A Little Hatred – Joe Abercrombie

A Little Hatred – Joe Abercrombie

Why hasn’t this been made into a TV series? There’s beautiful people, swords and magic. I listened to this, and the narrator (Steven Pacey) is superb!

Here’s the blurb …

The chimneys of industry rise over Adua and the world seethes with new opportunities. But old scores run deep as ever.

On the blood-soaked borders of Angland, Leo dan Brock struggles to win fame on the battlefield, and defeat the marauding armies of Stour Nightfall. He hopes for help from the crown. But King Jezal’s son, the feckless Prince Orso, is a man who specializes in disappointments.

Savine dan Glokta – socialite, investor, and daughter of the most feared man in the Union – plans to claw her way to the top of the slag-heap of society by any means necessary. But the slums boil over with a rage that all the money in the world cannot control.

The age of the machine dawns, but the age of magic refuses to die. With the help of the mad hillwoman Isern-i-Phail, Rikke struggles to control the blessing, or the curse, of the Long Eye. Glimpsing the future is one thing, but with the guiding hand of the First of the Magi still pulling the strings, changing it will be quite another…

I really enjoyed this (so much so I am currently listening to the second) – it has a very medieval Europe feel to it. We follow various different characters from all walks of life – (some of them have great names – it took me a while to work out that ‘the bloody nine’ was in fact one person and not nine!) It’s witty and the world building is fabulous.

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London Rules – Mick Herron

London Rules – Mick Herron

I have been keeping ahead of the Apple TV series of Slow Horses, we have just watched series four, so I decided it was time to read (listen) book 5 London Rules.

Here’s the blurb …

London Rules might not be written down, but everyone knows rule one.

Cover your arse.

Regent’s Park’s First Desk, Claude Whelan, is learning this the hard way. Tasked with protecting a beleaguered prime minister, he’s facing attack from all directions himself: from the showboating MP who orchestrated the Brexit vote, and now has his sights set on Number Ten; from the showboat’s wife, a tabloid columnist, who’s crucifying Whelan in print; and especially from his own deputy, Lady Di Taverner, who’s alert for Claude’s every stumble.

Meanwhile, the country’s being rocked by an apparently random string of terror attacks, and someone’s trying to kill Roddy Ho.

Over at Slough House, the crew are struggling with personal problems: repressed grief, various addictions, retail paralysis, and the nagging suspicion that their newest colleague is a psychopath. But collectively, they’re about to rediscover their greatest strength – that of making a bad situation much, much worse.

It’s a good job Jackson Lamb knows the rules. Because those things aren’t going to break themselves.

I do hope the secret service is not like it is described in these novels (although it probably is). I do like how these books are written; there is funny bits, moving bits, adventure and excitement, not to mention double-dealing and back-stabbing, but the slow horses look after their own.

A review.

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This Strange Eventful History – Claire Messud

This Strange Eventful History – Claire Messud

I have read The Women Upstairs and The emperor’s Children – I enjoyed the former more than the latter, but was keen to give this one a go. And then it was nominated for the Booker Prize (but didn’t make the shortlist), which was my project this year.

Here’s the blurb …

An immersive, masterful story of a family born on the wrong side of history, from one of our finest contemporary novelists.

Over seven decades, from 1940 to 2010, the pieds-noirs Cassars live in an itinerant state—separated in the chaos of World War II, running from a complicated colonial homeland, and, after Algerian independence, without a homeland at all. This Strange Eventful History, told with historical sweep, is above all a family story: of patriarch Gaston and his wife Lucienne, whose myth of perfect love sustains them and stifles their children; of François and Denise, devoted siblings connected by their family’s strangeness; of François’s union with Barbara, a woman so culturally different they can barely comprehend one another; of Chloe, the result of that union, who believes that telling these buried stories will bring them all peace.

First, I knew nothing about Algeria (I knew it had been a French colony, but nothing about its independence). It sounds like a beautiful place, although I suspect it’s a bit troubled now as many former colonies are. This is a story about Gaston and Lucienne, their children and their grandchildren. It’s about life, love and family. It’s based on the author’s own family.

A few bits I highlighted

I know also that everything is connected, the constellations of our lives moving together in harmony and disharmony.

A story is not a line; it is a richer thing, one that circles and eddies, rises and falls, repeats upon itself.

We were on the one hand interchangeable and on the other each our selves.

[…] we had agency over only some small aspects of our stories

This strange eventful history that made a life. Not good or bad – rather, both good and bad – but that was not the point. Above all, they had been, for so long, wildly curious. Just to see, to experience all that they could, to set foot anywhere, to speak to anyone, taste anything, to learn, to know.

The writing is beautiful, I can see why it was nominated.

A review.

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Filed under 4, Digital, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Paper, Recommended

Daughters of Chivalry – Kasey Wilson-Lee

Daughters of Chivalry – Kasey Wilson-Lee

I am a sucker for a women’s history book. I bought this one from the Subiaco Bookshop (it has a great selection of books). However, in the end I read it on my Kobo (so I have two versions – print and digital).

