AlisonY - Still Randomly Rambling On in the 2H of 2021

Welcome to my 2H of 2021 reading. It's going to be a time of huge personal change for me on the job front, which feels fearful yet very welcome. Onwards and upwards! I'm hoping to bump into the old me again at some point later this year - it's been a hard 6 years in my current role.

On the reading front I have no plans beyond going where the winds take me. I have a few books waiting to be read on my shelf at home, and look forward to meandering into different authors and genres as the notion takes me. In the last few years I've been reading more and more non-fiction (c. 60/40 F/NF), which often gets inspired by reviews on CR or historical events that some fiction books are centred around, so I'd like to keep that up as much as possible.

2021 Reading Track

January
1. Life Under Fire by Jason Fox - read (3.5 stars)
2. Trick of the Light by Jill Dawson - read (3.5 stars)
3. All That Remains: A Life in Death by Sue Black - read (4.5 stars)
4. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel - read (4.5 stars)

February
5. Hunger by Knut Hansum - read (3.5 stars)
6. The Salt Path by Raynor Winn - read (4 stars)

March
7. Running for the Hills by Horatio Claire - read (4 stars)
8. Bring up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel - read (5 stars)
9. The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell - read (4 stars)
10. Touching the Void by Joe Simpson - read (5 stars)
11. The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco - read (4 stars)

April
12. A Summons to Memphis by Peter Taylor - read (2.5 stars)
13. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey - read (4.5 stars)
14. The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace by Jeff Hobbs - read (3.5 stars)

May
15. The Mirror and the Light by Hilary Mantel - read (4.5 stars)
16. Yang Sheng: The Chinese Art of Self-Healing by Katie Brindle - read (4 stars)

June
17. The Wedding by Dorothy West - read (3 stars)
18. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston - read (4 stars)
19. The End of the World is a Cul de Sac by Louise Kennedy - read (3 stars)
20. Mr Mac and Me by Esther Freud - read (3.5 stars)

July
21. Amo, Amas, Amat and All That by Harry Mount - read (3.5 stars)
22. Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell - read (3.5 stars)
23. Your Best Year Ever: A Five Step Plan for Achieving Your Most Important Goals by Michael Hyatt - read (3.5 stars)

August
24. The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee - read (4 stars)
25. This Game of Ghosts by Joe Simpson - read (4.5 stars)
26. The Corner That Held Them by Sylvia Townsend Warner - read (3.5 stars)
27. More Than a Woman by Caitlin Moran - read (4.5 stars)
28. 84 Charing Cross Road/The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street by Helen Hanff - read (4.5 stars)

September
29. Reading in the Dark by Seamus Deane - read (4 stars)
30. Childhood, Youth, Dependency by Tove Ditlevsen - read (4.5 stars)
31. Lean, Fall, Stand by Jon McGregor - read (4 stars)
32. The Maiden Dinosaur by Janet McNeill - read (4.5 stars)
33. The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between by Hisham Matar - read (4 stars)
34. The Narrow Land by Christine Dwyer Hickey - read (4.5 stars)
35. The Standing Chandelier by Lionel Shriver - read (4 stars)

October
36. Goodbye to All That by Robert Graves - read (4 stars)
37. The Island by Ana Maria Matute - read (3 stars)
38. The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe - read (4 stars)
39. Quartet in Autumn by Barbara Pym - read (4 stars)
40. The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch - read (4.5 stars)

November
41. Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead - read (4 stars)
42. Bitter Orange by Claire Fuller - read (3.5 stars)
43. Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam - read (4 stars)

December
44. Jamaica Inn by Daphne du Maurier - read (3.5 stars)
45. Close Range by Annie Proulx - read (3 stars)
46. Outline by Rachel Cusk - read (3.5 stars)
47. Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor - read (4.5 stars)
48. Light on Life by B.K.S. Iyengar - read (2 stars)
49. On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin - read (4.5 stars)
50. Older and Wider by Jenny Eclair - read (3 stars)

currently reading

Non-fiction / memoir: 20
Fiction: 30

Up next:



Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell

Really keeping my fingers crossed that the perfect new job comes your way Alison. The process isn't fun or easy on the whole, but the outcome will be good. Imagine what you want it to be, and you will draw it to you.

>4 Caroline_McElwee: Thanks Caroline. Glad I'm still able to keep up a steady reading pace despite the busyness at the moment.

>5 AlisonY: I think it's great that you are reading such great books at such a good pace while dealing with life stress. My reading tends to become drop in both quality and quantity when I'm stressed.

I started off the year reading a lot of nonfiction, but then became engrossed in several novels in a row. I currently stand at 30% nonfiction.

Good luck with the job hunting. I'm in the same boat, I left my job of (almost) 6 years without another job lined up as I'm hoping for a career change. Both exiting and terrifying!

My reading is all over the place - I'm "currently reading" six books - so I admire your steadfastness.

>6 labfs39: I usually fall off on my reading when life is stressful too, so I'm pleased I've been slowly keeping at it. I won't break any reading records this year, mind you.

>7 rhian_of_oz: Hey job hunting buddy! Best of luck with the career change - that does sound exciting. Have you a firm idea of what you'd like to move into? I need financial stability at the moment so I'm tied to keeping within the same functional role but I'm keeping my eye out for a new industry opportunity.

I think a lot of people in CR juggle a few different books at the same time, but I would definitely end up adrift in my reading if I attempted that.

>8 AlisonY: I used to have a fiction and a nonfiction work going at the same time, but for the last year or so, I find I can only focus on one at a time. These days I also try to write the review right away, before I start the next book, or I lose momentum.

>8 AlisonY: I want to move into data analytics. I have the soft skills required but am missing the technical experience so I'm splitting my days between looking for/applying for jobs, and online study.

I wanted to do this 7 years ago when I was made redundant but the circumstances weren't right so I absolutely sympathise where you are at the moment.

>9 labfs39: I'm exactly the same but it seems to work for me.

>10 rhian_of_oz: Best of luck with it. I'm currently working in the tech sector and know that there are huge opportunities within the data analytics field.

Yeah, it sucks that the money trap so often influences whether we can follow our dreams / passions or not. I'm convinced you need several lives to be able to pursue many different careers (and of course to read so many more books!).

I love the Eliot quote, Alison. Happy new thread. Hamnet was one of my favorite books of last year. I'll watch for your comments.

And, again, good luck with the job hunt.

>12 BLBera: Thanks Beth. I still can't believe I've not read any Eliot yet - must address that soon!

Back at Amo, Amas, Amat and All That - the geek part of me was interested in the refresher, but having read your review, I suspect I would have the same reaction to that suppressed teenaged boy as you did, and would chuck the book quickly.

Happy New Thread

Good luck on the job hunt! And, glad you are still reading. I rely on your reviews!

I hope you enjoy Hamnet as much as I did, it was hands down my favourite book last year.

I am totally out of the loop, as you know, but I wish you the best in your job search.

>14 SassyLassy: Yeah, less is more is the phrase that comes to mind. I get that he wanted to make it refreshingly modern, but it was too much at times. I also felt that by trying to be funny / smart with many of his examples the translations were too difficult to be a 'refresher'.

>15 VivienneR:, >16 sallypursell: Thanks. Nerves are starting to set in a little, but hopefully all will fall into place.

22. Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell

Hamnet. Hmm. Long awaited, much anticipated, not what I expected.

This novel took me a long time to get into it, and to be honest were it not the book talk of the town last year I'd probably have abandoned it. The stilted prose style felt suffocating somehow, unduly dense.

A hundred odd pages in I finally got into my stride with it, but then the child Hamnet dies and it became simply the saddest, most upsetting thing to read about it, and I found myself getting cross that O'Farrell was getting her literary creative juices flowing by ripping the reader's heart out with what can only be one of the most upsetting contexts of grief, that of a mother losing her child. I enjoy a bit of misery lit probably more than the average person, but this was too much, even for me. I thought of how many of my CR pals had said they'd felt emotionally manipulated by A Little Life, which I didn't get at all from that book, but boy I got it in spades from Hamnet. It was the book equivalent of rubber-necking at the most terrible car crash, and by the end I felt like the whole point of the novel was simply to sell us some cheap seats to the most upsetting of shows.

I get why others liked it, but I was surprised at how this particular portrait of grief rubbed me up the wrong way. Most likely it's because it was based on the death of an 11 year old child, and with one of my own children that exact age it just wasn't something I enjoyed immersing myself in.

Also, as little seems to be known about Anne Hathaway, O'Farrell also seemed to take huge historical licence with her interpretation of her marriage to Shakespeare and her life in general, and whilst I'm happy with the necessary padding that comes with historical padding, this novel seemed to go a step further.

3.5 stars - a tale well told once I got used to the narrative style, but it pushed my buttons in the wrong way.

>18 AlisonY: I haven't been eager to jump on the Hamnet bandwagon for some reason, and your review solidifies my hesitancy. Not my cuppa.

Thanks for your balanced and very good review of Hamnet, Alison. I bought a copy of it after reading numerous glowing reviews of it, but I haven't picked it up yet. I have plenty of books that I'm much more eager to read, so it will stay in my bookcase for the time being.

(note I am a huge fan of 0'Farrell, which may color my opion) The author books often tell of some kind of loss,and she wrote a memior I am I am I am, which is about her own daughter who has significant health issues. Im not sure shes trying to manipulate anything, I do think she used the real story of his death to bring the parents together I like the idea that Shakespear wrote Hamlet for his son

That being said, having a child of that age I can see why it would rub you the wrong way and if I had a child i am not sure Id read it.

as far as Anne Hathaway since there is no record, she invented a story that made sense to her. Its historic fiction, not real. Authors like Sharon Kay Penman and Hilary Mantel know how to fill in the spaces, by using what the history tells them. i had no problem with that characterization at all I will say she has written better, but this is the first time I've seen her go into the whelm of Historic Fiction. and would be interested to see what she does next. However you many not want to read her anymore. And I do think your review does give us pause.

>19 labfs39:, >20 kidzdoc: I never wish to put anyone off a book, and know that I'm probably in the minority with my thoughts on this one. I didn't hate it, but I'd struggle to recommend it to anyone.

>21 cindydavid4: I definitely can see why people liked it, but for me it just dwelled on something that was so heartbreaking as a parent that it made me quite miserable reading about Agnes' grief.

Up next:



The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee

>23 AlisonY: I'm not sure this is going to be a more uplifting book than your last, Alison. I look forward to your review, as Emperor of Maladies has been sitting on my shelf for years while I wait for the mood to strike.

>24 labfs39: Ha - yes, the very same thought did occur to me. However, so far I'm enjoying the writing style. I've also had it on my shelf for a while and keep thinking I'm not in the right mood, but I decided to take the plunge this morning on my day off.

>18 AlisonY: I had trouble with the first half of Hamnet, also in a button-pushing sort of way, but thought the novel got better in its second half. I wouldn't say the book lives up to its hype. In the end I was glad to have read it, but I wouldn't go out of my way to recommend it to anyone.

>22 AlisonY: I totally get it, really. hope your next read is better......tho, um.....

>26 rocketjk: I agree the second half was better, but it just made me too miserable.

>27 cindydavid4: Well, we'll see!

Despite its grim topic The Emperor of Maladies is more or less a feel good story, as it focuses on the success of the treatment of childhood leukemias. When I was a child ALL, acute lymphocytic leukemia, would have been a death sentence, but now the 5 year survival rate is approximately 90% in all cases, and higher for kids 1-10 years of age who have favorable markers in their leukemic cells. A dear friend of mine, a nurse who I worked with until recently, has a young daughter who was diagnosed with ALL just over a year ago. She had a very rough year, but her prognosis remains excellent, and she is doing well.

I loved The Emperor of All Maladies, and I enjoyed Dr Mukherjee's subsequent book The Gene: An Intimate History nearly as much.

>29 kidzdoc: Thanks, Darryl. I agree - so far I'm not finding it a depressing tale at all. It's fascinating to learn about just how far cancer treatment has come. Last night I read about how patients with breast cancer were severely butchered at one point, with their clavicle and pectoralis major removed in addition to the breast. Patients truly were human guinea pigs, with consent not even a notion.

>30 AlisonY: Right, Alison. I'm proud to say that Dr Bernard Fisher, an alumnus of and a professor of surgery at my medical school, the University of Pittsburgh, was key in combatting the dogma that radical mastectomy was required to cure breast cancer patients, and instead using lumpectomies for localized tumors. He was roundly criticized and vilified by the medical community, and when I was in medical school from 1993-97 he was accused of fraud, after a statistician from Montreal who worked with him was found to have falsified data, and his shining star was severely tarnished. Fortunately he was found to be innocent of misconduct in 1997, his findings were revalidated, and his good name was restored, although the University of Pittsburgh had to publicly apologize to him. Dr Fisher taught into his 90s, and died two years ago, at the age of 101.

The PBS series Cancer: The Emperor of All Maladies discussed Dr Fisher, which is shown in this short video segment about him (he grew up in the city, and he has a discernible Pittsburgh accent!). I think the book discusses him, but it's been quite a while since I've read it and I'm not completely sure.

>31 kidzdoc: That's really interesting. Cancer surgical innovation must have been a particularly difficult area to work in, with plenty of grey areas in the statistics (mind you, probably still is). Certainly the piece I most recently read spoke of this, with some early pioneers patting themselves on the back for close in improvements in mortality rates, when in reality people were still mostly succumbing several months down the line after surgery.

Lies, damned lies and statistics... The flawed data that hugely exaggerated the breast cancer risk for women on HRT is another medical data minefield that springs to mind.

>32 AlisonY: Yes, I think it's fair to say that surgical management of cancer is still an evolutionary process. My father was diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer last year, and 10 years ago he would have probably undergone a radical prostatectomy; now, though, he is being managed with hormone therapy, as that will keep the cancer in check. Due to his advanced age (86) and other health problems it is unlikely that it will be the cause of his death.

One major problem with advances in medicine throughout history is the dogma associated with pioneering physicians, and the associated egos of those physicians and those who unquestionably follow their tenets. Medicine is a very conservative profession, and surgery especially so, and surgeons, as I'm sure you're aware, tend to be arrogant and difficult to convince, even in the face of data such as Bernie Fisher submitted in support of his position. We all tend to practice medicine based on our personal experiences, especially if we've been in the field for a number of years (I'll celebrate my 21st anniversary as a pediatric hospitalist in two weeks). Younger practitioners tend to look toward their older colleagues and partners for advice on how to manage challenging cases, and we older docs tend to practice the way we were trained in residency. That's why continuing medical education is so important, so that we all stay abreast of the latest studies and recommendations and practice up to date, evidence based medicine. This process was hyperaccelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic, as my partners and I spent dozens and possibly hundreds of hours reading journal articles and listening to lectures about the management of COVID-19 and MIS-C, multisystem inflammatory syndrome of childhood, which is known as PIMS (paediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome) in the UK. My partners and I are now comfortable managing those patients, but that doesn't mean that we should stop learning or that we'll practice exactly the same way this time next year.

Lies, damned lies and statistics... The flawed data that hugely exaggerated the breast cancer risk for women on HRT is another medical data minefield that springs to mind.

Yes. I'm not as familiar with this controversy, as it's obviously out of my scope of practice, but it's a great example of why we have to remain vigilant and open minded, and continuously question data and the way we practice medicine.

Apologies; I seem to be very wordy this morning...

Edited to correct several grammatical errors.

>33 kidzdoc: Not at all - I find it hugely interesting. We all obviously have a patient view of medicine, but it's very interesting to get perspective from the clinician POV.

I'm one who did love Hamnet, Alison. I thought the portrayal of grief was beautiful. However, if I had a child that age, I can see how disquieting it must be.

I don't know if Id say beautiful, but very very realistic. Both parents finding their own way of grieving. Reminded me of Joan Didions non fiction the year of magical thinking when she lost her husband and daughter. So realistic that it feels like a punch in the gut or a stab in the heart. Think its a rare person who didn't feel that when reading it

>33 kidzdoc: Interesting commentary to me too, Darryl, and I really want to read the book—I think in advance of any major changes in my husband's cancer status (there are a few areas to keep an eye on but nothing considered a full-blown recurrence) and also since it looks like he's changing hospitals—his oncologist just got nudged out of her practice seeing patients, not sure what's going on there but I've disliked the system he's in for the entire four years he's been there and I'm very happy he's talking about changing.

One totally OT thing that fascinates me about Mukherjee is that he's married to artist Sarah Sze. Which has nothing to do with his medical practice, but I love the idea of artists and scientists in relationship/conversation. and they're two standouts in their respective disciplines, in my opinion.

Still interested in reading Hamnet, but all the thoughts here are interesting.

>36 cindydavid4: Lisa, I didn't know that! Keeping both of you in my thoughts....

>35 BLBera:, >36 cindydavid4: Yes, I think it was because it was a child that I found it so upsetting; the part that dwelled on her with the child's body for so long just was too much for me. It felt laboured on gratuitously.

>37 lisapeet: From what I've read so far I wouldn't be nervous to read it whilst dealing with cancer in the family, but I'm only about a quarter of the way through and I'm at the historical stage rather than the present, so I'll let you know.

Greetings! Just a quick hello and an fyi that I've finally read Their Eyes Were Watching God and that my short review is posted on my CR thread. All the best.

>38 cindydavid4: Thanks, Cindy.

>39 AlisonY: I wasn't thinking about not wanting to read the book while dealing with a cancer recurrence so much as being better informed in advance of switching care providers. At this point I'm kind of in the bring it frame of mind when it comes to reading.

>22 AlisonY: We read Hamnet for my RL book club recently. It was one of the very few books in over 20 years where everyone agreed that they loved the book. I thought that I would worry about lack of historical accuracy when so little was known about about Shakespeare’s wife, but it really didn’t seem to matter.

I think the fact that the background, where and when it was taking place, was very accurate, as well as the plague itself. And the events that took place, while not historical, were certainly realistic given the time, and human nature not changing a lot in 500 years. (thinking in particular William and Agness meeting and going from there)

>41 lisapeet: I'm about halfway through, Lisa (got terribly distracted by rare good summer weather!), and have got to the mid 1980s. Nothing startling in terms of what you're referring to, other than historically it seems to have been the luck of the draw in terms of which oncologist you end up with as they all have their own ideas. Not sure how much that has changed these days - I'll let you know by the end of the book.

