Novel Insights has a New Home!

So it's au revoir, but not goodbye - I have decided to move over to Wordpress so please do pop by and take a look at http://novelinsights.wordpress.com/. Recent book reviews include:

• The Uncommon Reader (Alan Bennett)
  
• The Red House Mystery (A.A. Milne)
• The Other Hand (Chris Cleave)
• The Bell Jar (Sylvia Plath)
  
• Flowers for Algernon (Daniel Keyes)
• The Dud Avocado (Elaine Dundy)
• The Stepford Wives (Ira Levin)
• Out (Natsuo Kirino)
• Child 44 and The Secret Speech (Tom Rob Smith)

Would love to hear what you think of the new site!

Booking Through Thursday - Recent Funny

Q: What’s the funniest book you’ve read recently?

A: I haven't read any laugh out loud books recently although The Believers by Zoe Heller was quite witty and I remember Kate Atkinson's One Good Turn having amusing characters - a sort of comic mystery story. One of the few books that has made me laugh out loud was How to be Good by Nick Hornby - I read it while on a visit to New York and giggled so much at one bit that the lady on the train asked me what I was reading!

Oh and actually I just remembered that The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins really did make me laugh because of the hilariously over the top characters and the way that on of the leading characters, Marian Halcombe makes sweeping statements about how useless women are despite her being quite fabulous.

Lawrence Durrell Discovery: The Alexandria Quartet

A little belated blog about some gems I picked up in Savidge Reads' favourite 5 for £2 secondhand bookstore a couple of weeks ago. Actually they were a bit more expensive at £1 each from the classic literature section, but I couldn't help myself as it was a full matching (ish) lot of 4 Faber books.

So here they are - The 'Alexandria Quartet' comprising Justine (1957), Balthazar (1958), Mountolive (1958) and Clea (1960) by poet and novelist Lawrence Durrell.


The books didn't have much of a blurb on the back and even a quick flick through didn't really help me in figuring out what they were about, but I guess I was sort of drawn to the mysteriousness of them. Also, I noted that the prose at the beginning of the first book was quite beautiful;

"The sea is high again today, with a thrilling flush of wind. In the midst of winter you can feel the inventions of Spring. A sky of hot nude pearl until midday, crickets in sheltered places, and now the wind unpacking the great planes, ransacking the great planes..."

According to the bumpf on the Faber & Faber website, the Alexandria quartet is 'an investigation of modern love', exploring the sexual and political intrigues of a group of expatriates in Egypt before and during the Second World War. Each book tells essentially the same story from character different perspectives.

I have a suspicion that these might be a bit of a mission to read, but I'm looking forward to giving them a go and hopefully finding something special.

Has anyone read these novels? Are they beautiful literature or just plain odd?! Would love to hear any thoughts before I embark.

Booking Through Thursday - Bookish Preferences

Q: Which do you prefer?

• Reading something frivolous? Or something serious?
• My favourite books have a bit of both but tend towards serious.
  

• Paperbacks? Or hardcovers?
• Paperbacks - especially small size classic penguins that bend nicely in your fingertips.
  

• Fiction? Or Nonfiction?
• Definitely fiction.

• Poetry? Or Prose?
• Prose.

• Biographies? Or Autobiographies?
• Biographies.
  

• History? Or Historical Fiction?
• Historical fiction (terrible considering my degree is in History!).
  

• Series? Or Stand-alones?
• Stand-alones.

• Classics? Or best-sellers?
• Modern classics.

• Lurid, fruity prose? Or straight-forward, basic prose?
• As fruity as a margarita!

• Plots? Or Stream-of-Consciousness?
• Plots.

• Long books? Or Short?
• Short.

• Illustrated? Or Non-illustrated?
• Non-illustrated unless it's for children and has beautiful plates.

• Borrowed? Or Owned?
• Owned - without a doubt!!!

• New? Or Used?
• Used (or as I like to think of it, loved).

The Believers - Zoe Heller

Last night I just couldn't sleep, so thought I might as well finish reading The Believers by Zoe Heller. Unfortunately it was not the kind of book that makes you snooze!

I very much enjoyed Notes on a Scandal and having been given a copy of The Believers by the lovely Savidge Reads, I was curious about how it would compare. To be honest, I didn't quite know what to expect with this one as it is one of those novels that revolves around a family and the experiences of the different people in it which I'm not normally 100% keen on reading.

Without giving too much away, plot-wise, the book revolves around a family living in New York whose father Joel Litvinoff, a prominent and radical lawyer, becomes ill. Audrey, his wife makes a devastating discovery about him and is forced to re-examine everything she thought she knew about her 40 year marriage. The grown-up children of the family (Rosa, Karla and Lenny) have to face this secret themselves, alongside their own muddled up lives.

At this point, I just want to say that this isn't a bleeding-heart story at all, rather the illness is more a lynchpin around which we see the different characters develop and change. It is a moving novel, but so carefully crafted with Heller's trademark dark humour that it never feels contrived or soppy in any way.

Initially it took me a little while to get into The Believers, but I always think that it does take a while with novels that revolve around the experiences of a variety of different characters. After all you have to get into the heads of each one instead of just following a main protagonist.

