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Books Read in 2014 – 65. Maddaddam – Margaret Atwood

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Genre: Dystopia

Narrative style: Third PersonUnknown

Rating 5/5

Published: 2013

Format: Paperback

Synopsis: This picks up the story at the end of both Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood with the earth decimated by a man-made plague. Toby and Ren have found Amanda, currently being held by two Painballers and are contemplating their next move when Jimmy appears. The action continues from this point. 

My expectations were high for this book. I had enjoyed the first two and really, I meant to read this one much earlier. I was half expecting to be disappointed. Could it possibly live up to my hopes?

Of course, this is Atwood we’re talking about. If anything this was better than The Year of the Flood. This was largely due to the Crakers being back on centre stage and Jimmy also. Although Jimmy wasn’t always an active participant, his character was inseparable from the mythology that he gives to the Crakers who treat his hat and watch as sacred objects. There is a lot of humour and also a lot of affection in Atwood’s creation of a religion for the Crakers. I particularly liked the way that they mistook the curse ‘Oh fuck’ for a cry to a deity who would come to help.

Zeb’s backstory added colour to the story of Crake and helped to explain events of the other two novels. It was enjoyable watching him switch identities and jobs, always managing to just get out of trouble. The love story between Toby and Zeb was also enjoyable. There was a refreshing lack of sentiment in their relationship. Toby was easy to identify with as she learned to put her insecurities to one side as the future of their group was much more important than any personal issues she may have.

I was a little troubled about the alliance between the humans and the pigoons at first. I wasn’t convinced that it wouldn’t just seem ridiculous but Atwood even managed to pull that off and they became more human than pig in the end.

The idea of teaching the Crakers to write and so be able to pass on their creation story to other generations was inspired. Atwood gives them childlike voices but never belittles them and their lack of guile. Perhaps this is what we would have to be like in order to actually save the current world.

The end of the novel is both sad and full of hope. There are deaths and battles but also births – babies that are half human and half Craker. The hope lies in the Crakers, their new mythology and the potential of the new species. It seems that the future is at least a little rosy.

Books Read in 2014 62. Tears in Rain – Rosa Montero

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Genre: Science Fiction

Narrative Style: Third person from different points of view. Largely chronologicalUnknown

Rating 2.5/5

Published: 2012

Format: Kindle

Synopsis: Bruna Husky is a technohuman or a replicant. She is also a private detective. One morning, her next door neighbour – also a rep – goes mad and attacks her before plucking out her own eye and dying herself. More stranger murders / suicides start to happen and reps become equally feared and despised. Bruna is called upon to investigate and soon finds herself involved in a conspiracy that goes right to the very top. 

I was offered this as a free kindle book from Amazon when I downloaded some classic sic-fi. There was a choice of four and this seemed the most interesting. Otherwise I don’t think I’d have picked it up. I prefer my Science Fiction to be of the dystopian kind not the robots and aliens kind.

Having said that, this did have dystopian elements. There was certainly a strong moral objective about difference and equality and at first, I thought I would enjoy it more than I did. It was clearly indebted to Bladerunner, both in its choice of heroine and in its landscape but I didn’t mind that. Bladerunner is a great film and there are certainly worse things to base a novel on.

The main problem was the writing was a bit flat. I’m not sure if this is a problem with the translation or also present in the original but there was little in the way of style and the narrative was often slowed down by the leaden prose. There was the misuse of the word literally –  as in she was literally sick everywhere. Oh, I know that the OED have added this use of the word to its definition because it is so widespread but that doesn’t make it any less wrong. There were redundant sentences of the “it really had been a dreadful night” variety which just irritated me. I found that the writing distracted from what could have been a rollicking adventure.

The characters were equally flat. Bruno’s personality was all over the place. She was whatever was required of her by the narrative rather than having any personality of her own. The other characters responded to her and were equally without personality. Some appeared and disappeared without really even touching the narrative and you had to wonder what the point was.