>42 SandDune: I definitely seem to be a bit of an outlier on my thoughts on Hamnet. Even if I put to the side my annoyances with labouring the child's death, it's not a book that's stuck with me particularly. Guess that's what makes our discussions interesting - it would be a dull place if we all had the same reaction to every book!

>43 cindydavid4: I get where you're coming from on that point, Cindy. It probably resonates more when here we are living our own modern day epidemic.

23. Your Best Year Ever: A Five Step Plan for Achieving Your Most Important Goals by Michael Hyatt

The minister at my local church is an incredibly kind and thoughtful chap, and knowing that I'm going through a big work transition at the moment he contacted me last week to ask if I wanted a loan of this book which he'd found quite helpful.

I have a consistent mental pattern with self-help books: I start off super engaged for the first 2, maybe 3 chapters, and then my enthusiasm falls off a cliff. There's always something nagging me at the back of my head that the writers of these books are laughing all the way to the bank on the back of peddling some mysterious black art that's actually stuff we generally know already but which feeds our common weaknesses. A few choice lines in this book certainly didn't challenge that train of thought for me (Hyatt taking all his staff and partners on a Caribbean cruise in celebration of goals achieved, and his personal assistant doing things that he's clearly too important and busy to have the time to do, like phone up and make a restaurant reservation for date night with his wife).

In a nutshell, this book is about identifying your habit and achievement goals, zoning in on your motivations to keep them, identifying actions on how you're going to meet your goals, regularly reviewing progress and celebrating achievements. Anything mind blowing for anyone there? No, me neither. It is useful to a degree if you need a kick up the backside to do some of this stuff. Perhaps my biggest realisation on the back of reading this is that I've not really had any personal goals for a long while as I've been focused for too long on the goals of my company and my family, so if nothing else it was worth reading to get a prod on that.

For sure there are some useful techniques and takeaways from this book, but I'm not entirely sure I want to be one of those laser-focused Alphas who runs their life like a military operation. I can see why guys like Hyatt and CEOs of multi-million pound businesses love all this stuff, but I'm mostly OK with where I am right now.

3.5 stars - an interesting enough read and a good prompter if you're into this sort of book, but nothing earth shattering in terms of methodologies.

>45 AlisonY: My experience with self-help books is much the same as yours - initial interest that falls away. Your rating was quite generous.

the only self help book that did me any good was the first one to make a splash: Im Ok, You're OK. Read it in college, during a particularly low point in my life. The book explained a lot to me, how I was, how my parents were, and how that all made a difference. Reread it a couple of times as an adult and still rang true, but have no idea how it would fly today. Also read Staying OK which is more about how to use the ideas sto deal with trama and PTSD. (I think these books were the start of TA transcedal analysis. Had lots of disagreements with how people interpreted that but still think the book itself was sound)

The only self help book that has been of any use to me was Cooking in a Bedsitter by Katherine Whitehorn

>45 AlisonY: Great, helpful comments, Alison. My experience with self-help books mirrors yours. I also think that the ones I've picked up have reflected changes I'm already going through, so much of what is in them seems obvious or stuff I've already thought about. Still, if one can gain one insight, it's not time wasted.

>46 VivienneR:, >48 cindydavid4:, >49 baswood:, >50 BLBera: Thanks for stopping by. Funny we generally seem to get the same out of self-help books (i.e. very little) yet there's a multi-million pound industry on the back of them. Probably the same as the gym effect - that first chapter or two of enthusiasm is like the gusto one finds in gyms around the world in January.

Oh, and by way of aside on these guys and gals who write this stuff laughing all the way to the bank, I recently went on a freebie webinar run by an English life coach who specialises in career transitions. Clever psychological (brainwashing) stuff - that dream job really is obtainable and you only need to work 4 hours a day, etc. etc. And then the classic ending - 'If I was to price up everything you'll get in my one-of-a-kind course it would come to over £10,000. Yes, £10,000. But you can have this for the special price of..... £4,500. If you order within the next 2 days....' Oh, and he'd prize 'giveaways' too. Only a few, mind you, so I was quite chuffed to win one - a £300 voucher to use with his company. I thought that might buy me a brand new job, but no - I'd have to put £100 towards it to buy the cheapest session available (probably 10 minutes whilst he's waiting to pick his kids up from school).

The webinar was filmed in his house which looked pretty nice, so I guess there are enough schmucks out there willing to pay this kind of money to finance his lifestyle.

24. The Emperor of all Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee

Depending on where you live, if you're in the western world chances are you're looking at a pretty high chance of getting cancer in your lifetime. In the UK it's now 1 in 2, and my nearest geographical neighbour - Ireland - has the third highest rate of cancer per 100,000 people in the world (behind Australia at #1 and NZ at #2). We all know people who have survived it and people who have died from it, and sadly that's often just within our own immediate families. In my own family I've had it and my father currently has it, so given that there's no getting away from it I was interested in learning more about it, and this Pulitzer prizewinner from 2011 seemed as good a place to start as any.

It does what it says on the tin, taking us from the earliest known examples of cancer (breast) in BC times to savage surgery in the 1800s, the first use of radiation in the early 1900s, the introduction of the first chemotherapy in the 1940s (nitrogen mustard) and the critical discovery of the first identified oncogene in the 1980s and pursuant biological and clinical strategies in the fight against the disease.

Mukherjee is thorough in relaying this history to us. Although some patient stories are included that area was a lighter touch than expected, but in retrospect I appreciate that. This book is not an emotive, personal account of cancer (although it's clear that patients are front and centre in Mukherjee's mind during his day job as an oncologist) but rather a biological and clinical focus (with the emphasis on the former). It's a complicated subject area, and although a book for the layman Mukherjee doesn't overly dumb it down so some chapters are harder going than others. Overall, however, it was a hugely informative read, and my big takeaway was a much better understanding of the complexity of the cancer war, with not only stark differences between cancer types but also hugely different personal cell mutations even within the same cancer type.

Given that there are so many different types of cancer, this book concentrates especially on leukaemia, breast cancer and lung cancer, where perhaps there have been most marked changes in survival rates over time.

Would I recommend this if you're currently dealing with cancer, either personally or with a close family member? I'm not sure. It's not a depressing read and mostly is a chronological account of development in surgical and biological advancements, but there is the odd line here and there that's pretty sobering. This isn't a book like Atul Gawande's Being Mortal - I don't think there's anything in here that would hugely influence any decisions you'd make around treatment.

Not being from a medical background this book did raise a number of questions in my head. There seemed to be quite a chasm of missed opportunity between biologists and clinicians at various points in this history of cancer, and I wonder if this is still true today (sadly I expect it is). Also, given the advancements that were made in treatment at the cost of early patients' lives, I wonder in this modern day of medical governance and ethics just how free today's oncologists are to try out new ideas with patients, or if the fear of litigation hampers that.

My main gripe with the book was that it's very much an American biography of cancer. Yes, Mukherjee touches on advancements from other countries when it's relevant to the narrative in the States, but it's definitely very much an American political, biological and clinical journey of cancer.

All in all a dense but interesting read. Sorry to be the one to deliver a spoiler, but it appears that the notion of a magic bullet for cancer is the stuff of fairytales, and the best we can hope for are personal therapies that adjust throughout our lifetimes as personal cancer mutations change trajectory.

4 stars - a fascinating journey through what is indeed the emperor of all maladies.

Up next:



This Game of Ghosts by Joe Simpson

>52 AlisonY: Thank you for the review of Emperor of Maladies. It's been on my shelf for a long time. Based on your comments, I think I will hold off on reading it for now, but keep it teetering in the pile.

>53 AlisonY: I'll be curious to read your opinion of Simpson's book. Opinion seems to be divided on this one.

>54 labfs39: I think you have to know it's an OK time to pick up this book. Much of it is totally fine as it's historical, but as he comes more up to date there are some areas that could be very affecting for people depending on their circumstances.

>54 labfs39: I'm not far in but I think I can understand the mixed reactions. I'm trying to settle myself to it not being a competing book with his experience in Touching the Void.

>52 AlisonY: Edited, as I forgot to add my moan about this book being very much a US journey of cancer.

>53 AlisonY: I'll be watching for your review of Simpson's book.

>57 VivienneR: Nearly done, Vivienne. Loving it.

25. This Game of Ghost by Joe Simpson

After being blown away by Touching the Void, This Game of Ghosts took me by surprise in that it started with Simpson's account of growing up as an army brat in Malaya and Germany, with boarding school in England during term time. At first it felt a bit disappointing - interesting enough from another writer, perhaps, but not what I'd expected from Simpson. However, he doesn't let the reader down, and it later becomes a useful backdrop to understanding what makes these crazy, risk-taking mountaineers tick. If Simpson's anything to go by, the mountaineers of tomorrow are the primary school kids of today who are already on first name terms with their local accident & emergency staff. You know the kind - a dangerous combination of excess energy and fearless recklessness and several plaster casts down before they're in double figures.

This Game of Ghosts is both a prequel and sequel to Simpson's horrific Andes accident recounted in Touching the Void. The latter was gripping, can't-look-away horror, so it seemed unlikely that any follow up book could hold a candle to it, but in many ways This Game of Ghosts takes the drama up a notch and the reader into utter disbelief. Even the most risk-averse armchair reader could probably cut Simpson some slack for being unfortunate enough to have that dreadful accident in the Andes, but then you learn in This Game of Ghosts that he'd had not one but two major falls before that in the Alps which could have killed him, and incredulously goes back to climbing after the Andes fall and is almost killed in Asia.

This is not just a book of mountain escapades and disasters; it's an unsentimental, self-deprecating introspection of reckless passion, loss and what drives mountaineers to take such enormous risks time and time again. The ghosts in the title refers to the huge number of young friends Simpson loses in the mountains over the years, many of whom beam at the camera in photos included in the book, young twenty-somethings who appear carefree and high on life.

I found this book hugely affecting, in many ways more than Touching the Void simply because Simpson exposes just how huge the risks are for those addicted to serious climbing, no matter how experienced.

4.5 stars - sobering yet utterly riveting. True rubber necking territory. Simpson triumphs once again.

>59 AlisonY: This sounds really good, Alison. Whether I will get to it is another story. I still haven’t read Touching the Void which you had put on my list.

>60 NanaCC: He's a great writer, Colleen. Mountaineers are crazy people, but a little part of me envies their live for the moment attitude.

>59 AlisonY: Sounds fantastic. Onto the list it goes.

>62 labfs39: It certainly worked for me. I'm always a bit nervous about recommending books like this as maybe it's just because the subject interests me.

>63 AlisonY: I have done just enough backpacking and rock climbing, and known just enough mountaineers personally, to make this appealing. Although my experiences are small potatoes, it gives me an appreciation for what true mountaineers do. I lost a classmate in college to a climbing accident, and it was sobering to realize how dangerous it can be even on smallish mountains.

>59 AlisonY: Hmmm... I bet my son would like that. He has a birthday coming up, too—though I'm a bit reluctant to buy him books right now because he has so little time to read. But this might be a good diversion from hospital rounds, who knows.

>64 labfs39: I'm the same, Lisa. I'd never take on the sport knowing the risks, but whilst part of me thinks these guys and gals are mental for doing so, another part of me admires and envies their guts.

Oddly enough, a classmate of mine from school also died climbing when he was around 20, and Touching the Void made me think of him as I was reading it and how tragic it was to lose your life at such a young age.

>65 lisapeet: Has he read Touching the Void already, Lisa? I would start with that if he hasn't, as the second book mentions that accident but doesn't get into it as Simpson assumes you already know about it from the first book.

>66 AlisonY: Ah, good to know. Thanks!

Your prior review made me purchase Touching the Void for Kindle, but I haven't gotten to it yet. And now you are tempting me with the sequel/prequel. So far, only tempting, and I'll try to wait until I read the first one before pursuing it further.

reading into thin air from the Outside article was enough for me. I never had a desire for climbing, think Ill stick with what hiking im able to do.

>68 arubabookwoman: Hopefully I've not over sold it!

>69 cindydavid4: Oh I'm an armchair adventurer really. But I do envy their nerve.

>59 AlisonY: "Even the most risk-averse armchair reader could probably cut Simpson some slack for being unfortunate enough to have that dreadful accident in the Andes, but then you learn in This Game of Ghosts that he'd had not one but two major falls before that in the Alps which could have killed him, and incredulously goes back to climbing after the Andes fall and is almost killed in Asia."

Have you read Between A Rock And A Hard Place (the story of the fellow who cut off his arm)? His story sounds similar in the sense that while the accident he had was freakish he'd had so many close calls (I remember considering him reckless when reading his story) that it was really only a matter of time until something happened.

>71 rhian_of_oz: No, I haven't read that book, but I do remember that story well from the news. I think there's a fair smattering of recklessness to many of the guys and gals who get involved in that stuff.

Hi, stopping by. I am avidly interested in your climbing books, and I think I'm just about ready to read some. But I might have to read The Emperor of All Maladies first. That sounds mesmerizing.

I can't imagine doing the climbing myself. I also am risk-averse, and an armchair athlete only. I seem to have never had the sports gene, and I don't even watch the Olympics.

Your reviews are fine reading, by the way.

>73 sallypursell: Good to see you, Sally! The book on cancer is interesting, but not a quick gallop to get through. It gets bogged down in the science at times, but with your background you'd probably enjoy that.

I'm the same re. the mountaineering books. I'm a wannabe adventurer, but was cautious as a child and have stayed the same as an adult.

26. The Corner That Held Them by Sylvia Townsend Warner

I had such a muddled reaction to this book, and those who commented to me in advance that it is bizarrely paced were spot on. At times I got really into it, and then on the next page I got completely bogged down and more often than not lost the thread of the story.

The story chronicles the lives of nuns at a nunnery over three decades in the fourteenth century. Major potential plot points come and go without a great deal of fuss, to the point that I kept regularly glossing over key sentences and then realising in the next few pages that I'd obviously completely missed something key. Normally I can quite happily read without distraction whilst the TV blares in the background and my family carry out a conversation over the top of my head, but that just didn't work with this book. It requires 100% attention, and I probably didn't get the full experience that I could have done if I'd had the luxury of reading it at a leisurely pace in peace and quiet.

It's a work of genius in many ways, yet at times it required stamina to keep my attention with it so veered into slog territory. It's probably the most lost I've got in a book's plot in quite some time, and sadly I mean lost as in confused rather than lost in a dreamy happy place. Many passages were quite dense with no particular focus, and I didn't notice I wasn't giving it my full attention until I realised that yet again I'd lost track of who was now prioress and the back-story of the nun currently under discussion.

3.5 stars - a work of beauty in many places, but not a book for snatched bouts of reading, and one that I was quite glad to finish in the end.

Up next:



More Than a Woman by Caitlin Moran

>75 AlisonY: I can totally see how this would be an exhausting book. I think I had the benefit of reading it at a very leisurely pace—it was a book club book and I started really early, and had another book going at the same time. To me it was like drifting past a very strange but often wonderful shoreline in a very slow boat. But yeah, I had to go back often and check to see who was prioress and which nun was which. For whatever reason, that didn't bother me too much.

I can't read (or write) with the TV on in the background or even music most of the time. We have a big enough house that I can go elsewhere if my husband is watching TV without his headphones—he's basically very considerate of me, but he also has a really nice sound system and I'd feel bad if he didn't get to listen to it at least some of the time—but I'm not sure how it would all work if we downsized to a smaller place. I think it would have to be at least a 1-bedroom for that reason alone.

>77 lisapeet: I think I probably should have read it as a second book with something else like you did and in smaller chunks at a time. It definitely required close reading as several times I realised I'd missed something important and had to go back, and I think you have to be in right mood for that kind of book.

27. More Than a Woman by Caitlin Moran

Hitherto I've avoided reading any books by Caitlin Moran. It's not because I don't think they'll be any good - I enjoy her column every Saturday in The Times magazine and most weeks envy her linguistic cleverness and fierce, witty intelligence. No, it's just because she's always come across as a bit annoying. Brilliant, but in that precocious child self-satisfied way. A grown up who never managed to mentally evolve beyond her student days of grungy clothes and getting naked when she gets drunk.

However, if Moran was standing in front of me now I'd look her in the eye and apologise. Well, partly apologise, for I do think she was like the above for a long time, but if this book is to believed she's finally grown up (extreme eyeliner excepted).

As the prime target audience for this book (i.e. a middle-aged woman and mother), this book made me laugh out loud at times but it also touched me really quite deeply in places. For Moran exposes with brutal honesty what it's like to be a middle-aged woman in current times, a world where we spend years utterly exhausted from the juggling of jobs and housework and child rearing and parental caring and realise we need to be 'more than a woman'. We need to be several women.

Your previous problems were all problems with yourself. Young woman problems. But when you enter middle age, you'll know you're middle-aged, because all your problems are... other people's problems.

I kept coming back to that paragraph, as it so neatly sums up what makes this stage in life tough.

Whilst parts of the book are a passionate polemic against the various injustices that women continue to fight against (safe streets, equal pay, etc.), this book is more than a clever feminist manifesto. Yes, Moran is passionate about fighting women's corner, but she's also pretty much up for fighting just about everyone's corner and trying to make the world just a teeny bit better to live in. In one chapter she rails about the issues modern men are dealing with and how expectations on how men should 'be' sadly often leaves them with no one to talk to when the going gets tough. In another deeply sad chapter she talks about dealing with her teenage daughter who has developed a serious eating disorder and made several attempts on her life, and how difficult it is when normal motherly nurturing urges not only cannot bring her around but moreover often makes things worse. Yet interspersed with rallying cries for change and insightful commentaries on the world around us are hilarious witticisms and one-liners that had me chortling away to myself.

Perhaps one of the most refreshing things about Moran is that she's that rare breed of someone who is utterly content in her own skin, neck wattle and all, and that self-contentment makes for what is ultimately a rallying cry of hope and possibility rather than bitterness and reproach.

4.5 stars - honest, insightful, hilarious. All hail being a middle-aged woman.

>79 AlisonY: Glad you liked it Alison, as I recently took a punt on it for a friend, without having read it myself. I have read one of her earlier books for a book group though.

>80 Caroline_McElwee: It was a present from a pal of mine for my birthday, Caroline, and it was a great choice. Hope your chum enjoys it as much as I did.