To my surprise, religious belief played much less of a part in this novel than I thought it would. Whoever drew the cover with all it's different religious symbols on it confused me greatly! The character who confronts religion is Rosa who despite her parent's adamant atheism has discovered a new found attachment to Orthadox Judaism. Rosa finds herself naturally drawn to Judaism, but struggles with the intellectual basis of the rules and rituals. I recently read The God Delusion, and in the light of that, I found the clash between Audrey and her daughter's opinions on the topic of organised religion particularly interesting. Audrey's strident anti-religious stance reminded me of Dawkins, particularly when asks why exactly she should respect other people's religious views if she thinks they are rubbish. To further illustrate how anti-religion the Litvinoff's are, Heller describes how upon receiving invitations to bar mitzvahs of their friend's children, they would send them back with "THERE IS NO GOD" scrawled across the engraved lettering! But, while Rosa's battle is theological, the other characters are also struggling with their own demons - Lenny with drugs and Karla with an unhappy marriage and having to think about what they believe in.

Even though it took me a little while to relate to the characters in this novel, I became really absorbed in it by the halfway point. I was particularly intrigued by Karla's relationship with her smarmy husband Mike, and the budding love affair between her and Khaled, a shopkeeper at the hospital she works in. The characters are well drawn and often painful to imagine, caught up as they are in their internal problems and insecurities. Audrey particularly is spiky with a sharp cutting tongue who simultaneously made me wince and smile at her bitchy comments.

Going back to The God Delusion I found that, despite enjoying it and thinking it was a genuinely brilliant book (very highly recommended), it is by it's very nature one long argument aimed at convincing the reader of a point of view. When I read The Believers, and the ideas about belief and religion Heller touched on, I realised that what I love about fiction is that it is thought provoking but leaves more room for making up your own mind. A definite thumbs up from me.

Booking Through Thursday Belatedly & More Bargain Books

Having just discovered Booking Through Thursday today, my contribution is a little belated but here it is anyway:

Q: Do you keep all your unread books together, like books in a waiting room? Or are they scattered throughout your shelves, mingling like party-goers waiting for the host to come along?

A: I had to downsize my accommodation before travelling, so I actually put all my 'read' books into storage. So I only have TBR's in my room now, except for those which I've read recently which I kind of put to one side. My read and unread books are definitely not partying, they are in fact, estranged!

On another note, I did a bit more book buying today. I felt compelled to pop into my local charity shop today - not for myself you understand, but for my boyfriend. His birthday is coming up and being a frugal pair, we like to collect all sorts of bits of inexpensive random stuff to give each other. So after perusing the bookshelves, I discovered the following:

The Guide to Family Photography, by Reg Mason - My boyfriend loves photography and so I thought I would pick this little gem up for him. It's probably pretty useless from a theory point of view as it was printed in the late seventies, but I couldn't resist it's fabulous combination of step by step cartoons, interspersed strangely with images of Prince Charles. I thought that this one was Mills & Boon-worthy actually!


Then because my man is always moaning about how he's getting old now, I snapped up Happy Birthday (you poor old wreck). A compilation of messages to 'old people over 21' by young children, including such wisdom as;

"Cats have birthdays like us. No one nose what cats thik about birthdays probly nothink." Denis Hutchinson, 8

"When you die you don't have birthdays" David Pollick, 7

OK, so it's not that hilarious but it was birthday-related and only a quid. I also saw a copy of the original Jane Fonda workout book, which I was sorely tempted by but resisted. Although there were actually two copies so if I change my mind...

A Perk of the Job

Warning! Second-hand book-shop in close proximity to new office alert!

Popped in to my new offices in Wimbledon today so that they could check my passport and make sure that I am not illegal and lo and behold, there is a really great bookshop just a short distance away called Copperfield's.

Actually I did spot it when interviewed (not that it influenced me in any way at all!) but resisted the urge to go in after telling myself I have too many books on my 'to read' pile already!

But today I wasn't so steadfast, and was drawn like a moth to a flame to their stack of Penguin Classics craftily placed by the entrance.

Copperfield's has all the hallmarks of an excellent second-hand bookshop - happily jumbled looking books stacked on a table outside, good prices and most of all that lovely lived-in feel and bookish smell which makes you feel you can browse for ages. Plus, just look at the signage, it just says 'come into our little treasure-trove!'.

I was fairly restrained and purchased two lovely Penguin Classics -

Savidge Reads got me into Susan Hill's creepy stories and blurb on the back of The Bird of Night, by Susan Hill (1976) made me think it might be an interesting little number for £1.

"Francis Croft, the greatest poet of his age, was mad. His world was a nightmare of internal furies and haunting poetic vision. Harvey Lawson watched and protected him until his final suicide. From his solitary old age Harvey writes this brief account of their twenty years together [secret gaylords perhaps?!] and then burns all the papers to shut out an inquisitive world."

Then I spotted The Bachelors, by one of my favourite authors Muriel Spark (1960). Not one I've heard of but had a fabulous cover and I love everything she writes. Plus it has a great plug on the back from Evelyn Waugh who writes;

"I am dazzled by The Bachelors. It is the cleverest and most elegant of all Mrs Spark's clever and elegant books."

Well, that convinced me to hand over my precious £1.50 and snaffle it into my handbag.