Here’s the blurb …

Virginal, chaste, humble, patiently waiting for rescue by brave knights and handsome princes: this idealised – and largely mythical – notion of the medieval noblewoman still lingers. Yet the reality was very different, as Kelcey Wilson-Lee shows in this vibrant account of the five daughters of the great English king, Edward I. The lives of these sisters – Eleanora, Joanna, Margaret, Mary and Elizabeth – ran the full gamut of experiences open to royal women in the Middle Ages. Living as they did in a courtly culture founded on romantic longing and brilliant pageantry, they knew that a princess was to be chaste yet a mother to many children, preferably sons, meek yet able to influence a recalcitrant husband or even command a host of men-at-arms.

These women’s lives were fascinating. The royal family was constantly on the move – visiting various palaces, manors, nobles, etc. The children had their own households from a young age and roamed the country. Mary was sent to a nunnery when she was 6! The other girls were married off to various European nobility. What I found interesting was the care and interest Edward took in his children (obviously he ordered them about when required), but he clearly loved them as well. Within the constraints of the time, these women wielded power and influence, and had great wealth they used to further causes important to them.

A review.

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Juice – Tim Winton

Juice – Tim Winton

I am not a huge Tim Winton fan, I usually find his characters to be unsympathetic, but I have always admired his creation of place. I heard him being interviewed by Claire Nicols and it sounded like something I would like. In the end, I listened to it.

Here’s the blurb …

An epic novel of determination, survival, and the limits of the human spirit. This is Tim Winton as you’ve never read him before.

Two fugitives, a man and a child, drive all night across a stony desert. As dawn breaks, they roll into an abandoned mine site. From the vehicle they survey a forsaken place – middens of twisted iron, rusty wire, piles of sun-baked trash. They’re exhausted, traumatised, desperate now. But as a refuge, this is the most promising place they’ve seen. The child peers at the field of desolation. The man thinks to himself, this could work.

Problem is, they’re not alone.

So begins a searing, propulsive journey through a life whose central challenge is not simply a matter of survival, but of how to maintain human decency as everyone around you falls ever further into barbarism.

The descriptions of the different landscapes were fabulous. I enjoyed how the story unfolded slowly and we gradually learnt what had brought our protagonist to this bleak place. It is a story for our times and might hopefully get people thinking about the environment and the impact of climate change. It is a bleak story and (without giving away spoilers) it has a ‘Winton’ ending. I can see this being made into a movie.

A review.

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Intermezzo – Sally Rooney

Intermezzo – Sally Rooney

I am a Sally Rooney fan. I was keen to read this and my daughter received an ARC, but she didn’t get onto it, so in the end I listened to it (highly recommended by someone from my stitching group). It was a very good decision to listen to it, the narrator was fabulous.

Here’s the blurb …

Aside from the fact that they are brothers, Peter and Ivan Koubek seem to have little in common.

Peter is a Dublin lawyer in his thirties—successful, competent and apparently unassailable. But in the wake of their father’s death, he’s medicating himself to sleep and struggling to manage his relationships with two very different women—his enduring first love Sylvia, and Naomi, a college student for whom life is one long joke.

Ivan is a twenty-two-year-old competitive chess player. He has always seen himself as socially awkward, a loner, the antithesis of his glib elder brother. Now, in the early weeks of his bereavement, Ivan meets Margaret, an older woman emerging from her own turbulent past, and their lives become rapidly and intensely intertwined.

For two grieving brothers and the people they love, this is a new interlude—a period of desire, despair and possibility—a chance to find out how much one life might hold inside itself without breaking.

I think this is my favourite of her novels. The writing is beautiful, it’s written from the perspectives of Ivan, Margaret and Peter, and each of their voices are different. I loved how internal it was, we were in their heads. Ivan was my favourite. There is a lot of thinking about what it means to be a good person and to live a good life. It is very thought provoking. And it’s about relationships: brothers, mothers and sons, lovers, and friends.

A review.

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Filed under 5, Audio, Fiction, Recommended, Serious

The House in the Cerulean Sea – T J Klune

The House in the Cerulean Sea – T J Klune

The theme for my book club this month is joy and when I googled joyful books this one came up.

Here’s the blurb …

A magical island. A dangerous task. A burning secret.

Linus Baker leads a quiet, solitary life. At forty, he lives in a tiny house with a devious cat and his old records. As a Case Worker at the Department in Charge Of Magical Youth, he spends his days overseeing the well-being of children in government-sanctioned orphanages.

When Linus is unexpectedly summoned by Extremely Upper Management he’s given a curious and highly classified assignment: travel to Marsyas Island Orphanage, where six dangerous children reside: a gnome, a sprite, a wyvern, an unidentifiable green blob, a were-Pomeranian, and the Antichrist. Linus must set aside his fears and determine whether or not they’re likely to bring about the end of days.

But the children aren’t the only secret the island keeps. Their caretaker is the charming and enigmatic Arthur Parnassus, who will do anything to keep his wards safe. As Arthur and Linus grow closer, long-held secrets are exposed, and Linus must make a choice: destroy a home or watch the world burn.

An enchanting story, masterfully told, The House in the Cerulean Sea is about the profound experience of discovering an unlikely family in an unexpected place—and realizing that family is yours.