Up next:



84 Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff

On The Emperor of All Maladies, I read and reviewed this fairly soon after it was published, in 2011. I thought it was excellent. I read the book a year or so after my mum was first diagnosed with cancer, before she was told it was terminal (though she actually lived until October 2016). I liked the style and I actually found it really helpful to have a more informed understanding of what "cancer" is. I can see that this being a very American account is a valid criticism (am in England). I'm not the person who actually had cancer in this case, and I don't assume that everyone would find it as helpful or as relevant to them as it was to me, but I was and still am very glad that I read it when I did.

>83 elkiedee: I agree - I learnt a lot more about the complexities of cancer and why it is so difficult to cure which I found very useful.

The first 3/4 I was pretty confident that anyone could comfortably read, even if they're in the middle of dealing personally with cancer. However, in the last quarter there were the odd lines here and there which felt a little hopeless with regards to treatment of certain types of cancer, and on the basis of those few lines I don't think I'd rush to recommend it to someone who's in a place where holding onto hope is vitally important.

>82 AlisonY: I love that book.

>85 Caroline_McElwee: It's such a joy, Caroline. If only more people were like Helene Hanff. The world would be very jolly.

>82 AlisonY: First time or reread? if first time - have fun - it is one of my favorite books. :) If a reread - well, you know what to expect :)

>87 AnnieMod: First timer. It's such a delight.

Edited to add you've actually got me thinking about how I'm probably one of the few in CR who never re-reads a book. I have total FOMO where unread books are concerned. Perhaps one day when I retire and have more reading time (although I can't see that happening. My family has a thing for constantly having to be busy. Sitting reading during the daytime would be akin on the sloth meter to watching Jerry Springer all day with a bowl of fried food. When we walk past people in cafes my 81 year old Mum's regular comment is What do they do all day? How have they got time to sit there?).

>88 AlisonY: I love your mother’s comment. It made me laugh.

>89 NanaCC: My mum is the worst for it, Colleen. She'll look for housework to do, whereas I'm closer to the other end of the spectrum pm that one.

I didn't used to reread books, with a few yearly reads of special to me books. But there have been so many times on finishing a book, that I just have to reread it. Or stumble upon a book noted here that I forgot all about and decide to reread it with mixed results. Still most of my reads are new reads. And a word of warning - even if you were retired, believe me, I don't always have time to read let alone reread!

>91 cindydavid4: Well that's what I'm thinking. I can't see retirement being restful days doing nothing but reading!

>88 AlisonY: Rereading is always an interesting topic. I rarely reread complete books (unless I am reading a book in a new language or I read the book in my teens and barely remember it). Although I have a few books I revisit often when I feel like I need a known quantity - this one had been on this list since I read it back in 2014.

And your Mum sounds like my grandmother - she could not sit down without having something to do - knitting, wool spinning, whatever - and was always getting up to do something. Although she got used to the idea that reading was something to do (being functionally illiterate, it baffled her for awhile). Her only problem was that her "sitting" activities were often in company while gossiping and that does not work with reading ;)

>90 AlisonY: I'd say it is a Mom's thing but who knows...

>93 AnnieMod: There are probably 20+ books that I'd really like to reread at some point, but who knows if I ever will. If I could just catch up on all the books I've not read yet....!

28. 84 Charing Cross Road/The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street by Helene Hanff

I really was quite spoiled on my birthday a couple of weeks ago, and got books from three different people which was an absolute joy. This one had been on my wish list for ages.

When I think of ways to describe this book words like 'delight' and 'joyful' and 'jolly' are the first that spring to mind. This edition is actually two books, and includes the sequel The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street, but as they're both novellas and barely make a slight novel when sandwiched together I'll consider them as one book.

Helene Hanff, small-time writer of children's books and plays, became something of a quiet sensation amongst book fans after she published 84 Charing Cross Road, an epistolary chronicling her warm and witty correspondence from New York with an employee at Marks & Co. booksellers in London over 20 years from 1949 until his sudden death. Helene's teasing and mischievous prose is utterly charming, a wonderful piece of bygone nostalgia which just wouldn't happen in today's world of technical and professional efficiency.

Having always threatened to visit London and the store, The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street is a diary-style account of when Helene finally gets to visit London in the early 1970s on the back of the success of 84 Charing Cross Road. By then, sadly the book shop has closed, but Helene has a fine old time jaunting around the sights she'd always dreamt of visiting, with outings facilitated by people connected with Marks & Co. and various fans, including the British actress Jean Grenfell. Hanff can't quite believe her luck at what a high time she's having, and as she keeps them all on their toes with her witty commentary it feels a privilege as a reader to get to tag along.

4.5 stars - a refreshing delight from start to finish. We all want to be in Hanff's gang.

Up next:



Reading in the Dark by Seamus Deane

I was down south in Leitrim in the Republic of Ireland for a few days earlier in the month, and visited a small bookshop. I decided that I couldn't possibly buy anything other than something by an Irish author, so this is what I came away with.

>95 AlisonY: I wonder if anyone has ever failed to like that book? It is such a delight.

>97 thorold: It really is. Such a fun read.

I've enjoyed catching up with your thread, Alison, but I'm particularly interested in your comments on More than a Woman. I confess to sharing your (old) views on Caitlin Moran. I have actually read and enjoyed a couple of her books over the years, but just recently I picked up another (old one) in a second hand shop, and as soon as I started it I realised that I just couldn't take any more of this brilliant but slightly tiresome overgrown adolescent. I am delighted to read that you think she has grown up, and I won't hesitate to give her another chance because I do think she has a lot to say that's worth listening to.

As I haven't been around much over the last few months I was unaware you were looking for a new job. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you.

>99 rachbxl: There's still a tinge of the tiresome overgrown adolescent here and there in this book (probably more in the first quarter, although that was also the funniest part of the book in places). However, that aside I felt she mostly had a lot of really interesting commentary to make, and probably because I'm the target audience and in the same stage of life it very much resonated with me. If you buy it I would say stick with it even if you feel the first 30 pages still feel a bit Moran of old, as her topics become a little more serious as she gets into her stride and she handles them accordingly.

And thanks for the job seeking best wishes. I'm spinning a few potential plates at the moment, so hopefully the right one falls into place.

>95 AlisonY: did not know there was a sequel!!! ok, gotta read that! Also i get to reread the first, if I can just find it!!

>95 AlisonY: Great comments on 84 Charing Cross Road, and I think you are right that any reader would find joy in this book. I need to revisit it. And read the sequel.

>101 cindydavid4:, >102 BLBera: I can't imagine how 84 Charing Cross Road stood up as a book on it's own - it's only 90 pages, and most of those are half or 3/4 filled!

I actually enjoyed the sequel of sorts more, as it was such fun being in Helene's shoes as she basks in her new-found success and journeys around London with all sorts of characters.

>95 AlisonY: Nice review :)

>103 AlisonY: As I said in my review a few years ago (https://www.librarything.com/work/18487/reviews/105701391): You do not need 6000 pages to tell a great story. You do not even need 300. :)

>97 thorold: - you’d be surprised. Look at the 2 star reviews on Amazon for example. Some people are just weird.

>95 AlisonY: I've yet to meet someone who isn't smitten Alison.

>104 AnnieMod:, >105 Caroline_McElwee: I think the shine has really gone out of life if you can't find joy in this book.

Huh. I went looking - and apparently there is no ebook edition of 84, Charing Cross Road. Not in the libraries, not on Amazon. So weird. There is one (or more) of the sequel... So I got the Duchess and am going to check the first book out of my library.

I read so many more ebooks than physical books these days...

>107 jjmcgaffey: That is strange, given they have the sequel. Definitely read them in order.

US pals - I have to ask as there's been lots of debate on Trump in CR over the years and I know many of you breathed a sigh of relief when Biden got in. Biden is getting a LOT of negative press in the UK over the Afghanistan situation, and not just in terms of his foreign policy but also in terms of the way he's handled things and come across in the past couple of weeks. The right wing newspapers here are having a field day commenting on his 'I can't cope with this' body language and continue to try to paint him as an old man with poor mental faculties.

How's he being perceived in the States by Democrats right now? I don't want to open up a can of worms on how people's politics lie and whether they agree with the withdrawal or not (please don't go there or I'll really regret asking the question - I don't wish to upset anyone): I'm just interested in how this is all going down on your side of the pond and what the sentiment is on how he's handling this major test of his leadership.

>107 jjmcgaffey: It's kind of fitting that a book celebrating a bookstore isn't in electronic form. I like that!

>95 AlisonY: I love those events when you receive well chosen books from others, often books you would not have selected yourself.

>110 SassyLassy: In this case the book was gifted on the back of my wish list, but the previous book wasn't and was an unexpected delight.

>109 AlisonY: I think that in general people are glad we're getting out of another "forever war." The end was never going to be easy and the fact that Afghanistan fell so quickly after we'd occupied it for two decades shows what a waste of resources and lives it was. 120,000 people have been evacuated since the US told Americans and visa-holders to leave in March, and I think when the smoke clears, history will judge Biden well for his willingness to not go along with the Warhawks and those making money off of the suffering of others. Of course the right wing here has forgotten that Trump negotiated us leaving with the Taliban (and omitted to include the American-installed Afghan government in the negotiations), but we are so polarized as a nation right now that there is nothing Biden can do that the right would praise, just as there was nothing Trump did that the middle and the left could say was fine. I'm sorry that we have exported that polarization to the UK. At least you guys have fewer people who take their polarization to the level of screaming at healthcare workers or physically assaulting teachers.

>112 RidgewayGirl: Thanks Kay - that's interesting to get that perspective from your end. Hard to know what the right or wrong answer is where Afghanistan is concerned.

I'm not quite sure where British heads are on many political things just now. I think everyone's still so preoccupied with COVID we've gone a bit insular.

>112 RidgewayGirl: & >113 AlisonY: I'd say that there are almost as many opinions about this issue among Democrats as there are Democrats. Speaking as one myself, I will offer a couple of counter perspectives to some of Kay's remarks (only one a couple of points: mostly we agree), offered with respect. These are my personal opinions, only:

"the fact that Afghanistan fell so quickly after we'd occupied it for two decades shows what a waste of resources and lives it was."

This might just be semantics, but I don't know if it's accurate to say that the U.S. ever "occupied" Afghanistan. I only comment on this point because I heard a political pundit also use this word on the radio the other day. At the end there were around 2.500 U.S. soldiers, plus a lot of non-government contractors, on the ground there. And that was a draw-down from, what, 12,000 before that? Hardly an occupying force. Even at the height of the U.S. presence there were 140,000 soldiers, so that's a lot, but I don't think of their presence there as being an occupying force in the same way that, say, Nazi Germany occupied France. Again, perhaps semantics, only.

Also, my perception is that the women of Afganistan do not look at the two decades of American presence in the country as a waste of resources. From what I've read and heard in interviews, our presence there (or, perhaps I should say the forced absence of the Taliban) allowed women to make very substantial advances in all sorts of ways that brought significant enhancement in their quality of life. Certainly, whether that was worth American money and lives is an open question. I wonder (and I mean that literally, it's not some sort of rhetoric device; I'm saying I really don't know) how the soldiers felt about fighting to try to rid Afghanistan of the Taliban, and whether they'd say that that period of relief for Afghan women was worth while (or what families of the soldiers who died would say), even though the effort ultimately failed.

That massive numbers of mistakes were made along the way is evident. For example, everything I've read over the past few weeks has made it clear that the idea that we were never going to be able to build an effective Afghan Army of 300,000 soldiers was always a pipe dream. What we did do was create an effective small cadre of specialists who were actually operating quite well within their own designed portfolio. But everyone knowledgeable on the subject that I've heard speak has had nothing but contempt for the idea that "the Afghans wouldn't fight for their own country" as Biden and others have alleged. Afghan soldiers have died by the thousands, and in much larger numbers than U.S. and European soldiers.

"I think when the smoke clears, history will judge Biden well for his willingness to not go along with the Warhawks and those making money off of the suffering of others. Of course the right wing here has forgotten that Trump negotiated us leaving with the Taliban (and omitted to include the American-installed Afghan government in the negotiations), but we are so polarized as a nation right now that there is nothing Biden can do that the right would praise, just as there was nothing Trump did that the middle and the left could say was fine."

Agreed, mostly, as I think it's at least worth considering the possibility that the Afghan people as a whole will henceforth be suffering more rather than less. But, we should remember that Biden was against U.S. involvement in Afghanistan from the beginning, and as VP strongly advised President Obama against the "surge" that brought the numbers of U.S. soldiers up to that 300K level. Biden, as Kay says, was definitely hamstrung by that agreement that the Trump administration made, which basically gave away the farm and also cut the Afghan government entirely out of the process, serving to deligitimize them at a time when they most needed support in that way.

I really look back to the Bush administration, though, who, through their hubris, turned down the Taliban's offer to surrender 20 years ago.

"'The United States is not inclined to negotiate surrenders,' Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld said in a news conference at the time, adding that the Americans had no interest in leaving Mullah Omar to live out his days anywhere in Afghanistan. The United States wanted him captured or dead."

The NYTimes article from which I took that quote is here. There may be a paywall, but a google of "Taliban surrender offer" should bring up something you can read:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/23/world/middleeast/afghanistan-taliban-deal-uni...

Again, possibly pay-walled, but David Patraeus, a fellow with a bit of knowledge on the subject, does have some unkind words for the way Biden has handled the situation, but in a very nuanced manner. Patraeus has given a bunch of interviews, though. One or more ought to be available.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/david-petraeus-on-american-mistakes-in-af...

Finally, journalist Stephen Coll, who has written a couple of books on the U.S. presence in Afghanistan, has some very insightful comments to make. Again, this is from the New Yorker and may have a paywall in front of it, but Coll has also been interviewed quite a bit, and I think there are a couple of youtube videos of talks he's given recently:
https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/how-america-failed-in-afghanistan

So, anyway, obviously, there is no unified point of view among American Democrats. As usual!

But the bottom line, I agree with Kay, is that for the most part folks (including me) are glad to have us wash our hands of this whole mess. Whether we will feel so happy about that 20 years from now, or even 10, is of course unclear. My guess is that people will feel that the Taliban takeover was inevitable, and that it is the Afghans' business to clean up their own country. Of course, the people supplying the Taliban with their weapons take another view of that question. With luck, though, the Taliban will stick to at least some of their promises to rule with a somewhat gentler hand this time. I've got my fingers crossed on that, but I wouldn't make any bets on it. Also, they're being hit by all sorts of international sanctions, and have had a lot of their offshore funding frozen. So we'll see how long they're able to stay dominant.

Sorry to go on at such length. Reading those interviews with Petaeus and Coll have given me a lot to think about. But I certainly don't consider myself any sort of expert. I'm feeling around in the dark just like all my friends here.

>114 rocketjk: Jerry, you are a mine of information as always. I appreciate that. I'm going to go back to some of those links in the morning as it's getting late and I want to digest them properly.

I will add to Jerry's comments; if Bush stayed on task with afghanistan perhaps a standing afghani military would have been a reality. Instead he decides to invade Iraq who had little to nothing to do with terroism, and ended up taking resources and money away from afghanistan. I don't hear many people remembering that, but I sure do.

>116 cindydavid4: Afghan. Afghani is money (the word is the equivalent of "dollar"). We used to correct newcomers and tourists all the time - it really grates on me that now, even ethnic Afghans born in the US call themselves Afghani. Their parents gave up on correcting the entire nation...

I read an article recently (in the SF Chronicle, I think) that was about the fact that the US training was all about teaching Afghans to fight like modern Americans (with all the supplies etc that requires). Unsurprisingly, it pretty much failed. The Afghans are, as a people, really good at fighting - but how they fight - what they've won so many times before - was a guerilla war. Stand-up fighting...not so much. The article said approximately "so we trained them to be Redcoats when we should have been training minutemen...". Those specialist forces that were the only effective ones were also the only ones fighting in more-or-less traditional styles (and there weren't enough of them).

Note that these are the people who held off - defeated, really - both the British Raj in the 1800s and the Russian army in the 1970s and '80s. Both times, by ambush and sniping and raids that secured them better weapons which they used for better ambushes and sniping and raids...

I lived in Afghanistan as a child, from '73 to '76. They are a people I admire, and I'm really pissed about this mess - but it's way too late to complain now. There was never any way Biden could pull out, especially on Trump's timeline, without a disaster; the speed of the Taliban's moves surprised everyone (yes, there was intel that suggested they could. There is _always_ intel that suggests...everything. It's only after the fact that the bits that support what actually happened can be sorted out from the mountain of intel), but it wasn't going to be good ever. Big public timeline was a bad idea...but how else could it be done? I don't know how many troops there were in Afghanistan at the beginning of the pullout - but there were many more non-military Americans (support staff, NGO staff, missionaries (religious and other), weapon sellers, etc.). They needed the timeline - and too many of them left it to the last minute even with the timeline. It looks like only the Taliban were paying attention to the deadline.

I have no idea how this all will shake out. The Taliban are the first major opponent Afghans have had who are Afghans themselves - _they've_ been fighting the sniping war. Maybe they'll take all the tanks etc and mess themselves up so the real Afghans can take the country back - though the problem with that is that the ones best able and willing to fight don't really believe in the country. Remember the "Afghan warlords"? They, many of them, are chiefs of tribes who never really accepted being "Afghans"; the country exists because the Brits drew a line around (basically) "that area we can't win in" and lumped all the tribes there together. Most of the countries in that area are similar - which is why there's all the conflict with the Kurds, for instance. They are one tribe divided by national borders, which they pretty much ignore (when they're allowed to). Maybe "Afghanistan" will collapse into multiple small tribal states. Maybe the tribes will accept some over-ruler (like the king, before he was chased out). Maybe some Taliban leader will become that over-ruler. Maybe a lot more Afghans will leave, again, the way they did in the 80s and 90s, and the various Afghan settlements in the US and Britain and Europe will get an influx of new residents. Maybe all of the above, maybe none - who knows?

>117 jjmcgaffey: oh, thanks for correcting me. Its imporant to be accurate with names, whether for people or countries.

Note that these are the people who held off - defeated, really - both the British Raj in the 1800s and the Russian army in the 1970s and '80s. Both times, by ambush and sniping and raids that secured them better weapons which they used for better ambushes and sniping and raids..

yup. read enough about both of those, saw Charlies War, assumed others did as well. Think once we got Osama, we should have started pulling back, slowly, with time give for people to escape. But the speed which the invasion happened was like lightning. Really people sort of forgot about the country, except for the families of those fighting of course. Now of course everyone is an expert

Wonder what would have happened to both middle east and central asia would have been like if the Brits didn't draw their line in the sand. Maybe just more war between the tribes? Wonder if skipping iraq and focusing on building afghanistan would have been worth it. What it looks like is a waste of money and lives. Those poor people.

Interesting reading over here.

I always wondered what would have happened if Massoud rather than Hekmatya was supported as leader. Massoud was assassinated two days before 9/11, his son is now following in his footsteps as a potential leader.

>114 rocketjk: Thanks for that more nuanced take, Jerry. I agree that the fate of Afghan women is made worse by withdrawing. I don't, however, think that women were ever a real consideration for why we went in or stayed so long, although they were useful for propaganda. Maybe we can channel some of the trillions we're not spending on this war into making opportunities for women and girls around the globe.

>117 jjmcgaffey: How fascinating and wonderful to have lived in Afghanistan.

>116 cindydavid4:, >117 jjmcgaffey:, >118 cindydavid4:, >119 Caroline_McElwee:, >120 RidgewayGirl: Enjoying all the debate on this question. Thanks folks.

>120 RidgewayGirl: "I agree that the fate of Afghan women is made worse by withdrawing. I don't, however, think that women were ever a real consideration for why we went in or stayed so long, although they were useful for propaganda."

I mostly agree with you. But since we often focus in on "collateral damage," I think it's also worthwhile to consider "collateral benefits" to attempt to approach an understanding of the full scope of events. We originally went in to punish terrorists for 9/11. But there were multi-level reasons that we stayed in to take another swing at "nation building." A big part of that was at the impetus of multi-national corporations who wanted to sell their cement, backhoes, helicopter parts and jeep tires. I think we're agreed, there. But I do think that there were also people who thought that "nation building" meant spreading "the American way," which at least partially includes, nowadays, the kind of secular society that improves the lot of women over what the Taliban have to offer, to put it mildly. Certainly, that was what we told the Afghans.

fyi, John Oliver's take-down of the whole U.S. adventure in Afghanistan and, in particular, of the withdrawal (that first aired a week ago Sunday), which in total I feel is sort of a mixed bag of accuracy and ramped up over-the-topness (mostly due to Oliver's ranting tone), includes a short but powerful section on this topic at about the 11:30 mark:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dykZyuWci3g

"Maybe we can channel some of the trillions we're not spending on this war into making opportunities for women and girls around the globe."

As my Russian Jewish grandma would have said, "From your mouth to God's ears." But that's another proposition that, sadly, I'm not making any bets on.

That was all very interesting about Afghanistan. I spent a short time in the country in 1976 when it was relatively peaceful and the hippie trail was flourishing. My impressions were that it is very much a collection of tribes, probably as ungovernable as most map drawn countries. By modern standards (1970's) it was very backward, but there was not the miserable poverty that was so evident in the big towns of Pakistan and India. However much of the country is desert, there was only one paved road through the country linking the towns of Herat, Kandahar, Kabul, and Mazar I Sharif in the north. There was rumoured to be another road through the centre and I travelled on this for a short way before turning back.

The Pashtuns were the ethnic race that controlled much of the local business in Herat and Kabul, and they were encouraged by the Americans, however the problem was that the grouping stretched across the border into Pakistan. It would seem that the porous border with Pakistan has led to all sorts of problems. In my view America and the UK should never have sent troops into Afghanistan the whole idea of taking the "war on terror" as a euphemism for an attempted invasion or a sphere of influence was doomed to failure. When will countries learn that a war launched against an extremist faction in their own country will more often than not only succeed in uniting that country against the aggressor. There comes a time when you have to negotiate with the extremists and America missed that opportunity. In my view, now America and the UK have to be very careful - a drone war will let in Isis or Daech.

Sorry about adding my two pennyworth, but I have good memories of Afghanistan - a proud people with a culture very different from mine, but one of course worthy of respect - instant westernisation was never going to work, but as a couple of you have said the temptation to make money overrides everything.

>120 RidgewayGirl: I'm a Foreign Service brat - lived in four countries (five counting a little while in the US) before I was a teen. Afghanistan was my favorite...but the country I loved hasn't existed for quite a while. A lot of the people that made it such a great place are in the US, and Europe, and elsewhere.

Note: I was 6 when we arrived in Afghanistan and turned 9 a couple months after we left. Just old enough to be paying attention...

>123 baswood: When/where were you in Afghanistan? My dad worked for the embassy in Kabul until spring 1976.

Also, my parents had been Peace Corps volunteers in Farah (far south-west corner - along that theoretically paved road through the center) about 1966. I was conceived there, born in the US.

>120 RidgewayGirl: I'm glad to see someone questioning the rhetoric about the situation of Afghan women on this thread.

And I'm quite dismayed by the use of some of the same stereotypes used to justify 19th century imperialism in Afghanistan and elsewhere, albeit with a more secular vision in place of the Christian missionary rhetoric. Errrrrrrr, warring tribes?

>125 jjmcgaffey: I was there for about four weeks September/October 1976 and again April 1977 (on the journey back from India) I did not visit the American Embassy, but probably knew where it was. Kabul was not a large town.

Yeah, warring (or at least, not unified) tribes. Really. Imagine if the US, instead of taking over the center of the country and pushing all the Native Americans out, had drawn a line around all their territories (which wouldn't have left any space for the US...the Brits had areas they had been able to conquer, around the sides) and said "this is a country". The Sioux and the Navaho and the Apache and the Iroquois and the Cherokee and...all the others - though they were not fighting each other all the time, they were definitely not one people (and there was plenty of fighting between them). Add a thin skin of "dealing with outsiders", from mostly the members of one tribe (the Pashtun, in Afghanistan)...but when that breaks down, the tribes are still living not too differently from how they were in the 1800s, and nearly as independently.

Which does _not_ justify any imperialism - they're doing fine on their own terms, and if the Brits hadn't pushed to conquer they might have been good allies. But as it was, they retreated and held on to old ways stubbornly - and Afghans are champions of stubbornness.

In Kabul in the 1970s, there were definitely tribal areas - not ghettos (in the modern sense), where people are pushed together as they're kept out of others, but by choice. "I will live here, near the people of my tribe, who do things the way I understand and think the way I do". And those were the ones who were willing to leave their traditional lands and go live among strangers and deal with outsiders. There might be a dozen little shops, but if you were from Farah you went to the shop run by the people from Farah, not any of those _other_ ones (my parents were scolded, when they finally found the Farah shop, for going to strangers instead of the people who knew them).

>127 baswood: Ah, OK. So we didn't overlap, and probably wouldn't have encountered each other even if we had. It's always a curiosity for me - and I've found many many people who did encounter my parents, and sometimes even remember them. I think that's fun.

>123 baswood: your memories jibe with my readings of different memoirs esp Jason Elliots An Unexpected Light This is really a travel narrative, and one of the best Ive seen. Like others, he emphasis the kindness and hospitality to strangers, and how much they are like us as members of the human race.. Then again, Elliot never does talk about how all that hospitality appeared suddenly on the ground. Women were very much in the background, not much said. I wonder now, after women and girls have had two decades of freedom, if they will risk it all to continue those freedoms and how far the taliban will let them go

ETA it had been a long time since I read the book, one of the reviewers reminded me of a great section of the book "The centrepiece of the book, an alphabetical tour through Afghan history while imagining a flight over the country on the back of the Simorgh of Sufi legend, is breathtaking, and really gives you a sense of the country that no one else was reporting"

Thanks for all the perspectives on Afghanistan. I love that we can tap into this little global group for different insights on current affairs and more.

Anyhoo, back to books....



29. Reading in the Dark by Seamus Deane

This is a fine Northern Irish novel that was a real grower. Set in Nationalist Derry during the 40s and 50s, at first this book reads like a series of vignettes in a young Irish Catholic boy's life, but as the novel gathers pace a connection begins to emerge between what had initially seemed like disconnected snapshots of growing up and the truth behind a series of family tragedies relating back to the the divided politics of a new Northern Ireland beginning to emerge.

There are a number of recommendations on LT linking this to some of Frank McCourt's books, but beyond them both being set in Ireland during a certain era the similarities stop there for me. Whilst McCourt's Angela's Ashes is firmly in the misery lit territory of impoverished Ireland, Reading in the Dark is a window to Catholic Nationalist sentiment before The Troubles and dark family secrets born out of loyalty to 'the cause'.

This novel really evoked a sense of a forgotten rural Northern Ireland for me; although it was set many decades before my birth, many of the characters typified people I came across as a child when visiting grandparents in rural Fermanagh. As someone born on the Unionist side of the divide, whilst I can never empathise with or condone loyalty to the IRA, books like this from Nationalist writers are an important part of the understanding that must come from Protestants if we are ever to properly heal together as a nation.

Whether this novel would touch readers outside of Northern Ireland as much I can't say, but for me this is a work of tragic loss conveyed through pitch perfect prose.

4 stars - devastating yet so deftly sewn together.

>131 AlisonY: Many years since I read this Alison. Maybe it should go on the 'to reread' list.

>132 Caroline_McElwee: I really enjoyed it, Caroline. The style of writing really worked for me.

Up next:



Childhood, Youth, Dependency by Tove Ditlevsen

A bit of Nordic literature next. I don't think I've read a fictional book set in Denmark before.

>134 AlisonY: I read this a couple of months ago, the middle of the three short books was the one I liked the most Alison. I'll be interested to hear your thoughts.

>135 Caroline_McElwee: I expect it was from your thread that I hit upon it, Caroline.

Reading in the Dark sounds good, Alison. It's been on my shelf for a while. Maybe time to dust it off.

>137 BLBera: I enjoyed it more than I expected to, Beth.

>131 AlisonY: Studiously avoiding Irish misery porn for years has meant that I have probably missed many worthwhile Irish books. This sounds like one of them. I'll have to look for it.

>103 AlisonY:

I seem to be doing this a lot--bringing up movies when people talk about books--but this one, 84 Charing Cross Road, is a little special and if you liked Hanff's books you may enjoy the effort they made to show the bookshops of the era (or similar). The movie was made in 1987 so before the Great Bookshop Disappearance set in.

Anne Bancroft plays Hanff and Anthony Hopkins her main correspondent. Of course there's very little "plot" to talk of, but that only makes it more perfect a "book movie", IMO.

>139 SassyLassy: To be honest I've been the same. I was either bored of the misery lit or put off by novels that are too much about the Troubles (lived through them, don't really feel a want to read a fictional account of them). However, I really enjoyed this book, and the setting of the era before the Troubles kicked in was very interesting, particularly as it was subtly done.

>140 LolaWalser: Oh thanks for that. I didn't realise there was a movie of the book. I'll have a look on Netflix and see if they have it. My husband hates this kind of slow moving film, whereas it's just my kind of movie, so if they have it I'll watch it in peace late one evening.

>140 LolaWalser: >141 AlisonY: It is definitely a good movie of the book Alison. I think it is on Prime.

>142 Caroline_McElwee: Oh excellent - I have Prime. When I get everyone off to bed early one night I'll watch it.

>141 AlisonY: It's also on Netflix. I've been contemplating watching it again, as it keeps popping up in suggestions.

>144 SassyLassy: I must have missed that amongst all the suggestions for war and action films. You can tell that it's not me who mostly uses Netflix...! Thanks.

>145 AlisonY: That's what profiles are for...very useful.

>131 AlisonY: I’m glad I got caught up here, or I might have missed Reading in the Dark. I’ve added it to my wishlist.

>146 jjmcgaffey: Indeed. Unfortunately no one else in our house enjoys the slow burn kind of films that I like, so my Netflix profile isn't much use as I usually end up watching stuff that everyone else likes!

>147 NanaCC: I hope I've not over-sold it, Colleen, but I enjoyed it.

>148 AlisonY: You can add things to your Watchlist even if you don't get round to actually watching them. The person who uses Netfix most is our teenager, but he uses his dad's profile, as he watches stuff which probably isn't age suitable. Lots of violence and very action based, and a lot of swearing, mostly.

>149 elkiedee: I think the problem is that I never get good recommendations on Netflix because I watch my kind of film so rarely it doesn't get the chance to build up much in the way of suggestions. I used to have a window of 'me' time once everyone went to bed, but now we're in the teen zone too they go as late as us so the TV is no longer my own!

That's what the profile is supposed to be for - separating wants and watches so you do get good recommendations. But if you never get to watch...yeah, not so useful.

Interesting discussion of Afghanistan; and notes re movies & books. I love to watch multiple cinema or television adaptations of books I have read (from classics to mysteries/crime novels).

>152 avaland: I always forget to note the films of books I want to watch. One day I'll catch up...

30. Childhood, Youth, Dependency: The Copenhagen Trilogy by Tove Ditlevsen

A well known author in her native Denmark, Tove Ditlevsen has only become well known outside of Denmark in recent years as the trend in autofiction has developed.

A work of 3 novellas, in The Copenhagen Trilogy Ditlevsen writes with brutal candour about three key phases in her life. In Childhood we observe the child Ditlevsen in 1920s Copenhagen as the burgeoning writer within her struggles to identify with the narrow horizons of her working class neighbourhood of blue collared workers. As her poetry career begins to take off, in Youth we begin to see how an upbringing filled with insecurity about being loved has shaped the young adult Ditlevsen, as she tumbles into the security blanket of a bizarre chaste marriage to a short and overweight much older bachelor who publishes her first poem and whom she later quickly leaves without a backward glance when she meets a young student who sets her pulse racing.

Whilst Childhood didn't overly work for me (it read as an intelligised adult's observation of childhood rather than childhood seen through the eyes of a child), once the trilogy moved into Youth I was hooked. A classic stereotype of a tortured and deeply self-absorbed writer, Ditlevsen spares no punches in her depiction of herself as someone who is only truly happy when writing about life and relationships yet remains largely unsentimental and emotionally detached when it comes to her own love affairs. When, in Dependency, she reluctantly returns to a medical student she had a one-night stand with to abort the child she's unsure is his or her husband's, an utterly bizarre sequence of events marks the abrupt end of her second marriage and the beginning of a car crash marriage to a psychotic doctor who nurtures her addiction to prescription opiates, an addiction which plagues the rest of her adult life along with deeply depressive episodes (which no doubt contributed to her suicide at age 58).

Ditlevsen is her own worst enemy throughout her life, truly at the mercy of her erratic artistic temperament and need for self-gratification without care or interest in the consequences. I'd be highly surprised if her writing didn't influence a young Karl Ove Knausgaard, for this trilogy feels like the birthplace of nordic autofiction. Despite its setting in the 1930s and 40s, this work reads as fresh as if it had been written yesterday, as Ditlevsen conforms to the expectations of no one and follows only her own impetuous desires.

4.5 stars - After a disappointing first volume, this ended up a compelling page-turner which I was sad to reach the end of.

Great review of The Copenhagen Trilogy, Alison. I'm now very curious to see if her work inspired Karl Ove Knausgaard's My Struggle series. It looks as though I won't read Book Five and Book Six until sometime in 2022.

ETA: I just read this enticing review of The Copenhagen Trilogy, and I've added it to my library wish list.

>155 kidzdoc: Oh that's interesting that they mention Knausgaard in that article! The first part (Childhood) was probably a 3.5 star read for me, and it took me a while to get through it as it wasn't holding my attention, but the next 2 volumes were hugely gripping in a sad, rubber-necking way. It's only around 270 pages, so an easier commitment time-wise than Knausgaard's books (although you're right to postpone them until you've time to properly absorb those last 2 books).

Up next:



Lean, Fall, Stand by Jon McGregor

>154 AlisonY: Yup, I think we pretty much agree on that trilogy Alison.

>158 Caroline_McElwee: I wondered if I'd have felt more enthusiastic about Childhood if I'd gone back and reread it after loving the 2nd and 3rd volumes, but I had a quick flick through it again when I'd finished and I still feel it's much weaker than the other two volumes. Still, I loved them enough to have selective memory on that first one when it came to my star rating!

>156 AlisonY: Will do, Alison. I hope to finish My Struggle: Book Six in early 2022.

As a subscriber to Archipelago Books, which published Knausgaard's My Struggle series in the US, I received a copy of his essay collection In the Land of the Cyclops, which I'll also plan to read next year.

>160 kidzdoc: Did you know he has a new book out at the end of this month / start of October (in the UK at least)? Some of his other titles haven't overly appealed to me, but this new one looks good.

>161 AlisonY: I didn't know that, but I do now! His new book is titled The Morning Star, as you know, and it will also come out in the US at the end of this month, on the 28th here. It's published by Penguin Random House in the US, so I won't automatically receive it as part of my Archipelago Books subscription, but based on what little I've read about it I'll want to give it a go. Thanks for mentioning it!

31. Lean Fall Stand by Jon McGregor

This was a book I didn't know much about before starting it (it was a gift and I find the book blurbs can often be spoilers), and it surprised me as from part 1 I thought it was going to be an atmospheric thriller but parts 2 and 3 went in a very different direction.

Lean, Fall, Stand in the title is the name of the three parts of the book. In Lean, an Antarctic research trip goes badly wrong, Fall tells the immediate aftermath of a stroke for both the survivor and his wife and Stand is about recovery and the impact the stroke has on both of their lives in different ways.

It's a well told tale that keeps enough suspense about the truth of the tragedy in Antarctic whilst transitioning from an action and adventure novel to a human life story and honest portrait of a marriage of two hugely independent people navigating their way through cataclysmic change.

I wasn't sure where this novel was ultimately going, and enjoyed McGregor taking me on a bit of a ride through the dark in the story.

4 stars - a great page-turner. One that I'd recommend if you've hit a reading slump and just need a 'damn good read' type of book to get you out of it.

Up next:



The Maiden Dinosaur by Janet McNeill

32. The Maiden Dinosaur by Janet McNeill

Janet McNeill lived most of her adult life in Northern Ireland and was a prolific writer of plays and children's books as well as 10 adult novels and a number of volumes of short stories. She wasn't on my radar until I came across an article called ' Ten great Northern Irish novels you may have missed'.

Compared on the jacket to Barbara Pym, Anita Brookner and Elizabeth Taylor, the writing in this novel certainly reminded me of Barbara Pym's writing, particularly in terms of characterisation. I've not got to Taylor yet, but McNeill's writing quality is absolutely on a level with Pym's and Brookner's, and it's a shame that she's never received the same level of recognition (Virago, Persephone - sort it out).

The Maiden Dinosaur centres around the main character Sarah, a fifty-something year old spinster teacher and minor poet who shares her former family home (now divided into 4 apartments) with two of her childhood friends and the daughter and son-in-law of another friend. The plain, sensible, clever one, with no family of her own Sarah is the no-nonsense linchpin both they and their wider friendship group turn to as conveniences them, whilst Sarah has quietly devoted herself for over 40 years to Helen within the group, whose personal tragedies and vanities demand much of Sarah's willing attention.

As the shifting sands of life bring inevitable significant events within the lives of the group of friends, the novel explores themes of loss and new beginnings in a middle-age context over one summer in Belfast.

McNeill's writing in this novel doesn't evoke a sense of place in terms of Northern Ireland itself, but in a way I quite liked that and enjoyed the absence of the usual local colloquialisms. Belfast Zoo (or Bellevue Zoo as it used to be known) is mentioned quite often, as the novel is set in North Belfast where the zoo still to this day sits looking down over the city just below Cave Hill. There was a charming children's film called Zoo made in 2017 which is filmed at Belfast Zoo. It's based on the true story of a woman in a terraced back-street in Belfast who hid an elephant from the zoo in her tiny back yard to stop it being euthanised when the Belfast Blitz began (somehow that story could only be true from Northern Ireland).

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and will definitely be looking out for other titles by McNeill which are still in print.

This type of novel won't appeal to everyone, but if you're a lover of Pym or Brookner I recommend it (I believe it's titled The Belfast Friends in the US).

4.5 stars - A wonderful depiction of the claustrophobia that life as a middle-aged woman can become.

Thank you for bringing this author to my attention! I love the similar authors you mentioned so this goes straight on my wishlist.

>165 AlisonY: My Iris Murdoch Fan Girls Book Club is looking for suggestions—we just read Elizabeth Taylor's The Soul of Kindness, and this sounds like it would be up everyone's alley. Thanks!

>166 japaul22:, >167 lisapeet: You might need to try under the other name in the US. I hope it's still in print on your side of the pond.

Up next:



The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between by Hisham Matar

>168 AlisonY: Hmmm, not very easily accessible and doesn't seem to be in print, but looks like I can get a used copy on ebay or abe books.

>170 japaul22: Now I'm hoping I haven't over-sold it....!

I never mind scrounging up a book by a woman author who should still be in print!

>165 AlisonY: I loved the title The Maiden Dinosaur, I wonder why on earth they changed it to Belfast Friends!

>165 AlisonY: A new to me author as well, and I enjoy both Pym and Brookner, so on the list she goes Alison.

>172 japaul22: A most noble attitude!

>173 labfs39: I couldn't agree more. The Maiden Dinosaur is such a great title and really typifies what many of the characters think of the main character Sarah. It's strange the ideas that publishers get sometimes. Belfast Friends is so dumbed down.

>174 Caroline_McElwee: I think you'd like it, Caroline. Some of her other titles are also highly recommended (in small circles!).

33. The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land In Between by Hisham Matar

Hisham Matar's father was a high ranking resistance leader against Qaddafi's regime who was eventually imprisoned and 'disappeared'. Exiled from Libya 36 years previously, the book opens with Matar returning for the first time to Libya with his mother and American wife, and as he meets cousins, uncles and aunts for the first time in decades he confronts the ghosts of his past and the years before and after his father's capture.

I found this to be a really interesting book. I'm not sure that Matar is as successful as he could have been in terms of instilling a sense of place in Egypt and Libya, nor of fully characterising his wider family, yet the story was fascinating nonetheless, and perhaps for me in ways in which Matar had not designed.

His father's strong politicisation had ramifications across his whole extended family, with cousins and uncles at best restricted in their movements in Libya for many years and at at worst rounded up and imprisoned for a decade or more. Yet on the family's return visit to Libya there was nothing but an outpouring of love for them and the lost brother / uncle. As the story develops two points stood out very strongly for me - 1. the extent of politicisation that pervades male lives in Arab countries like Libya, and 2. the fierce loyalty to family. Together these are a fiery combination, and I found myself questioning my own perception of Arab states a lot as I read. I'm not sure that as a Westerner I can ever fully understand or empathise with what it's like to live in countries were there has been political unrest for centuries, where generation after generation has fought against various regimes and where fighting between tribal and family ties run deep. I would have loved for Matar to have given the reader much more insight on how this shapes so much of men's lives in Libya (the women are very much in the background in that traditional role in his family account), but he doesn't, and as a result it feels like he is holding something back from the reader and not telling the full story.

I felt very conscious when reading this book of my own prejudiced views, shaped by fear and distrust from decades of absorbing Western reporting on Arab political and religious fanaticism. This book isn't open enough in its narrative to fully give me an alternative, more balanced view point, but it has given me an interest to read other books that can, and I'd certainly appreciate any book recommendations that will help make my understanding of any of the Arab states a more rounded one.

The Return isn't a book that evokes the empathy from its reader that it could have - I expect Matar's writing is heavily overshadowed by the ramifications of his writing on the lives of his family, particularly those who still live in Libya. However, it's still a very thought provoking and enjoyable read, and a snapshot, however limited, of the hotbed of Libyan politics and a personal account of the impact of Qaddafi's regime.

4 stars - hugely interesting, but I felt like I wanted the door into this story to be opened more than it was.

>176 AlisonY: Fascinating. Thanks.

>176 AlisonY: Enjoyed your review. I've heard Matar on the radio several times discussing this book, and always meant to read it. I wonder if one author could ever tell the whole story, given the differences among all the diverse Arabic speaking countries.

Interested in your comment "I'm not sure that as a Westerner I can ever fully understand or empathise with what it's like to live in countries were there has been political unrest for centuries", and immediately thought, "but wait a minute, she lives in Northern Ireland". The struggles in Northern Ireland and the Republic, along with theories on nationalism, often figure in writings on the subject. I know they are advanced modern countries, but the root struggles may have had some similarities.

I share your desire for an alternative, more balanced view in the media. Al Jazeera English is one option, and often has good documentaries, which make me try and balance what is being presented elsewhere.

I suspect you are right about ramifications for Matar's family.

>177 rocketjk: Thanks for stopping by, Jerry.

>178 SassyLassy: I agree that Matar couldn't have told the full Arab story, but I didn't feel I got the full Libyan story, or not even the full Libyan story from the perspective of his family's involvement in the resistance. I really wanted to get more into his and his family's psyche.

Yes, the root struggles in NI may have some parallels (interesting view point - I didn't think of that before), but here the political / religious fanaticism is in the minority (believe it or not - again, that's not what the media may have you believe), and at least we've had the reassurance of living in a modern democracy and not under a dictatorship. I don't look back at the men or women in my family and see people who were so fixated on politics that they were willing to die to defend their British identity, for instance.

But this is where I want to get a more balanced view - how politicised does the average Arab man feel in many of the Arab states (and I appreciate that they are all different countries with different issues going on. I'm also deliberately excluding women there, as I can better understand the political activation of Arabic women given their oppression under various regimes, but find it harder to get in the mind of the Arabic male)?

I've picked out a few candidate books on Amazon that I'd like to get to at some point. It's probably necessary to read a few to get a balanced view. And yes I agree, Al Jazeera is often a good alternative viewpoint in terms of the news.

Up next:



The Narrow Land by Christine Dwyer Hickey

>179 AlisonY:

I feel similar to Sassy--from the outside, there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of difference between the problems of Northern Ireland and the Arab world, at least regarding the politicization of everyday life and fanaticism present. The "fanatics", I think, are always everywhere in a minority, but due to their very nature, the willingness to go to the extremes, they dominate both the outsiders' view and impose their tune to other people, internally.

My uncle spent two years working in Libya in mid-1990s (he's a petrochemist). He has many colourful anecdotes about Gadaffi, and was very conscious of being in a country with restrictions on individual freedoms, but it didn't appear that different--or worse--than most other Arab countries. In fact, in certain aspects it was better off, and although Westerners blanch at hearing anything good said for policies that centre the poor, Gadaffi did concern himself sincerely and efficiently with providing basics to every Libyan. I don't suppose this is a view much represented among the would-be upper classes, those who write books and such.

Anyway, on the question of Arab mentality, I have a suggestion that's somewhat out-of-the-left-field (and likely to be contested as un-PC by many), a popular handbook by Margaret Nydell called Understanding Arabs. Must note first that I base this on one of the earlier editions, I'm not familiar with the latest one (i.e. possible changes etc.)

The incomparable worth of Nydell's book lies exactly in what critics might point out as a deficiency--there is little history, religion, politics in it. This text was meant to help foreigners LIVE among Arabs and for that reason the emphasis is on behaviour. Here's the thing--in the end, this proves to be so much more illuminating than whole courses on history and politics might. By no means should it be the only book one might read on the subject, but as a foundation it can't be beat.

>181 LolaWalser: I see the NI situation as being quite different, but it's interesting that from the outside they seem quite similar.

Understanding Arabs is one of the books that I'd put on my wish list, so good call on that one. There was another one I was looking at - The Arab Mind by Raphael Patai and also What's Really Wrong With the Middle East by Brian Whitaker, although as he's an ex-Guardian journalist I may not get the balance with that one that I'm seeking.

Great review of The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between, Alison. I've read two of his novels, In the Country of Men and Anatomy of a Disappearance, which were both good, although I liked the first one considerably more.

One memoir set in the Arab world which I highly enjoyed and learned a lot from was Once Upon a Country: A Palestinian Life by Sari Nusseibeh, which I unfortunately failed to review. I gave it 5 stars at the time, and read it soon after Amos Oz's equally superb memoir A Tale of Love and Darkness, as the two of them were close friends despite being on opposite sides of the Israel-Palestine border.

>183 kidzdoc: I'm curious as to how Matar's fictional style compares to this memoir. I have heard In the Country of Men very much rated.

Thanks for the heads up on the Oz and Nusseibeh books. I had a look at them on Amazon and they both look really interesting. I'll add them to my list.

>184 AlisonY: I did review both novels by Hisham Matar on LT, BTW.

Those two memoirs are amongst the best I've ever read, which both easily earned 5 stars from me.

>182 AlisonY:

It's similar in the sense that an outsider is most likely to perceive both in terms of political strife and unrest (with notable role of religion), whereas "locals" would of course have a more complex experience which may place emphasis on entirely different things.

Patai's book is a classic but very hefty and, as far as I know, the data it relies on ends in 1970s. So it misses, for example, the great progress made in, say, literacy rates (among men) but it's still interesting, for example, if one compares the downturn women's rights have taken SINCE it was published.

One factor I'm not sure how to compute within the traditional picture is the rise of the cyber-generation, the Arab Zoomers. Their influence is growing, and there are indications that it may work to erode the differences between Arab and non-Arab, down the line.

Both Lean Fall Stand and The Maiden Dinosaur are now on my wishlist, Alison. McNeill, especially, sounds like an author I would love.

>186 LolaWalser: Hmm - I replied to this yesterday but for some reason my reply's not showing. I noticed that Patai's book is now on a sixth edition dated 2018, so hopefully there have been a number of additions to bring it up to date. Having said that, I don't see anything in the contents around the advent of the internet and the impact of change that's having on the younger Arab generation as you quite rightly point out. It would seem a huge omission not to have that in there somewhere - perhaps it pops up somewhere but isn't a section in itself.

>187 BLBera: I hope you manage to get a copy of The Maiden Dinosaur, Beth. If it's hard to find I might have to start distributing it myself around CR!

34. The Narrow Land by Christine Dwyer Hickey

If I was Esther Freud I'd be hauling Christine Dwyer Hickey's backside to court quicker than you could say 'get your own bloody ideas', for The Narrow Land shares more than a hint of resemblance to Freud's Mr. Mac and Me. Famous painter living in cute house in semi-isolation with artistic wife - check. Beguiling friendship with a lonely, damaged young boy - check. Artist struggling with his artistic mojo - check. Coastal setting - check. Wartime setting - well, half a check. Freud's book is set at the beginning of WW1, whereas Dwyer Hickey's is set a few years after WWII, but still. No wonder there was such an air of familiarisation to this book.

BUT (and Esther please forgive me - I generally love your writing dearly), I think Dwyer Hickey's novel is better by some margin. Why? Well, for starters there it felt like more of a story was developed in The Narrow Land, which is odd given that on paper Freud had a much more exciting real-life drama to play with in her book. I think Freud excels when she's all about brooding landscapes and emotional tension, and it felt like she begrudgingly squeezed an unwanted plot she didn't know what to do with into the last few pages of her book. Also, Dwyer Hickey is just plain terrific with her characterisation in The Narrow Land, particularly in the way she used different characters to bring out the best and worst sides of Hopper's wife in particular, who was drawn out especially well.

Backing up (and I'll set the knife down now Esther), The Narrow Land tells the story of the intertwining relationships between Edward Hopper and his wife Jo and a family renting a house close by on Cape Cod. Socially prickly and jealous of both her husband's success and his attractiveness to other women, Jo Hopper's relationship with the Kaplan's gets off to to a poor (and unwanted) start, but as an unlikely friendship develops between Jo and a 10 year old German orphaned boy staying with the Kaplan's, the social net of the Kaplan's draws in the Hoppers, throwing a lens upon the Hoppers and their marriage that they eventually can't avoid looking through.

Whether this US novel by an Irish author stands up to scrutiny by American readers more directly familiar with Cape Cod I can't say, but it certainly worked well for me and my imagination.

This novel was a joy to read, and I'll be looking for more of Christine Dwyer Hickey's books in the future.

4.5 stars - Dwyer Hickey's timing is just spot on in this fine novel.

35. The Standing Chandelier by Lionel Shriver

I'm in my first RL book club! Well, almost. I was all enthusiastic about joining when the first club in my village was recently set up, but then they decided to meet in the local pub and COVID became rife in the village and I decided that it wasn't a good idea given my dad's poor immunity. But the lady who started it turned out to be lovely, and she brought me round a copy of the book they're reading nonetheless, so I'm sort of taking part. I must admit I was a bit nervous that they might be into genres that really aren't my thing, so I was delighted when a Shriver title was handed over.

The Standing Chandelier is a short novella based around a classic conundrum - can a man and woman's platonic friendship survive one of them entering a serious relationship, and, moreover, can a friendship ever be truly platonic if it crossed the line, however long ago that might be?

I really enjoyed this brief novel. Having been on the receiving end of some awkward unfriending by a couple of close platonic male friends back in my early 20s when they met their soul mates (at their new loves' behest), I thought this was a really interesting topic, and a fantastic one for book club discussion. Shriver wields a merciless knife as ever with her usual sharp tip of acerbic wit, and she handles the perspectives of all the three characters with fair balance.

Who's in the wrong? The jealous fiancée who can't handle her partner's longstanding close relationship with another female, particularly one she can't stand? The male friend / betrothed who spends hours every week playing tennis and confiding in his tall, good-looking, eccentric friend, who was the one to dump him on the couple of occasions in the past when they crossed the line? Or the female friend, who can't or won't read the signs that the landscape of their friendship now has to change?

4 stars - a really fun and tight read by Shriver.

>189 AlisonY: I loved this one too Alison. I haven't read the Freud yet.

My fav of hers was post birthday world similar to the movie sliding doors, but original story in its own right. She has another that I really liked but don't remember a name.

>191 Caroline_McElwee: I think you passed on that delightful BB, Caroline (yet again!).

>192 cindydavid4: Yes I enjoyed Post Birthday World too. I've read 4 or 5 of her books now - she's an author I enjoy.

Hi. Just had a long catch up. Nice to see you cruising along with your reading and even real life book clubs. Enjoyed the conversations here.

I caught up on your thread a few minutes ago, then looked at this week's issue (27 September) of The New Yorker, and I noticed that it has a short story by Esther Freud titled "Desire". The magazine's web page has a link to the short story, along with a podcast of Freud reading it.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/09/27/desire

https://www.newyorker.com/podcast/the-authors-voice/esther-freud-reads-desire

I'm completely unfamiliar with her, so I'll read this short story this week.

Oh Ill have to look for that, I still have the issue.

>194 dchaikin: Thanks for calling in, Dan!

>195 kidzdoc: I think she's a great writer, Darryl. Thanks for the link.

Up next:



Goodbye to All That by Robert Graves

Just dropping by to say hello as I've been absent from you thread for a while. Now that I've read it back to where I'd left off, there are too many books/topics to mention so I'll keep it short.

I've found the Joe Simpson book at the library that I'm sure my climber son and I will both enjoy. Thanks for that.

I loved Reading in the dark and I believe rated it with the full five stars. There was one story in particular that I enjoyed when an aunt came to allow mother to get some rest. She told a ghost story that ended just as sounds indicating that suppertime (or should that be teatime?) approaching.

Your next book by Robert Graves is another favourite. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. I have it in my "revisit" collection but I have so many books I'll never get around to never mind re-reads.

Any luck in the job hunt? I didn't see it mentioned above, although I could have missed it.

Good to see you dropping by, Vivienne. Hope you enjoy the Simpson book.

The job hunt is becoming... complicated. There's some stuff going on at work that could end up influencing my next move, but it's all quite up in the air which is difficult. I'm hoping that by the end of this month I'll know better what my next move is.

I'm enjoying the Robert Graves book, but haven't had as much reading time these past few days. Hopefully I'll get more time on it this week.

Good luck on the job front, Alison.

Both The Narrow Land and The Standing Chandelier are now on my wishlist. I like novels about artists and I haven't read any Shriver yet, and this seems like a good place to start.

>198 AlisonY: I have this one on my shelf, Alison. I read so much from WWI when we were doing the group reading for the centennial that I think I burned out on reading more at that time.

>201 BLBera: I hope you enjoy them, Beth. Other Shriver books I'd recommend are We Need to Talk About Kevin and The Post Birthday World (which isn't a perfect book by any means, but is still a very enjoyable read).

>198 AlisonY: I get like that too on WWI and WWII books, Colleen. I reach saturation point and then have to give them a rest for a while. I'm enjoying this one, though (if enjoyment is the right word). It's up there with Hemingway's Farewell to Arms in terms of being such a vivid portrayal of WW1 (given that they both were in it). It's a different perspective - much more on what trench warfare was like, although I suspect the second half of the book moves on from that.

I've enjoyed catching up with your thread. I haven't read the Graves, but another very effecting, although much more obscure, World War One memoir I have read is Memoirs Of a Blue Puttee: the Newfoundland Regiment in World War One by A. J. Stacey and Jean Edwards Stacey. A.J. Stacey was a member of the regiment of the title, and Jean Edwards Stacey was his daughter who edited the diary that he kept during his time at the front. The regiment was almost entirely wiped out at the Battle of Beaumont Hammel. I picked this book up when my wife and I visited Newfoundland around 15 years ago. It's quite well done.

