Feed on
Posts
Comments

South Riding – Winifred Holtby

Mar 8th, 2012 by

I watched the recent BBC adaptation of South Riding  and had to read the novel.

The novel is much darker than the TV series – lots of death, poverty and squalor.

Here is the blurb …

 This s Winifred Holtby’s greatest novel – A rich evocation which explores the lives and relationships of the characters of South Riding. Sarah Burton, the fiery young headmistress of the local girl’s school; Mrs Beddows, the district’s first alderwomen – based on Holtby’s own mother; and Robert Carne, the conservative gentleman-farmer locked in a disastrous marriage – with whom the radical Sarah Burton falls in love. Showing how public decisions can mould the individual and strongly echoing Middlemarch, South Riding offers a panoramic and unforgettable view of Yorkshire life.

It was beautifully written. Very evocative of a particular time and place (Yorkshire between the wars). It had a broader outlook (quite modern really) compared to other novels published about the same time (i.e Dorothy Whipple). Its focus is on the community of South Riding and the various personalities that impact on the community. From the scheming Mr Snaith (some things never change), ideological Joe Astley and the very conservative Robert Carne – he seems to be against the council spending any money.

Although I thoroughly enjoyed reading this novel, I have some reservations about recommending it. It is very bleak, there is illness (measles, cancer and heart disease), poverty and grime. I think if you’re ill or know someone who is ill, you should avoid this one for a while.

Here are some other reviews …

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/feb/19/south-riding-winifred-holtby-rereading 

http://bookssnob.wordpress.com/2011/11/06/south-riding-by-winifred-holtby/ 

Tags: ,

Posted in Fiction | No Comments »

The Innocent – Ian McEwan

Mar 6th, 2012 by

I listened to this one while finishing mindless tasks – like this. I’m becoming quite a convert to audio books. I’ve always liked Ian McEwan – Atonement in particular, so I was keen to try this one. I didn’t enjoy it as much as Atonement, but I didn’t dislike it as much as Solar (here’s that review).

Here is the blurb …

 The novel takes place in 1955-56 Berlin at the beginning of the Cold War and centres on the joint CIA/MI6 operation to build a tunnel from the American sector of Berlin into the Russian sector to tap the phone lines of the Soviet High Command. Leonard Marnham is a 25-year-old Englishman who sets up and repairs the tape recorders used in the tunnel. He falls in love with Maria Eckdorf, a 30-year-old divorced German. The story revolves around their relationship and Leonard’s role in the operation.

This novel had a bit of cold war/spy drama about it, but mostly it was about Leonard and his relationship with Maria. He has quite a vivid fantasy life and it would often lead him astray. For the majority of the story we only have Leonard’s point of view and he is ‘the innocent’. Without revealing too much of the story something happens to Maria and Leonard which they feel needs to be covered up. They attempt to do this, but things go wrong and in an effort to make things right (or at least protect himself) Leonard slips into betrayal. I think the point being just how easy it is for someone to betray them self, friends and country.

Here are some more reviews …

http://bostonreview.net/BR31.1/boylan.php  – this is an essay on McEwan and covers many of his novels.

http://jawasreadtoo.wordpress.com/2008/11/13/review-the-innocent-by-ian-mcewan/

Tags: ,

Posted in Fiction, Recommended | No Comments »

The True Story of Butterfish – Nick Earls

Feb 21st, 2012 by

I’ve been listening to The True Story of Butterfish while quilting – here is my quilt. I use the audible app on my ipod, which works well.

I’ve read a few Nick Earls’ books; Zigzag Street, World of Chickens and Perfect Skin and I’ve enjoyed all of them. I’ve always described them as chick lit for boys and I wasn’t being derogatory. I mean that in a good way.

Here is the blurb …

With his chart-topping band, Butterfish, Curtis Holland lived the cliched rock dream. But no dream lasts forever. When Annaliese Winter walks down Curtis Holland’s front path, he’s ill-prepared for a sixteen-year-old schoolgirl who’s a confounding mixture of adult and child. He’s back in Brisbane trying to build a life and he is not used to having a neighbour at all. So when Curtis receives an invitation to dinner from Annaliese’s mother, Kate, he is surprised when he not only accepts but finds himself being drawn to this remarkably unremarkable family. Even to fifteen-year-old Mark, who is at war with his own surging adolescence. Curtis soon realises that with Kate divorced, Annaliese and Mark need a male role model in their lives, but it’s hard for him to help when he’s just starting to grow up himself and harder still when Annaliese begins to show an interest in him that is less than filial.

