Monthly Archives: July 2010

Weekly Geeks 2010-26: Happy Birthday TKAM

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Fittingly this week’s discussion topic is related to the 50th anniversary of the publication of To Kill a Mockingbird. As a non-US resident the question I am ostensibly answering is “If you read the book but don’t live in the U.S., how did the novel influence your opinions about race in the U.S.?”

The short answer is, it didn’t.

I first read the book (and yes it was the one in the picture) in 1981. I was in my second year at high school and it was one of our set books for English that year. About all I can remember from my first reading and the discussion we must have afterwards was clearly identifying with Scout Finch. On subsequent readings this became something of an embarrassment to me as we really didn’t have a heck of a lot in common aside from long summers spent in the company of other children with equally vivid imaginations as Scout, Jem and Dill. But in those subsequent readings I continued to be more struck by things other than race: issues such as gender, justice and a generic treatment of outsiders. When I did think of race in connection with the book I must admit I consigned the issue to one of only historical significance. I suspect the reason for this is that America’s racial tensions are (or were when I was 14) pretty foreign to me and, particularly as I read the book first during my impressionable and egocentric teenage years, I concentrated on those aspects of the book that I could more easily identify with and relate to. Even now racial issues are not the first (or even second) thing I think of when I think of TKAM.

This copy of TKAM is one what is literally a handful of books that I have kept since reading it. It has accompanied me through eight house moves, done a couple of stints in long-term storage while I backpacked the globe and survived countless culls of the books on my shelves (I am the opposite of a hoarder).

It is a book I have re-read many times, thought about many more. I love it.

Review: The Reunion by Simone van der Vlugt

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I added this book to my TBR pile after reading Dorte’s review and chose it for my F2F bookclub to read because I’ve since read several other good reviews for it and I wanted to pull something from ‘the pile’ rather than buy a new book for bookclub (at least this month).

Sabine has been off work for a year due to Depression and as the book opens she is returning to her work at a bank for half-days only. During her absence a woman called Renee seems to have taken over the small office and she makes it clear that she is now in charge and Sabine will have to do exactly as she says. At the same time as she is coping with this situation Sabine is starting to remember events from when she was a teenager and her classmate Isabel disappeared, seemingly forever.

Sabine is a very well drawn character. As a young teenager she is realistically shown as the victim of bullying and ostracism and as a troubled young woman she is also depicted very naturally. Both the way her struggle to deal with Depression is shown as a daily hurdle rather than something which can be forever banished and the fragmented way her memory of the traumatic period from her earlier days returns both had a particularly credible feel to them for me. I felt everything from empathy (for the office bullying) to annoyance (because she didn’t change her locks immediately her odd boyfriend started displaying his true nature) for Sabine and it’s always a sign of good characterisation when I am engaged in this way. There are solid minor characters too including Olaf, the aforementioned odd boyfriend, and Renee, the office bully (who I failed to feel much for when something horrid happened to her).

The novel really is full of suspense. The events that surrounded Isabel’s disappearance are slowly revealed over the course of the story but at each turn a potential new culprit comes to light. What did the creepy school caretaker have to do with the disappearance? Which of the many boys who lusted after Isabel played a role? Robin, Sabine’s much-loved older brother? Bart her own teenage boyfriend who kept their relationship a secret? Or perhaps Olaf, Sabine’s current boyfriend who is reluctant to talk of his own link to Isabel? Although she now lives in Amsterdam Sabine keeps returning to the small town where she grew up in an effort to help the memories that she has locked away to resurface so there is a constant juxtaposition between the present and the past which helps to flesh the story out.

I did think perhaps the author was trying a little too hard to misdirect readers down a particular line of reasoning. This perversely made me guess the real ending relatively early on in one of those ‘if she wants me to think A then the real solution can only be B’ thought processes that I sometimes have when reading crime fiction. I also found myself wondering at several loose ends left at the end of the book, including what might have become of all the other missing girls that Sabine uncovers in her search for the truth surrounding Isabel’s disappearance.

However the novel has much to commend it, not least its very reasonable length, its sensitive translation by a new (to me) translator Michele Hutchison, the fact it is a standalone novel, its excellent characters and the very satisfactory build-up of suspense that kept me up late one night. I am looking forward to reading Simone van der Vlugt’s next novel Shadow Sister (due to be published in English in December this year).

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

My rating 3.5/5

Translator Michele Hutchison; Publisher Harper Collins [this translation 2009, original edition 2004]; ISBN 9780007301317; Length 295 pages

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The Reunion has been reviewed at Crime Scraps, DJ’s Krimiblog, It’s a Crime! (Or a Mystery), Mysteries in Paradise, Petrona

Everyone’s talking about e-readers but who’s using one?

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The news this week that e-book sales had stripped hardcover book sales at Amazon over the past 3 months has generated a flurry of comment and opinion both celebrating and despairing the news in a way that few topics can be guaranteed to do. I have what can only be described as minimal interest in the entire subject but with the release of this news I couldn’t help but remember a dark time in my personal history.

It was in 1996 that the first of a very, very long line of sales folk trapped me in a room for 90 minutes to extol the virtues of an early model e-reader (a Sony). The tag-team of expensive suit wearing chaps waxed lyrical about the many ways in which the organisation I then worked for would be more efficient, generate more wealth and solve forever the problem of world hunger if only we bought e-readers for everyone. In the subsequent 14 years I’ve endured countless similar sessions in which the gadgets have gotten fancier and the sales speak has gotten slicker but the reality hasn’t changed much at all: very few of the workforce wants an e-reader.

I think now as I thought then: something that is as good as the sales people say it is shouldn’t need such a strong pitch. If e-readers are such a boon to life, business (and solving world hunger) then they will naturally replace paper books without the help of an army of cologne-wearing salesmen. Won’t they? I don’t remember the switch from LP to CD for the mass consumption of sound recordings taking 14 years and requiring a never-ending stream of opinion pieces. It just happened. Fairly organically. And reasonably quickly. In a business context the smart phone has been around for a lot less time than the e-reader but has experienced a much (much) higher adoption rate.

Perhaps this week’s news means that e-readers are finally on the home stretch for world domination and it just took a little longer than anyone thought it would. But honestly I don’t think so, though I admit my ‘evidence’ isn’t terribly scientific:

  • I can think of two dozen people I know in real life who are moderate to heavy readers and only 3 of them have any kind of e-reading device
  • In the Crime and Mystery Room at Friend Feed where I spend many a happy moment chatting about all things crime fiction with other fans there are (I think) only 2* e-reader users (*Update – apparently there are 4 not 2)
  • At work the take-up rate is minuscule, less than 1% of the eligible workforce has one
  • I don’t have one (I’m an avid reader, could easily afford an e-reader, am in no way averse to technology and harbour no inherent objection to the format but have yet to be convinced of the need to own one)

I wonder where we’ll be in another 14 years.

How do you say congratulations in Swedish?

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By now everyone who cares is undoubtedly well aware that while I was sleeping on Friday night Johan Theorin’s The Darkest Room was awarded the 2010 UK Crime Writer’s Association’s International Dagger Award for crime fiction translated into English. My heartfelt congratulations and thanks go to Theorin and his translator Marlaine Delargy for what is a wonderful book and a terrific win. Although it wasn’t my personal pick of the bunch I will repeat what I said when I finished all six of the shortlisted books: there wasn’t a dud in the bunch and any winner is deserving. I congratulate the five nominees (indicated by ** in the list below) and their translators too because they were in excellent company.

To look at the bigger picture for a minute I’m also grateful that there is an award for translated crime fiction at all, and also for the great websites that bring these works to my attention, in particular the excellent Euro Crime which is a brilliant source of reviews and information about what I should spend my pay cheque on each fortnight :)

I am reading my 17th translated book of the year at present. Before the past couple of years I simply did not read translated fiction. I barely even knew it existed really but so far this year I’ve read (in reading order):

Before you think I’m being all lefty intellectual in rating ‘foreign’ stuff above English works I should point out that the above list contains my equally highest rated books of the year as well as by far the worst book I have read this century and everything in between. But being able to read from a much wider range of settings and voices than just the English-writing ones has enriched my reading life, even including the odd dud (it’s The Last Pope in case you’re wondering).

I have another couple of dozen translated titles teetering on mount TBR and that’s without starting to think about the books eligible for next year’s International Dagger award. I wonder what treats I have ahead of me.

Review: A Few Right Thinking Men by Sulari Gentill

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After being unable to settle with any of my books since finishing the marvellous Gunshot Road more than a week ago I wandered into a local bookstore to pick something brand new. The title of this called me from the shelves and when I realised it featured a little-explored period in Australia’s political history I couldn’t resist it.

It is the early 1930’s and Australia, like the rest of the world, is in the grip of the Depression. As often happens in such times the political scene has become tense with a newly emerging socialism at odds with the established conservatism. Striding both worlds is Rowland ‘Rowly’ Sinclair, the youngest son of a wealthy landowning family he knows great privilege but he chooses to mix with, even share his house with, artists, left wing types and even members of the Communist Party. When his uncle is savagely beaten and killed the Police seem alarmingly disinterested in finding the culprit so Rowly and his friends embark on their own investigation.

This was a delightful book to read. I’ll admit right up front that the mystery component was a bit on the light side but because it played out against a fascinating and well-drawn backdrop of social and political events it kept my attention from the outset. Australia is not noted for its political unrest but Gentill has done a tremendous job of taking just enough real people and events from one of the few genuinely tense times in our political history and surrounding them with interesting fictional characters and intriguing situations. Rowly and his friends, some of whom are members of the Communist Party which is rising in popularity among the working class, find themselves up against the New Guard, a right-wing group that rose up (albeit briefly) in response to the perceived threat of the spread of Communism and the slightly more real threat from the brand of socialism expounded by the local Premier at the time, Jack Lang. The increasingly bizarre plots to ‘save’ the country are credibly depicted and do indeed demonstrate how easy it is for people who believe a little too fervently to move from doing good works to dangerous ones in the blink of an eye.

The characters too are nicely drawn. There was potential for them all to be a bit stereotyped and one-dimensional but they’re all nicely rounded out. Rowly is an accomplished artist, secretly in love with one of his house guests but she is pursuing her own artistic dreams. While he wants to be his own man he still does have respect for his family name and though he argues with his older brother Wilfred, now head of the family, he doesn’t deliberately set out to upset him. And though Rowly and his friends lived a life of luxury amidst the harshness of the Depression their lives aren’t without sadness, such as having to deal with the fact that Rowly’s mother believes him to be his other brother who died in the war and she constantly refers to him by his dead brother’s name and only ever talks to him about events from his brother’s life rather than his own.

The book is rounded out by a gentle humour and some imaginative interpretations of what might have happened behind the scenes at some well known moments in our history. I was easily and quickly lost in the story and keen to find out how it would all unfold. I read the whole thing in a couple of sittings and would recommend it to those who don’t mind their mysteries taking a back seat to great settings, interesting historical details and warm, lively characters. It’s a delicious treat of a book.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

My rating 3.5/5

Publisher Pantera Press [2010]; ISBN 9780980741810 Length 349

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Aside from being happy that I’m finally over my reading slump I’m also chuffed to have discovered this debut work (of adult fiction though Gentill has published YA fiction) by an author whose work I can now look out for with pleasure. In one of those spooky coincidences I discovered after finishing the book that Sulari Gentill shared a panel stage with Adrian Hyland at last weekend’s Crime and Justice Festival held in Melbourne.

A Few Right Thinking Men has been reviewed at AustCrimeFiction

The good, the bad and the ugly of reading slumps

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The good (great even)

I loved Adrian Hyland’s Gunshot Road and feel very privileged to have read it. I have already told you all to read it but it warrants repeating.

Read it. Now. All of you. Yes even you over there in the corner.

The Bad

Since finishing it a week ago I have started 4 books and finished none of them; leaving them all lying about the place in various states of non-completion. I am quite sure that none of them are especially bad and one or two of them might even be excellent. But special books like Gunshot Road are as rare as honest politicians and it seems the price one pays for discovering them is a few days (weeks?) of dull reading where things pale in comparison.

Don’t get me wrong though: the price is worth paying.

The Ugly

My reading slump is not being helped by having suffered the mental trauma of watching our country’s former prime minister’s sex life writ large on our television screens on the weekend. In both a dramatised tele-movie and the interview with the man himself which followed it, Bob Hawke’s contribution to Australian public life was boiled down to the fact that he liked to bonk someone other than his wife. A lot. Regardless of who was in the bathroom next door trying desperately not to listen. Although a Rhodes Scholar in his younger days Hawke apparently never got as far as D in the dictionary because neither discretion nor decorum are concepts he is familiar with. Oh how I long for the days when the only acceptable topics of conversation for Australian men in public were the prospects for one’s footy team and the likelihood of rain.

Bob & Blanche (you can't see her botox but trust me it's there)

How can a girl concentrate on reading when images of these two at it like rabbits are running through her brain?

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So today I undertook the kind of therapy that any self-respecting book addict would endure to get herself out of a reading slump. I toddled off to an actual bookstore (something I do only once or twice a year since discovering online shopping) and bought a book I know absolutely nothing about.

It’s fairly large and heavy. If reading it doesn’t work at least I can beat myself in the head to stop the continuous loop of images of Bob and Blanche bonking.

what to read while #ausvotes

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When I was a doe-eyed 17-year old I was so excited by the prospect of my first opportunity to vote that I put my name on the electoral roll early just in case an election was called before my birthday for a date after my birthday. I was, apparently, only the second person ever to take advantage of the little known clause in the legislation at my local electoral office (for the record, it worked, I voted in a state election a mere 12 days after my 18th birthday).

Old and new Parliament Houses, Canberra

25 and a half years later the gloss has well and truly worn off my excitement about voting. I still devour political news on TV and in print, watch every minute of election-night coverage and yes am following #ausvotes on twitter. But these days all this news-following is accompanied with more cynicism than anticipation.

I hate being one of those “all politicians are equally unethical and you can’t trust any of ‘em” moaners but that’s where I’m at. We only have two major parties, one of whom will form government and both of which are currently being led by people who usurped their party’s respective leaderships in what can only be called slimy circumstances. Both have also apparently hired the same advertising agency and speech writers as ‘moving forward’ is clearly the buzz phrase of the 3-day old campaign. Its constant repetition is already a more annoying noise than the world cup’s vuvuzelas. I guess the parties assume that if they repeat it often enough we’ll all forget the pretty miserable way they have behaved in the past few months. And even if we don’t, who else are we gonna vote for (and in Australia we have compulsory voting so we have to vote for someone or pay a fine)?

But as this blog isn’t about politics I do have a reading-related point. Well actually a favour to ask. I need some recommendations.

What great political themed fiction should I read over the next 5 weeks?

Can you recommend a book that takes place during a political campaign?

Or perhaps one where a candidate gets brutally, horribly mutilated (I know it’s mean but it’s better I read about it than do it to my local member who will once again be elected from our very safe seat despite having morals that an alley cat would look down upon)?

Or can you suggest something that will rekindle my faith in the democratic process?

Looking forward to your suggestions.

Weekly Geeks 2010-24: Shiny Book Syndrome

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This week’s discussion topic asks book bloggers to divulge whether or not we suffer from Shiny Book Syndrome which Tara defines as “when a person only wants to read their newest book and leave piles of poor unread books on their shelves to collect dust“. Tara then goes on to make some suggestions about how to overcome this affliction.

Much as it pains me to admit it shiny book syndrome does appear to be something I suffer from. Back in February I divided a big chunk of my then TBR pile up into categories and shared them in a list called Games, Sets and Matches. Since I posted the list of 86 books on February 10 I have read 69 books (well I’ve started 69 and finished 66 if you want to be pedantic). Alas only 14 of them are from the list. The other 55 books are in one way or another new additions to the house: new books I’ve bought or downloaded, new borrowings from the library, a few ARCs and some gifts from my reading fairy godmother/evil stepmother. It doesn’t help that this year I discovered pre-orders from Book Depository and have become something of a junky for them.

I can in part blame participation in such worthy activities as the Global Reading Challenge and the CWA International Dagger Award Shortlist for being attracted to my new books more than my old books but in reality that only accounts for a small fraction of my total reading. Although I rarely read a book as soon as it arrives (Gunshot Road being a recent exception which I finished within 36 hours of its arrival on my doorstep) I do tend to remember why I wanted to read the books newer to my shelves when I am wondering which book to pick next.