I would call this a ‘romantasy’. It is very warm and cozy, and the characters are charming. I don’t think I am the target audience for it, I found it a bit didactic (a bit too much respect everyone, include everyone, etc.) I think I needed a bit more conflict.

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Filed under 3, Digital, Fiction, Romance, Science Fiction

Orbital – Samantha Harvey

Orbital – Samantha Harvey

This is the last of my Booker Prize shortlist reading. It is a wonderful selection. All of the books have been beautifully written and I have liked them all.

Here’s the blurb …

Six astronauts rotate in their spacecraft above the earth. They are there to collect meteorological data, conduct scientific experiments and test the limits of the human body. But mostly they observe. Together they watch their silent blue planet, circling it sixteen times, spinning past continents and cycling through seasons, taking in glaciers and deserts, the peaks of mountains and the swells of oceans. Endless shows of spectacular beauty witnessed in a single day.

Yet although separated from the world they cannot escape its constant pull. News reaches them of the death of a mother, and with it comes thoughts of returning home. They look on as a typhoon gathers over an island and people they love, in awe of its magnificence and fearful of its destruction. The fragility of human life fills their conversations, their fears, their dreams. So far from earth, they have never felt more part – or protective – of it. They begin to ask, what is life without earth? What is earth without humanity?

This book is beautifully written. The descriptions of the earth as seen from space are mesmerising. Although, it does put me off ever going to space – all of the things that happens to one’s body in micro gravity!

It’s very poetic, for example (when describing humanity)

[…], the igniters of fires, the hackers in stone, the melters of iron, the ploughers of earth, the worshippers of gods, the tellers of time, the sailors of ships, the wearers of shoes, the traders of grain, the discoverers of lands, the schemers of systems, the weavers of music, the singers of song, the mixers of paint, the binders of books, the crunchers of numbers, the slingers of arrows, the observers of atoms, the adorners of bodies, the gobblers of pills, the splitters of hairs, the scratchers of heads, the owners of minds, the losers of minds, the predators of everything, the arguers with death, the lovers of excess, the excess of love, the addled with love, the deficit of love, the lacking for love, the longing for love, and the love of longing, the two-legged thing, the human being.

We follow the astronauts and cosmonauts over a 24 hour period, which is 16 orbits of the earth. As the earth is spinning each orbit is slightly different, so we here about different parts of the earth. There is a terrible typhoon that builds and then slams into the Philippines, seeing cities at night with all of the connecting lights, deserts and rivers from space.

It’s a short novel (novella really), but very moving.

A review

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Big Sky – Kate Atkinson

Big Sky – Kate Atkinson

Sadly, I have now finished all of the Jackson Brodie books. Number six – Death at the Sign of the Rook, has just been released, so it will be a while before another one is published.

Here’s the blurb …

Jackson Brodie, ex-military police, ex-Cambridge Constabulary, currently working as a private investigator, makes a highly anticipated return, nine years after the last Brodie, Started Early, Took My Dog.

Jackson Brodie has relocated to a quiet seaside village, in the occasional company of his recalcitrant teenage son and an aging Labrador, both at the discretion of his ex-partner Julia. It’s picturesque, but there’s something darker lurking behind the scenes.

Jackson’s current job, gathering proof of an unfaithful husband for his suspicious wife, is fairly standard-issue, but a chance encounter with a desperate man on a crumbling cliff leads him into a sinister network—and back across the path of his old friend Reggie. Old secrets and new lies intersect in this breathtaking novel by one of the most dazzling and surprising writers at work today.

This was excellent. Different strands coming together in a beautiful tapestry. All of the good literary Atkinson things – literary references, great sense of place, fabulous characters (I particularly liked Harry and Bunny). A return of old characters – Reggie and Julia. Julia seems to live in Brodie’s head – always making comments on his thoughts.

Guardian Review

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Filed under 5, Audio, Crime, Fiction, Recommended

Started Early, Took my Dog – Kate Atkinson

Started Early, Took My Dog – Kate Atkinson

I am continuing on my Jackson Brodie audio marathon (this narrator pronounces Niamh wrong, which is grating).

Here’s the blurb …

Tracy Waterhouse leads a quiet, ordered life as a retired police detective – a life that takes a surprising turn when she encounters Kelly Cross, a habitual offender, dragging a young child through town. Both appear miserable and better off without each other – or so decides Tracy, in a snap decision that surprises herself as much as Kelly. Suddenly burdened with a small child, Tracy soon learns her parental inexperience is actually the least of her problems, as much larger ones loom for her and her young charge.

Meanwhile, Jackson Brodie, the beloved detective of novels such as Case Histories, is embarking on a different sort of rescue – that of an abused dog. Dog in tow, Jackson is about to learn, along with Tracy, that no good deed goes unpunished.

This was very good. The new characters Tracy, Barry, Tilly and Courtney are excellent. I enjoyed getting their perspective (not Courtney – she’s only four). Jackson’s new dog was an added bonus. There were crimes and they do get solved, but it’s more about the characters, their interactions and how they develop or not over the course of the story.

A review.

I have read this before, so here is my previous thoughts. (It was 14 years ago).

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