In the end, there were few surprises. It was always obvious who the love interest would end up being, who the bad guy was and what the outcome would be. When I finished, I felt as though a good had idea had been wasted. But maybe that’s not quite what I mean. After all, Bladerunner was the good idea and there is probably no way for that to actually be bettered.

Books Read in 2014 – 61. Travels in the Congo – Andre Gide

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Genre: Travel

Narrative Style: First person recollection2036108

Rating 4/5

Published: 1927

Format: Paperback

Reading Challenges: Eclectic Reader Challenge – Genre travel.

Synopsis: Gide wishes to discover Africa, to go to places that have barely been discovered, to witness new landscapes and people. He travels through the Belgian Congo as it then was and makes observations about the colonial system that prove to be politically important. 

There were a couple of reasons for picking this book. At first, I was going to read one of Michael Palin’s travelogues, a couple of which have been bought for us. I don’t do much in the way of reading travel writing so there wasn’t much to choose from on my shelves. I could have picked a Bill Bryson up, sure in the knowledge that I would like it but that would seem to defeat the point of this being an Eclectic challenge. All the same, I wasn’t really looking forward to reading the Palin, enjoyable as the accompanying tv series were. Then I inherited a lot of books and this Gide was among them. I’ve wanted to read Gide for a while and I was also curious as to what it would be like for him travelling through Africa at the point in history. Even then, this remained till the very last. I kept putting off picking it up.

I don’t know why. It was exquisitely written. Gide has a novelists eye for detail and his descriptions of the landscape are often quite poetical. He describes their hardships and delights unsparingly and doesn’t flinch from his own stupidity or embarrassment. He is clearly knowledgable about plants and insects which he also describes in detail.

This isn’t the main interest though. Seeing Africa through the eyes of a white, privileged man gave a strange image of the times. Gide is clearly a reasonable and intelligent man and he treats the natives he meets with respect and even though he is prone to calling them simple, he allows them a dignity that I imagine was lacking in a most of the dealings between colonialist and colonised. He spends long hours teaching Adoum, one of their entourage to read and is genuinely bereft when he has to leave their company. He disapproves of the way the blacks are ripped off by the colonists and is always fair, sometimes paying a higher rate than they would normally get. He suggests that the exploitation of those working to produce rubber was akin to slavery. Indeed, on publication, the book influenced anti-colonist movements and inspired reform.

Alongside this, is Gide the hunter and Gide the butterfly collector. It seems strange to our sensibilities that whenever a new animal is spotted, the first recourse is to the gun. Indeed, they succeed in shooting a hippopotamus which they then skin and cut up, parts of which turn the whale boats they are in into abattoirs with blood running over the boards. Gide has a curious mind and is clearly excited by each new butterfly or insect that he sees. Unfortunately for the creature, that usually meant that its fate was sealed as it is then killed and preserved.

Overall, this was interesting as a historical document as well as a travelogue. The map at the front of the book is now completely different and you can’t help but wonder exactly how different the landscape and the people would be, if you visited today.

 

Books Read in 2014 – 60. High-Rise – J. G. Ballard

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Genre: Dystopia, anti-heroes

Narrative Style: Third person three different perspectivesUnknown

Rating: 3/5

Published: 1975

Format: Kindle

Synopsis: Robert Laing quickly spots the careful class demarcations when he moves into the high-rise. Whilst ostensibly for the rich, it quickly becomes apparent that some are not as rich as others. These demarcations follow the floors with the lowest on floors one to ten and so on. When the electric start to fail, panic and violence quickly ensue. Before long, everyone has returned to a savage state and society has completely broken down. 

This has what is perhaps my favourite opening line ever – “Later, as he sat on his balcony eating the dog, Dr. Robert Laing reflected on the unusual events that had taken place within this huge apartment building during the previous three months.” This raised my expectations quite highly. The plot then moves through those three months. Unfortunately they don’t quite live up to this powerful opening line.