I always have the excuse that I need the reading material for my commute, plus I have discovered that there is a Lush in Wimbledon too. A book and a luxurious bath. What could be a better combination?

Brick Lane - Monica Ali. Did it live up to the hype?

I had been wanting to read Brick Lane by Monica Ali (Black Swan, 2003) for ages but never really got round to it. The impetus to finally read it came from from book group and I picked up a copy at a brilliant second hand book shop in Tooting frequented by Savidge Reads for a bargain 40p along with variety of others!

Brick Lane follows the experiences of Nazneen, a Bangladeshi woman married off to a man - Chanu - twenty years her elder at the age of eighteen. He takes her to live on the other side of the world in London's East End. The book follows Nazneen as she adjusts to her new life, initially speaking no English and being virtually confined to the tower block where she lives with such wonderful wifely duties as cutting her husband's corns and plucking his nasal hairs along with housekeeping and cooking. Far away from her home and receiving only occasional letters from her sister who endures all sorts of problems after eloping with a man whom she loves, Nazneen is isolated and feels powerless to help. As time passes she settles into family life raising two daughters and makes a close friend within the community. She also finds a certain measure of Independence through working herself, squirrelling away pennies for her sister abroad. However this new Independence brings a young man into her life with radical ideas and the potential to uproot her family life completely.

I have to say that the hype around this book had the effect of putting me off slightly and perhaps for me it did suffer a bit from being so highly recommended in that my expectations were very high. The first few pages threw me in at the deep end with Nazneen's dramatic birth and the story of "How I was left to my fate", and I very much enjoyed reading about Nazneen's first impressions of England in contrast to that. In particular, I loved the bit where she watches the "Ice-eskaters" on television and is totally enamoured by their beautiful outfits and how they seem to float on the ice. some very sweet and witty moments! However while I did think that the book was very well written and enjoyed reading it I didn't find it to be a book I was rushing to pick up. Perhaps it was because I didn't feel that I warmed to the main character as much as I could have and also I didn't really feel that I had a sense of how much time passed throughout the story. I lost interest a little around the middle of the book, exactly at the time when it should have become more interesting with the arrival of Karim (Nazneen's love interest).

I don't think that I'm alone in finding this a difficult read. A quick glance at Amazon ratings reveals some mixed feelings about the book. Also I was interested to read up on Wikipedia that there was actually quite alot of controversy surrounding the book in the way that Ali represents certain groups and on top of that, she managed to annoy the Richard and Judy producer Amanda Ross (oops!) causing her to say that Brick lane is the only book that Ross selected for the book group that she didn't believe in.

However I'm glad that I persevered with this as in the final part of the story you really see Nazneen's character develop and see her making some difficult decisions. Towards the end of the novel she fights against her ingrained idea that "fate will decide" and becomes more active in her choices. Also, I couldn't help but feel totally endeared to Chanu, the philosophising husband who could cook better than his wife. One of my favourite lines is when Nazneen says "From the very beginning to the very end, we didn't see things. What we did - we made each other up." A few very wise moments but not always as well tied together as they could have been.

Overall I enjoyed Brick Lane and feel that for a debut novel it is very good, but I wouldn't put it on my best books list. Maybe this is because I felt frustrated that it could have been even better!

It's usually pretty easy to pick up a copy of Brick Lane in your local second hand bookshop. Alternatively, you can get a used copy from £0.01 from Amazon or a new one for £4.80 (at the time of writing) here.

"Brick Lane has everything: richly complex characters, a gripping story and it's funny too." Observer

Back from a Blogging Hiatus!

Memories of travelling: Sunrise at Changi Beach, Koh Samui April 2009, courtesy of the photographer boyfriend.

Over the last few months I've had a bit of a blogging hiatus, due to travelling, job applications and whatnot. Composing cover letters drains all the fun out of writing! But while I might have given the keypad a break I've been enjoying catching up on some great books. There's nothing like long plane, and bus journeys to give you some good reading time, in fact the only downside was fitting the books into my rucksack and making sure I didn't have to pay excess! I even sacrificed a pair of shoes to make space for Margaret Atwood's hefty novel The Blind Assassin. Below is my travel reading list (from which you'll notice that I managed to get through quite a few on my 'catch up list').

• The Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood - A big old pullitzer prize winner full of original ideas as the perfect escapism from cramped hostels in Tokyo.
  
• The Parasites, Daphne Dumaurier - A dark little novel exploring the relationship between and the personalities of a group of self-centred siblings enjoyed in the sunshine in Bangkok.
• No Time For Goodbye, Linwood Barclay - Unputdownable thriller / mystery about a girl who discovers her family have gone missing one morning. Beach reading for Koh Samui.
• One Good Turn: A Jolly Murder Mystery, Kate Atkinson - Entertaining read about a curious collision of lives pilfered from a hotel bookshelf (I did leave the Parasites in return!) in Koh Samui.
• Mudbound, Hillary Jordan - A moving story about the struggles of rural living and racial tension in the Mississippi Delta after the second world war, consumed mostly in a hotel room in Ho Chi Minh City.
• A Case of Need, Michael Crichton - A fantastically battered copy of a 70's novel about an abortion doctor and a heated legal case read in a very hot, fanless guesthouse in Siem Reap Cambodia.
  
• Sovereign, C.J. Sansom - A monkish mystery set in Tudor times that now I think of it has lots of parallels with The Name of the Rose. Fitted in between lots of partying in Sydney!
• In Cold Blood : A True Account of a Multiple Murder and Its Consequences, Truman Capote - An incredibly detailed journalists account of a gruesome murder of an all-american family that occured in Kansas in 1959. An instant favourite during my stay in Auckland
• Just After Sunset, Stephen King - Awful and at times just plain wierd book of short stories, by a usually excellent horror writer.
• The Body Farm, Patricia Cornwell - My first foray into the Kay Scarpetta novels was entertaining but I still prefer Tess Gerritson and Sophie Hannah
  
• The Woman in White, Wilkie Collins - Such an enjoyable classic, I loved the over the top characters and the thick plot while staying on Rarotonga in the Cook Islands
• The Name of the Rose, Umberto Eco - A bit of a struggle to get through the theological philosophising to the actually very good plot while driving around sunny California!
• The Testament, John Grisham - A multi-billionaire commits suicide and leaves the expected heirs nothing while pledging everything to a daughter who lives a life of a reclusive missionary! A recipe for trouble thoroughly enjoyed on a 2 night stint in an LA hostel.
  

The stand out novel by far for me was Truman Capote's In Cold Blood which, on putting down thought 'I think this might be the best book I have ever read!'. I found the depth to which Capote investigates the characters and the skill by which he conveys them to be truly extraordinary. It's a book that really got under my skin and it is definitely my 'new favourite'. Really I should have been organised and planned books for different countries (although I did read In Cold Blood in advance of visiting the States!) but I enjoyed picking up novels I might not normally have read in hostels and second hand bookshops along the way. For instance, I have never particularly wanted to read a Michael Crichton novel or a John Grisham having had some idea that they are the kind of books read by middle aged business-men, but actually really, really enjoyed them to my great surprise and found the writing style to be superb. It just goes to show how important it is to stay open minded about what does and doesn't make a well written book.

The Book Thief & The Joy of Being Read To!

I managed to read The Book Thief by Markus Zusak in time for book group, although I have to admit it was pretty close, with me sat on the tube reading with a tear in my eye on the way to the restaurant!

I don't think it's really giving much away to say that this is a moving novel. Narrated by Death, the story, set during WWII follows a little girl called Liesel, who is taken under the wing of foster parents Hans and Rosa Hubermann in a German village following the death of her little brother. It is implied that her Mother, a communist has been taken to a concentration camp. The story follows Liesel from her induction into book-thievery, her new life in the village and her relationship with her indomitable friend Rudy, through to the difficult experience of hiding a Jewish refugee in their basement.

I felt that the device of using Death as narrator was an original idea, and a good way to develop a birds-eye view on the situation, however I found the way in which he was given such a 'human' perspective a little implausible. I also didn't feel that the characters were particularly complex, with traditional Nazi 'baddies' and the endearing grumpy but ultimately 'good' Rosa Hubermann. I almost had the sense that the book was written with a film in mind (particularly the relationship between Rudy and Liesel), as it was quite cinematic in content. The upside of this was that the the story itself was a joy to read - engaging, beautifully written and with charming characters. The highlight of this novel for me was the personalities described by Zusak and the warmth that he was able to develop between different characters. Liesel herself was beautifully described and her friendship with Rudy was completely enchanting. Although I felt it wasn't quite gritty enough (WWII 'lite'?), I enjoyed reading from an alternative perspective on this period of history. Overall this was a wonderful read, and reminded me of stories that my own grandmother used to tell me about her experiences during the war.

Another reason why I enjoyed The Book Thief was because it was a fantastic distraction from the horrible flu that I had that week! And even better, in my sorry state, I had the pleasure of having a few chapters read to me in bed by my indulgent boyfriend which was really quite wonderful. It's quite special to have something read out loud to you for two reasons. Firstly, you experience the story in a different way than you would reading it in your head - I found that the way that my boyfriend read it brought out the humour in the novel because the form of the sentences and style comes through more clearly. Secondly, being read to is great because it makes you feel cared for and is a sweetly intimate experience reminiscent of more innocent days. I have also enjoyed having first chapters of favourite novels read to me by friends (Perfume, by Patrick Suskind) which is a great way to be introduced to novels that like minded people are passionate about. Whether it's a loving partner, a good friend or a reader at a book group, I thoroughly recommend seeking out an opportunity to hear stories being read out loud.

'Catch-up' Book List 2009

Sitting at home with the sniffles and the last episode of Tudors series II on pause, I was suddenly inspired to have a look through my shelves and decide which of the books that I already own, I would really like to get round to reading this year. This is a particularly good time to decide, as I am moving out of my beloved flat in a couple of weeks. I have to say it's a thoroughly cathartic process, organising myself down to the minimum of possessions to store at my boyfriend's house before I go travelling next month. Of course I have tried (not really) and failed to actually get rid of any books, but I will be putting a few out of sight and out of mind for the time being. I'm thinking that the short (ish) pile left cluttering up my dressing table will consist of the following:

The Book Thief Markus Zusak

My next book group read, I've finally conceded that I need to put down the Never-ending Anna Karenina temporarily in order to meet Thursdays deadline for reading this. Luckily I've been hugely looking forward to reading The Book Thief , but I really don't like starting one book while I'm reading another...grrr!

American Psycho Brett Easton Ellis

Oddly for me my desire to read American Psycho hasn't been dampened by having seen the film beforehand. Perhaps it's because I imagine it being different from the film, and because it is generally hard to put me off a bit of dark and gruesome fiction anyway. A gory gift from my ever benevolent book benefactor Savidge Reads, perhaps I will have to sacrifice a few pairs of undies so I can fit this copy into my rucksack for my travels.

Dorian: An Imitation Will Self

Having read both Great Apes and The Book of Dave, I know that I find Self's writing to be tough going and pretty pretentious. However... I still enjoy reading his books... perhaps because I feel like he's allowed to be pretentious because he's so damned clever and original. When I read his books, I always feel as if my perception of things has been pushed around a bit and stretched which I like. Also, Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, is one of my all time favourite novels so I'm looking forward to reading this even more twisted version!

Hurting Distance Sophie Hannah

Having recently read The Point of Rescue in the wrong order (slap on the wrist!), I now feel compelled to go back and fill in the gap by reading Hurting Distance before The Other Half Lives is released. I do so enjoy Hannah's clever plots, and suspenseful writing style.

Calendar Girl Stella Duffy

Another book gifted to me by Savidge Reads, after I joined a certain literary salon that is Polari and met the lovely Stella herself. Looking to forward to delving into this intriguing novel that promises a heady mixture of mystery and lesbianism. Oo-er!

The Blind Assassin Margaret Atwood

Ok, I don't know much about this except that it's got a great cover, a brilliant title and won the Booker prize. Sounds good to me!

I, Claudius Robert Graves

Most people don't like the kind of books that people are made to read in school. Being contrary, I seek them out. I was a bit of an English Lit geek, plus I also love reading Classical stuff, having devoted much of my childhood to reading Greek myths... plus the blurb promises folly, vileness, wickedness and tragedy. What more can a girl ask for.

Brighton Rock Graham Green

I struggle with Graham Green a bit, but again, because I'm contrary I like to stick at authors when they're clever but difficult and give them the benefit of the doubt. You see I loved The End of The Affair (although it wasn't at all what I expected), and was completely confused by Our Man in Havana. Anyway, this is one of those GCSE-type books and the blurb makes it sound so odd I have to read it. Oh, and I have a lovely old Penguin copy which I shall have to add a picture of when I read it with pink writing, so that sealed the deal for me.

Tennyson selected by Kingsley Amis

Another one I will have to add an image of, I picked up this lovely battered copy of Tennyson poems on a visit to my Nan's house. Apart from the brilliant 1970's cover, I mainly want to read this so that I can be even better at University Challenge. When Paxman asks a question about poetry the answer is nearly always Keats, Shelly, Wordsworth, Byron or Tennyson and I want to improve my 1/5 shot at getting it right. I know it's so wrong. I'm hoping that I might also discover something beautiful at the same time mind you, especially as one of my favourite paintings is The Lady of Shallot by John William Waterhouse so I suspect I will have that rather romantic image in my head when I read the poem.

Here's that lovely picture by the way, (although it's much better seen in real life for free at Tate Britain in a moment of contemplation):

Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird & Fulfilling Fiction

Lesson for the week - don't say you'll write something tomorrow unless you're actually going to! I made a promise to get my thoughts out on To Kill a Mocking bird on Boxing day and of course I didn't. I wonder, when we promise to do something does it make us less inclined to actually do it?! Anyway, here it goes now...

The wonderful Savidge Reads bought me a charity-shop copy of To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Not only did it have a beautiful cover with endearingly well-thumbed pages, what was inside was pure, unadulterated, good for the mind-and-soul literature. What am I going on about? To try and explain, here's my check list for really fulfilling fiction:

• It has to be an eye-opener - It's great to feel as if what you're reading is really 'worth it', that it has substance and you're going to take something new in. Harper Lee's portrait of Alabama in the 1930's is made so vivid in the way that it's described and whether it's Scout, Jem and Dill spying on 'Boo' Radley, the dramatic court case, or a cut-the-atmosphere-with a knife lunch congregation of southern ladies, Lee has something to say. The trial of Tom Robinson in particular is such a brilliant plot device for her commentary on racism in the Deep South.
  
• It's got to have a great plot - I found the way the plot was constructed unusual and original. A slow-burner to begin with, Lee spends a good few chapters, setting the scene with the children's antics and school life. Then the court scenes are almost in the middle of the book - a point of high tension, that left me wondering 'is it finished now then?'. I wasn't quite prepared for the dramatic ending, which was so successful in tying up the storyline. It was very 'neat' in the way that it followed through with a moral conclusion, but I found it an effective contrivance.
  
• I want to be moved - Ok, so it didn't make me cry (heartless wench that I am), but I was moved by the plight of Tom Robinson, and Atticus' bravery in defending him. That it was all described through the eyes of a child meant that people's actions seemed even more black and white and therefore so much more unjust when prejudices won over simple reason.
  
• It's got to be real - (I feel like breaking into Cheryl Lynn's disco classic, but I won't or the man on the train beside me might think I'm crazy!). Lee has a gift for painting pictures with her words. You genuinely feel as if you are looking right in on the mixed-up Southern community and witnessing the injustice and the contradictions of the situation. And with some exceptions (Tom Robinson and the Ewells are perhaps too stereotypical and simplistically portrayed), some of the characters have got such defined personalities (particularly Scout, and Miss Maudie) you feel as if you know them.
  

To Kill a Mockingbird ticked all these boxes and it made me wonder why I hadn't read this bit of literary heaven earlier! In fact now I fancy reading a bit more about the author herself (which is unusual for me as I never read biographies) after bumping into this mention of I Am Scout: The Biography of Harper Lee by Charles J. Shields, when I was searching for an image of my particular edition. I've also been inspired to read Truman Capote's In Cold Bloodwhich I guess will just have to go on my huge 'to-read' pile!!

Going back to the novel, one of the things that I found interesting was the way in which the little family of Scout, Jem and Atticus functions. You get a sense that though the family is well respected, they are regarded as a little odd. Having lost her mother, Scout and her little brother are brought up by her father on their own, with help from their maid, Calpurnia (and later on their Aunt too). Scout and Jem live a free childhood, always getting up to mischief. This is frowned upon by community members like their Aunt Alexandra who disapproves of Scout's tomboy appearance and Mrs Dubose.

The relationship that the children in the book have with their father reminded me of how my parents used to talk to me almost as a grown-up when I was little and that I called them by their first names, a bit like the children in the novel call their father 'Atticus'. Another thing I identified with was that my parents were always very open with me.

In the novel, there is some disapproval because Scout sits in on the court case which involves a girl who claims to have been raped. Scout is able to make her own quite mature judgements about the situation because she was able to ask her father what 'rape' meant and have it explained to her frankly. The children are outspoken, and adventurous as a result of their unusual upbringing.

I don't necesarily think that parents should share everything with their children, but I suppose I appreciated the idea that a willingness to be honest with children means that they are able to handle important information better and to understand the consequences of their own actions, making them thoughtful and aware of others.

There's so much to say about this book, I could go on, but after all that thinking its time to stop and get a cup of tea and get absorbed in Anna Karenina...

Christmas Day Ponderings

It's Christmas and it seems like its the first day in ages I've been able to sit down and blog. It'll be a quickie though I think as cooking a first-class turkey has knocked the stuffing out of me - sorry, pun intended.

What I'm most excited about at the moment is that it's a great time to really get my nose into some books. I've just finished Sophie Hannah's detective novel Point of Rescue, and I have to say she is fast becoming my favourite author for gripping page-turning reads. I suppose what I like about her writing is that it's quite unique in that it has a distinctly female voice or at interesting female characters - I enjoy this of course but I do wonder whether if this would turn off male writers. Although, my boyfriend picked up my copy of one of her earlier books - Little Face, and stormed through it. Then the other day I was reading Point of Rescue and went to make a cup of tea and the cheeky bugger picked it up and started reading, so I'm thinking that my concerns about her audience being limited are probably ill-founded!

I also recently read a more classic (of the modern variety) novel in the form of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird and have been procrastinating about blogging about it probably because I thought there was so much to say and I didn't quite have the energy to do it justice yet. I'm starting to realise that I'm going to have to blog a bit more frequently - especially as a new-starter, I know its very bad form to blog sporadically! I think I may have to admit to myself that I can't be insightful every day but do my best to write a little more often and still be coherent. I am determined to get my thoughts out on To Kill a Mockingbird tomorrow though!

I am also going to embark on Anna Karenina tonight which I will be reading in tandem with fellow blogger, Savidge Reads. I am completely excited about this, to the extent that I went to the effort of hunting down thisparticularly attractive Folio Society copy because I didn't like any of the paperback covers that you get in the bookshops right now. I am hoping it lives up to the idea I have in my head of an enthralling and epic Christmas-read that Mr S and I can enjoy gossiping about together afterwards.

Right off, to get a cup of tea and read the first chapter of AK!

Well that Explains it...

I have just done some 'Nora' research and discovered that in 2006 she was inducted into the Romance Writers of America Hall of Fame, and that she is startlingly prolific having written more than 150 romance novels. This explains how a certain friend of mine who loves a Mills and Boone or two, knew exactly who she was when I mentioned I was reading 'this book with a fabulous cover and a super-dramatic plot'. Mystery solved!

Romantic Thrillers - What's the Formula?

I think I mentioned in my first post that I liked books with good covers. Well this predilection led me to pick up a novel which I guess falls into a sort of romance/thriller crossover genre - The Reef, by Nora Roberts. It was a particularly grey day in August, and on popping into an Oxfam shop in Penzance (of all places), I spotted a fabulous cover with palm trees and sparkling blue sea which promised tropical adventure. The battered pages suggested that it had been well loved, probably on a holiday somewhere, so I thought why not?!