Am I ready to do something about the problem? Join one of the challenges that Tara suggests to denude my TBR shelves of their old content? Not really, though I will cull the couple of dozen books I know for sure I will never read just as soon as I find a bit of time and a charity shop that will let me through the doors with a bag of books.

One day I know I’m going to say out loud to my employers all the things that I currently only say in my head which will result in my being sacked and suddenly lacking in book-buying funds. And then I’ll rediscover all the old, dusty delights on my TBR shelves. Until then I’m just going to live with my shiny book syndrome.

Review: The Last Child by John Hart

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Johnny Merrimon’s twin sister Alyssa disappeared a year ago. Since then Johnny’s father has abandoned the family and his mother has slid into depression, drug use and an abusive relationship with a man who Johnny despises. The case of his sister’s disappearance is the responsibility of the small town’s lead detective, Clyde Hunt, whose own life has soured as his obsession with finding Alyssa and patching up the Merrimon family has grown. As the book opens Johnny learns something new about the case which sets of a series of explosive events.

Johnny’s story is beautifully depicted. The way he copes with his situation is to delve into the history and folklore of the town and his own ancestors and create a set of somewhat mystical beliefs and tasks that will, if followed properly, rescue him from the hell his world has become. This desire to actively exert some control over a life spiralling into chaos was perfectly credible in the way it combined the folly and impetuousness of his youth with a more adult maturity that would surely come to a boy who had endured all of Johnny’s horrors. His role in the book was fleshed out by his relationships with others, in particular his friendship with Jack Cross, whose physical deformity marks him as another of the town’s outcasts, and also to Levi Freemantle, an escaped prisoner who Johnny encounters at several key points in the story.

The other heavily featured character is Clyde Hunt who I found vaguely objectionable. The obsessive cop is a staple figure of crime fiction and I am not normally put off by them but something in Hunt’s obsession didn’t ring true for me. Perhaps it is just that I have grown weary of men who view women as fragile objects to be worshiped but never really taken seriously which is essentially how Hunt behaves towards Johnny’s beautiful mother Katherine. “So you wouldn’t give a damn about this missing kid if her mother wasn’t gorgeous?” is what I’d like to have asked Hunt (if it were possible for me to converse with fictional beings).

The beginning and the end of this book were very solid from a storytelling perspective but I got a bit bored in the middle. It’s hard to talk about why without giving away spoilers so all I will say is that I was just not engaged by the rather large (and I thought quite obvious) red herring that occupied the Police for a good chunk of time. I couldn’t help wondering what this book would have looked like 15 years ago when 200-300 pages was a perfectly acceptable length for a novel.

Now I must admit that I found the audio book hard going due to the narration. Reading other reviews of this recording by people far more knowledgeable about regional American accents than I am it seems that Scott Sowers has mastered the Southern US accent very well (to suit the book’s small town in North Carolina setting). What is less clear is whether or not the long ‘a’ and ‘the’ that Sowers uses every single time he utters the prepositions is representative of the accent. Frankly even if making those words have syllables is reflection of the local accent I found it extremely annoying and I swear the practice lengthened the book by an unnecessary hour. However I think I can separate my enjoyment of the story from my annoyance at the narration.

Overall I would recommend you read the book for one of the most believable and sensitive depictions of a teenage boy I’ve read in a very long time. I could not however recommend this particular recording and would suggest you opt for the print version of The Last Child.

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My rating 3.5/5

Narrator Scott Sowers; Publisher Macmillan Audio [2009]; ISBN N/A; Length 14hours 44 minutes

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The Last Child has been reviewed at Petrona

Aussie Authors Aced

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I know the title doesn’t mean much but I had a yen for alliteration. What it means is that I have finished the highest possible level of the Aussie Author Challenge (8 books by Aussie Authors during 2010). And it’s only July.

These are the titles I read counted for the challenge

I have a swag more books by Aussies sitting very close to the top of the TBR pile so this is by no means the end of my aussie reading for the year. Stay tuned.