The story is told from the perspective of three men – one from the lowest ranks, Wilder; one from the middle, Laing; and one from the top, Royal who is one of the architects of the high-rise. Before civilisation starts to break down, there are already petty jealousies and rivalries about who can use which swimming pool and which lift. This seemed realistic enough and it was easy to see how such grudges might escalate into something bigger.

However, I wasn’t convinced by the triggers for the escalation. Very quickly, it seemed, people were no longer leaving the high-rise and hunting in packs for people from the other floors. Once that had happened, there were very few places for the narrative to go. Nothing else really happened and it felt like events levelled out. They didn’t really get any worse and there was clearly no way for them to get better.

That wasn’t the only problem. I couldn’t really decide what point Ballard was trying to make. I suppose that the high-rise was meant to represent a microcosm of society with the three levels representing upper, middle and working class but because these were all from the same class, the point didn’t quite work. At the end. only Laing is left eating his barbecued dog suggesting perhaps that the middle classes are the ones that will survive and then because they wait it out passively. I’m not sure what sort of moral lesson that is supposed to be.

This is as much about masculinity as it is about class and the three men show different ways of being male. Wilder, as his name might suggest, is very much ruled by his sexuality, Laing is more refined, preferring to wait and see what happens and finally Royal is a leader, at least for a while, by virtue of his money and his penthouse apartment. This also relates to stereotypical versions of masculinity and class e.g. the beastlike working class male. The women in this novel are underdeveloped, there to largely be raped or rescued depending on the man in question. That also was disappointing.

Ultimately this was an interesting idea which was well-written but just didn’t quite work for me. This is the second Ballard I’ve read lately that has left me a little cold but I’m sure I will be tempted again as the initial ideas just sound so interesting. They have made a film of this, to be released next year and it maybe that it will work a little better as a film. I’d certainly be keen to see what they do with the material.

Books Read in 2014 – 58. A Kind of Loving – Stan Barstow

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Genre: Romance, Masculinity

Narrative Style: First Person, Chronological11816034_f260

Rating 3.5/5

Published: 1960

Format: Kindle

Synopsis: Vic Brown is looking for the right woman and when Ingrid catches his eye, he thinks she may be the one. What starts off romantic quickly becomes lustful and Vic is caught between his longing for sex and his knowledge that he doesn’t like Ingrid that much. Then the worst happens: she gets pregnant and he has to marry her. 

I had seen the film A Kind of Loving about twenty years ago and I really enjoyed it so I was looking forward to reading it. And it was quite enjoyable. There were just a few annoying little things that kept me from giving it a higher rating.

Vic Brown is a typical man of the fifties. He is young, employed and has money in his pocket. His narrative voice is quite charming and flows along nicely. He is cultured and wants to make something of himself. He is on the cusp of manhood, thinking himself to be the only one of his friends who hasn’t had sex (this turns out not to be true) and also wanting a loving wife who would also be a friend.

At the beginning, he adores Ingrid from a distance, thinking himself in love with her. And at first, they get on well enough. However, when Ingrid lets him go a bit further than he expected, he becomes confused as to whether he still likes her or just lusts after her. He vows not to see her but she drags him back in. He finds that although he should behave better towards her, he does not because he is caught by his lust.

There is no doubt that Imogen is shoddily treated by Vic. She is similarly caught in the mores of the day, wanting to discover her own sexuality but also knowing that it wasn’t approved of. One of the difficult things about reading this was not to give her a more modern psyche and make her voice stranger and louder.

When she gets pregnant, Vic agrees to marry her and then has to move in with her and her mother because they haven’t the money to find their own place. It is here that Barstow really gets to criticise the current morality. Ingrid’s mother is monstrous, attempting to control her daughter and determined that it must have been all Vic’s fault. She very nearly destroys any chance they have of making any sort of loving out of their situation.