>205 AlisonY: That's interesting, Jerry - I've not heard of that one. First-hand accounts of WWI are incredibly sobering, aren't they?

>205 AlisonY: Absolutely. Have you seen the Peter Jackson documentary, "They Shall Not Grow Old"? He was given hours and hours of WWI footage of British soldiers, including battlefield and trench footage, and both colorized it and normalized the speed. Plus he found people who could read the lips of the people in the films and otherwise recreate the sounds likely being heard by the people in the footage. They are called forensic lipreaders. Anyway, what was created was an extremely moving film of what the soldiers' experiences must have been like. It starts out in black and white and then gradually morphs into color. The movie covers the experiences from boot camp through the problems the soldiers had after the war, when nobody would hire them, figuring the veterans were probably shell-shocked and unreliable. Here is the official trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6Do1p1CWyc

>206 rocketjk: I've heard of this, Jerry, but not seen it. I must check out if it's on UK Netflix. I'd love my kids to watch bits of it too, as I think you feel so much more detached from it when it's in black & white.

36. Goodbye to all That by Robert Graves

This one's been on my wish list for a very long time, so I'm glad I finally got around to reading it.

Around two-thirds of Graves' memoir focuses on his time as a soldier on the front in WWI, while the remaining third bookends this with insights on his time at Charterhouse public school before the war broke out and his life after the war.

Graves' time at public school wasn't particularly enjoyable, but his account read as a very honest account of boys' boarding school, including the love affairs and crushes that developed amongst the boys. That first part of the book was OK, but the really interesting part of the memoir starts when Graves enlists and is sent to the front. His account not only vividly gives you a visual perspective on the theatre of that war, and the horrendous conditions in the trenches, but also shows how his mental attitude to what was going on around him changed over time, and how terribly affected he was for ten years after the war ended with what we would call PTSD now.

What I also found fascinating was the insight into how upper class Britain functioned in terms of connections from education opening doors at a young age to important positions such as consulate roles and university teaching positions. I didn't get the impression from Graves' account that this was influenced by the huge loss of life in WWI; more, it was just how things worked. I couldn't help but fast forward 100 years in my mind to our current UK government, still so heavily dominated by that public school /Oxbridge network of cronies - clearly it's a network that's still very successful in looking after its own. Graves isn't shy about name dropping, and I enjoyed hearing his accounts of brushing shoulders with characters such as Thomas Hardy, Ezra Pound, Wilfred Owen, T.S. Eliot, George Mallory and T.E. Lawrence.

I also found this era's huge interest in poetry fascinating, with important characters from many different walks of life seemingly interested in being introduced to Graves after enjoying his poetry. I expect that the War fuelled a lot of the poetry revival in that era, which Graves mentions drops off in terms of public interest some years later.

All in all a very enjoyable memoir, and worth the wait.

4 stars - a vivid account of a key time in history, seen through the eyes of a colourful and interesting character.

Up next:



The Island by Ana Maria Matute

>208 AlisonY: I’m interested in this. I once tried to read his boom The White
Goddess and just quit because it was just an endless list of things (mythology and some kind of occultish related stuff) for hundreds of a pages. I think this would be an easier read.

>208 AlisonY: I'm happily surprised that you enjoyed Goodbye to All That. I read it at university and thought it was terrific, both for the details about his war experience, but also about the class system (his schooling, his rank in the military, his privilege, etc.). It's good to hear that someone from the UK got something out of it, and it wasn't just because I was a (removed-from-the-situation) Canadian. A year later in university, I was assigned All Quiet On the Western Front and I was a titch disappointed, only because I felt I'd already explored a lot ot it. I did enjoy AQOTWF, but I wasn't blown away like many readers, just because I felt that Graves had said a lot of the same things.

>211 Nickelini: I had the opposite reaction to these two books - because I read them in a different order. I liked Graves but it almost sounded derivative (and I discovered him years after I read Remarque).Yes - one is fiction and what is not but they kinda sorta work as a pair. Both authors are probably overdue revisiting though.

>212 AnnieMod: me too, I didn't hear of graves till years later when I watched his "I Claudius' series, and learned that he wrote a WWI book. both show the horror of war and a whole genertion 'butchered and damned"*

(btw AQOTWF has two sequels. I read the road back which was just devastating. The last is three comrades but never read it.) movie is outstanding)

*lyrics from The Green Fields of France (No Man's Land)
Song by Dropkick Murphys. Think of the song every now and again.

>213 cindydavid4: Remarque was one of the western authors who was popular back home both before and after the regime fell. Most of his novels were translated so I’ve read them in my teens. I’ve never read him in English or as a real adult - I think the last one was read when I was still in my teens technically or just out of them. They hit even harder at that age. :)

Now I want to read something by him again. :)

>210 dchaikin: It's very readable, Dan, and as Joyce commented in >211 Nickelini: it's an interesting window to the British class system of the time as well as a fantastic WWI account.

>211 Nickelini: My husband's surprised too as I mostly don't enjoy his war films, but I do enjoy reading books on significant wars (up to a point - I couldn't over-immerse myself).

>212 AnnieMod:, >213 cindydavid4:, >214 AnnieMod: I've not read AQOTWF, but I probably won't feel the need to look for another WWI for a while. I did, however, very much enjoy Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms. His was a different fictional perspective on WWI given he had a different role in the war. Interestingly I see that many people in LT hated that book.

>215 AlisonY: Farewell to Arms was one of the first movies I remember seeing on tv. The scene that sticks in my mind is the nurse in the flower field an the bomb going off. Sometime I should read the book.

>213 cindydavid4: I didn't realize AQOTWF had a sequel. Onto the wish list it goes.

Hello Alison! I've managed to stop by and take a peek at what you've been reading. Very interesting! I've always avoided 84, Charing Cross Road because it seems to be very much Not My Thing, and I don't have to remedy that if it's not available digitally, haha.

>218 ursula: Thanks for stopping by. I'd recommend 84, Charing Cross Road if you ever need a bit of joy injected in your life. It's a tonic for the soul.

>219 AlisonY: What Alison said. On first glance 84, Charing Cross Road is not the kind of book I would expect to enjoy, but I absolutely loved it; it earned 5 stars from me.

I am a curmudgeon who really doesn't like sappy books I loved this one! read it without fear of too much saccarine

>219 AlisonY:, >220 kidzdoc:, >221 cindydavid4: I'll keep that in mind if it ever makes its way into my library's Kindle collection. :)

37. The Island by Ana Maria Matute

Matute is an acclaimed writer in Spain, her work heavily influenced by her own childhood experience of the Spanish Civil War. The Island is the first in a semi-autobiographical trilogy of books, but the only one translated into English (in fact it's the only one of her works translated as far as I can see on Amazon).

Set during the Spanish Civil war, 14 year old Matia has been sent to live with her matriarchal grandmother on the island of Mallorca after being expelled from her convent school. Also living there are her slightly older male cousin Borja and his mother, and a housekeeper and her young son, who is tasked with schooling the two children until they return to school. It's a coming of age story, but a bleak one at that. With a dead mother and a father who has abandoned her, Matia is looked after by her aunt and grandmother but feels little that resembles love. The adults in the novel are all unlikeable, full of prejudice and holding onto societal divisions, and Matia's coming of age story is essentially one of discovering that it's a cruel, unfair world out there. Whilst the island itself isn't directly impacted by the Spanish Civil War, many of its male inhabitants are away fighting, and the class and religious struggles which were some of the many facets of that war pervade the bleak sentiments of this novel. In this loveless atmosphere which seems to envelop much of the town, unsurprisingly the children too are often cruel and unruly.

At one point I almost abandoned this novel, but in the end I was glad I stuck with it. It's not a bad book by any means; it's just relentlessly bleak, and as a novel that's not plot focused its pessimism and unlikeable characters - young and old - sucked the life out of me at times.

3 stars - Despite myself, I'm finding myself thinking about this book and its uneasy atmosphere but I wouldn't go out of my way to recommend it.

Up next:



The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe

The second book from my RLBC (which I'm a ghost member of due to COVID), and a good example of what has put me off being part of book clubs before, i.e. that I'll have to read books I wouldn't choose normally.

I generally hate authors who greedily capitalise on references to books or libraries to sell to a market based on people who love reading (84, Charing Cross Road excepted), and I also have an issue with something as horrific as Auschwitz being used for historical fiction, which feels like a rather sick moneymaking device.

But, I stick by the notion of the books chosen being for discussion and that I don't necessarily have to like them all. I just hope the next few titles aren't terrible, as the RLBC lady is being so utterly lovely and going out of her way to drive round with the book each month for me (I didn't really plan on being a ghost member and was just happy to sit out the group, but she's very kind and wants to keep me involved and I feel obliged to stay involved now).

I have that issue with Holocaust literature too. The gimmick aspect feels very offensive to me. But, going up one, very interesting about the Island. I'm intrigued and do hope to read or listen to it.

>225 dchaikin: I hope you enjoy The Island if you get to it. It's a book I couldn't read with distraction in the room otherwise my attention quickly wandered, but I found I started to enjoy it more once I gave it some proper focus in a quiet reading environment.

>225 dchaikin: Just to add, Dan, anti-semitism is also key in The Island. A family in the novel are treated as outcasts (and worse) as they are Chueta - Majorcan Jews. As it's a coming of age novel the protagonist doesn't fully understand what she sees happening, but knows that it's inherently wrong.

>224 AlisonY: Yes, that makes me uneasy as well. Memoirs and novels by survivors are important, but using that event as a way to give your novel a bit of extra tragedy feels exploitative.

I also have trouble with that book and frankly tired of the meme. But for me depends on the read. women in the castle and all the light we cannot see are examples of stories that are just on the edge of the holocaust; people who arent involved but know what is happening around them, and tell a history that still fits.

Nice review of The Island, Alison. Ana María Matute is one of the most celebrated 20th century Spanish novelists, so I may end up reading this at some point. I can't say the same for The Librarian of Auschwitz.

>224 AlisonY: One of the Bulgarian publishers had been publishing a procession of these novels in the last year or so and I really do not get the appeal of them. Yes, we should never forget what happened but putting your characters in the camp as a way to shortcut building a believable setting has always sounded ghoulish to me. Especially so many years after the fact - I can read the ones written in the immediate aftermath and I can handle the camps in novels but not when they are used that way. And yet, these novels are popular :( they often get compared to The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (in terms of using the camps as backdrops) which misses the point of both Boyne’s novel and of what these are. Oh well. Have fun reading it anyway if at all possible.

>224 AlisonY: I agree with Kay that memoirs and novels by Holocaust survivors (and their children) are very important, but there have been several very popular "based on a true story" books lately that have made me uneasy. I have read some of them because they are gifts. People know I read about the Holocaust and WWII and seem to give me any book with "Auschwitz" in the title. The Tattooist of Auschwitz and The Apple : A Novel Based on the Herman Rosenblat Holocaust Love Story are both "based on" books that I had trouble with, and Sarah's Key and The Boy in the Striped Pajamas are novels that I likewise found troubling. While I think it is important that we "never forget," I don't think super-popular fictionalizations like this are the best way to honor that sentiment. What's interesting about The Librarian of Auschwitz is that the author is Spanish (and Tatiana de Rosnay is French/British). The phenomenon is not only an American one.

On a separate but related note, I was horrified by this news story from a couple of days ago: Books on Holocaust should be balanced with 'opposing' views, school leader tells teachers. A direct result of the new law in Texas meant to prevent the teaching of critical race theory.

>231 AnnieMod: Yes, we should never forget what happened but putting your characters in the camp as a way to shortcut building a believable setting has always sounded ghoulish to me.

Annie the problem is that people are forgetting, (which is why we have deniers like the guy above in Texas. There is no'other side' to this) these kind of novels help people remember the horror of it. We must never forget, else it could easily happen again. Which I think is why we have so many of these. And is which is why I am all for schools teaching real history and not whitewashing it.

>232 labfs39: I know! and he hasn't been fired yet! I think Texas is the new Florida. Just baffling and horrifying All the more reason for real history to be taught

>233 cindydavid4: There is that but this specific subset of modern novels are really using the recognizable name of a camp for marketing purposes.

There is space for Holocaust novels - they won't be for everyone but there is a reason for them to exist. I have problems with that recent glut of these pseudo-Holocaust ones, putting the most recognizable from the camps name in the title. They don't try to keep the memory alive - they use the instant recognition of the name to set the story against a backdrop of horror they do not need to write. It just sounds... cheap.

As for history teaching. The big problem is that some people actually believe that the whitewashed history IS the history. So they believe they are teaching real history. It is a vicious cycle. I remember being horrified when I learned that not all US schools teach evolution (back home it is not a "this is one possibility" - I had been taught that this is the science and based on the latest research, that's what happened) or how little history and overall science is being taught in a normal US school. But that is a different conversation :)

Great debate since I was away. Looks like we're all on the same page on these types of books. The Librarian of Auschwitz is in the camp of 'based on a true story of...', but the author seems to have spent extensive time with the survivor whose story forms the book, and she writes a short forward to it. Does that make it more acceptable? I'm trying to figure that one out.

Im glad the author researched so much, and wrote about it for further understanding. Did he indicate what parts if the story he changed? Does he have any bibliography for futher reading? those help. Still I won't read it (same with sarahs key and boy in striped pajamas. its a foregone conclusion and no desire to go there)

just thought of an example of one I loved book theif for some reason didn't bother me that much.

I really think whether Holocaust–set novel is exploitative or genuinely affecting comes down to the quality of the writing and the author's intent. I've read some wonderful work by writers who weren't necessarily there, but may have heard stories passed down from survivors, and that distinction wasn't important—but their sensitivity to the material makes all the difference. A short story collection I read a few years ago comes to mind, Helen Maryles Shankman's They Were Like Family to Me, set in the Polish town of Wlodowa in the first half of WWII, for the most part. Shankman was too young to have been there but she had family that was, and she absorbed a lot of first-person accounts and folk tales, and it's a really nuanced and interesting batch of stories, as I remember. A good writer can work wonders with any kind of material, a bad writer... it doesn't matter how resonant the setting is.

>238 lisapeet: I've been following with interest this discussion about novels set in the Holocaust. Just want to chime in to say that Lisa's post just above says it all for me, too. Very well said. I'm pretty sure most of us would be on, or very close to, the same page.

>238 lisapeet: yes. It’s the kind of topic that demands a lot from an author and they need to put that into it. I read a kind of thriller based on creating hiding places in France during ww2. It was second rate writing, and really offensive to me because of the context. It’s not something you right fun literature about.

(But I still like Indiana Jones)

>238 lisapeet: yes, totally agree. On the same token, can a white author write about the poc experience? can a male actor write about women? the word appropriation is used a lot, not sure if the books we are all talking about are guilty of that. But like lisa, depends on the writer.

Interesting article in NYT about an artist who escaped with his cousin from the Nazis. He has spent much of his adult hood interviewing survivors or family members and painting First one he did was of the woman on Schindler's list. And I can't find it now

But on the same section was an article about the conductor of the Berlin Orchestra during the war. I think they are trying to make him look good. Sorry, not planning on buying his box set any time soon no matter how historic his music is. I usually say I can separate the artist from their work. This is an exception. just cant stomach it

>237 cindydavid4: I too liked The Book Thief and also The Zookeeper's Wife. So I think Lisa's point (>238 lisapeet:) about the importance of the author's intent, the quality of the writing, and the sensitivity with which the material is handled is a good one.

>243 labfs39: yup.

>1 AlisonY: Alison just gotta say, everytime I see that quote when I come visit, I smile. Its just lovely

yup.

>1 AlisonY: Alison just have to tell you how much I love that quote. I smile everytime I see it, its so true!

>245 cindydavid4: That quote's very relevant to me in this year of work change - I'm trying to hold on to the positive perspective of an end being a new beginning.

Great further debate on holocaust literature. I've finished the book, so now to muse on where my head's ended up on this one.

38. The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe

Well, you all know how I felt going into this novel - so how did it pan out?

About 30 pages in I'd decided to bail. The fictionalising of events in Auschwitz really wasn't sitting well with my conscience, and the narrative voice wasn't doing it for me either. It felt like something had perhaps been lost in the translation from Spanish to English; there was a stiltedness to it. At over 400 pages long it's not a short book either, and I wasn't sure I could go the distance given the subject matter.

So I put it to one side, but then my husband and I had a conversation about it. This is a man who won't watch the Titanic movie as he feels disgusted about Hollywood turning a terrible tragedy into entertainment, and who refused to go to Auschwitz when he was in Poland as he didn't want to feel like he was contributing to it being a tourist attraction. I expected for sure that he'd agree that writing a novel about a librarian in Auschwitz was a poor taste way of getting sales, but he surprised me by suggesting that there may be value in reading it given the author's engagement with Dita Kraus, the 'librarian' of Auschwitz. At the back of the book I found that Iturbe had engaged significantly with her, even visiting the Czech ghetto with her where her family were initially moved to, so I decide to pick it up again, and a few more chapters in the narrative style stopped jarring with me and I really got into it.

Having read Eli Wiesel's Night, Iturbe doesn't capture the horror of Auschwitz with the same sharpness of a survivor's own account, but I tried to keep the perspective that his objective wasn't necessarily to be that authority. Rather, he wanted to develop out the story of Kraus' teenage role in Auschwitz as librarian for 8 books as the narrative device for telling the story of the family camp. This was, at the time, a new and suspicious step by the Nazis, allowing families to stay together, with the prisoners informed that after 6 months each intake would receive special treatment. A school for children was allowed to take place every day, a significant event beyond its educational merit as its structure and focus resulted in no children dying whilst attending the school, which statistically was unheard of in Auschwitz hitherto. Needless to say the family camp was simply a ruse to distract any potential inspections from The Red Cross, and you can guess what the special treatment at the end of the 6 months was for so many innocent souls.

The trouble with fictional accounts of something like Auschwitz is that as you become absorbed you can lose the perspective of it being based on real lives. As Iturbe develops the plot of this book and dramatic tension is built up at various points, at times I did feel uncomfortable that the Auschwitz horrors were giving me page-turning moments.