There are some funny, laugh out loud moments in this novel. I particularly enjoy the conversations. There is some poignant stuff too – dealing with ailing parents and divorce. The setting is fabulous – I could imagine the heat and the ‘dagginess’ of the studio. This is a fun, easy novel that never jolts you with a poorly written sentence.

The version I listened to is here  and the narrator (David Tredinnick) was fabulous – because the narrator can make or break an audio book.

More reviews …

 http://www.theage.com.au/news/entertainment/books/book-reviews/the-true-story-of-butterfish/2009/07/20/1247941862229.html

http://aussiebookreviews.aussieblogs.com.au/2012/01/30/the-true-story-of-butterfish-nick-earls-review-by-jill-smith/ 

Tags: ,

Posted in Fiction, Recommended | 1 Comment »

Little Coffee Shop of Kabul – Deborah Rodriguez

Feb 20th, 2012 by

I downloaded this using the google books app on my ipad, but I was very disappointed (in the app not the book). It always wanted to be portrait despite the fact that I always read in Landscape – I don’t think I could take notes like I can in the Kindle app and there was no dictionary.

Anyway, this book was selected for book club with the idea being that  it was a quick and easy read (February is short month after all). It certainly made me think about Afghanistan and what life is like for women.

Here is the blurb …

 After hard luck and some bad choices, Sunny has finally found a place to call home – it just happens to be in the middle of a war zone. The thirty-eight-year-old American’s pride and joy is the Kabul Coffee House, where she brings hospitality to the expatriates, misfits, missionaries, and mercenaries who stroll through its doors. She’s especially grateful that the busy days allow her to forget Tommy, the love of her life, who left her in pursuit of money and adventure.

Working alongside Sunny is the maternal Halajan, who vividly recalls the days before the Taliban and now must hide a modern romance from her ultra traditional son – who, unbeknownst to her, is facing his own religious doubts. Into the café come Isabel, a British journalist on the trail of a risky story; Jack, who left his family back home in Michigan to earn ‘danger pay’ as a consultant; and Candace, a wealthy and well-connected American whose desire to help threatens to cloud her judgment.

When Yazmina, a young Afghan from a remote village, is kidnapped and left on a city street pregnant and alone, Sunny welcomes her into the café and gives her a home – but Yazmina hides a secret that could put all their lives in jeopardy. As this group of men and women discover that there’s more to one another than meets the eye, they’ll form an unlikely friendship that will change not only their own lives but the lives of an entire country.

Brimming with Deborah Rodriguez’s remarkable gift for depicting the nuances of life in Kabul, and filled with vibrant characters that readers will truly care about, A Cup of Friendship is the best kind of fiction – full of heart yet smart and thought-provoking.

It was a quick and easy read with some important points to make. However, I did find myself doing other jobs rather than reading it. I just kept waiting for something awful to happen and consequently didn’t want to keep going. Bit of a spoiler now, awful things do happen, but not as bad as you’re expecting.

For me the best part of this book is reading about life in Afghanistan – seeing a different culture in a new and sympathetic light. Read this novel for the plot and location.

Here are some more reviews …

http://pamelasbookspot.blogspot.com.au/2012/01/little-coffee-shop-of-kabul-by-deborah.html 

http://freepagenumbers.wordpress.com/2012/02/12/the-little-coffee-shop-of-kabul-better-in-theory-than-in-execution/ 

Tags: ,

Posted in Fiction | No Comments »

So Long, See You Tomorrow

Feb 15th, 2012 by

I read They Came Like Swallows  and so when I saw So Long, See You Tomorrow for $5 in my local book store I had to have it.

I am amazed how much can be fitted into such a small space.

Here is the blurb …

 ”This is one of the great books of our age. It is the subtlest of miniatures that contains are deepest sorrows and truths and love – all caught in a clear, simple style in perfect brushstrokes.”

Michael Ondaatje

On an Illinois farm in the 1920s, a man is murdered, and in the same moment the tenous friendship between two lonely boys comes to an end. In telling their interconnected stories, American Book Award winner William delivers a masterfully restrained and magically evocative meditation on the past. “A small, perfect novel.”–Washington Post Book World.

The writing is beautiful – each word appears to have been chosen with great care. It is quite a short novel and yet manages to convey so much about place, time and character.

This novel can be thought of as a sequel to The Come Like Swallows, but can easily be read alone.

I encourage everyone to read this novel – here are some better (and way more comprehensive reviews)

 http://www.openlettersmonthly.com/year-with-short-novels-the-rooms-of-the-past/

http://dovegreyreader.typepad.com/dovegreyreader_scribbles/2010/03/so-long-see-you-tomorrow-william-maxwell.html 

http://bookssnob.wordpress.com/2011/05/09/so-long-see-you-tomorrow-by-william-maxwell/

Tags: ,

Posted in Fiction, Recommended | No Comments »

Too Much Happiness – Alice Munro

Feb 14th, 2012 by

I’ve been on a bit of an Alice Munro fest.