The ending is quietly optimistic and Barstow buts his faith in the younger generation being able to sort out their own lives without the interference of the older generation. They move out of her mother’s house and into their own space, giving their future at least a fighting chance. But it isn’t a cloying they all lived happily ever after ending either. The moral being if they mess it up at least they’ll know who to blame.

So to the things that stopped it being rated higher. I always find it a bit difficult to read a novel like this because I can’t help hoping for the female character to fight back a bit and Ingrid was a bit of a drip. There were strong women in this book but they both used their strength to control everything and everyone so they weren’t exactly positive. And while I obviously understand that a novel is definitely of its time, that doesn’t necessarily make it any easier to read. The final thing that annoyed me was Vic’s choice of bint as a generic term for all women. I really dislike the word. And while he uses it in much the same way as you might use bird, it still really got on my nerves.

Books Read in 2014 – 56. Barracuda – Christos Tsiolkas

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Genre: Australian Fiction, Sport, GLBTbarracuda

Narrative Style: First person moving back through events, third person moving forward through events. 

Rating: 5/5

Published: 2013

Format: Kindle

Synopsis: Danny Kelly has one desire – to win olympic gold. His whole life is focused around swimming, racing and training. When he loses for the first time, he feels the world come crashing down on his head. He almost doesn’t recover. 

At the beginning of the novel, the grown up, present day Danny Kelly is clearly in a bad place in his life. He is out of place – both literally and metaphorically – and unclear where his life is going. You know something has gone badly wrong for him. This is reinforced in the third person sections of the text which describe Danny starting a fee-paying school on a swimming scholarship and his many racing successes. The reader is immediately drawn in. What on earth could have gone wrong?

Clues are slowly revealed such as the fact that Danny has been in prison. The first person narrative moves back in time and presents such a startling contrast to the third person that at times it is hard to believe that this is the same Danny Kelly. The two narratives converge on the same moments in time in roughly the middle of the novel. It was nerve-wracking reading up to this point as it becomes more and more apparent what is going to happen. I wished so hard to be able to stop the inevitable but Danny could not be stopped from hitting the very bottom.

After this, the pace changes, the first person narrative is now the one that is filled with the joy of swimming as it relives Danny’s early years and the third person narrative shows Danny slowly becoming a new person after his spell in prison. There is still a contrast between the two narratives but it is less jarring than in the first half of the book and I began to hope that Danny would find some sort of contentment.

One of the reviews that I read of this book suggested that it was ridiculous that Danny would fall apart after just one race but I think that actually Tsiolkas describes his downfall well. It is all tied up with the fact that Danny is working class in an essentially middle/upper class environment. When he fails, it is only the inevitable catching up with him. Even his father seemed to believe that failure was just there waiting for him. There is no sense in trying again as he there would only be more of the inevitable. Tsiolkas offers a strong commentary on class and the meaning of success in this novel. I particularly enjoyed his critique of the Sydney Olympics which was close to how I felt in 2012.

Danny is gay but this is just an accepted fact and causes him no problems. The problem for Danny is his class not his sexuality. It was very pleasing to read a novel where sexuality was just taken as a given, not as an issue in and of itself. Definitely one of my reads of the year.

 

Books Read in 2014 – 55. The Gods of Gotham by Lyndsay Faye

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Genre: Detective Fiction, Historical Fictiondownload (15)

Narrative Structure: First Person Narrative, chronological

Rating: 3/5

Published: 2012

Format: Paperback

Synopsis: New York is overrun with Irish immigrants and bad feelings towards Catholics are running high. Timothy Wilde has lost everything in the Great New York Fire so he reluctantly agrees when his older brother, Valentine, gets him a position as one of New York’s newly appointed police officers. When it appears that someone is murdering Irish children and leaving them with their chest opened like a cross, Timothy is determined to solve the mystery even if it puts his life in danger. 

