I have left publishing this so late that I already have a review to write for the next round up. But in normal month terms, this is the 31st so it’s not that late. February has been a grey dull month but I got to celebrate my fifth engagement anniversary on the extra day.
Ruskin Park – Rory Cellan-Jones
This was a Christmas present and by a journalist I’ve always liked (a dog lover, which helps.) Ruskin Park is a biography, of sorts, of Cellan-Jones’ mum, Sylvia Rich, but more than that, it’s a story of a very different time, here in Britain, not that long ago. You often hear people dismissing feminism because ‘women have it all now’ but a lot of today’s freedoms are so recently won and we forget that. Sylvia worked at the BBC, but was ambitious – her first problem in the eyes of many, and to all intents and purposes, a single mother – the second problem. Married to the father of Rory’s older brother for a short while, she managed to get a divorce from him when pregnant with Rory, expecting a second marriage which did not materialise. Rory’s dad was James Cellan-Jones, director of many TV dramas including The Forsyte Saga, but who Rory didn’t actually speak to until he was an adult. The book concentrates on Sylvia, piecing together the story of her life from a box of documents left in her tiny flat in Ruskin Park and tells how she managed, trying to juggle two children alone while working at the BBC. She had such plans and schemes to try and while RCJ sometimes says he laughed at her or dismissed her stories as eccentricity, it seems likely that she didn’t curb her enthusiasm for life and, in another, easier world, she could have been amazing.
The Mystery of Henri Pick – David Foenikinos
The random number generator brought this forward, a book I heard discussed on A Good Read, and the first title published from the Walter Presents stable, bringing translated fiction to English in the same way that the WP TV stable has been bringing forward European TV drama. This is the story of a library of unpublished manuscripts and how one day a publishing editor found a book written by the town’s local pizzeria owner Henri Pick, now dead. She published it, the world goes mad for it, but the mystery is that no one, including Henri’s wife and daughter, knew that he had any interest in writing. The style of this takes a while to get into – it’s very tell don’t show – and I did guess the ending but I enjoyed it anyway.
The Tap Dancer – Andrew Barrow
This month’s reading group choice as largely chosen as it’s Alan Bennett’s favourite book and you can tell why it appeals to him – it’s a story of everyday people with all their little foibles pointed out. But the story – such as it is – is centred around the narrator’s father and describes him over a period of his retirement until his death, in such terms as mark him out to be primarily a thoroughly unpleasant person but one who is tolerated only as eccentric by his family. There are a few genuinely terrible incidents that occur to the family over the years but they are all dealt with in the same tone, and there is little idea of who most of the characters are. There were a few details in there that reminded me strongly of my own father to start with but once I was used to those, I’m afraid I didn’t really see the point of this. Sorry Alan, this one wasn’t for me.
Shrines of Gaiety – Kate Atkinson
I’d avoided this for a long while simply as I thought her last two books were very disappointing. She is one of those authors everyone reveres and on the whole I’ve enjoyed her work. But this was set in inter-war London theatre with a hefty dose of the criminal underworld, and there was only so long I was going to be able to avoid reading it. So, Nellie Coker is the matriarch and owner of a number of London clubs, and the book opens with her release from Holloway Prison. She and her children run a shady empire, and face external threats to take this over from dodgy crims and a bent copper. There are a lot of other characters to keep track of, including two errant girls, an eccentric librarian, a policeman with a sad wife and a dodgy journalist and you meander your way through each short chapter that talks about each. There is a dark underbelly to the storyline but on the whole, I felt this was a romp of a tale, though it was mostly a prologue with a brief ending.
Year of Wonders – Geraldine Brooks
This had sat on the shelf for ages and people have recommended it to me for a long time, so my question is, why did no one mention what a terrible ending it has? Did you forget? Year of Wonders is a novel of the village Eyam in Derbyshire which cut itself off in 1665/66 to contain the plague. No one went in or out for nearly a year and this book is based on the true story. Narrated by Anna Frith, a widow with two young children, who works at the rectory, the book tells us about that terrible year of loss, how so many people died and the efforts of the village to manage to soothe the dying and the grieving families. It starts brilliantly and for the most part is a terrific book, really absorbing and emotional, and you get to see all the reactions of a traumatised population, including losing their faith in God, turning to witchcraft or alcohol. So far so good. But then it felt like she had no idea how to end it and the last 50 pages go off at a completely different angle of sensationalism. The end has bothered me more and more since finishing the book, such good work to be spoiled by such nonsense. A pity.
Dear Neighbour – Jane Claire Bradley
I took an online course with Jane a long time ago and from one idea on that course, I wrote a book that once got shortlisted for a prize, though was never published. But still, I was so pleased that Jane had written her own book and, as she’s such a cool, clued up person, I was sure her book would be great. And it is. Dear Neighbour is a feel-good book, about a community of people that grow together when they and their houses are threatened with eviction and demolition. Do they come together and gel quickly? Yes. Do you ever feel genuine concern that this won’t end well? Not really. Does any of that matter? No. JCB has always been about giving all kinds of people a voice, her values are clear when listening to anything she writes, and she is a kind soul, wanting to empower all sorts of folk, no matter their background. And this is what Dear Neighbour is about. About giving people a voice and letting them use it. About reminding us that people not profits shouldn’t just be a nice slogan, but a guiding ethos for us all. I’m here for it.
In Gratitude – Jenny Diski
Jenny Diski was diagnosed with terminal cancer and as a writer, decided to embrace the cliche of writing about it, but she also realised that there was a period of her life she hadn’t covered in print yet. So this period leading to her death also covers her teenage years when she’d been thrown out of school, abandoned by her parents and was instead sort of adopted by Doris Lessing of all people. Diski didn’t necessarily change her rebellious ways and so the title of the book is a way of marking her thanks for the care she received, both back in her teens and in her last months. It’s very detailed writing and understandably contains all sorts of deep pondering, but I’m not sure I’d say I liked it.
Wahala – Nikki May
Well, this is an odd book. It’s marketed as a black Sex and the City style young women about town but it turns out to have hints of thriller about it. Wahala means trouble, apparently, and trouble here comes in the form of Isobel, the childhood friend of Simi a Nigerian-British woman living in London. The book centres around three women, Simi, Ronke and Boo, who are all mixed race British Nigerians and all three are wrestling with modern life – to have children or not, to find someone and settle down or not, to try and break out of the tedium of childrearing and work more or not – when Isobel who is immensely wealthy comes back into their lives. She seems great – but is she? I found this to be very strange, at first I thought it might be because the characters are all younger than me but it wasn’t just that. They all seemed full of self loathing, slow to trust each other an quick to judge, but the men weren’t written very well either and the ending was daft.
Moments of Pleasure
I very much enjoyed American Fiction, the film of Percival Everett’s book Erasure. It’s a satire of the publishing industry and the humour is intelligent and sophisticated, and the performances were excellent. Highly recommended.
It was a shame about the other people who were watching the film with me, most of them appeared to be fairly well educated, mature middle class types but their manners were all over the place. Arts venues keep talking about how audience levels are down and wondering what they can do about it and I’m afraid a huge problem is something they can’t do anything about – sharing space with other people is even less enjoyable now than it used to be and we’ve all lost our tolerance for it.
But this is meant to be moments of pleasure so I double recommend American Fiction – I need to go and read the book now.
Susan E Barsby 