Books do furnish a room

Glad it's not just me France Whispers Under Ground by Ben Aaronovitch “It was a good plan, and like all plans since the dawn of time, this would fail to survive contact with real life.” Third in the Rivers of London series. It’s more Harry Dresden than Harry Potter and there is a certain laconic humour which helps the series along. “This is why magic is worse even than quantum physics. Because, while both spit in the eye of common sense, I've never yet had a Higgs Bosun turn up and try to have a conversation with me.” As always London is the backdrop and in particular the Underground (and the sewers). This one is a murder mystery and the main plot of the series, the search for a particular villain, though present is a side show here. The minor characters are further developed and are all quite strong. There is the usual magic and mayhem along with a fair bit of police procedural. There are also communities of people living in the many tunnels under London (which, as ever, is a significant character in itself). As this takes place around Christmas, the weather also plays a role: “The media response to unusual weather is as ritualized and predictable as the stages of grief. First comes denial: "I can't believe there's so much snow." Then anger: "Why can't I drive my car, why are the trains not running?" Then blame: "Why haven't the local authorities sanded the roads, “Where are the snowplows?”, and how come the Canadians can deal with this and we can't?" This last stage goes on the longest and tends to trail off into a mumbled grumbling moan, enlivened by occasional ILLEGALS ATE MY SNOWPLOW headlines from the *Daily Mail....*” It is formulaic, but that doesn’t really matter as it works as entertainment and is good last thing at night to doze off to. 7 out of 10 Starting Manhattan in Reverse by Peter F Hamilton

The Bronte's went to Woolworths “A woman at one of mother's parties once said to me, "Do you like reading?" which smote us all to silence, for how could one tell her that books are like having a bath or sleeping, or eating bread - absolute necessities which one never thinks of in terms of appreciation. And we all sat waiting for her to say that she had so little time for reading, before ruling her right out for ever and ever.” There are rare occasions when I finish a book and think WTF. This was one of those. It’s another offering from Virago. Rachel Ferguson was a novelist, journalist, critic and campaigner for women’s rights. This is about the Carne sisters and their mother. Mr Carne has recently died. The sisters have a vivid fantasy life which gets a bit mixed up with the real world at times. This is firmly set in the upper middle class in the 1930s and there is a level of snobbishness which reflects that. They are rather cruel to the youngest sister’s governess who eventually leaves, being unable to cope with the “weirdness”. There is no discernible plot and consequently no real start or finish. Eccentric is possibly one word for this. A couple of the character are childhood toys and the dog plays a significant role. In their imaginations they are friends with some real life people: “We get their papers, and follow their careers, and pick up gossip, and memorise anecdotes, and study paragraphs, and follow their moves about the country, and, as usually happens if you really mean business, often get into personal touch with their friends or business associates, all with some fresh item or atom of knowledge to add to the heap.” It would probably be called stalking these days. The whole thing is a bit muddled. I can see why it can be seen as a working out of grief, but it does very fixed in the English middle class. The Bronte’s do pop up in the fantasy world, indeed, shopping in Woolworths. 6 out of 10 Starting Jenny Wren by E H Young

