Categories
2014 Recommended books

After the Bombing by Clare Morrall

After the Bombing

Five words from the blurb: WWII, Exeter, girls, school, destroyed

Clare Morrall is a fantastic author. I’ve enjoyed all of her books – especially Astonishing Splashes of Colour, a book packed with wonderfully dysfunctional families. She has a talent for constructing realistic, flawed characters that you can’t help forming a deep attachment to. After the Bombing is equally rich in character development and I loved it, despite the fact it tells a story I’ve heard many times before.

After the Bombing is set in Exeter during the extensive bombing raids of WWII. It tells the story of Alma, a fifteen-year-old girl who is forced to evacuate her boarding school when it is damaged during an air raid.

The plot is very simple, but this didn’t matter as the characters were so strong. I felt as though I knew Alma and her friends so well I could predict their thoughts and actions. Some sections of the book showed what life was like for Alma in the 1960s and in many ways these were the most interesting. They showed how the war continued to affect the adults decades later and how quickly the past was forgotten by the younger generation who hadn’t lived through the trauma of war.

The book was very well researched, with beautiful details of everything from the food they ate to the music they listened to. I’m not familiar with Exeter, but I’m sure that those who know the city will be interested in the local history and the descriptions of how landmarks were changed by the war.

At the top of the bank, it’s possible to see the rose garden and the statue of the Goldwyn’s girl that used to stand outside Merrivale. An iconic photograph of this statue was published in the Western Morning News after the bombing. The young girl stood triumphantly in the midst of chaos, miraculously untouched, a symbol of Exeter’s ability to survive and rise again.

After the Bombing was packed with atmosphere and is one of the most vivid books about ordinary people living through the war that I’ve read. Much of the book reminded me of The Night Watch by Sarah Waters, but I think After the Bombing is the better of the two as its simpler structure left the characters to shine.

Overall, this is a wonderful piece of story-telling and is proof that Clare Morrall is capable of turning the simplest of stories into an emotional delight. Highly recommended.

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Categories
2014 Books in Translation Chunkster Crime Uncategorized

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair by Joël Dicker

The Truth about the Harry Quebert Affair Translated from the French by Sam Taylor

Five words from the blurb: American, disappearance, mystery, writer, love

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair is an intricately plotted murder mystery set in New England. It begins with Harry Quebert, a famous author, being arrested for the murder of a 15-year-old girl who went missing thirty years ago. Marcus Goldman, an old friend who was mentored by him at college, is convinced that Harry is innocent and rushes to his side. He sets out to investigate the truth behind the crime; discovering a host of secrets buried in the small coastal town.

Joël Dicker is a Swiss author, but it is impossible to know this from reading the novel. He’s somehow managed to produce a novel that feels authentically American. The characters are all well drawn and all hide secrets from their past. It is like the literary equivalent of Broadchurch (a fantastic British crime drama that I highly recommend) in that almost all the characters have a motive for the murder, but the clever plot keeps you guessing right until the end.

The pacing and structure of the book was perfect, with new information and plot twists added regularly. The way everything came together at the end was especially good and I found myself marveling at the construction of it all. I also loved the meta aspects of the novel. Some of the sections reminded me of the wonderful HHhH, although I’m not sure if the similarities were simply due to the fact both novels have the same translator.

The book was long, but it never dragged and I loved the way I felt as though I knew a wide-range of characters by the end. The reader occasionally has to suspend their disbelief and there were a few cliches sprinkled throughout, but I was willing to forgive these as I was so engrossed in the plot. 

This isn’t great literature, but it is a fantastic piece of story-telling. I recommend this book if you’re after an entertaining diversion that will keep you guessing for hours.

