Book Review: THE GIRL YOU LEFT BEHIND BY JOJO MOYES

Genre:  Fiction
Published:  Penguin  27 Sept 2012
Source:  RealReaders



About the Book:

In 1916 French artist Edouard Lefevre leaves his wife Sophie to fight at the Front. When her town falls into German hands, his portrait of Sophie stirs the heart of the local Kommandant and causes her to risk everything - her family, reputation and life - in the hope of seeing her true love one last time.

Nearly a century later and Sophie's portrait is given to Liv by her young husband shortly before his sudden death. Its beauty speaks of their short life together, but when the painting's dark and passion-torn history is revealed, Liv discovers that the first spark of love she has felt since she lost him is threatened...




The story starts in a small town in war-torn France when Sophie attempts to outwit the local German Kommandant, a man who will have a large say in her destiny.  She misses her husband who is away fighting and when she and her family are forced to serve the Germans with food every night in her small hotel, her emotions are stretched as the Kommandant becomes obsessed with a painting done by her husband of a young Sophie.

The first part is left on a cliffhanger and we are then moved forward to the present time and find that the same painting is now hanging in the bedroom of Liv, who's deceased husband bought it for her as he thought the girl in the painting looked like her.

Unfortunately, this is where my interest started to wane.  I loved the first part set in WWI and, even though the story goes back and forth, I did not enjoy it as much, somehow I could not warm to Liv and I found myself rushing through the story to read about what happened to Sophie.

Overall, I did like the storyline, I thought some of the characters were memorable, but I just wish that the first part had been longer and the second part had been shorter!

Book Review: THE UNSEEN BY KATHERINE WEBB

Genre:  Fiction
Published by:  Orion (Mar 2011)
Pages:  373  (Paperback - Uncorrected proof)
Source:  Waterstones Facebook
My Rating:  9.5/10

About the Book:

England, 1911. The Reverend Albert Canning, a vicar with a passion for spiritualism, leads a happy existence with his naive wife Hester in a sleepy Berkshire village. As summer dawns, their quiet lives are changed for ever by two new arrivals.
First comes Cat, the new maid: a free-spirited and disaffected young woman sent down from London after entanglements with the law. Cat quickly finds a place for herself in the secret underbelly of local society as she plots her escape.
Then comes Robin Durrant, a leading expert in the occult, enticed by tales of elemental beings in the water meadows nearby. A young man of magnetic charm and beauty, Robin soon becomes an object of fascination and desire.
During a long spell of oppressive summer heat, the rectory at Cold Ash Holt becomes charged with ambition, love and jealousy; a mixture of emotions so powerful that it leads, ultimately, to murder.

The story starts in 1911 with Hester writing a letter to her sister saying that she’s looking forward to the new maid, Cat, coming and how she will be her ‘project’.

We are then fast forwarded to the present when Leah, a freelance journalist, has been asked to come to Belgium from England to try and discover the identity of a young WWI soldier who has been found buried in a garden.  He had two letters on him from a H. Canning which pique her interest.

This is the intriguing beginning to a compelling drama played out during the long hot summer of 1911 when everyone’s lives would never be the same again after the two additions to the Canning household, who comprised:-

Cat Morley, feisty, unafraid to speak her mind, even to her employer, and had been in prison for her suffragette activities.  I really liked her, and, like many servants at that time she was starting to question her status and rights.

Robin Durrant, a theosophist who believed in ethereal beings and was on a quest for wisdom and spiritual enlightenment.  Both Cat and Hester didn’t trust him.  He was manipulative, smooth, unreadable and a very unlikeable but compelling character.

Hester Canning, naive and nervous wife of the vicar, she is desperate for a child.  I felt a lot of sympathy for her, she was a good person who tried to do the right thing but she was too soft.

Albert Canning, the local vicar who invites Durrant to stay, believes everything he says and hangs on his every word, his face alights with excitement welcoming Robin to his house.  

In the present, while Leah is trying to identify the soldier, the sender of the letters and the secrets contained therein, we discover the truth about the lies and deception during that ill-fated 1911 summer.

I really liked the dual narrative between past and present.  

I loved everything about this book, the time period, the writing, the original plot, the characters who all seemed real and believable to me.

If you’re interested in this time period I would definitely recommend a non-fiction novel called The Perfect Summer: Dancing into Shadow in 1911 by Juliet Nicholson.  The backdrop is the long hot summer of 1911 and here are my thoughts on the book.