Here is the blurb …

 Ten superb new stories by one of our most beloved and admired writers – the winner of the 2009 Man Booker International Prize.

In the first story a young wife and mother receives release from the unbearable pain of losing her three children from a most surprising source. In another, a young woman, in the aftermath of an unusual and humiliating seduction, reacts in a clever if less-than-admirable fashion. Other stories uncover the ‘deep-holes’ in a marriage, the unsuspected cruelty of children, and how a boy’s disfigured face provides both the good things in his life and the bad. And in the long title story, we accompany Sophia Kovalevsky – a late-nineteenth-century Russian émigré and mathematician – on a winter journey that takes her from the Riviera, where she visits her lover, to Paris, Germany, and, Denmark, where she has a fateful meeting with a local doctor, and finally to Sweden, where she teaches at the only university in Europe willing to employ a female mathematician.

With clarity and ease, Alice Munro once again renders complex, difficult events and emotions into stories that shed light on the unpredictable ways in which men and women accommodate and often transcend what happens in their lives.

Too Much Happiness is a compelling, provocative – even daring – collection.

This set of stories is classic Munro. Although, once again, I think collecting the stories by theme lessens their impact. They all end up being a bit too similar.

I found the big story in this one (about Sophia Kovalevsky) dragged a bit. I’m not sure why this is the case it sounds so interesting – a female mathematician in the 19th Century and she has a lover, but it was my least favourite of the stories.

More reviews …

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/too-much-happiness-by-alice-munro-1792706.html 

http://longingtobe.wordpress.com/2011/06/12/too-much-happiness-alice-munro/ 

http://weloveliterature.com/2011/02/13/review-alice-munro-too-much-happiness/

Tags: ,

Posted in Fiction, Recommended | 1 Comment »

They Knew Mr Knight – Dorothy Whipple

Feb 13th, 2012 by

As you all know, I’m a bit of a Dorothy Whipple fan – see here, here, here and here. I’ve been meaning to read They Knew Mr Knight for ages and then, luckily, a friend had a copy. I liked it, not as much as Because of the Lockwoods , it is a bit too overtly religious for me, but it is classic Whipple with her shrewd understanding of character.

Here is the description from Persephone …

 A Book Society Choice, shortlisted for the Femina-Vie Heureuse Prize, the second Dorothy Whipple novel we publish is also wonderfully well-written in a clear and straightforward style; yet ‘this real treat’ (Sunday Telegraph) is far more subtle than it at first appears.

The Blakes are an ordinary family: Celia looks after the house and Thomas works at the family engineering business in Leicester. The book begins when he meets Mr Knight, a financier as crooked as any on the front pages of our newspapers nowadays; and tracks his and his family’s swift climb and fall.

Part of the cause of the ensuing tragedy is Celia’s innocence – blinkered by domesticity, she and her children are the ‘victim of the turbulence of the outside world’ (Postscript); but finally, through ‘quiet tenacity and the refusal to let go of certain precious things, goodness does win out’ (Afterword). And the TLS wrote: ‘The portraits in the book are fired by Mrs Whipple’s article of faith – the supreme importance of people.’

 This novel provides a glimpse at life between the wars for a certain set of people (middle class English families). Thomas gets into deeper and deeper financial trouble by following Mr Knight’s advice. At first everything is wonderful; he buys back the engineering works, he can afford a new and nicer house, but then, as always, he needs more and ultimately he over extends himself and loses everything. Celia is happy with their position at the start of the novel – she is busy keeping house and tending the garden. As they move up in the world she has less to do and becomes disgruntled. She hates the new house and is over joyed when they move again – although it is clear that it will be a stretch to keep the new house. Thomas’s focus shifts from his family to the stock market and business concerns. The oldest daughter is more concerned with appearances – she only wants the best and doesn’t want to appear poor, and in the end she escapes into a loveless marriage to avoid the family’s ruin. The other two children are made of sterner stuff and it is clear that the family will survive the calamity and possibly be the better for it.

This novel is about ordinary people living an ordinary life, but even these ordinary people face temptations and must live with the consequences of their actions.

I’ll be looking for more by Dorothy Whipple.

There is a fabulous review here.