So, in all, I own up - I enjoyed it and zipped through it in 2 days. Should I have enjoyed it? Should it have been page-turning fodder? I still feel that there's an author's selfishness at play in wanting to use Auschwitz as a plot device, but on the other side of the coin he writes of the bravery of a number of people whose stories would probably otherwise be lost in history forever.

4 stars for being a good read. I'm still searching my conscience a little, though.

>247 AlisonY: At the back of the book I found that Iturbe had engaged significantly with her, even visiting the Czech ghetto with her where her family were initially moved to, so I decide to pick it up again, and a few more chapters in the narrative style stopped jarring with me and I really got into it.

I read that as well, and it kinda sorta makes it ok; while I dout I will read it, I really doubt you or other readers lose that perspective. Its right in front of you, how can you escape whats happening! A mature reader can put several ideas in their head at one time.

As for "at times I did feel uncomfortable that the Auschwitz horrors were giving me page-turning moments.' He obviously is a good writer, and took his interviews with the famiy to heart, to make a compelling story, for you to urn those pages.. Enjoy might not be the right word but found the book worked for you. I don't think there is a need to search your conscience. Make you feel horrified, angry,appalled, consider what this means when you hear holcaust deniers,perhaps. But there is nothing to feel sorry or guilty about

(btw tell your husband I agree with him; I refused to watch Disneys Anastasia for making entertainment about another tragedy. Did watch Titanic which I thought was a good production, without the two main actors ,it did bring home what happened. I also did not visit Auschwitz. However I agree that there may be value in reading it given the author's engagement with Dita Kraus, the 'librarian' of Auschwitz. ) And as I said above, if it makes one person get knowledge of what happened, then there is one less person to deny it happened

>248 cindydavid4: Thanks Cindy. You're making me feel a little less uncomfortable for finding I couldn't put it down.

>247 AlisonY: Interesting Alison.

Alison, I appreciate your thoughtful approach to this. And the ensuing conversation has made me think.

You have made me aware of and interested in Dita Kraus, and I learned that she wrote a memoir called A Delayed Life. I might look for that. Echoing Kay's thanks for a thoughtful conversation.

>247 AlisonY: Glad you thought about whether this was ok, and also found out the author made a real effort to do their homework and be responsible. I appreciate that. Like Lisa, I'm now curious about Dita Kraus.

>250 Caroline_McElwee: This one challenged me before I'd started, Caroline. Good debate on the thread about it.

>251 RidgewayGirl: Thanks Kay. I've appreciated everyone's perspectives on this.

>252 labfs39: Oh I didn't realise she wrote her own memoir. That would be a great follow up.

>253 dchaikin: Dita Kraus came across as someone with so much spirit and courage. She's still alive, if Wikipedia is to be trusted - 92. This author commented on how spritely and determined she was when he met her in her 80s.

Up next:



Quartet in Autumn by Barbara Pym

>255 AlisonY: I'm trying to fit this one in this year too. Not sure when though, as I'm a bit swept up with Spooktober

>256 Nickelini: I'm pleased with the randomness of ending up reading a book with autumn in the title in autumn.

>257 AlisonY: When things are so random that they actually become logical. Love it. :)

>259 AlisonY: I figure if I'm consistently random, statistically things must fall into place some of the time...

>247 AlisonY: Great, thoughtful comments, Alison. I'm not sure how I feel about the issue either. I might pick it up some day...

Pym is quite the contrast to your previous read.

>260 BLBera: Sure is. I've found it hard to get into it just yet, and I think that's why. Plus we've been distracted finishing a 1,000 piece Jane Austen jigsaw my daughter got for her birthday. It's now finished (along with my back from all the bending over it).

39. Quartet in Autumn by Barbara Pym

This one started as a little bit of a slow burner, but once I gave it some proper concentration this poignant tale of loneliness in later life became really quite affecting.

It's a quiet book of life's every day minutiae, yet at the same time it shouts loudly of the desperate sadness of the long-stretching days of those lonely in their autumn years with few family or friends and only a modest income. The story revolves around two men and two women, all in their 60s and living alone, who have worked together for years yet never manage to evolve their relationship beyond that of polite colleagues. When the two women retire, the loss of the routine of work leaves a gaping void of endless days to fill, shining a heartbreaking spotlight on the abject isolation of Marcia in particular, a prickly, private individual, who ironically ends up becoming the linchpin that draws the other three together.

Plot seekers look elsewhere, for this is a lens on the sadness of every day lives in our midst. Barbara Pym books rarely leave you feeling joyful, but there's an unflinching honesty and truth to her writing about quintessentially English middle-aged women from a bygone era.

4 stars - quietly impacting in its ordinariness.

Up next:



The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch

>262 AlisonY: I have only read one book by Barbara Pym, Excellent Women. I described it as melancholy, as it seems, is this one. I have to be in the right frame of mind to enjoy quiet sadness. I wonder if all of her books are of a similar ilk.

>263 AlisonY: I've read a bunch of Murdoch, but not The Black Prince. Interested to hear what you think.

I love both Quartet in autumn and The black prince, but I should think it must be a very disconcerting change of gear going from one to the other!

>264 labfs39: Excellent Women was the only Pym I'd read before too, Lisa, but yes - a bit like Anita Brookner, there seems to be a common theme of melancholy to her writing. I preferred this one to Excellent Women, though.

>265 lisapeet: Looking forward to getting into it, Lisa.

>266 thorold: I think my last few books have all been strange changes of gear between each other! Good to hear a thumbs up for The Black Prince.

I like to mix up my books a bit and for there to be some differences. Although often I find surprise common themes between 2+ books in my current reading pile or between books I read in the same month or whatever.

I’ve read four or five of Pym’s books, and enjoyed them all. I’m not sure I could remember plots, but I rated them between 3.5 and 4 stars.

>269 NanaCC: Although I enjoyed this one, Colleen, I don't know that I'll rush to seek out more by Pym.

I started reading Pym about the time I started Norah Loft, and was taken by the latter;s Historic Fiction (starting from her series bless this house that Im afraid I dropped Pyms. May need to start that up again

>270 AlisonY: Quartet in autumn is rather darker than most of Pym's other books, which tend to have more of a mischievous, subversive thread undermining the spinsters-and-vicars (or spinsters-and-anthropologists) plots.

>271 cindydavid4: It's worth giving her a try, Cindy.

>272 thorold: Yes I guess it was more sombre than Excellent Women, but there was a melancholy tone to the latter as well as far as I remember.

I also enjoy Pym, and I loved The Black Prince. I'll watch for your comments.

>274 BLBera: I'm enjoying The Black Prince, Beth. There's a dark grit to it that reminds me of one of Mantel's non-Cromwell books I read a while back.

40. The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch

Well this was much more fun than I expected.

The narrator, Bradley Pearson, talks the reader through this book at intervals as if commenting on his own biography, although at the end Murdoch discombobulates us and leaves us to our own devices in terms of whether to believe him or not.

As Bradley would have us believe, having recently retired from the tax office he was getting ready to disappear to a cottage rental to focus back on his writing again (having published some work in the distant past) when a series of events turns his plans on their head and who he is upside down. Embroiled in the affairs of his friends and family despite his protestations against involvement of any kind, The Black Prince is a smart, tragical farce that was highly enjoyable.

This was my second Iris Murdoch novel, and I enjoyed it even more than The Sea, The Sea. Clever, funny and engaging - what's not to love about this book.

4.5 stars - wonderfully darkly comedic, with a cast of terrific characters.

Up next:



Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead

>276 AlisonY: Great review of a book by an author I've always meant to read. Could this be the one?

>277 AlisonY: Looking forward to see what you think of Great Circle. People either seem to love or dislike this one.

>276 AlisonY: sounds so good. Someday, Murdoch.

I need to go back to Iris Murdoch. I acquired a lot of her books in 1970s orange Penguin editions (probably in my local Oxfam) as a teenager, and think I read some but I read all sorts of things which sailed over my head somewhat and my memory from over 35 years ago is a bit hazy. I've since replaced many of them with better condition Vintage Classics in two or three different sets of covers, still a few Penguins too, and I now have a few on Kindle (at some point I might pass on the paperbacks to a charity shop).

>276 AlisonY: I read this one a while ago, Alison, and what I remember best is the humor - maybe it's time for a reread. Great comments.

I somehow have gathered 5 Iris Murdoch novels, but never feel brave enough to pick one up. Your comments are encouraging. Do you recommend The Black Prince? I own that one. I prefer shorter novels and I'm not going to start with one of her chunsters like The Sea, The Sea

As a member of the Iris Murdoch Fan Girls Book Club, which started up among far-flung friends during the pandemic, I think this might be a fine choice for 2022. We've broken away from Iris for a bit—we've read Sylvia Townsend Warner, Brigid Brophy, Muriel Spark, Elizabeth Taylor, and next up is Penelope Fitzgerald—but it might be time to circle around to her again, and that sounds like a good one.

>278 labfs39: I found this one grabbed me sooner than The Sea, The Sea, although I really enjoyed the latter more once I got into it. Enjoying Great Circle so far - we'll see how I feel in 500 pages' time!

>279 dchaikin: I think you would probably enjoy Murdoch's writing, Dan.

>280 elkiedee: She's definitely worth a revisit.

>281 BLBera: It was great dark humour, Beth. I really got into it.

>282 Nickelini: I definitely would recommend The Black Prince, Joyce. It's not daunting at all - I very much enjoyed it.

>283 lisapeet: Lisa, The Black Prince would be a great book club read. Lots to debate given the open ending Murdoch leaves you with.

Just caught up here all the way from >187 BLBera:. What a busy month of reading! I'm another who hasn't read Iris Murdoch despite my best intentions. Earlier I spent several years studiously avoiding post WWII writing by English women, but I do think I should get over it. She seems like a good place to start, although >262 AlisonY: seems promising as well.

>259 AlisonY: I figure if I'm consistently random, statistically things must fall into place some of the time... Great thought to keep in mind.

>285 SassyLassy: I would go with Murdoch over Pym if you've not read either.

41. Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead

This is a hefty novel (and a heavy one at that in hardback), so I'm physically glad to finish it but very glad I read it.

Despite being a Booker prize short-listed novel, this was never a book that was going to win, but that doesn't mean it's not a rewarding novel to read nonetheless. Its subject matter and style is too pedestrian for what the Booker looks for (rightly or wrongly), but it's an immensely readable epic spanning from 1914 to present day.

Centred around the fictional pilot Marian Graves, whilst her flying story is important the real story is one stemming from childhood loss and a difficulty with accepting love and finding a place in the world. The characters are well drawn out, as is the historical, geographical and aviation detail, all of which was well balanced and served to bring the story to life rather than getting bogged down with unnecessary researched detail (I've read too many books where the author can't drop all the research he or she has painstakingly accumulated).

Whilst Marian is the narrator for much of the book, around 20% of it swaps to the perspective of a modern day Hollywood actress playing Marian in a new film. I can see what Shipstead was trying to do with this, using it as a narrative device to include perspectives that would have been impossible through only Marian's perspective, but I'm not entirely sure it was necessary. These sections seemed a distraction from the main narrative and a bit of a cliché storyline (screwed up rich actress, etc.). 150 pages could probably have been saved by getting rid of this, bringing the novel to a more manageable size.

I'm torn on my review for this. By the end I was closer to 4.5 stars, but somewhere in the middle the end seemed exhaustingly far away so I'll be a little mean spirited and give it 4.

4 stars - an enjoyable sweeping epic that just needs a bit of clipping here and there.

Up next:



Bitter Orange by Claire Fuller

After many CR recommendations for Claire Fuller's work, I'm finally getting there.

>287 AlisonY: Thank you for your comments on length vs value added, as well as the narrative structure. These types of comments help me decide whether or when to read a book more than just a plot summary, especially since I have already read so many summaries.

I enjoyed your comments on Great Circle (I like how the default touchstone is Great Ground-Beef Recipes by Family Circle. LOL). Anyway, the novel isn't on my radar, and your post is all I need for now.

I hope you don't find Claire Fuller to be overhyped at this point. She was one of my great finds of 2021

>287 AlisonY: enjoyed your review too. I rated about the same as you, but leaned towards a lower end of 4, whatever that means. Interesting what parts worked for you and which didn’t. On audio I liked the modern day famous actress (and the flawed contemporary attempt to reach the historical figure, which reflects what the author is doing.). Also that narrator was very good and different from the main narrator, so that may have played a role in how I responded.

>287 AlisonY: I still want to read that—I really like the premise—but it'll have to be a time when I don't have other books clamoring for my attention, I think.

>289 labfs39: Just my usual ramblings, Lisa!

>290 Nickelini: That ground beef recipe touchstone was getting a tad annoying after a while! I'm enjoying Bitter Orange so far.

>291 dchaikin: I went back and read your review again, Dan. Interesting that you pointed out her passivity being annoying. I didn't really get that when I read it - I felt she was fiercely independent above all else, but I think I get what made you feel like that. I wonder how different an experience the book was overall on audio versus reading.

>292 lisapeet: It's worth reading, Lisa (although I'm delighted to lose the weight of it now I'm on to something much slimmer).

>293 AlisonY: huh. The narrator can really impact the shades of the text. There was a whole of “alright”s from Marion, regardless of the question. Maybe narrator exaggerated it a bit? Anyway, it sums up my main impression of her outside flying. She never says something like, “no. Eff off”.

>294 dchaikin: That's so interesting - that wasn't obvious to me at all reading it. Outside of flying I don't think she knew what she wanted, so maybe I read it more as indifference as opposed to passivity. I didn't consider before how much a narrator can affect a reading, though.

>296 dchaikin: The joy of books, these different perspectives.

Nice review of Great Circle, Alison. You and a couple of other LTers have convinced me that I should read it this year, which I'll probably do next month.

I enjoyed your comments on Great Circle, Alison, and agree that Shipstead could have done without the modern perspective.

>299 BLBera: I'm just not sure that it added anything to the story, Beth, other than length.

42. Bitter Orange by Claire Fuller

A psychological thriller, this is one of those books where you know early on that something bad has happened, but of course the reveal is never quite as you expect.

The protagonist, a social misfit who's spent years caring for her mother, takes a job at a decayed English country house to itemise the garden features for its new and remote American owner. Her life becomes entangled with an emotive young couple also staying there, and as their triangle develops and the narrative flashes forward to Frances' deathbed and her conversations with an old vicar friend, we know that this new relationship which develops quickly is not going to end well.

This was a fun novel, but I doubt it will stick with me for long. Recommended for when you just want a good zipping read that you don't have to think too hard about.

3.5 stars - enjoyable, but didn't stand out for me.

Up next:



Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam

Hi, I want to catch up with people, after an absence that was more prolonged than I expected. I hope you will forgive me for not reading all the foregoing. Read anything good lately?

>301 AlisonY: I am often in the mood for exactly this kind of book.

>303 sallypursell: Hi Sally, hope you're feeling a bit better. If you scroll to to the top of my thread you'll see a summary of the ratings I've given stuff I've been reading. My favourites in Q3:

Childhood, Youth, Dependency by Tove Ditlevsen (mid-century Danish auto fiction)
The Maiden Dinosaur by Janet McNeill (N. Irish overlooked writer - similar to Barbara Pym/ Anita Brookner)
The Narrow Land by Christine Dwyer Hickey (fictional account of Edward Hopper & his wife)
The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch (plenty of black humour as a middle-aged guy's life derails).

All very different but very enjoyable.

>305 RidgewayGirl: I know exactly what you mean.

43. Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam

Knowing that this was an apocalyptic type novel I wasn't sure if it would be my bag, but I actually thoroughly enjoyed it.

What I liked most was that Alam didn't fall into the usual plot stereotype of this type of book. It's not like McCarthy's The Road, focusing on the fallout of an apocalypse for the few remaining survivors. Instead it focuses on the first hours of something major happening (we never find out what), when the characters, who are staying in a relatively remote area, get the sense that something's happened as TV and mobile phones stop working, and animals start behaving in strange ways, but they don't know what or how cataclysmic it is.

It feels believable, and for that reason successfully edgy and eerie, particularly in this COVID era where the end of the world now feels depressingly possible rather than the stuff of fictional fodder.

The setting for the book is a family in an upmarket holiday rental who are forced to accommodate some unexpected and unwelcome visitors as the situation starts to unfold. It works brilliantly; the polite, awkward tension between the two families as they're thrown together in the situation, neither wanting to be with the other, no one knowing what is happening, how serious the situation is and whether it's safe to leave the social discomfort of the house. Rumaan Alam could have easily got carried away with the plot and taken it into full apocalyptic territory, but he controls it and keeps it tightly reined in to the hinterland of the event.

4 stars (possibly a bit more) - clever writing that haves you questioning throughout - 'what would I do?'

Up next:



The Bird Way: A New Look at How Birds Talk Work, Play, Parent and Think by Jennifer Ackerman

>307 AlisonY: Leave the World Behind sounds interesting. Did you read Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice? It too is about the first hours, then weeks, of some sort of cataclysmic event, we never learn what. He's coming out with a sequel that I'm looking forward to reading.

>309 labfs39: I thought of Moon of the Crusted Snow too when I read Alison's description. I won't read Leave the World Behind but it's being filmed for Netflix or HBO or something, so I'll definitely watch it.

>309 labfs39: That's interesting - I didn't realise Moon of the Crusted Snow has a similar premise (haven't read it).

>310 Nickelini: I could see Leave the World Behind working in a film. Funnily enough not my usual cup of tea for a film, but I'll probably watch it having enjoyed the book.

I decided to bail on The Bird Way. No reflection on the book at all - I'm just working long hours at the moment and it felt a bit like extra homework rather than relaxation when I picked it up at the start of the week. Right book, wrong time - I hope to come back to it at some stage.

Instead I hope to start this sometime soon:

Up next:



Jamaica Inn by Daphne Du Maurier

A very Happy Thanksgiving to all in CR who celebrate it.

>312 AlisonY: i was planning to start Jamaica Inn next too. Not sure now if I will

>314 Nickelini: I've not had time to read anything this week at all. Hoping to start it over the weekend.

>306 AlisonY: I love that title The Maiden Dinosaur. Surely that would qualify as a phrase that was unique in the world when she chose it.

I did go back and look at your ratings, and I read a scattering of reviews.

>305 RidgewayGirl: I'm in that camp, too.

>307 AlisonY: I'm really looking forward to this one when I get it to it. I think I would have wanted the whole apocalypse, but this sounds paced just right.

>316 sallypursell: It wins title of the year for me in my reading, Sally.