Book Review: THE CONFESSIONS OF A LIBERAL LOVER BY EM MULLER

Genre:  Fiction
Published by:  Red Rose Publishing  (May 2010)
Pages:  160 on my eReader
Source:  Received from the author
My Rating:  7/10



This is the tale of a young girl who reads too many romance novels and believes that the secret to happiness is to find the man of her dreams and she'll live happily ever after ............but she discovers that life is not perfect and it doesn't work out the way it does in romance novels.

We follow Maud as she makes mistakes in picking the wrong man (I'm sure most girls can identify with that!) for the wrong reasons.

The only friend she has is a toy gargoyle that she picked up at a fair, he was a 6" grey plastic creature, hunchbacked with short thin bowed legs and large pointy ears.  It was quite weird when, after 10 years, he suddenly started talking to her and offering his advice on her love life......but I really loved the idea!  It was so funny yet, in the context of the book, I thought it worked. 

Oh how Maud needed advice!  One boyfriend asked her if there was anything in her past that could embarrass him one day by the media if he was a politician....not very romantic!  She even experimented with a female relationship.  There are some X-rated scenes!
 
This is a light-hearted and fun read that's easily downloaded to your reading device...........ideal for the lazy summer days when you just want to read a short story.


E.M. Muller's website is here.  I thank her for sending me this download.

 

Book Review: THE PARTICULAR SADNESS OF LEMON CAKE BY AIMEE BENDER

Genre:  Fiction/Magical Realism
Published by:  Windmill Books  (Feb 2011)
Pages:  292  (Paperback)
Source:  Received from the Publisher
My Rating:  8/10



About the Book: 

On the eve of her 9th birthday, unassuming Rose Edelstein, a girl at the periphery of schoolyard games and her distracted parents' attention, bites into her mother's homemade lemon-chocolate cake and discovers she has a magical gift: she can taste her mother's emotions in the slice. She discovers this gift to her horror, for her mother – her cheerful, can-do mother – tastes of despair and desperation. Suddenly, and for the rest of her life, food becomes perilous. Anything can be revealed at any meal.

Rose’s gift forces her to confront the secret knowledge all families keep hidden – truths about her mother's life outside the home, her father's strange detachment and her brother's clash with the world. Yet as Rose grows up, she realises there are some secrets that even her taste buds cannot discern.



Take one dysfunctional family, sprinkle some magic dust, a few slices of depression, loneliness, sadness and mystery, stir in a pinch of family secrets and you’ll have the most unusual tale of a young girl with the most unusual gift of knowing how someone is feeling while they’re cooking a meal just by consuming it.

As I finished that first bite, as that first impression faded, I felt a subtle shift inside, an unexpected reaction.......it seemed that my mouth was also filling with the taste of smallness....of upset, tasting a distance I somehow knew was connected to my mother, tasting a crowded sense of her thinking.

For Rose, every food had a feeling, by the time she was 12 she could identify exactly where it was produced or grown.  As she grew up she found it more palatable to eat food that was produced in a factory, preferably not by human hands.

Her brother Joseph was distant and uncommunicative (and he keeps disappearing and appearing out of nowhere!), her mother was raw with loneliness (but keeps it well hidden) and her father rarely spoke to her (and he has a secret of his own).

This is, basically, a family saga as we follow Rose through her early years, her jobs, her college life, her crush on Joseph’s friend, George, who is the only one who believes her, and, ultimately, as she comes to terms with her gift.

This is a wonderfully written story, full of oddball but memorable characters, which I felt enchanted by.  

My favourite was the secretive and sad Joseph, I wanted to know more about him, how he was feeling, what he was thinking but the book focused mainly on Rose and the other characters were just on the periphery so I didn't feel as if all my questions were answered ......... but perhaps that was what the author intended .......... or perhaps it was just me not seeing the answers!
 
The writing reminded me of The Little Giant of Aberdeen County by Tiffany Baker

Book Review: A CLOCKWORK ORANGE BY ANTHONY BURGESS

My son, David, has read and reviewed this book




Genre:  Fiction
Published by:   William Heinemann  (1962)


Rating:  9 / 10






As I grow older my taste in books and films changes and I am finding myself drawn more towards the so called “classics”.  So when my girlfriend conveniently left her copy of “A Clockwork Orange” in my room one day I jumped at the chance to read Anthony Burgess’s famous tale of a young boy in a dystopian society doing as he pleases and eventually getting his comeuppance.

I’m sure everyone has heard of the book, thanks to Stanly Kubrick’s motion picture adaptation, of which i wasn’t too keen.  Although they have quite a few differences the theme is still true, our protagonist or “your humble narrator”, as he likes to call himself is Alex, a 15 year old boy who during the day goes to school and listens to his classical music collection (most notably Ludwig Van) whilst during the night he is joined by his gang and partake in a bit of violence and rape.  Although the subject matter is quite harsh at times, Burgess manages to fill every page with humorous dialogue and comical situations.  The language Alex and his “droogs” or friends use is one of the biggest talking points of the novel, it took me personally about half the book to get used to it and figure or unlock it in my brain, but once I did I was loving it and laughing along as our narrator gets himself deeper and deeper in trouble.  I’ve heard that some newer versions of the book have a glossary even for all the new words Burgess invents for his characters.  A kind of cross between English and Russian slang.  Women become Malchicks, seeing becomes viddy and laughing to yourself is referred to as “having a good smeck”.

Anthony Burgess has said on numerous occasions that he is displeased with how popular this book has become as it wasn’t one of his favourites and doesn’t like it taking away attention from his other works.  If that is true then i must check out another of his novels as “A Clockwork Orange” has  quickly become one of MY favourites and one that I most certainly will be revisiting.

It isn’t very long and there’s a small chunk in the middle that can drag quite a bit but despite its shortcomings it is a very pleasant, funny and, once you get through the initial slang talk they use, it is a very easy read.

BOOK REVIEW: CALIFORNIA SCHEMIN' BY GAVIN BAIN

Genre: Fiction, True Story

Published by: Simon & Schuster (April 2010)

Pages: 274 (Paperback)

My Rating: 8/10

CALIFORNIA SCHEMIN' BY GAVIN BAIN

About the Book:

California Schemin' is the remarkable real life story of how two rappers from Dundee pretended to be two rappers from California and duped the record industry out of hundreds of thousands of pounds. Gavin Bain and Billy Boyd - or Silibil N' Brains, as they became known - were two ordinary Scottish boys who shared an extraordinary dream: to become rap superstars. Creating new identities for themselves, they persuaded the music industry that they were the latest hot young talent from California. Silibil N' Brains then lived out that lie for more than two years, securing an enormous record deal with Sony and being catapulted into the industry high-life, rubbing shoulders with the likes of Madonna, Eminem and D12. But, ironically, they could never actually deliver and promote the album that they were paid so much money to put together. As soon as they became famous they would be recognised by anyone who had known them in their former lives in Scotland and the dream would evaporate. As the pressure mounted, there would be disastrous consequences......

My Thoughts:

My first thoughts on finishing this book is that it's a wonder how Gavin Bain managed to write a coherent book at all after the huge amounts of alcohol he had consumed after his wild partying lifestyle! In fact, the book starts with him being rushed to hospital (not for the first time!) having drunk so much alcohol and popped so many pills that it was presumed it was a suicide bid.

First Lines:

Afterwards they would call it a suicide attempt - and that's if they would call it anything at all. Mostly they chose never to speak about it, at least not in my company

.

This story is mostly about the build up to that night and how Scot Gavin -- a neurotic, obsessive, insomniac -- and his friend Billy Boyd -- handsome, confident, self-satisfied -- fooled everyone in this fascinating account of a crazy two years in the life of the rappers known as Silibil N' Brains. Their whole appeal was built on a lie, a scam.

Gavin's life in those days was full of highs (signed by Sony and given a huge advance) and lows (too many to mention) and we follow him through all these, knowing that he's heading for a fall. I did feel quite sorry for him several times, but he was his own worst enemy, he doesn't want our pity, he knows he was an idiot.

I enjoyed his writing style, it was simple, never dull or boring, he didn't try to sensationalise things - he just told it how it was - and I'm glad he did and I'm glad I read it.

Gavin Bain interviewed in the Scotsman.

Thanks to Simon & Schuster for sending me this book to review.

Book Review: THE EARTH HUMS IN B FLAT BY MARI STRACHAN

Genre: Fiction

Published by: Canongate Books (May 2010)

Pages: 327 (Paperback)

My Rating: 9/10

THE EARTH HUMS IN B FLAT BY MARI STRACHAN

About the Book:

Gwenni Morgan is not like any other girl in this small Welsh town. Inquisitive, bookish and full of spirit, she can fly in her sleep and loves playing detective. So when a neighbour mysteriously vanishes, and no one seems to be asking the right questions, Gwenni decides to conduct her own investigation. She records everything she sees and hears: but are her deductions correct? What is the real truth? And what will be the consequences of finding out, for Gwenni, her family and her community?

My Thoughts:

First Lines:

I fly in my sleep every night. When I was little I could fly without being asleep; now I can't, even though I practise and practise.

Seen through the eyes of 12 year old Gwenni who lives with her mum, dad and older sister Bethan, in a small Welsh village in the 1950's, this is a lovely, quirky story, featuring characters such as Jones the Butcher, Edwards the Bank and Mrs Owen the Milk, a village where everyone knows everyone else's business and is full of secrets.

Gwenni wants to be a detective like her fictional hero, Albert Campion, and when one of her neighbours, Mr Evans, goes missing she decides that she will try and find him by looking at the clues and talking to Mr Sergeant Jones the policeman............but she finds more than she bargained for while learning a lot about her own family secrets and growing up.

This is a delightfully told and very descriptive story full of vivid and rich characters and sometimes I felt as if I was eavesdropping on private conversations, as if I was actually there in the room.

Gwenni was so sweet and innocent and serious and I very quickly warmed to her, she was always observing other people and is obsessed with being watched by inanimate objects such as her poster of Buddy Holly on her bedroom wall and the toby jugs on the living-room shelf

.........the mantelpiece's clock's tick-tock is loud. I look up at the clock and see the Toby jugs almost falling off their shelf as they strain to watch and listen. They're straining so hard their faces are crimson.

It's a wonderful, funny, easy read and I loved it!

This is Mari Strachan's debut novel and her website can be found here

I thought it was quite similar in some ways to What Was Lost by Catherine O'Flynn.

Book Review: A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

Genre: Fiction

Publisher: Bloomsbury (2007)

Pages: 482 (Large Print Paperback Edition)

ISBN: 978-1-40740-544-5








Synopsis from Amazon:
Mariam is only fifteen when she is sent to Kabul to marry Rasheed. Nearly two decades later, a friendship grows between Mariam and a local teenager, Laila, as strong as the ties between mother and daughter. When the Taliban take over, life becomes a desperate struggle against starvation, brutality and fear. Yet love can move a person to act in unexpected ways, and lead them to overcome the most daunting obstacles with a startling heroism.

First Line:

Mariam was five years old the first time she heard the word harami.

I loved the character of Mariam right from the beginning as she spends every Thursday waiting anxiously for her father to visit her. He already had 3 wives and Mariam was born out of wedlock. It was interesting and upsetting watching her grow up and begin a new life in which she had very few choices and nothing much to look forward to until the 15 year old Laila enters her life.

It was this relationship that was very moving. At first Mariam disliked and distrusted the young girl but gradually they began to depend on each other for moral support and a common enemy.

I found it so frustrating how the women were treated by the Taliban and couldn't help thinking throughout the book about the comparisons between their lives and mine. I think this paragraph (page 103) sums it up very well:

Mariam lay on the couch, hands tucked between her knees, watched the whirlpool of snow twisting and spinning outside the window. She remembered Nana saying once that each snowflake was a sigh heaved by an aggrieved woman somewhere in the world. That all the sighs drifted up the sky, gathered into clouds, then broke into tiny pieces that fell silently on the people below.
As a reminder of how women like us suffer, she'd said. How quietly we endure all that falls upon us.

This is not only a moving story but it's a history lesson and a reminder of how lucky I am to live in a country where women have as many opportunities as men and are listened to and respected as equals.

The title of A Thousand Splendid Suns (as explained on page 221) is taken from a poem written in the 17th Century, two of the lines are:

'One could not count the moons that shimmer on her roofs,
Or the thousand splendid suns that hide behind her walls.'

If you're interested in learning more of Afghanistan from 1959 until 2003 then this is a book I would certainly recommend.

About the Author:

Khaled Hosseini was born in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1965. His father was a diplomat with the Afghan Foreign Ministry and his mother taught Farsi and History at a large high school in Kabul. In 1976, the Afghan Foreign Ministry relocated the Hosseini family to Paris.

The Hosseinis sought and were granted political asylum in the United States. In September of 1980, Hosseini’s family moved to San Jose, California.
While in medical practice, Hosseini began writing his first novel, The Kite Runner, in March of 2001. In 2003, The Kite Runner, was published and has since become an international bestseller, published in 38 countries. In 2006 he was named a goodwill envoy to UNHCR, the United Nations Refugee Agency. His second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns was published in May of 2007. He lives in northern California with his family.



Extras:

A film version of A Thousand Splendid Suns is being adapted to the screen by Steve Zaillian, the brilliant screenwriter behind Schindler’s List and Searching for Bobby Fisher. The film will be produced at Sony/Columbia by Producer Scott Rudin, who just won an Oscar for No Country For Old Men.