I forgot about it for a couple of months and then thought I'd give it a go, fancying a break after reading a sequence of rather taxing novels. I discovered a page-turner of an adventure with glamorously-named leading characters 'Tate Beaumont' and ' James Lassiter' on the hunt for sunken treasure in the Caribbean. Roberts it seemed, had crafted something like Sunset Beach meets Indiana Jones - the perfect combination for my distracted mind! Which set me thinking...what are the key ingredients that make for a fun adventure novel like this? Well this is what I came up with:

Rule #1 - Set your book in an exotic, sunny location -

Lets face it, where's the romance in a wet weekend in Bognor Regis? I speak from experience! The beauty of a novel like the Reef is that it is set in paradise - our fantasy location. When the novelist transports us to far away shores, we imagine ourselves on holiday, at our most relaxed, bronzed and frisky - and we can believe that we too could find love and adventure on a Carribean island with lots of treasure to boot. I suppose you could argue that there's the English variety of romance so heartrendingly depicted in Graham Green's The End of The Affair. This suits a grey day on Hampstead Heath, and really is beautiful, but also is terribly complicated and painful. Then there's On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan - I don't want to give away the ending to anyone who hasn't read it but it's not exactly cheerful - I blame it on the weather! The rainy english climate doesn't exactly lend itself to dreamy leading men stripping off their tops all the time and frolicking in the sea - they'd catch a cold. Yes, yes, yes - we do have Colin Firth in that lake scene but I know that my boyfriend is far more likely to get his kit off on a hot sunny island and I'd rather be on a ship in the middle of the Carribean than smuggling peanuts in the North Sea.

Rule #2 - An element of mystery -

You know what clinched it for me when I saw this book? As well as the gold embossed serif font on the front, the blurb promised hidden... and get this... cursed treasure! "but one treasure has always eluded them: Angelique's Curse - a jeweled amulet heavy with history, dark with legend, and tainted with blood." Perhaps I've been spoiled by 80's adventure movies like Romancing the Stone and Raiders of the Lost Ark, but I love a bit of mysterious treasure. Nora hooks you with the idea of a fascinating, priceless object that's got a dangerous side, and keeps you guessing if its power is real.

Rule #3 - All good characters are American. Baddies are European -

This is surely one of the key tenets of any thriller - whether it be Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs or James Bond's arch-enemy Blofeld. Ms Roberts outdoes herself with leading evildoer Silas Van Dyke who has a "European" accent and to cap it of has a bit of French totty who turns out to be a complete uber-bitch in complete contrast to the peppy, feisty Tate "Red" Beaumont.

Rule #4 - A "Shocking" Twist -

Every thriller has to have that moment, about a chapter from the end of the book when you're lulled into a false sense of security and then hit with a short-lived come-back by the bad guy who attempts to spoil everything with a last minute hijack of the happy family scene. I have to say, I almost didn't see this one coming until I reached what seemed to be something of a cheerful conclusion and then noticed I had a good 20 pages left - silly me!

Rule #5 - The Classic Happy Ending -

Secretly, we all love a happy ending and we want to see the baddie and his evil henchmen brought to justice, riches and love for our leading stars, and hard-won happiness for those that have fallen off the wagon or simply been led down the wrong path. It's quite amazing how quickly after the suspensful final twist, a skilled author can bring all these threads together and leave you with a nice warm glow.

I can poke fun, but I picked up this novel exactly because I thought it would be formulaic. And yes, it did follow certain patterns and had a cast that would make stilton look un-cheesy by comparison, but if it had been a bad novel I would have just put it down. Instead I was gripped! I may have expected a happy ending, but Roberts' knack was that she got me there with a real knack for storytelling... via palm trees and tropical sunsets.

On Indecision and Happy New Beginnings

Just a few months ago, I was going through a tricky patch in my professional life. I found I was being put in a situation that I felt uncomfortable in. You see I'm a manager (or was) of a team of lovely staff, and my boss had started pushing me to look at my 'team structure'. Warning bells went off in my head and I started to panic...I felt protective of my team and compelled to defend the qualities of each individual, because they were all smart, brilliant people.

What I didn't realise was that I was making the whole thing more convoluted and painful (mostly for myself at the time) than it needed to be. My emotional involvement with the situation was clouding my ability to make decisions. I was all in a tangle, and I couldn't pick a direction so I was stuck, and no-one was benefiting from the situation. At the time, I remember comparing myself to a character from a book that my parents used to read to me when I was a little girl.

On my fourth birthday I was given a book that became very precious to me - Terry Jones' Fairy Tales - a collection of original short stories with beautiful, lavish illustrations by Michael Foreman. Terry Jones is of course better known for being a member of the Monty Python team, but apparantly he also knows how to spin a good yarn for children! The book was also rather special because the person who gave it to me added their own illustration and a short (rather gruesome) story all about me!

Of course when I was little I just enjoyed the stories in their own right. However traditionally, fairy tales have a moral behind them, and I find myself thinking back quite frequently to the little lessons that were hidden behind the magical lines.

The straight way's short, but the long way's pretty...

So in my dilemma, I started thinking about one of the stories in particular - Katy Make-sure. The name says it all really! Katy Make-sure was a little girl who couldn't make up her mind. In the story, Katy is out for a walk in the woods when she bumps into a goblin who offers her the once in a lifetime chance to visit Goblin City and get a reward (for finding his lost shoe). But the problem comes when she asks how to get there, and the little man replies:

Short or long to Goblin City?
The straight way's short,
But the long way's pretty!

Katy can't decide which is the best way to go - the long or the short way - and each time she asks the goblin for advice, he simply repeats himself and she gets more confused! Eventually after she's asked his advice over and over she asks "How can I be sure i'll like it whichever way we go?" The goblin finally becomes impatient and disappears, leaving Katy all alone, and she never does get to visit Goblin City in the end poor thing!

But isn't it all too easy too caught up in trying to 'make sure' a decision is the right one? Especially when it's an important choice and the consequences are an unknown quantity, we can sometimes spend too much energy worrying and not enough finding a solution to the problem. Our uncertainty paralyses us and we become like Hamlet, a victim of our own inaction. It can be comforting to be indecisive, but what if we were to be brave... start down the long pretty road, or just get there quickly instead of dithering around. Maybe we'll make some wrong choices and we might get burned, but we can only make the best decision we can at the time and learn from our mistakes, arriving our destination a little wiser. Perhaps what prevents us is that don't want to get to our destination...but even then, does standing still help?

In the end, I took action - moved forward. Ultimately, my choices resulted in positive (if surprising) changes for my team, the company and for myself - including deciding to leave my job on my own terms instead of staying on for a sense of security. And the best thing is that I feel so much better for it. I found out that by taking action you can actually influence the destination you come to. Which is kind of wonderful, I think.

Empire Falls - Richard Russo

Today I feel i have been struggling against the tide a little at work. I find - and I'm pretty sure this is true of the majority of people - that identifying what tasks are most important and actually getting down to them can be a bit of a challenge. It is easier to procrastinate and do other less-useful things which give you a sense of superficial satisfaction, but don't actually get you any closer to your goal.

Why do we put things off? Is it because we don't really think that the end result will be that beneficial to us? Is it that we are afraid of not completing it to our own personal standards? Or, could it be that we don't truly know what it is that we want to achieve and why? And moreover, why - you may be wondering - am I rambling on about procrastination in a book blog?!

I mentioned a certain lady from Maine in my previous post. The lady I was referring to was a Mrs Whiting from the 2002 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Empire Falls, by Richard Russo. I read Empire Falls in August as part of readers group with friends, and although I enjoyed it once I'd finished it, I found it a little long-winded. Also, while Russo has a brilliant skill for developing his characters, I didn't empathise with most of them or the setting either. As a Brit, I don't really identify with the faded nostalgic glory of the small American mill town, that Russo depicted in his novel.

But one of the town's inhabitants, Mrs Whiting (and her demented cat) really tickled me. She was interesting for being such a strong and formidable character, and I remember thinking at the time of reading that despite the fact that she was a bitch of the first order, I could take something away from her methods!

In the novel, Mrs Whiting controls the little town of Empire Falls, and is a thorn in the side for Miles Roby, the manager of the Empire Grill who is too distracted by his failing family life to notice how suffocating her iron grip really is. Mrs Whiting, despite being an aged single lady with a disabled daughter, she always gets what she wants.

Firstly, she knows her own mind. This is in contrast to Miles who for most of the book seems unable to pursue even his own happiness leading him to putter and sputter along. Though he doesn't realise it, Mrs Whiting is a deadly succubus in his life and his resigned temperament simply makes easier for her to affect him.

Secondly, Mrs Whiting has a particular method of getting what she wants with a grim determination reminiscent of the kind of zombies from third rate horror movies. You know, those ones that don't always move very fast but always get their victims in the end. Her philosophy is to break down her goal into smaller tasks that are easier for her to undertake. And if she can't achieve those? She breaks them down into even smaller, more minute pieces. This makes her unstoppable.

So what did I take from that? Well I'm not saying I want to be a scary, calculating sort of person, but this reinforced something for me. I believe that if you know what you want and can identify the steps to move towards it, your goal becomes manageable, and therefore achievable. A note of caution though. Mrs Whiting's inflexibility and desire to control everything eventually leads to her undoing. Beware megalomania!

Right, I'm off to write my task list now and conquer the world...

Introductions and Insights

Let me introduce myself. I'm a twenty-something girl, living in London who loves books. Particularly novels, and particularly ones with nice covers which I know is naughty as it's supposed to be what's between the sheets...oops, I mean the pages that count.

Why I wanted to write about books -

Some books and certain characters, really make me want to wax-lyrical about them. Why? Because in their own little way they are life-changing - so that's why I wanted to start Novel Insights.

Novel insights is a place for me to share my ideas about novels, particularly fictional characters that have had an impact on my way of thinking.

Being inspired by fiction -

For me one of the beautiful things about fiction is that you almost always inadvertently learn something new at the same time as enjoying the story for it's own sake. For example, when I read The Kite Runner, a few months ago, I experienced a whole other culture and the intense, human drama of it all made me want to watch the news more - pay attention to what was going on in the world in a more active way. It was like Khaled Hosseini had used his moving words, exciting story and charming characters (well some of them were charming!) to fool me into opening my eyes a little more. I like learning something new, and I like it wrapped up in vivid, spellbinding prose like a gift.

So I want to share what I've learned from reading, not in a preachy way I hope, and maybe my thoughts will strike a chord with someone else or at least inspire them to read some fantastic stories.

Now, like Sheherazade, I'm going to attempt to be mysterious and give you a taster of what comes next. My next post will be about the character who sparked me to write Novel Insights - a certain formidable old lady from Maine. Can you guess who she might be? More about her next!