I hope you enjoy Leave the World Behind. It's a good book to read when you're in a mood for just quickly getting into a good story and not having to think too hard about what you're reading.

44. Jamaica Inn by Daphne du Maurier

This was... OK. Enjoyable enough, but I'm not going to spend too much time thinking about it afterwards.

Brave heroine goes to live with aunt and evil uncle who's into all sorts of wrongdoing (it takes half of the book to set the scene on that part). Reaches somewhat improbable climax and then our brave heroine heads off into the sunset with her new lover.

Good enough for the type of book it is, and some enjoyable scene setting amidst the moors which worked well.

3.5 stars - the book equivalent of easy listening music.

Up next:



Close Range: Wyoming Stories by Annie Proulx

I love Annie Proulx. This mainstream cover irks me, though. It loses the 'Wyoming Stories' to throw out the attention grabbing Brokeback Mountain.

>320 AlisonY: I try to avoid the movie tie-in covers, but that's the cover I have for my copy too.

45. Close Range by Annie Proulx

I loved the second book of short stories in the Wyoming series when I read it a few years back, so I was looking forward to this first book but sadly didn't enjoy it anywhere near as much.

Brokeback Mountain probably was the best story in the collection; it was tightly woven, there was a connection with the characters and Proulx took her time with the ending. Many of the other stories had a lot of characters as Proulx wanted to connect up their different back stories at the end of the piece, and they felt unsatisfying to read, with too much time spent on these different narratives as a beginning, not much of a middle and then sudden, abrupt endings.

The writing, as always from Proulx, was superb, and there was plenty of dark humour in phrasing she used throughout the collection, but in all I laboured somewhat through this book. Some sort of linkage between the stories probably would have worked better rather than the individual stories with far too many characters to get to grips with.

3 stars - I glazed over too many times in this collection.

PS - I'm guessing the Wyoming tourist board doesn't use these stories from Proulx...

Up next:



Outline by Rachel Cusk

I think I have read her a while back but cant remember what. let me know how that one turns out

Hope you’re enjoying Outline. I read the beginning in The Paris Review and later bought a copy. But haven’t read it. So you’re not second from last either. Enjoyed reading about Proulx, who I haven’t read. Think I’ll skip Jamaica Inn.

Oops. Duplicate post.

>325 cindydavid4: Review coming up...

>326 dchaikin: I think Proulx is ordinarily a superlative writer, Dan. I loved The Shipping News and the second in this series of short stories.

46. Outline by Rachel Cusk

I had the most relaxing Sunday I've had in a long while. We didn't go to church so the morning was my own, and my mum made Sunday lunch for my family and one of my sisters and her partner, so half of Sunday afternoon wasn't burnt up preparing Sunday dinner like it normally is. Point being I got a rare long period to just immerse myself in reading rather than a snatched hour in the evening, so managed to turn this one around in a day.

I'm trying to figure out if I loved this book or not. The fact that I tore through it in one sitting shows that I liked it well enough, but somehow it already feels not particularly memorable. I liked the idea of what Cusk did with the book; the protagonist flies to Athens to teach a week-long writing course, and each chapter focuses on some soul searching conversations she has with various people in that time. Much of this was centred around a search for oneself in the context of failed relationships and the passage of time, and this is perhaps where my star rating started to slide a little, as at times the overwrought philosophising in these conversations got in the way of the novel. Cusk clearly had a perspective she wanted to get across, but for me that goal started to force the story too much, and it could have been achieved more effectively in what was left unsaid and without such extended dialogue.

Still, an enjoyable read, but I'm not sure I'll actively seek out book number two in this trilogy.

3.5 stars - almost 4 if Cusk had just given the message in the novel room to breathe a little more.

Up next:



We, the Survivors by Tash Aw

>329 AlisonY: Funny Alison, i started this on my travels to Dorset a couple of years ago, and set it aside by the time I arrived. Not sure why, it just wasn't ringing my bells. Haven't returned to it yet.

Did buy a Kindle copy of her Booker long/?shortlisted novel to give a try.

>330 AlisonY: Interesting, I'll look forward to your review of this one.

>329 AlisonY: you captured my memory of the first part that I read. I keep thinking I will finally read it for real partially to try to understand the nature of that elusive aspect.

>329 AlisonY: Sunday afternoon wasn't burnt up preparing Sunday dinner like it normally is
I read that two ways and wondered what the burnt up dinner was.

>322 AlisonY: Interesting about this collection of short stories. In Postcards, which at times reads like short stories, the linkage is there and it really works. I don't think it would have without it, so I can see what you mean about the lack of it.

>331 Caroline_McElwee: It's one of those books I'd describe as 'fine', Caroline. Definitely readable, but not one I'm going to rave about.

>332 labfs39: It's been on my wish list for a while - I hope it lives up to the hype.

>333 dchaikin: It's certainly worth a read, Dan, but I wouldn't rush to move it to the top of your pile.

>334 SassyLassy: Well sometimes Sunday dinner does end up burnt, and sometimes I end up burned making it too, so all of the above.

Yeah, I was quite disappointed with this collection, especially seeing as the second volume was so strong. I think Proulx could have quite easily created linkages between them too to create a thread. It was just too busy and complicated - by the time she got to the climax of many of the stories I was disinterested and just couldn't wait to get onto the next story to get the book finished.

47. Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor

I got side-tracked from We, The Survivors (still debating whether to abandon it completely or not - it's not speaking to me currently). This shiny new number arrived through the post and I've been really looking forward to reading it.

The gist of this popular science book is that although breathing is something we instinctively do 25,000 times per day, we've allegedly lost the art of how to breathe correctly. Nestor presents the evidence on what's changed through evolution, the potential grave consequences and what we can do about it.

I fit into two ideal marketing boxes for the book - firstly, I've increasingly become a mouth breather when I'm sleeping, and although my husband hasn't been complaining yet about that leading to snoring (possibly because he snores so loudly himself he'd never hear me if I did), I'm conscious that it makes my mouth feel horrible in the morning and is incredibly bad for your teeth. Secondly, I've done Iyengar yoga on and off for a number of years and so am already bought in to the notion of breath being hugely important for good health (but am very much lapsed in doing anything about it).

Straight away Nestor cuts to the chase about mouth breathing, and apparently I've much more than bad breath and cavities to worry about. According to the research he's done, at best mouth breathing leads to increased stuffiness / infections in the nasal cavities, and at worst leads to hypertension and the metabolic and cognitive problems that come with sleep apnea. If you regularly get up in the middle of the night for a wee your mouth breathing could be to blame as it also affects kidney regulation.

It's not only breathing through the correct airway that improves our health but also how we breathe (5.5 seconds in and out is optimal, which is probably a lot less breaths per minute than most of us take) and, believe it or not, how we chew. Science has shown that man's change of diet in evolution to softer foods has decreased the size of our mouth cavities to a size which is sub-optimal for allowing room for our teeth and room for an effective airway system. Whilst not everyone is likely to queue up for the type of orthodontic 'widening' device that Nestor tries out (successfully, in terms of his overall sinus function), he provides detail on how new facial bone can be developed at any age through the regular use of certain hard gum (nasty habit - I struggled to get on board with that idea, although the science behind it sounds plausible).

I loved this book. It was interesting and written in a very engaging style, and I took a lot from it in terms of practices I want to start adopting.

4.5 stars - entertaining, fascinating and potentially life transformation. Recommended.

PS - I can report that I went to bed with the recommended piece 3M tape on my mouth last night to stop my mouth breathing and woke for the first time in months with much reduce nasal stuffiness. I may not have looked too hot, but I'll certainly be doing it again.

>336 AlisonY: I had no idea mouth breathing was a health issue (or that people could sleep without it.) My library has this book, so I'm going to check it out. I have had multiple sinus infections, so need to developing my habits of nasal rinsing and alternate nostril breathing.

I'd love to be able to quit snoring. Its a family thing, my sis is the same way and both of our husbands sleep elsewhere in the house so they can get to sleep. I'll have to look at this and see if the way I breath has anything to do with it

>336 AlisonY: I think I had better read this book.

>336 AlisonY: I must dig this out, I picked it up last year after reading an article about it, and didn't get to it. Glad it's a hit with you Alison. I do need to pee several times in the night, but put that down to my age and being a healthy water drinker.

>337 markon:, >338 cindydavid4:, >339 baswood:, >340 Caroline_McElwee: it's a really interesting book. I hope you all get something out of it.

>340 Caroline_McElwee: Caroline here's a quick blog that summarises some of the thoughts on the link between sleep apnea and nighttime peeing:

https://www.usa.philips.com/c-e/hs/better-sleep-breathing-blog/better-sleep/the-...

The author of the book did an extended experiment with his nose sealed up and his nighttime peeing dramatically increased. I had no idea there was a link. Obviously people can pee for many reasons during the night, but I found this correlation interesting.

I hope 2022 is a year with special moments Alison.

>342 Caroline_McElwee: Thanks Caroline. I hope you have a happy and safe Christmas and New Year.

Happy holidays everyone, and to all who celebrate it a very Happy Christmas. I'm working all week so it's not feeling Christmassy just yet, but hopefully I'll squeeze in at least one more finished book before the end of the year.

Niche interest book alert - feel free to skip this review.

48. Light on Life by B.K.S. Iyengar

This is a reread (well sort of, as I only read the first part of it previously). I'm hoping to go back to my Iyengar yoga class in the New Year, so following on from the previous book on breath was interested in returning to Iyengar's insights on breath work, etc. Iyengar was the founder of the Iyengar style of yoga, which takes Hatha yoga as its foundation but puts much more focus on the precise position of every part of the body during poses.

The first two chapters (on the asanas, or poses, and breath) were interesting enough, but it wasn't long before I remembered why I'd given up after that previously. There's a lot of lecturing on inner wisdom and enlightenment, and despite a lot of text around successful yoga practice (and life) relying on loss of ego there seemed plenty of ego coming across from old Iyengar himself. Iyengar had a lot of opinions, and boy did he allow himself the luxury of examining them in minutiae detail in this book.

2 stars - recommended for insomniacs or those interested in alternative torture methods.

Up next:



On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin

>346 AlisonY: I have this book on my list to be read early in 2022! I'll look forward to reading what you think of it. Cheers!

oh I love him, tho don't think Ive read that one. Need to check..ETA didn;t realize it was about wales!!!!! Ok, on my list!

>346 AlisonY: One of my favourite books Alison. Hope it works for you.

>347 rocketjk:, 348, 349 Loved it - review coming up.

49. On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin

This is a beautiful, quietly written book with an old soul. Set on a Welsh mountain side, it's a moving account of the bond between twin brothers who live at Black Hill farm throughout the entirety of their lives, and the often fraught relationships between family members and nearest neighbours.

I really enjoyed this gentle novel. Reminding me of a cross between Thomas Hardy's and Kent Haruf's writing, it was emotive and moving with well executed characters trying to make ends meet in the rural isolation of the Welsh mountains.

For anyone who's already read this and enjoyed it, I thoroughly recommend Horatio Clare's memoir Running for the Hills. It has a very similar setting on a Welsh mountain farm and real-life eccentric rural characters. I kept thinking of it as I read this book (to the extent that I wonder did it heavily influence Clare's own book).

4.5 stars - a wonderful read. Highly recommended.

>351 AlisonY: So glad it hit the spot for you Alison. I've probably read it 3-4 times.

I have the Clare book somewhere.

I can' remember, have you read A Month in the Country by J L Carr? If you like the Chatwin, I think you'd like that. Another I've read half a dozen times.

>351 AlisonY: I mentioned it else thread and someone said it was very grim (she'd seen the movie) But I am going with your recommendation, I love everything Chatwin has done!

>352 Caroline_McElwee: No I've not read that one, Caroline. Noting it now - I definitely like that kind of rural setting in books.

Do you know I hadn't even heard of Bruce Chatwin until I stumbled upon that book recently in the Oxfam bookshop. How did he escape me? I gather he didn't write many books given his early demise (ah, echoes of Kent Haruf again) - have you read any of his other novels? I get the impression that On the Black Hill is the one considered his best.

>353 cindydavid4: Oh I didn't find it grim at all, Cindy. It was moving and sad in places, but if you like those rural novels from previous eras I think you'll enjoy it.

>354 AlisonY: Songlines,in patagonia, Utz, but oh my while looking on my shelves I found On the Black Hills! It doesn't look like I read it! I will now....

I've never heard of Bruce Chatwin either, so thank you for putting him on my radar. Sounds like a book I would really enjoy.

>355 AlisonY: Did you every read How Green My Valley My dad found it for me when I was in JrHi and Id read it many times afterwards. Also about rural Wales.

>356 cindydavid4: Did you enjoy Chatwin's other novels, Cindy?

>357 japaul22: Hi Jennifer. Yes, I think you'd definitely enjoy this one.

>49 baswood: I adore Chatwins not-really-nonfictional books. I haven’t read a novel yet. This sounds wonderful, actually.

Oh I loved them; he really was a travel writer, and he wrote about Australia outback in Songlines and Patagoinia in well patagonia; ut is about a collector of antiques in he Czech area.. He loved antiques and for a while worked for Sotherbys, and wrote for the Sunday Times Magazine.

>360 dchaikin: oh yeah, theres lots of controversy over how true some of his characterizations of the people he met. But I remember not caring; the worlds he brought to life was so well worth reading

>362 cindydavid4: yes, you have to accept them as they are, and enjoy the experience. The facts, as far as I know, are wildly divergent from the books.

>360 dchaikin:, >361 cindydavid4:, >362 cindydavid4:, >363 dchaikin: That's interesting, as Horatio Clare is normally a travel writer and honestly, there were so many parallels with this book. No doubt totally embellished with a healthy dose of imagination too.

I usually am ok with embellisments, in about the same way I am ok with magic realism; with the right author, it works. but a good example when I wasnt was Mutant Message Down Under Written as a non fiction account, even I saw problems reading it in HS. Cant remember what happened but it was a huge controversy at the time

>354 AlisonY: I've read all his books Alison. I have been a fan from early on. There is a fine film of On the Black Hill, I was at the London premier, but sadly he was too ill to come on stage, although he was in the auditorium, and heard the audiences response.

I would say all his works are different. He refused to describe his books as either fiction or non-fiction. He was a self-mythologist, he had a big brain. One of the last great explorers.

IMO his weakest book is The Viceroy of Ouidah (Filmed as Cobra Verde). I think Paul (Cranswick) read it recently and was underwhelmed. It is the only of his books I've only read once.

Songlines, Utz, In Patagonia and there are a couple of volumes of essays, all are fine in my opinion. There is also a volume of his photographs. On the Black Hill scrapes by as my favourite though.

>365 cindydavid4: Yeah, I'm OK with some embellishment too, so long as it doesn't veer into the territory of abject lies (aka A Million Little Pieces).

>366 Caroline_McElwee: Yourself, Dan and Cindy are all easily persuading me to pick up some of Chatwin's other titles. I had a look for the film of On the Black Hill last night but it's on neither Amazon or Netflix. I never realised he died of AIDS - so sad. Such talent.

Yeah I didnt realize that either, so young! FWIW I am really enjoying Black Hill, love how he describes the lives and people of this area. Really reminds me of How Green Was my Valley.

>336 AlisonY: You got much more out of Breath than I did.

Wishing you a very happy new year.

>368 cindydavid4: Glad you're enjoying it, Cindy.

>369 VivienneR: I think you hit the nail on the head in your review of Breath, Vivienne - I was particularly interested as I'm fed up of waking with a paper dry mouth in the morning through mouth breathing, and also being very congested each morning.

50. Older and Wider: A Survivor's Guide to the Menopause by Jenny Eclair

I bought this as part of a Christmas gift for my middle sister, and then my son quite rightly said "Why do you keep buying her books on the menopause?" so I held onto it. What can I say - she's hard to buy for and everything and everyone's been annoying her for the past few years, so I somehow this subject area keeps springing to mind.

Anyway, as I'm heading towards the menopause rapids in a barrel myself I thought this would be a perfect filler read to bring me to a nice round 50 books in 2021. Feel free to look away now if you've kept reading this far.

If you're not familiar with Jenny Eclair further afield from the UK, she was a comedienne back in the 90s and is more recently known as a writer of newspaper columns and books and has had some success in recent years with tours on subjects that appeal to women of a certain age. I'm not sure what I expected from this - probably funny musings on the menopause. Eclair probably thinks this is the book she's written, but sadly it missed the mark on several fronts.

Firstly, this was literally an A to Z of the menopause, which resulted in lots of filler content to fill all those awkward letters. Secondly, as far as I'm aware Jenny Eclair doesn't have a secret clinical degree that she's hiding under a bushel, yet she felt in a position to talk with authority on subjects such as HRT and alternative remedies. What very much wound me up was her failure to not once mention the link between HRT and breast cancer, despite writing a good few pages on the subject. Sadly the humour was also try-hard and didn't work for me. Eclair is one of those women that feels she has to be bolshy and shocking but it just comes across as a bit sad and out-dated - that was maybe how she had to be to get on in the man's world of the comedy circuit 30 years ago, but I think we've all moved on a bit now.

3 stars - it wasn't dreadful, but I'll not be recommending it (no matter how bad your mood swings).

Up next:



The Morning Star by Karl Ove Knausgaard

This is a chunky doorstop - to be concluded in 2022.

I really need to get back to my Knausgaard reading.

>371 AlisonY: ah ok. I am past that stage thanksfully but loved the title and thought she might have intereting stuff to say. I'll skip this one gladly

>371 AlisonY: Yeah... not to be censorious or anything but I think there could be a moratorium on cutesy menopause books and the world would not be worse off for it.

>373 ursula: I'm a bit nervous about this one given the reviews haven't been stellar, but I've enjoyed the first 50 pages.

>374 cindydavid4: She has absolutely nothing new to say in this book that haven't been said in a million other places before, so don't waste a penny on it.

>375 lisapeet: Ha! It's definitely a far from cutesy point in our biology.

>371 AlisonY: as I'm heading towards the menopause rapids in a barrel myself,
I'll not be recommending it (no matter how bad your mood swings)

The book may have been a dud, but I laughed reading your review.

Happy new year Alison! I’m looking forward to your reading in the new year.

>379 NanaCC: Happy New Year, Colleen! Likewise, look forward to your books this year.

allison, do you have a new thead for 2022 or are you just continuing this one? I want to make sure I dont miss anything!

Hi Cindy - yes my new thread is here: https://www.librarything.com/topic/337964#n7711515