My Year in Books 2023: March

This is a bit of a short post, I'm afraid (as well as being a bit late). March was a tough month for a number of reasons, and I had a couple of big things to read for work reasons. So there's only one title on this month's list - it's a good one though!

In case you're curious, here are my other two posts for this year so far: January, February

The Pursuit of William Abbey by Claire North (2019)

I’ve previously read and enjoyed a couple of Claire North books. I particularly liked The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August. William Abbey has similarities with Harry August, and there’s a passing comment that suggests they exist in the same ‘universe’. Nevertheless, this is a standalone story, rather than a sequel or crossover. The story begins with William Abbey as a listless young man in Victorian England. He trains as a doctor and ends up going to South Africa. There, he witnesses the lynching of a young boy called Langa. Abbey doesn’t intervene, and as a consequence is cursed by Langa’s mother. Forevermore, he will be followed by a ‘shadow’ of Langa, and whenever the shadow catches up with him, someone he loves will die. A significant element of the curse is that whenever Langa comes close, the doctor will be compelled to ‘truth-speaking’ – compulsively spilling the secrets of anyone who is around him at the time. Abbey is drafted into the secret service, as his ‘truth-speaking’ is a valuable tool in espionage, meets others who carry the same curse, and travels the world in an attempt to outrun Langa. It’s a fascinating premise, with North’s characteristic deceptively detached storytelling style. William Abbey is more direct in its social commentary than Harry August, particularly around empire and colonialism, and it’s more brutal in its violence. I probably did (just) prefer Harry August, but I’d still recommend William Abbey either as a standalone or as a companion to the earlier book.

My Year in Books 2022: November

Time for my penultimate book review post of the year. I'm a little bit last posting this, but at least there's a healthy number of titles on this month's list. As you'll see, most of them are library books, so maybe that's what has got me out of the cycle of short posts!

In case you're interested, here are my posts for the rest of the year: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October

Silverweed Road by Simon Crook (2022)

The first book on this list should really have been on last month’s, as it was one of my Halloween books. I didn’t quite finish it before I posted my October list, so I’ve included it on November’s instead. I got a copy of Silverweed Road as soon as it came out, because it looked like it would be a proper Halloween read. And it was! Although it’s a novel, it’s got the feel of an anthology horror film. Each chapter is a self-contained story, and each one is about a household on the eponymous cul-de-sac. The framing narrative is a blog written by a former police officer, recounting the mysterious occurrences on the road, as well as his failure to solve them. The reason why the book works so well is that each of the twelve chapters is a different kind of story, employing different horror tropes – this is what creates the anthology horror feel. So, we start off with a classic ‘don’t mess with jackdaws’ suburban horror, but elsewhere there’s some folk horror, a few ghosts, a very Tales of the Unexpected-esque story about a disreputable antiques dealer, a Faustian deal, a house that defies explanation, and so on. The novel draws on a lot of inspirations (some clearly stated, others more implicit), so it’s a fun read for genre fans. Ultimately, there is an explanation given, and I would probably have preferred a more open ending, but other than that, this one was perfect for the season!

The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North (2014)

The next book on this month’s list was a library book. I read another book by Claire North this year (84K), and I really enjoyed it, so I had high hopes for this one. But I was also a bit trepidatious. It was clear that The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August shares a premise with Life After Life by Kate Atkinson, a book that I absolutely love. That premise is that the protagonist lives the same life over and over again – i.e. when they die, they immediately return to the time and place of their birth. Given how much I like Atkinson’s novel, I was worried North’s might not measure up. But I needn’t have worried… the two books (for all their shared premise) are very different. Atkinson’s novel is a character study, with its protagonist being an unexplained oddity who never quite gets to grips with her unusual version of immortality. North’s novel, on the other hand, is an adventure story. Harry August is not the only immortal person (called kalachakra or ouroboreans) in this world. There are clubs full of them, and (unlike Atkinson’s protagonist) they generally carry memories of previous incarnations through their subsequent lives. When Harry gets a message from the future (the mechanics of this make sense – don’t worry!) that the world is ending, he’s drawn into a plot to wipe out the kalachakra, which throws him into the path of someone that will become his nemesis for many lifetimes. I loved this book!

Jasmyn by Alex Bell (2009)

And another library book now (this is very much the theme of this year, isn’t it?) Jasmyn is a bit of an unexpected read. As the foreword warns, it really doesn’t develop in the direction you might be expecting. The eponymous Jasmyn is a young widow. Her husband Liam has died of an aneurysm, and when we first meet her she’s lost in the rawness of grief. However, some strange things have started to happen. The bodies of five black swans fall on Liam’s coffin at his funeral, and before long a strange (and rather threatening) man turns up at Jasmyn’s door. And that’s not to mention the unexplained feud between Liam and his brother Ben, which no one around Jasmyn wants to talk about. The book begins with hints of something potentially supernatural surrounding Liam’s life and death, and I guess that is what transpires. But the sort of ‘supernatural’ here isn’t quite what I was expecting. When the blurb says it’s a ‘magical story’, that really is what you get from Jasmyn. Without giving too many spoilers, this is a book where magic and fairy tale intrude into the contemporary ‘real’ world. Bell works a fine balance between the fantastic and the realistic – we’re supposed to believe in Jasmyn as a person who exists in our world, but we’re also asked to accept the existence of folkloric and fairy tale creatures. On the whole, this works really well, and the result is a compelling and quite charming tale.

The Dinner Guest by B.P. Walter (2021)

The next book – you guessed it – was another library book. This one was a bit more of straightforward domestic thriller, which is a genre I have very mixed feelings about! Charlie is a well-to-do (very well-to-do) Instagram influencer, who is married to Matthew and has an adopted son called Titus. One night, as they’re eating dinner, a woman who they barely know arrives at their house, stabs Matthew through the heart, calls the police and confesses to the crime. This is where the book starts, by the way – it’s not a spoiler! This premise was intriguing enough for me to put aside my reservations about the genre and give the book a go. Straightaway, I enjoyed the fragmented way the story unfolds. Chapters are told from different perspectives, and they jump back and forth between incidents before and after the murder, sometimes showing the same incident from different points-of-view. It’s quite clear from the start that Rachel (the mysterious dinner guest) might not actually have committed the murder, and it’s also quite clear that the men’s friendship with her might not be quite as it seems (but that’s probably a given for this type of novel!). Admittedly, the characters are incredibly posh, to the point of almost being unrelatable, and some of their motives are a bit hard to believe (some of the ‘reveals’ towards the end are a little difficult to swallow). But ultimately Walters’s storytelling style is interesting and entertaining enough to keep you reading until the end.

The Lie of the Land by Amanda Craig (2017)

And the next book was another library book (as if you needed telling), and a bit of a change of pace. The Lie of the Land is part thriller, part dark comedy, part slice-of-life tale of well-to-do middle class Londoners moving to Devon after losing their well-paid city jobs. Quentin and Lottie are getting divorced as a result of Quentin’s infidelity, but neither of them can afford to buy out the other’s half of their London home. They decide to rent the house out until they can find a buyer, and move to Devon while they wait. Lottie’s son (Quentin’s stepson) Xan gets a job in the local pie factory, and the couple’s two daughters join the local school. Quentin (a journalist) gets a gig writing a regular column about what it’s like moving to the countryside from London, and Lottie (an architect) tries to find work with local firms. The family have moved to an old farm house on the grounds of a manor house owned by world-famous rock musician, Gore Tore, but they soon find out it was the site of a grisly murder not long before they moved in. There’s a lot going on here, and it doesn’t always gel together perfectly. The grislier elements – and the melodramatic resolution of the murder plot – seem to belong to a different novel to the depictions of rural life and musings on the London housing market. It’s well-written, with some interesting elements, but it’s a bit inconsistent in its storytelling.

Things in Jars by Jess Kidd (2019)

And finally… it’s another library book! I picked this one up as I read another novel by Jess Kidd earlier this year, The Hoarder, and I really enjoyed it. I knew Things in Jars was a bit of a different type of story (and not necessarily the sort I usually read), but I liked Kidd’s writing style in The Hoarder, so I was hoping for more of the same. And that’s what I got! The book is set in the Victorian period (mostly in the 1860s, but with some flashbacks to the 1840s). Bridie Devine is an unconventional investigator, part consulting detective (working with Scotland Yard in an almost Holmesian way) and part forensic scientist (she uses techniques she learnt while apprenticed to a surgeon as a child). She is accompanied on her pursuits by a ghost of a boxer who she picks up in a graveyard one night, and her housekeeper/companion, the seven-foot-tall former circus performer Cora Butter. Bridie ends up on the trail of a missing child, who may well be something out of the ordinary. The novel takes in the grand macabre of Victorian London – sinister circuses, psychopathic surgeons, cabinets of curiosities and resurrectionists – with a stylish mixture of ghoulishness and whimsy. Kidd’s writing keeps things moving at a fair pace, pulling off the impressive feat of being both chilling and charming in equal measure. And some bits are incredibly chilling! (And some incredibly charming!). This one is a real page-turner, and a strong recommendation from me.

My Year in Books 2022: September

So, I didn't read as many books in September as I did in August, but I'm definitely back on track after a couple of months where I struggled to read anything for pleasure. Weirdly, everything I read this month was from the local library (despite me having far too many unread books of my own). I don't know if that's what's got me out of my slump this time. Whatever it is, I've read some good stuff this month (as well as a couple of less good things!).

In case you're curious, here are my posts from the rest of the year so far: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August

The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing by Mary Paulson-Ellis (2019)

Another library book to start this month. As is a bit of a habit, I only skim-read the blurb first. I knew it was about a man called Solomon Farthing who makes a living tracking down inheritances, and that a WWI soldier would be a significant part of the plot. Haha… I wasn’t prepared for this book at all! And, as usual, I regret nothing! Solomon Farthing is an ‘Heir Hunter’ – he makes a shady living by tracking down long-lost next-of-kin for unclaimed estates (for a ‘finder’s fee’, of course). When he is asked to do a favour for a police officer of his acquaintance, Solomon finds himself tangled up in a mystery that goes back the WWI, and which will touch on his own life in very unexpected ways. The story is told across multiple timelines – Solomon’s ‘present day’ quest in Edinburgh and beyond (set in 2016), the story of a small band of soldiers seeing out the final days of the war in a French farmhouse (in 1918), and others that I won’t spoil here. I was sort of expecting this to be a straightforward mystery with some historical vignettes thrown in, but The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing isn’t like that at all. It’s off-beat and quirky, told with in a vivacious and ‘shaggy dog story’ style that is really quite charming. I loved the character of Solomon Farthing as well – a really memorable creation with a more complex backstory than you might expect. Definitely recommend this one.

84K by Claire North (2018)

The next book I read was another library book. I’d renewed this one a couple of times, and I didn’t want it to go overdue, so I thought I should crack on and read it quickly. Turns out, the library deadline wasn’t really relevant, as I genuinely couldn’t put this one down once I’d started it! I read it in a couple of sittings, because it was just that compelling! 84K is a dystopian tale, set in a near-future (and it’s terrifying how ‘near’ it feels) version of Britain. Privatization has given way to full-scale commodification – towns are sponsored by companies, health and care are run through insurance companies, and all of these companies are owned by other companies that are owned by The Company (who also own the prisons, tax service, etc.). A man who goes by the name of Theo Miller works in the Criminal Audit Office; his job is to assess crimes and work out the ‘indemnity’ due by the perpetrator. If the perpetrator can’t pay the indemnity, they face being sentenced to the ‘patty line’ – indentured labour to pay off the debt to society. This vision of the future is stark and, like all good dystopian fiction, the plot is kicked off by the protagonist realizing (à la Winston Smith) that he can’t be part of this system anymore. However, the storytelling style elevates 84K into a different league. It’s almost hypnotic in its fragmented, lyrical style, but still with a plot that’s an utter page-turner.

Quarter Past Two on a Wednesday Afternoon by Linda Newbery (2013)

Looks like it’s going to be a library-heavy month for me… this next one is also from my local library. Newbery’s novel is Anna and her sister Rose. At a quarter past two on a Wednesday afternoon in August, young Anna leaves the house to go to the shop. When she returns, her older sister Rose has disappeared without a trace. Twenty years later, Anna still doesn’t know what happened to her sister. As she reaches something of a turning point in her life (a relationship getting more serious, a new job offer), Anna begins to wonder if she’ll ever find out the truth. Quarter Past Two moves at a slow pace, but I’m not sure this always works to its advantage. There’s a lot about Anna’s relationship with her (in my opinion) rather unlikable boyfriend and his ex-wife, Ruth. This is interspersed with vignettes from Anna’s relationship with Rose, and from the aftermath of the disappearance. There are also some sections from another character’s perspective, but I’ll leave you to discover for yourself who that character is. In the end, though, the disappearance itself is remarkably easy for Anna to solve and a bit of an anti-climax. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy this one, but I found it difficult to really engage with the characters in any depth. Most of them make decisions and choices that are hard to understand, and their motivations aren’t always convincingly explained. It’s not a bad novel, but it isn’t mind-blowing either.

Little Sister by Gytha Lodge (2022)

It’s library books all the way down this month… I’ve read one of Lodge’s other novels before, She Lies in Wait, and I remember that I quite enjoyed it. I didn’t realize when I started Little Sister that the detective in She Lies in Wait (DCI Jonah Sheens) became a series character for Lodge, and so I was actually jumping back in at book No. 4! This isn’t too much of a problem – and I don’t think it would be a problem if you haven’t read any of the books in the series – as there are plenty of recaps to catch you up on the lives of the detective and his team, and there aren’t any spoilers for the previous three books. In Little Sister, Sheens is confronted by a teenager, Keely Lennox, emerging from the woods near a pub with blood on her hands and clothes. Keely, it transpires, was reported missing from her care home a few days earlier. Her younger sister Nina went missing at the same time, but Keely has turned up alone. As Sheens tries to find out what happened, it becomes clear that Keely is more interested in playing mind games than telling the police what happened to her sister. But as the detectives investigate, a story emerges that’s disturbing in ways you might not expect. I have to admit, I did see most of the ‘twists’ coming with this one, but Lodge is an excellent writer, and Little Sister is a gripping read.

The Man on Hackpen Hill by J.S. Monroe (2021)

Ah… it seems me run of great library books has come to a bit of an end with this next one. This isn’t going to be a strong recommendation, unfortunately. And I think I’m going to have to give a couple of spoilers in order to explain. So, this was another library book, and I did read the blurb this time. The Man on Hackpen Hill is described as a thriller. The story – as hinted in the blurb – is about crop circles. A particularly mysterious example is discovered on the eponymous hill in Wiltshire… but there’s a body in its centre. Some of the (generally very short) chapters are from the perspective of DI Silas Hart, who has responsibility for investigating the murder, and then investigating two subsequent crop circles/murders. Other chapters are told from the perspectives of Jim – a young man who works at Porton Down, who believes he can reveal the truth about the crop circles – and Bella – a young woman who has just started working at a newspaper after finishing university. Now, here comes the spoiler: this book isn’t really about crop circles and secret experiments at Porton Down. The big reveal is that this is a story about mental illness and, specifically, psychosis and antipsychotics. And it’s one of the most egregious depictions of psychosis I’ve read in a long time. Not only is the presentation of schizophrenia and its treatment utterly unrealistic, the idea of psychotic delusions is romanticized to an extent that’s almost distasteful.

The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce (2017)

Even though I didn’t really enjoy the last one, it’s another library book next! I’ve read (and enjoyed) two of Rachel Joyce’s other books – Perfect (the first one I read) and The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry (her debut novel and her most famous one) – so I had an idea of what I might be getting with The Music Shop. What I loved about the other two novels was the way Joyce combined an off-beat tale of eccentric and flawed, but ultimately hopeful, characters with a harder core, exploring themes of mental illness, grief and lost time. The Music Shop has a lot of this too. The story begins in 1988, in the music shop of vinyl-loving Frank. Frank is a typical Rachel Joyce character: an eccentric oddball with a sad backstory but a strong connection to other people, or rather to other people’s stories. Frank’s world is disrupted by Ilse Brauchmann, an enigmatic woman who faints outside his shop one day. In many ways, though, Frank and Ilse’s scenes are stolen by the setting and the glorious supporting cast of characters. Frank’s shop is on a vividly-evoked near-abandoned street (Unity Street) in a run-down city, alongside an undertaker, a tattoo parlour and a religious gift shop. Although there’s a cruel blow at the end of the book’s first half, The Music Shop doesn’t quite have the punch of Perfect or Harold Fry. But it’s still a moving, funny and compelling story, and the ending made me cry a little.