English Magic by Uschi Gatward “Now that the lamp is on, the darkness seems to fall faster around it, this pool of yellow light the only lit space in the world.” This is a debut collection of short stories and it’s not about magic or fantasy, it’s about the England of the present day. Sadly it will be Gatward’s last collection as she was diagnosed with cancer at the time of publication and died soon afterwards. The stories cover politics, subversion, ritual, the natural world, those on the edges of society, collective action and much more. It was published by the independent Galley Beggar Press. There are some striking stories. “My Brother is Back” is based on the story of Talha Ahsan who was arrested in 2006 and extradited to the US where he remained for about eight years. “The Clinic” starts with a parents and a baby at a clinic. Little clues build up and gradually the reader realises that this is dystopian and we are dealing with a totalitarian state and that something catastrophic has happened. Vaguely reminiscent of The Road. “The Creche” depicts a trip by a Mother and Toddler group to a seaside resort. Inevitably the English weather is cold and wet and there is a certain humour to this. However there is a sense of threat and menace in the background. “Beltane” follows a couple discovering a rural May celebration in a village. There are the usual processions, bonfires, food, drink and maypoles! However the reader id on edge because there is again an underlying sense of unease and the thought in the back of the mind, “Is this going to turn into The Wicker Man”. In “Lammas” and old man recollects his past in a rather disjointed and muddled way. It is a history of political protest and radicalism in the East End of London (this time shades of The Ragged Trousered Philanthropist, one of the greatest English novels). Again “Oh Whistle And” recollects other works. This time it is one of M R James’s best ghost stories “Oh Whistle and I’ll come to you my lad” (rather than the poem/song by Burns). The starting point for the story is Edward Snowden the US whistleblower. The characters are given letters rather than names and we are I the middle of the security and surveillance society. “The Bird” (shades of Hitchcock) involves a honeymooning couple returning to their Brighton flat and discovering there is a bird trapped behind their fire. Their reactions sheds light on their relationship. This is an excellent collection and they all have impact and reflection on England today. 9 out of 10 Starting The Midnight Bell by Patrick Hamilton

Arthur and George by Julian Barnes “Honour is not just a matter of internal good feeling, but also of external behaviour.” This is Barnes’s account of a true story relating to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. It tells the story of the case of George Edalji. He is the son of a Scottish mother and a Parsee father. His father is Rector of Great Wyrley in the Midlands. For a period of years the family receives very nasty anonymous letters. The police aren’t interested and even suggest George may be writing them or that it may be racial prejudice. George finishes school and trains to be a solicitor. The letters stop and start and then someone in the district starts to attack/slash animals. George is suspected and on no real evidence he is arrested, tried and sentenced to seven years hard labour. Barnes tells the story at the beginning of the book. He then switches to Conan Doyle and pretty much writes his biography until the death of his first wife Touie. George serves three years of his sentence and then sets about trying to clear his name. One of his letters setting out his case reaches Conan Doyle, who is at a low ebb. George’s case fires him with enthusiasm because of the injustice and he sets about trying to prove George’s innocence. The rest of the novel covers Conan Doyle’s attempts to get George a pardon and their interactions. Conan Doyle’s interactions with the police force and other bastions of the establishment are also rather interesting. Barnes also outlines Conan Doyle’s growing interest in Spiritualism. This is a real case with a real outcome which is well recorded and known. The boundaries between fact and fiction seem to be quite blurred here. Barnes examines the inner lives of the two men involved and also looks quite closely at Anson, the Chief Constable. This is quite a worthy book and interesting if you don’t know the story. Barnes weaves in a lot of ideas and the whole is quite dense. The last twenty or thirty pages seemed quite pointless but it’s an interesting exercise. 7 out of 10 Starting Chouette by Claire Oshetsky

The Monk by Matthew Lewis “Ambrosio was yet to learn, that to an heart unacquainted with her, Vice is ever most dangerous when lurking behind the Mask of Virtue.” “She sealed his lips with a wanton kiss; 'Though I forgive your breaking your vows to heaven, I expect you to keep your vows to me.” One of the more notorious eighteenth century gothic novels. It was published in 1796 when Lewis was twenty. This is a novel written by a teenage male – bear that in mind – it explains a lot. This has pretty much all the gothic tropes: haunted castles, evil monks and nuns, misogyny, rape, ghostly nuns, incest, crypts, fiendish puzzles, convoluted plotlines, unrequited love, a good walk on part for Lucifer (who is, well, sort of devilish), some bartering of souls, hypocrisy, religious mania, date rape drugs (I kid you not), plenty of darkness, a female breast described as a “beauteous orb” (did I mention it was written by a teenager?), the corruption of innocence, starvation, heartbreak, misery and death. I may have missed a few. As you may have guessed I was not overly enamoured of this and much preferred Radcliffe. One of the few positives that I can think of is that there was less bad poetry here than in Radcliffe. It caused controversy at the time with plenty in favour and against. The Marquis de Sade was a fan. This is the Catholic Church we are dealing with (set in Spain), so obviously women are the fount of evil. It is worth noting that Lewis didn’t know much about Catholic ritual, so he just made it up! Some of the descriptions are overdone as well, like this one describing Lucifer’s first appearance: “It was a Youth seemingly scarce eighteen, the perfection of whose form and face was unrivalled. He was perfectly naked: A bright Star sparkled upon his forehead; two crimson wings extended themselves from his shoulders; and his silken locks were confined by a band of many-coloured fires, which played round his head, formed themselves into a variety of figures, and shone with a brilliance far surpassing that of precious Stones. Circlets of Diamonds were fastened round his arms and ankles, and in his right hand He bore a silver branch, imitating Myrtle. His form shone with dazzling glory: He was surrounded by clouds of rose-coloured light, and at the moment that He appeared, a refreshing air breathed perfumes through the Cavern.” Lewis worked as a diplomat and was an MP for a while. The source of his income were two plantations in Jamaica, he owned over five hundred slaves. This was pretty awful stuff. 2 out of 10 Starting Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne

I liked her first one Madeleine, but the others less so. Haunters at the Hearth edited by Tanya Kirk This volume of the Tales of the Weird series is a seasonal collection. The stories date between 1864 and 1974. There are stories from Winston Graham (of Poldark fame), Amelia Edwards, Howard Spring, W W Jacobs, E G Swain, D H Lawrence, A M Burrage, E S Knights, Eleanor Smith, Margaret Irwin, Elizabeth Bowen, R H Malden, James Hadley Chase, W F Harvey, Mildred Clingerman, L P Hartley, George Denby and Celia Fremlin. Eighteen in all. This is a good collection for cold winter nights by a fire (preferably with a glass of wine). The stories have a good deal of variety, there is even one where the haunting is done via the medium of books. L P Hartley’s contribution (The Waits) is chilling, but one of my favourites was the one by A M Burrage, Oberon Road. It is a sort of cross between A Christmas Carol and It’s a Wonderful Life. Bowen’s story, written in 1942, is set in the war and pretty effective. There are also haunted mirrors, Satanic ritual, a couple of ghostly modes of transportation, a pantomime cat which is more than it seems, a group telling ghost stories, a walking trip where a honeymooning couple find an abandoned village, a sinister guest and much more. A solid collection, some stronger than others and a few that are rather good. 7 and a half out of 10 Starting Cornish Horrors

The Shape of Darkness by Laura Purcell “She’s always thought it’s cruel to make mourners sing. If there’s one thing she understands about grief, it’s how it chokes: the fingers of death, squeezing the throats of the living.” Another “gothic chiller” from Purcell, set this time in Victorian Bath. Purcell usually gives her main characters a profession and this time it is the making of silhouettes. It also involves the Victorian craze for mediums and the spirit world and a child spirit medium. The plot is simple: Agnes looks after her mother and nephew. She works by making and selling silhouettes and people come for a sitting. Suddenly people who have visited her for a sitting start to be murdered. Running parallel is the story of Pearl, a child medium who is an albino. She is looked after by her older sister who practices mesmerism. Her father is dying of “phossy/fossy jaw” a condition caused by working with phosphorus (linked to the match industry. Agnes has a friend called Simon, a doctor who was married to her late sister. There you have the bones of it. All that is needed now is a bunch of tropes: an unreliable narrator, spooky séances, mysterious messages, murder, lots of twists, lots of red herrings, dark atmospheric weather, a fair sprinkling of wickedness, inimical sisterly relationships and spirits contacted by séance. Purcell can write and construct a plot that moves along with its twists and turns: “This is not the first time she has heard of spiritualists, although she usually keeps such talk at a distance by saying she does not believe. A more honest statement would be that she does not want to believe. She wants the dead safely caged in Heaven or Hell, not wandering, watching her through the cloudy eyes of a corpse.” It is a lot of nonsense and here again the only decent and moral character is the doctor, the only male character we get to know. The rest are all damaged/deceitful/dangerous in various ways. There was a certain predictability about this and it left a bad taste. 4 out of 10 Starting English Magic by Uschi Gatward

Here goes 2024

House of Glass by Susan Fletcher Another Virago; a modern one. This is the first novel I have read by Susan Fletcher. It is another gothic tale with a ghost story at the heart of it. It has some of the usual tropes. A taciturn retainer who fetches from the station, garrulous housekeeper, gardener who knows more than he lets on, mysterious and interested locals who gossip a lot, a house that creaks at night, mysterious footsteps, on the floor above, the lord of the manor who when he is at home is a recluse on the first floor (there are strong shades of Jane Eyre as a touch of Secret Garden), a house with history (a previous family with violent brothers and an enigmatic sister who may be haunting the house), flowers in vases that die overnight, an odd psychic investigator: many of the usual suspects. It is set in The Cotswolds in the summer of 1914, just before the First World War. Into all this comes the main character Clara who is twenty years old and works at Kew Gardens. The owner of a house in The Cotswolds has asked for someone at Kew to go to the house and set up a glass house with exotic plants. Clara has also been asked for as well. Clara though has what is known as “brittle bones”: “Osteogenesis imperfecta. Twenty-two letters which click in the mouth and which, at first, we tried slowly. My mother would whisper the name like a prayer or incantation. I, too, mouthed it privately. But this name was soon discarded and, in its place, it became Clara’s bones. I heard it in hospital rooms and corridors, and this more accessible, intimate name implied that it was my complaint alone. That there was no other person in London or elsewhere whose ribs fractured on sneezing.” This starts as a fairly routine ghost story with things going bump in the night. The minor characters are well developed and there are the usual plot twists. Just over halfway and the novel develops into something more nuanced, although still atmospheric and gothic. The theme throughout is the strength of women and linking it to women’s rights and the women’s movement. The baddie in this is a bit random and the joins between the two parts of the book are not really seamless. This is well written and I enjoyed all of the aspects, even though they didn’t hang together that well. The reveals towards the end are weighed down with a great deal of information, in contrast with the rather slow meandering start. I didn’t mind the slow start at all and did like the vulnerability of the protagonist. 7 and a half out of 10 Starting Whispers Under Ground by Ben Aaronovitch

Anderby Wold by Winifred Holtby “Anderby was hers. The mortgage was paid. That was worth anything; worth unlovely dresses made in the village, worth the constant strain of economy, worth the ten years’ intimacy with a man whose presence roused in her alternate irritation and disappointment.” One of the good things about Virago is that they publish lesser known novels. Anderby Wold is one of Holtby’s lesser known novels, indeed, her debut novel. The setting is her beloved Yorkshire and this does feel a little like a rehearsal for South Riding. Anderby Wold is a village in the Wolds, a series of hills running through Lincolnshire and East Yorkshire. Anderby Wold is a village and farm. The farm is owned by twenty-eight year old Mary Robson. She inherited it when her father died at the age of eighteen, she also inherited the debt he had left. She married John at the age of eighteen: he was much older (over twenty years) and very solid and reliable and most importantly willing to follow her lead. He was also a little boring. The novel starts just as the debt has been paid off and Mary and John have been married for ten years. The minor characters in this are all strong: Mary and John’s relations, the farmhands, the local schoolmaster who dislikes Mary for her appearance of being “Lady Bountiful”. The seasonal agricultural round has gone on time immemorial: “Thus they had harvested at Anderby since those far off years when the Danes broke in across the headland and dyed with blood the trampled barley. Thus and thus had the workers passed, and the children waved their garlands following the last load home. Thus had Mary and other Mary Robsons before her welcomed the master of the harvest.” However modern times and philosophies are at the door. A young socialist called David Rossitur is added to the equation and he talks about change, about unions, about wage increases and better working conditions. In one of those novelist quirks David is out in bad weather and is picked up by Mary in her horse and trap. He comes down with a fever and has to stay at the farm for a few days. The work out of the differing views and the personal tensions take up the rest of the novel: ‘You stand for an ideal that is, thank Heaven, outworn. The new generation knocks at your door – a generation of men, independent, not patronized, enjoying their own rights, not the philanthropy of their exploiters, respecting themselves, not their so-called superiors. You can’t stop them, but they may stop you. You can’t shut them out, but they may shut you in.’ This is a good novel. It portrays a period of change and Holtby manages to enable the reader to have a level of sympathy for most of the characters. It does feel like a rehearsal for South Riding but it is also a strong novel in its own right. 8 and a half out of 10 Starting The Brontes went to Woolworths by Rachel Ferguson

Captain Swing by Eric Hobsbawm and George Rude “Oh Captain Swing, he'll come in the night To set all your buildings and crops alight And smash your machines with all his might That dastardly Captain Swing!” “You are to notice that if you doant put away your thrashing machine against Monday next you shall have a "SWING".” “Sir, This is to acquaint you that if your threshing machines are not destroyed by you directly we shall commence our labours. Signed on behalf of the whole... Swing.” Published in 1969 this is an analysis and examination of the Captain Swing riots in 1830. It’s written by Eric Hobsbawm and George Rude; eminent Marxist historians. This is heavily based on detailed evidence with a detailed appendix. They explain their purpose: “we are now able to ask new questions about [the riots]: about their causes and motives, about their mode of social and political behaviour, the social composition of those who took part in them, their significance and their consequences […]. The task of this book is therefore the difficult one, which nowadays – and rightly – tempts many social historians, of reconstructing the mental world of an anonymous and undocumented body of people in order to understand their movements, themselves only sketchily documented” They detailed who the rioters were in each area and details of convictions and punishments. The riots took place primarily in the south and east of England, as far north as Lincolnshire and west to Wiltshire. The riots focussed on the breaking of threshing machines (which were perceived as causing unemployment) and the low level of wages Hobsbawm and Rude consider the origins of the riots including food shortages, low wages, enclosure (in some areas) and the ongoing recession following the end of the Napoleonic Wars. They also explain the role of the Speenhamland system, which was a method of poor relief introduced in 1795, which turned into a poverty trap. This is a detailed piece of work and although historiography has developed since then, it still stands the test of time. The research is meticulous. There is also an illuminating section on what happened to those of the rioters who were transported to Australia. There are lots of quotes. Some of them quite revealing. This one from the Duke of Wellington, the then Prime Minister sums up some of the attitudes of the aristocracy: “I induced the magistrates to put themselves on horseback, each at the head of his own servants and retainers, grooms, huntsmen, game keepers, armed with horsewhips, pistols, fowling pieces and what they could get and to attack, in concert, if necessary, or singly, those mobs, disperse them, and take and put in confinement those who could not escape. This was done in a spirited manner, in many instances, and it is astonishing how soon the country was tranquillised, and that in the best way, by the activity and spirit of gentlemen" This is dense and detailed but does highlight agricultural uprisings that are largely forgotten. 8 out of 10 Starting October by China Mieville