Tags: , ,

Posted in Fiction, Recommended | No Comments »

Molly Fox’s Birthday – Deirdre Madden

Feb 10th, 2012 by

I read about this novel here and was very keen to read it. I bought a copy for my Kindle, but in the end I read it on my Ipod (Kindle app) and was pleasantly surprised by the experience (the small screen wasn’t a problem at all).

Here is the blurb …

 Dublin, Midsummer: While absent in New York, the celebrated actor Molly Fox has loaned her house to a playwright friend, who is struggling to write a new work. Over the course of this, the longest day of the year, the playwright reflects upon her own life, Molly’s, and that of their mutual friend Andrew, whom she has known since university. Why does Molly never celebrate her own birthday, which falls upon this day? What does it mean to be a playwright or an actor? How have their relationships evolved over the course of many years? Molly Fox’s Birthday calls into question the ideas that we hold about who we are; and shows how the past informs the present in ways we might never have imagined.

This was a beautifully written story about family and friends, art, literature and drama, how we see ourselves and how the world see us. It is a short story encompassing only one day, but it seems to contain an amazing amount of interesting anecdotes, social history and character development. This is not a story for people who like a lot of action, but for those who like a gently unfolding story.

More reviews …

http://rippleeffects.wordpress.com/2012/01/19/molly-foxs-birthday-by-deirdre-madden/

http://abeautifulhue.blogspot.com.au/2012/01/beautiful-books-molly-foxs-birthday.html 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/aug/30/fiction.deirdremadden 

Tags: ,

Posted in Fiction, Recommended | No Comments »

One Pair Of Hands – Monica Dickens

Feb 8th, 2012 by

I’ve read Mariana (the Persephone edition), which I enjoyed, so when a friend lent me this I was keen to try it.

Here’s the blurb …

 What does a young, well-off English woman do with herself when she’s thrown out of acting school and is tired of being a debutante? Well, if you’re Monica Dickens, you become a cook. She makes the plunge to a life “below the stairs,” confident in her abilities to be a cook because she once took a course in French cuisine. She quickly learns the difference between school learning and real life. Scalded milk, dropped roasts, and fallen souffles plague her in her domestic career, but she perseveres. What makes this book so delightful is the sense of humor and drama Monica Dickens brings to her work. From dressing up for job interviews in a “supporting-a-widowed-mum look” to eavesdropping on dinner guests, she tackles her work with an enthusiasm for discovery. To her descriptions of battles with crazy scullery maids, abusive employers, and unwieldy custards, she brings a humorous and pointed commentary about the delicate and ongoing war between the wealthy and their servants. Written in 1939, this true-life experience reveals a writer who wasted no opportunity to explore daily lives and dramas. Her keen eye for detail, youthful resilience, and sense of the absurd make One Pair of Hands a deliciously inside look at the households of the British upper-class.

There are some fabulous laugh out loud moments in this memoir. It is worth reading just for the social history and when she tries to act the part at the interview (it always involves a sensible and frumpy hat).

It is written in a really chatty style – you can imagine sitting down with Ms Dickens over tea and being regaled with these stories. The work was hard and long – she arrived early to prepare breakfast and needed to stay to tidy up after dinner parties (which she cooked and served). This was all in a time before dish washers!

It’s definitely worth reading this memoir – it’s light, entertaining and a quick read. And now I know what a Cook General is meant to do.

Tags: ,

Posted in Memoir, Recommended | No Comments »

Runaway – Alice Munro

Feb 7th, 2012 by

I’m still getting through my holiday reading – in case anyone thinks I’m reading books in one day!

I really like Alice Munro’s short stories. I’ve read  Too Much Happiness (check back later for a review of that one) and Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship and Marriage. I was keen to check Runaway out when I saw it at the library.

Here is the blurb …

 A collection of stories about women of all ages and circumstances, their lives made palpable by the subtlety and empathy of this writer. Here are the infinite betrayals and surprise of love – between men and women, between friends, between parents and children – that are the stuff of all our lives. Alice Munro is the award-winning novelist, and has published ten previous collections of stories.

As always these stories are full of fabulous characters (very ordinary everyday people) dealing with difficult, interesting or just plain mundane circumstances. Munro has an uncanny knack of expressing her character’s inner lives – the good and the bad – which astonishes me. It is unusual to have things that you think are uniquely yours expressed in a novel.

My one criticism is the way the stories are collected. I know it makes sense to collect like with like, but I find each story loses it’s impact when it is surrounded by similar stories. I would prefer an eclectic mix of all of her stories.

More reviews …

From The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2005/feb/05/featuresreviews.guardianreview 

and the New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/14/books/review/14COVERFR.html?pagewanted=all 

Tags: , ,

Posted in Fiction, Recommended | No Comments »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »