Category: 2011

Five words from the blurb: Scottish, island, family, funny, haunted

Night Waking is an insightful glimpse into the life of a family who move to an uninhabited Scottish island. Anna Bennett is a historian who is trying to write a book whilst looking after her two sons. Unfortunately she is sleep deprived and so beginning to resent the constant demands of her children. She’d love a bit of extra help from her husband, or even just an acknowledgment of her efforts, but he is normally absent – monitoring puffin numbers on the other side of the island. 

The family’s life is complicated when they discover the remains of a baby buried in their garden. The police suspect that the body has been placed there in recent history and so investigations force the couple to suspect their close family, causing added tension.

Intertwined with this story are letters from a woman who came to the island at the end of the 19th century in an effort to reduce infant mortality. These letters, along with snippets from Anna’s book about childhood and institutions provided an added depth that I found fascinating.

I could relate to many of Anna’s frustrations and found myself laughing out loud as she struggled to juggle to the demands of two children – the scenes where she reads The Gruffalo over and over again had a particular resonance with me.

The writing was of a high quality throughout, but I suspect that the subject matter will mean that this book has greatest appeal to women with children.

In theory, I disapprove of cooking. It’s not a coincidence that ready meals and supermarkets appeared at the same time as equal opportunities legislation. In practice cooking means that you can hide in the kitchen wielding knives and listening to Radio Four and still be a Good Mummy, thus achieving a variety of domestic servitude which is still not, I believe, what Mary Wollstonecraft, Emmeline Pankhurst or Betty Friedan had in mind.

This engaging modern story, filled with historical detail, is one of my favourite reads of the year so far. Highly recommended.

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Pigeon English was selected as one of the Waterstone’s 11 and I loved the sample section that I tried.

The book is set in London where 11-year-old Harri has recently arrived from Ghana with his mother and older sister. A boy is stabbed to death on their estate, but police enquiries meet a wall of silence so Harri decides to start his own investigation into the murder.

Pigeon English has been compared to Room, but the only similarity is that they both have a child narrator. The difference between the innocence of a five-year-old and the insecurities of a pre-teen means that the two narrators are worlds apart.

Harri was an engaing character and I loved some of his observations about our society, but unfortunately the writing style began to grate on me as I progressed further into the book. The play-like layout of the text ruined the flow of the narrative for me, giving it a jumpy feel.

I also found that the mind of an eleven-year-old boy held little interest for me. I’m sure that it is all very realistic, but the immature banter made me cringe.

Connor Green: ‘Have you got happiness?’
Me: ‘Yes.’
Connor Green: ‘But are you really sure?’
Me: ‘I think so.’ He kept asking me if I had happiness. He wouldn’t stop. In the end it just vexed me. Then I wasn’t sure. Connor Green was laughing, I didn’t even know why. Then Manik told me it was a trick.
Manik: ‘He’s not asking if you’ve got happiness, he’s asking if you’ve got a penis. He says it to everyone. It’s just a trick.’
It only sounds like happiness but really it means a penis.
Ha-penis.
Connor Green: ‘Got ya! Hook, line and sinker!’
Connor Green is always making tricks. He’s just a confusionist. That’s the first thing you learn about him. At least I didn’t lose. I do have a penis. The trick doesn’t work if it’s true.

I’m afraid that the book went even further downhill with the introduction of the talking pigeon. I’m sure that fans of magical realism will love this touch, but I’m afraid that it didn’t work for me.

Pigeon English is a realistic portrayal of a confused young boy learning to live in a new country. It’s an original take on the usual tales of immigration and I loved some of the comic elements, but I’m afraid that the negatives outweighed the positives on this occasion.

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The thoughts of other bloggers:

…a decent, contemporary and original report on innocence and its loss. Asylum

…as the story advanced it became more confused, and it became difficult to pick out the important things from the more mundane. Fleur Fisher in her World

I just found it unrealistic for him to be so repetitive, simple-minded and was often frustrated by the lack of direction in the story. Monniblog

Five words from the blurb: pain, manifesting, light, human, phenomenon

The Illumination has a fantastically original premise: What would happen if we could see pain? Would our interactions with other people change if we could see exactly how painful our colleague’s toothache was, spot tumors inside strangers on the street, or see the continual suffering of the elderly?

The book is set in the present day, but the world has been changed by the arrival of a new phenomenon in which all pain and suffering, both physical and emotional, manifests itself as light.

A moment later, when she saw the light shining out of her incision, she thought she was hallucinating. It was steady and uniform, a silvery-white disk that showed even through her thumbnail, as bright and finely edged as the light in a Hopper painting. Through the haze of drugs, it seemed to her that the light was not falling over her wound or even infusing it from the inside but radiating through it from another world.

This simple change alters many aspects of life and I found myself thinking about the way our society tends to hide its suffering, particularly the emotional kind. It made me wish that we could see the pain of others, and be able to offer support and help to those who need it.

My only problem with this book was that it didn’t contain a compelling plot. It was more like a series of short stories, moving from one character the next in a random, unpredictable fashion. It was impossible to know whether the character you’d just been introduced to would appear again, or would go on to play a more dominant role in the next chapter. Questions were left unanswered and wonderful plot snippets were left dangling without any conclusion. This fractured style frustrated me on one level, but on another it allowed me to think clearly about attitudes to pain without being distracted by character and plot.

The writing quality was excellent and I’m sure I’ll remember scenes from this book for a long time to come. It is a wonderfully unique novel. Recommended.

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The thoughts of other bloggers:

… a beautifully rendered and deeply touching meditation on pain. The Book Lady’s Blog

…it was uneven and there were times when I just wanted to put the book down and walk away. Amy’s Book Obsession

 It is one of those novels with a simple concept like Saramago’s Blindness where a universal change to human experience suddenly appears and alters perception. Just William’s Luck