The Horned God: Weird tales of the Great God Pan Another in the Tales of the Weird series from the British Library. These stories (and a few poems) relate to Pan, who was a Greek god of the fields and woods. He was also musical, playing a form of pipes. There was a fascination with Pan in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. This was often as a counterpoint to formal, dry, established religion and a looking back to pre-Christian beliefs and rites. The music, often at the edge of hearing, the links to a more wild sexuality, a sense of the forbidden all have links to Blake’s “doors of perception”. Pan is also a challenge to modern rationality and science. He represents liberties relating to gender, sexuality and faith. The editor, Michael Wheatley, notes that Pan is much less visible in modern fiction. There are stories from Arthur Machen, George Egerton, Barry Pain, E M Forster, Saki, Kenneth Grahame, Margery Lawrence, Algernon Blackwood, Signe Toksvig (Sandi Toksvig’s great aunt), David Keller and Dorothy Quick. There are also poems from Oscar Wilde, Dorothy Quick, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Edith Hurley, Willard Marsh and A. Lloyd Bane. There are some interesting stories in this collection. One of the most fascinating is inclusion of a chapter from The Wind in the Willows. The chapter at the centre of the book “The Piper at the Gates of Dawn”. It is also the title of Pink Floyd’s debut album; the only one with Syd Barrett taking the lead. The chapter involves mole and rat searching at night for Portly, a missing otter cub. The chapter has been described as one of the most heathen moments in modern literature. They search for much of the night and eventually hear music and find Pan: “and then, in that utter clearness of the imminent dawn, while Nature, flushed with fullness of incredible colour, seemed to hold her breath for the event, [Mole] looked in the very eyes of the Friend and Helper; saw the backward sweep of the curved horns, gleaming in the growing daylight; saw the stern, hooked nose between the kindly eyes that were looking down on them humourously, while the bearded mouth broke into a half-smile at the corners; saw the rippling muscles on the arm that lay across the broad chest, the long supple hand still holding the pan-pipes only just fallen away from the parted lips; saw the splendid curves of the shaggy limbs disposed in majestic ease on the sward; saw, last of all, nestling between his very hooves, sleeping soundly in entire peace and contentment, the little, round, podgy, childish form of the baby otter. All this he saw, for one moment breathless and intense, vivid on the morning sky; and still, as he looked, he lived; and still, as he lived, he wondered.” The story by Forster involves a group of tourists in Italy who stumble across Pan. They experience fear and run, apart from one, a young man who is slightly apart from the group because of his idleness and “failures of masculinity”. The experience with Pan changes him. This is clearly a queer awakening narrative and the young man finds liberation. These stories have more of an edge than some of the usual ghost stories and this is one of the better volumes in the series. 8 and a half out of 10 Starting Haunters at the Hearth; Eerie tales for Christmas Nights

Stalingrad by Vassily Grossman “I can tell you as a surgeon that there is one truth, not two. When I cut someone’s leg off, I don’t know two truths. If we start pretending there are two truths, we’re in trouble. And in war too—above all, when things are as bad as they are today—there is only one truth. It’s a bitter truth, but it’s a truth that can save us. If the Germans enter Stalingrad, you’ll learn that if you chase after two truths, you won’t catch either. It’ll be the end of you.” This is effectively the first part of Life and Fate, Grossman’s magnum opus. Unlike Life and Fate, this was published in Grossman’s lifetime. This translation has restored many parts that were censored in the Soviet edition. Stalingrad in summation presents the moral cause and reasoning for opposing Nazism. In Life and Fate Grossman draws comparisons between Nazism and Stalinism. There is progression though. Stalingrad hints at what is revealed in Life and Fate. The two books complement each other. There is a sharp criticism of the political regime, especially in Life and Fate, but also praise for the social and economic system. Krymov reflects on the soldiers he fights alongside: “Before the war they had worked in Soviet factories and kholkozes [collective farms]; they had read Soviet books and spent their holidays in Soviet houses of recreation. They had never seen a private landowner or factory-owner; they could not even conceive of buying bread in a private bakery, being treated in a private hospital, or working on some landowner’s estate or in factories that belonged to some businessman. Krymov could see that the pre-revolutionary order was simply incomprehensible to these young men. And now they found themselves on land occupied by German invaders, and these invaders were preparing to bring back those strange ways, to reintroduce the old order on Soviet soil.” Comparisons will be drawn to Tolstoy inevitably. One major difference of course is that Tolstoy was looking back, but Grossman was there. Tolstoy was also more directly preachy, Grossman is more subtle, but is still able to make his point: “Among a million Russian huts you will never find even two that are exactly the same. Everything that lives is unique. It is unimaginable that two people, or two briar roses, should be identical… If you attempt to erase the peculiarities and individuality of life by violence, then life itself must suffocate.” Many of the characters in Life and Fate are here and the reader sees the beginning of their journey. At the very start of the novel the Shaposhnikov’s and their friends gather for a party. At the close of Life and Fate look back with sadness. The circles of the novel is complete. At its best there is a vividness to this, especially when it focuses on particular individuals and circumstances: for example Vavilov, who is a farm worker and his preparations for going to war. The whole is panoramic and manages to focus on the collective and the individual. It is not only the soldiers who are heroic, so are those further down the line: factory workers, childcare workers and the like. This is one of the great novels of the twentieth century. I did wonder whether it would bear any comparison to Life and Fate, but it does. “The strength and good sense of the people, their morality, their true wealth—all this will live forever, no matter how hard fascism tries to destroy it.” I only hope that is true, but I have my doubts. 9 and a half out of 10 Starting Arthur and George by Julian Barnes