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The thoughts of other bloggers:

Joël Dicker succeeds in pulling off one of the best literary deceptions in years. Pretty Sinister Books

…the sort of magnificently awful book to sharpen hatchets over while idly eyeing up your kitchen knives. Domestic Sluttery

 It’s 656 pages of pure readable summertime bliss. 3G1B

Categories
2014 Books in Translation

The Giraffe’s Neck by Judith Schalansky

The Giraffe's Neck Translated from the German by Shaun Whiteside

Five words from the blurb: teacher, scorns, students, species, succeed

The Giraffe’s Neck is narrated by Frau Lomark, a biology teacher who believes that Darwin’s principle of evolution should be applied to humans. She thinks that most teachers waste their time indulging their less-able pupils; whilst she prefers to concentrate on giving her knowledge to intelligent individuals – the ones that will make the most use of it.

Frau Lomark was a wonderfully bitter character. Her observations could be considered offensive, but there was something about their honesty that drew me in. The book raised many interesting questions about how much teachers are able to change the lives of their pupils and whether or not is it possible to engage everyone:

It just wasn’t worth it, dragging the weak ones along with you. They were nothing but millstones that held the rest back. Born recidivists. Parasites on the healthy body of the class. Sooner or later the dimmer bulbs would be left behind anyway. It was advisable to confront them with the truth as early as possible, rather than giving them another chance after each failure.

The writing quality was outstanding. Some people might find the biological details confusing, but I was very impressed. It is rare to find scientific information combined with such beautiful writing and I loved to see the moral arguments backed up with sound genetic data.

Unfortunately the plot didn’t develop as cleverly as I’d hoped. The momentum that built up over the first half of the book disappeared, leaving me a little disappointed.

Overall this was a thought provoking book, with many bold concepts. The minor problems with the plot can be forgiven because of the general intelligence of the text.

Recommended to anyone interested in the nature versus nurture debate and the way it applies to teachers.

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Categories
2014

Reasons She Goes to the Woods by Deborah Kay Davies

 Reasons She Goes to the Woods Longlisted for 2014 Baileys Women’s Fiction Prize

Five words from the blurb: girl, secret, dark, sinister, lyrical

Reasons She Goes to the Woods is a dark story about a deeply disturbed little girl. She is violent and often escapes to the woods in order to be alone. Some reasons for her behaviour are revealed over the course of the novel, but much is left to the reader’s imagination.

The book has an unusual structure, with every chapter lasting exactly one page. The writing quality was fantastic, but I quickly became frustrated by the rhythm of the book. I found the layout distracting, my mind concentrating on this rather than becoming absorbed by the characters. If you enjoy poetic vignettes then you’ll love this experimental style, but I prefer a more conventional narrative.

No matter what she does, it’s impossible for Pearl to shake off the feeling that there’s a raw, weeping patch growing on her heart, and that someone is pressing on it. It’s not as if I care about stuff, she thinks, but tonight the burning starts the moment she lies down, and chews away until she jerks herself out of bed and runs to open the window.

Some of the scenes were disturbing, but I reached the end of the book without really understanding their purpose. They seemed to exist purely to shock the reader, something I’m not keen on.

The ambiguous nature of the text means that it will probably work well as the focus of a book group discussion, but as an individual reader I felt I gained little more than a few disturbing new images in my head.

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The thoughts of other bloggers:

…disturbing and unputdownable, an uneasy but thought-provoking read.  Annabel’s House of Books

…it was so sick. Book-ish Variety

Original, offbeat, short and bitter-sweet. Amazon Reviewer

 

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Categories
2014 Novella

The Dig by Cynan Jones

The Dig

Five words from the blurb: Welsh, farmer, struggling, grief, violence

The Dig is a short, but powerful book set in the Welsh countryside. In two alternate narratives it follows a badger-baiter and a grieving farmer as they struggle with their difficult lives.

I was apprehensive about reading this novella as I worried it would be disturbing. I was right to be concerned as the images contained within this book were graphic and haunted me long after I turned the last page. The descriptions of badger-baiting were so vivid that I admit to skimming over several paragraphs in an effort to save myself from the nauseating images. But what I failed to realise was that the emotional impact of the farmer grieving for his dead wife was far greater. His narrative initially appeared to be gentle, but the power grew over time.