I’m not sure what is was about Timothy Wilde’s first person narrative but from the very first I found it difficult to get on with. It wasn’t difficult to read and the use of Flash – the criminal slang of the era – gave it authenticity. Maybe I just prefer my detectives a little more hard-boiled and edgy. Timothy just wasn’t a very interesting character while all others around him shone a bit more brightly – particularly his brother.

The story is exciting and that carried me through. In the beginning, Timothy finds Bird Daly, covered in blood and clearly frightened. He begins slowly to unravel her lies and is led to the madam, Silkie Marsh and her child prostitutes. When his investigations lead him to a mass grave of nineteen children, it seems that a serial killer is on the loose. With anti-catholic feeling running high, New York becomes volatile and rioters take to the streets.

Timothy proves himself to be an excellent policeman, sharp eyed and persistent, putting clues together and following leads that no one else has spotted. This contrasts with his stupidity in other areas, particularly his personal life. He completely misunderstands both his brother, Valentine, and his love-interest, Mercy Underhill so much so that he is in danger of ruining Mercy’s life. I’m not entirely sure that I was convinced by the character of Mercy either but she did at least have more than one side to her personality.

The story twists and turns and in the end, nothing is as you might have expected. I liked the ending and the way that it was worked out, using the then new techniques of forensic detective work. The historical detail was believable and helped create a New York that was dark and disturbing. However, I was pleased to be rid of Timothy Wilde, particularly when he is so drippy over Mercy even though it is likely his love will never be returned. It is a shame. I’m sure there is interest to be had in the books that follow but I wouldn’t want to spend another minute in his company.

Books Read in 2014 – 52. Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan

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200px-WillGraysonGenre: glbt, young adult, romance

Narrative Style: switches between two first person narratives, chronological

Rating: 4/5

Published: 2010

Format: Kindle

Synopsis: On the streets of Chicago, two teenagers called Will Grayson are having the worst night of their lives. Then they bump into each other and their lives change. 

This was, for the most part, a very pleasing read. The chapters alternate between Green’s Will Grayson and Levithan’s will. They are suitably different from each other and have different problems. I preferred Levithan’s will from the first as I felt I could relate to his depression. Green’s Will seemed more determined to make problems for himself and was less likeable. I liked the lack of capitalisation in Levithan’s chapters as it fitted well with that characters low self-esteem.

The story moved along quite quickly and the romances were well handled. Will Grayson’s confusion over whether he liked Jane or not was funny and apt whilst the romance between will and Tiny was touching and difficult. Between them they seemed to cover all the possible teenage romance problems without being too unsubtle.

In fact, I was close to giving this novel 5/5. There were a number of reasons why I didn’t. First of all, I felt Green’s characters were too large for the page and like in The Fault in our Stars, they were hard to get attached to because they seemed to represent so much. Tiny, in particular was annoyingly loud and painfully self-centred. He seemed to embody every gay stereotype. will was more convincing because he was just a teen who happened to be gay. I was actually pleased when the romance between will and Tiny did not work because I felt that will deserved better.

I’m not a fan of musicals. Although there was no singing, obviously being as how it is a book but even so there were songs. And while they were often witty, they were annoying. People bursting into song – hypothetical or otherwise – does not appeal to me.

Finally, the ending seemed to be quite sudden. Partly, this was due to reading on my kindle which claimed 91% because there was an interview with the two authors and an extract from The Fault in Our Stars but I could have read more. I thought that all the Will Graysons offering support to Tiny was a little sentimental although the two Wills were both in better places at the end so that was pleasing.

All in all, a witty and insightful look at teenage romance. The sort of book I wish I could have read when I was sixteen.

 

Books read in 2014 – 51. Five Red Herrings by Dorothy L. Sayers

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Genre: cosy mystery fiction 

Narrative style: third person, chronological

Rating: 2/5

five red herringsPublished: 1931

Format: paperback

Reading challenges: Eclectic reader challenge 2014 genre cosy mystery 

Synopsis: Campbell was not popular among his fellow artists so when his body is discovered in suspicious circumstances, there is no shortage of suspects. Lord Peter Wimsey has his work cut out working out truth from lies as all of the suspects seem to have something to hide. 