A Hero for Our Time by Lermontov “I was ready to love the whole world, but no one understood me, and I learned to hate.” A Russian classic at less than two hundred pages. Lermontov was born in 1814 and was dead by the age of twenty-six following a duel. The main character in this, Pechorin is certainly based on Lermontov himself. Pechorin is meant to be a Byronic hero (there are several references to Byron and Scott: Lermontov loved both of their works). There are three narrators. The first two parts of the novel are others talking about Pechorin. The third part is extracts from Pechorin’s diary. Lermontov makes life interesting for his creation, who is also not particularly likeable. There are abductions, smugglers, duels, fights over women, murder, drunkenness, seduction, romance, unrequited love, all the usual ingredients. Pechorin’s attitude to death and the duels he fought was symbolic of the way he lived life: "So? If I die, then I die! The loss to the world won't be great. Yes, and I'm fairly bored with myself already. I am like a man who is yawning at a ball, whose reason for not going to bed is only that his carriage hasn't arrived yet. But the carriage is ready ... farewell!" A nineteenth century army is a good place for a frustrated Byronic hero. Lermontov’s creation certainly played around with literary conventions. Lermontov has created something of a literary monster who uses people for his own ends, or sometimes just because he can. Lermontov had already angrily criticised and denounced Russian society in The Death of a Poet, a response to Pushkin’s death. This novel is influenced by Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin. Lermontov, like Pushkin influenced later Russian writers. He showed the complexity of the human personality, following Pushkin in writing a “psychological novel”. Pechorin becomes bitter, cynical and bored by life. Lermontov is shedding light on the nature of the contemporary hero. Holding a mirror to society and its mores. Lermontov also writes well about place: “What a glorious place that valley is! Inaccessible mountains on all sides, red-hued cliffs hung with green ivy and crowned with clumps of plane-trees, yellow precipices streaked with rivulets; high up above lies the golden fringe of the snow, while below the silver thread of the Aragva – linked with some nameless torrent that roams out of a black, mist-filled gorge – stretches glistening like a scaly snake.” Descriptions of the Caucasus. Lermontov is also rather knowing in his relationship with the reader: “Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe) is worthy of your curiosity.” There are also lots of literary references throughout: “The history of a man’s soul, even the pettiest soul, is hardly less interesting and useful than the history of a whole people; especially when the former is the result of the observations of a mature mind upon itself, and has been written without any egotistical desire of arousing sympathy or astonishment. Rousseau’s Confessions has precisely this defect – he read it to his friends.” It has been some time since I read any nineteenth century Russian literature, too long. I appreciated this and it won’t be too long before I read more. 8 and a half out of 10 Starting The Monk by Matthew Lewis