He sat with his elbows on his knees and held the clock and listened to the pinging and ticking of the stove cooling, the last settling embers shifting down through the grate, the metronomic ticking of the clock. Three hours. He didn’t even want the telly on. He stared at its vacant, dark cataract.

The writing within this book was outstanding. It was like a master-class in how to produce maximum emotion with a minimum number of words. It provided a vivid snapshot of life in rural Wales, but part of me regrets reading it. I felt as though I’d been emotionally battered, but gained no new insight or information. I’m hesitant to recommend it as I don’t want to inflict this disturbing story on the minds of others, but give it a try if you are emotionally strong and would like to be immersed in the extremes of human experience.

(because it feels wrong to penalise a book for being too vivid!)

 

Categories
2014 Other Uncategorized

The Best Books of 2014?: Authors We Know and Love

I’ve been flicking through publisher catalogues and asking booksellers and publicists about the most exciting books to be published in the UK in 2014. Next week I’ll let you know which debut authors I’m excited about, but this week it is the turn of the authors we are already familiar with.

Here are the 2014 new releases that caught my eye:

Note: UK release month shown, date may be different in other countries

The Lie

The Lie by Helen Dunmore

January, Hutchinson

The Siege is one of my favourite books so it is great to see Dunmore returning to the theme of war. This book is about a soldier returning from the First World War and the way he is haunted by a lie. One to watch for the Baileys Fiction Prize this year?

Barracuda

Barracuda by Christos Tsiolkas

January, Atlantic

The Slap was a controversial, but riveting read. Barracuda seems to be getting even more praise in Australia so I’m looking forward to finding out how he’s managed to make a novel about competitive swimming so engaging!

The Gospel of Loki

The Gospel of Loki by Joanne Harris

February, Gollanz, 

“a brilliant first-person narrative of the rise and fall of the Norse gods “

Joanne Harris has already proved she can write well in multiple genres. I’m looking forward to learning all about the “Underworld of Chaos!”

The Last Word

The Last Word by Hanif Kureishi

February, Faber & Faber

Kureishi writes with a rare combination of humor and power. I’m looking forward to this one which compares “the frailties of age versus the recklessness of youth.”

The Blazing World

The Blazing World by Siri Hustvedt

March, Sceptre

 “Emotionally intense, intellectually rigorous, ironic and playful, The Blazing World is as gripping as it is thought-provoking.” Is it possible to write a blurb that is more appealing to me than that? I doubt it!

In

In by Natsuo Kirino

August, Harvill Secker
Out by Natsuo Kirino is my favourite thriller so I’m very excited that her new book is going to be published here later this year. In contains an investigation into a best-selling author and promises to question the differences between life and literature. I hope it lives up to my exceedingly high expectations.

The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell

September, Sceptre

Climate change, a cult of predatory soul-decanters and a band of vigilantes? Only David Mitchell could pull off such a bizarre mix of themes. I can’t wait! 

The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters

Autumn, Virago

Set in London in 1922 this book revolves around a large house where impoverished widow Mrs Wray and her spinster daughter, Frances, are obliged to take in lodgers. It is “beautifully described with excruciating tension, real tenderness, believable characters, and surprises” I hope it is as good as it sounds!

Visitants

Visitants by Eggers

November, Hamish Hamilton

I don’t know anything about this one, but I’ve loved many books written by Dave Eggers so this is on my “must-read” list.  

 

Other books to look forward to:

The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd

Il Divino Bambino by James Frey

The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins by Irvine Welsh

Falling Out of Time by David Grossman

Nora Webster by Colm Toibin

Untitled Novel by Leo Benedictus

Every Day is for the Thief by Teju Cole

Irène by Pierre Lemaitre

Everland by Rebecca Hunt

Eyrie by Tim Winton

To Rise Again at a Decent Hour by Joshua Ferris

Bodies of Light by Sarah Moss

The Temporary Gentleman by Sebastian Barry

Which 2014 books are you excited about?