I bought this quite a while ago when I first started to read detective fiction and then just didn’t get round to it. I knew that it was going to a little old fashioned and safe and I like a fair bit of blood and gore in my detective fiction so it languished on the shelf until this year’s eclectic reader challenge. I’d never even heard of the genre of cosy mystery and had to look it up. I was pleased though that it would mean I would read Five Red Herrings at long last.

I did bring quite high expectations to the book. After all, Sayers is considered a master of the detective art. And in fact, I would have to say that was true. There was nothing wrong with the tightness of the plot. If anything it was too tight.

The first thing that irritated me was Lord Peter Wimsey himself. Of course, I knew he was going to be posh but he was just too jolly hockey sticks for me. If I’d been a character in this book, I’d have been tempted to off him the minute he called me “Old Horse”. Still that was a minor quibble and one that was down to my prejudices rather than Sayers’ writing. At the beginning, I was still enjoying the story and wondering who was the guilty one.

However, the plot soon became bogged down in train schedules and timetables of the murderers actions which were tedious to read. I also found it difficult to separate the artists from each other and couldn’t remember which alibi belonged to which artist.

At the beginning of the novel, Wimsey spots something that lets him know it’s murder. Instead of telling the reader, Sayers says in an aside that she won’t say what it is because the intelligent reader will know what it is. This annoyed me as I consider myself an intelligent reader but I couldn’t figure out what it could be. I felt that she was suggesting I was too stupid to work it out. When it was finally revealed, I felt better as it was not at all obvious.

In fact, I really had no clue about who did it. The various possibilities are outlined in the final chapters by various policemen and all are plausible enough. Unlike, the actual solution. maybe, I’m just peeved because I didn’t work it out but this was so ridiculously convoluted, I’m really not sure how Wimsey could have spotted it. In the end, it seemed like a detective novel solution rather than a real life solution.

This isn’t to say that the novel isn’t well written and it does all hang together, it’s just that the solution wasn’t satisfying for me and I can’t see me reading anymore of the Wimsey mysteries.

Books Read in 2014. 41. Turnstone – Graham Hurley

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download (11)

Genre: British Detective

Narrative Style: Third Person, Chronological
Rating: 2/5

Format: Kindle

Published: 2000

Synopsis: Joe Faraday is an overworked cop with family issues. Even though he lacks resources, he knows that he must help Emma Maloney find out what happened to her father. He is already dealing with a drugs bust gone wrong and a murdered grandfather. Furthermore, he lacks evidence and his boss wants him to focus on cases that will give the station a better media image. Joe cannot let the case go even when it seems that it is an obsession that is all in his head.

I picked this book to read because in the blurb it mentioned that it was about a daughter searching for her father and it sounded interesting. However, apart from a brief prologue, this storyline doesn’t appear until about a quarter of the way through. To me, this is too long before introducing what will be your main storyline. This problem of balance is one that effects the whole of this novel. At first, we have the murder of a grandfather and a drugs bust that goes wrong. But these are all but abandoned once the search begins for Maloney’s father. At times, Joe’s son is the focus of the story and then he too is abandoned. Moving between plot and subplot could certainly have been handled better.
I wasn’t convinced by the character of Joe. Maybe I am too much in thrall to detectives like Ian Rankin’s Rebus but Joe just didn’t convince. He seemed too well-behaved to go off on his own in the way that he does. By contrast, his opposite number, the corrupt cop was just a bundle of stereotypical bad cop attributes to really convince or make the reader have any feelings for.
The worst part of this novel though is the ending. Not so much the solving of the disappearance which was interesting enough but the epilogue which saw all of Joe’s family and personal problems neatly wrapped up. It was too simplistic by far. I won’t be reading anymore in this series.