Month: September 2017

Full House Reading Challenge – All the Little Children – Jo Furniss (Contains spoilers)

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Genre: Post-Apocalyptic, Published in 2017

Narrative Style: First person, chronological

Rating: 3/5

Format: Kindle

Published: 2017

Reading Challenge: Full House Reading Challenge – Genre – Published in 2017

Synopsis: Marlene and her sister in law take their children camping. However, they soon realise that something strange has happened to the rest of England. Dead bodies are piling up and there are no news broadcasts or electricity. It transpires that there has been a terrorist attack which has released a deadly virus. However, this will not be the only problem that they face when trying to get to safety.

This book is about motherhood. The post-apocalyptic, virus ridden setting is almost irrelevant. This is about Marlene learning to become a ‘good’ mother. It reminded me of films such as Jack & Sarah where the mother is sacrificed by the writer so that dad can learn to be a good father. Only this time the entire population of England was sacrificed for Marlene to learn her lesson.

Marlene was previously a workaholic who had little time to spend with her children. She has little fellow-feeling for her sister in law, Joni and her teenage daughter. Nor does she feel anything for a lost boy they pick up. A contrast is drawn between Joni, who is hippyish and maternal to the nth degree and Marlene who is cool and practical. These positions shift as Joni becomes withdrawn and unable to cope and Marlene has to take over.

This isn’t a bad book. The plot trots along at a nice pace. It does take a little bit of swallowing. The virus does its virulent job of killing everyone off but somehow they survive despite being near a number of dead bodies. The virus then disappears completely. This seemed unlikely to me although the author does try and explain that the virus used chemicals somehow and obviously once everyone was dead, there were very few of those left. Still, it didn’t quite hang right for me

Marlene and Joni were both annoying and both stereotypical. Neither really escaped from the character trap they were placed in. Marlene is supposed to have transformed at the end when she leaves her family in order to find Joni’s daughter but it just seemed like one more abandonment of them to me.

The ending of this novel is ripe for a sequel and I found that a bit annoying as it ends in the middle of the action and I wouldn’t really be tempted to read on. I would have preferred a bit more closure but I guess the point is that Marlene has learned her lesson about motherhood and so the novel can end. As I said at the beginning, this isn’t reallly a survival novel, more a story of how to become a better mother.

 

 

 

 

 

Full House Reading Challenge – Gilead – Marilynne Robinson

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Genre: Family, Religion

Narrative Style: First person

Rating: 4/5

Published: 2004

Format: Paperback

Synopsis: John Ames is trying to write a memoir for his young son. Aware of the fact that he will die soon and will not have much time with his son, he tries to write down what he feels is important – about his family and about history. Ames is a preacher and there is a lot of ruminating about the nature of heaven and what happens when you die. 

Full House Reading Challenge: Genre – American / Canadian Writer

I inherited this book a few years ago from my husband’s aunt and it has sat on the shelf since then. I was aware of Robinson as an important female American writer but when I read the blurb on the back of Gilead, I wasn’t sure I would enjoy it. I’m not a particularly religious person and I wondered if it would be too spiritual for my tastes.

It turned out that this was true to a certain extent – it was the reason I didn’t give it five stars. However, there is much to love about this book. Robinson’s prose captures Ames’ voice exactly and I could almost hear him talking in my ear. It was like having an intimate conversation with an older relative.

The historical details – the story dates back to the civil war – were interesting and vividly painted. I was particularly touched by the description of son and father setting out to find the grave of Ames’ grandfather who walks away from Gilead. Father and grandfather did not see eye to eye as the older man was a radical abolitionist and often preached in a blood soaked shirt.

Ames is particularly affected by the arrival of his namesake, the son of his neighbour and friend. John Ames Boughton had left town in disgrace many years ago and Ames finds he is worried by his reappearance and struggles to respond when the younger man reaches out to him. He has a number of theological struggles but the main one is to try to forgive Boughton his sins which he finds increasingly difficult.

It would be impossible not to feel for Ames who has been lonely for most of his life after losing his first wife in childbirth and his baby daughter not long after. He is now married to a much younger woman and has a child but is dying and cannot bear the thought that soon he will be nothing but a memory.

There isn’t a lot in the way of action in this story. It is mostly about the struggles of an old man who is about to die. The slow reveal of Boughton’s true situation offers some suspense but really the novel is about spiritual matters and how best to live your life according to your beliefs. In the end, Ames is able to respond kindly to Boughton, giving an example to his young son of how to live and be thankful for what you have.

Top Ten Tuesday – Books I’ve Struggled With

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Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This weeks theme is Ten Books I Struggled to Get Into But Ended Up Loving or Ten Books That Were A Chore To Get Through or Ten Books I’ve Most Recently Put Down.

I don’t often finish a book because I really hate abandoning something that has already taken up some of my time but I do struggle sometimes especially when it comes to classics. This list is a mix of books that I have struggled with – some I thought I would love but didn’t, some I didn’t finish and some that I’m glad I persevered with.

  1. Lorna Doone – R. D. Blackmore. I thought this was going to be an exciting adventure. I’d seen an adaptation and that was very good. They must have just taken the best bits and avoided all the filler. Far too slow. I’d recommend the 2000 BBC adaptation with Richard Coyle and Aiden Gillen. Much more fun.
  2. Gateway to Fourline – Pam Brondos. The pace was too slow with this one. It is the start of a series so I think the author wanted to include a lot of background and information. The characters were a bit flat too. I won’t be reading on.
  3. The Mysterious Affair at Styles – Agatha Christie. I love a good detective story so I thought I’d give Christie a go. This wasn’t much fun though. The characters were unlikeable, the plot was cheesy and Poirot was so annoying I wanted to reach into the text and throttle him.
  4. The Short Drop – Matthew Fitzsimmons. This is a more modern text. It has a lot of five-star reviews on Goodreads but I have no idea why. It was obvious what was going to happen next and the plot was cliched. I finished it but it was not very satisfying.
  5. The Last Girl – Joe Hart. This was a struggle to finish. It was full of tortured metaphors and overblown language which distracted from the plot. Another series I won’t be continuing.
  6. The Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne. I didn’t even get halfway through this one. I found the style impossible to get on with. A shame because it is an interesting idea.
  7. The Old Man and the Sea – Ernest Hemmingway. It was a good job this was so short otherwise I’d never have finished it. I just didn’t see the point.
  8. The Thorn Birds – Colleen McCullough. There were a number of reasons that this was hard work. The plot was cliched and unrealistic. The conversations read as if written by someone who had never spoken to anyone before. It was melodramatic and Meggie was too much a martyr to inspire much empathy.
  9. Rob Roy – Sir Walter Scott. I did finish it and some of it was exciting and interesting but Scott’s habit of describing every single meal and conversation really made the pace drag.
  10. War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy. This was quite a recent read. It took me five months and some days I could barely even look at it, never mind read it. However, I am glad that I finished it. Not just for the prestige of saying I’ve read it either. There are a lot of interesting characters and the relationships were well drawn. I was less keen on the war elements and the epic battles.