Hope you enjoy it Luna The House at Sea's End by Elly Griffiths “Never trust a man who flies the Union Jack.” This is the third in a series of detective novels. I sometimes don’t get too far in thos sort of series, but the setting and landscape helps. North Norfolk and the fens, often bleak and austere. “She loves the house, loves the view that stretches over the marshes into nothingness, loves the expanse of sky and the sound of the sea, loves the birds that darken the evening sky, their wings turned to pink by the setting sun. …It is a grey morning. The mist still lingers inland, but at the edge of the sea the air is cold and clear. It’s hard going, walking over pebbles and rocks encrusted with tiny, sharp mussel shells.” The archaeology is always interesting and Griffiths has produced a developing cast of characters with some interesting interplay. The plot in this one relates to World War Two and the threat of invasion: the north Norfolk coast being one of the places earmarked for a German invasion. Six skeletons are found on an eroding beach and are identified as being from Germany. The investigation has surprising resonances in the present and inevitably there are more suspicious deaths. There is more than a touch of the baroque here and although in this genre there is no shortage of female forensic experts, Griffiths seems to be producing one of the better ones. The landscape does help when building a sense of menace. There are lots of vignettes in this and the ongoing character of Cathbad (a druid) is one of the better ones. There is a wry humour which helps it along and which Griffiths uses to reflect on the characters. Ruth Galloway, the main protagonist is a new mother: “…she found that, increasingly, when she spoke, people tended not to hear. This was a shock for Ruth, who has been a university lecturer for all her working life. People used to pay to listen to her. Now, unless she was talking specifically about the baby, her mouth simply opened and shut like one of those nodding dogs in cars.” All in all this was ok, apart perhaps from a rather lame revel at the end. 7 out of 10 Starting House of Glass by Susan Fletcher

The Children of Gods and Fighting Men by Shauna Lawless A debut novel: a historical/fantasy novel based on the history and myths of tenth century Ireland, the first in a series. This was a time of great flux and tension. Viking raids were still occurring. Christianity and paganism were still battling it out, with Christianity in the ascendant. As always there was rivalry and contention between the various kings in Ireland: Dublin, Leinster, Munster to name a few and kings vie to be the high king. The various significant players are all historical figures. So there is a built in plot structure. Lawless also makes use of two mythical races; the Fomorians and the Tuatha De Danann. They are known as immortals, although in this case their life span is several hundred years. The Fomorians use fire magic and the Tuatha De Danaan are sworn to destroy them. They have a variety of gifts. The novel follows two characters. Gormflaith, a Fomorian, widow of the king of Dublin trying to ensure future power for her son. Fodla a Tuatha de Danann and a healer, sent on a mission to get close to Brian Boru, then King of Munster. The storyline alternates between the two. There’s plenty of plotting, tension, double-crossing, match-making and what you would expect of a decent historical novel. It is well written and well-paced with plenty of loose threads for follow on novels. The fantasy and historical elements seem to be well intertwined and so it reads well too. It was interesting to learn about a part of Irish history I knew only a little about. 7 out of 10 Starting The Shape of Darkness by Laura Purcell

Letters from Constance by Mary Hocking First time reading Mary Hocking: thanks again to Virago. This is an epistolary novel. Hocking was in the WRNS during the war, eventually becoming a full time writer. The letters in this novel are one sided, between Constance and her friend Sheila. The reader only sees the letters from Constance to Sheila, the letters stretch from 1939 until the mid-1980s. Constance and Sheila meet in the 1930s at school and so the novel covers most of their lives. They are very different women and their lives take different courses: we see loves, children, grandchildren, jobs, marriages, happiness and sorrow. There is periodic comment on the times from the 1945 general election through, Suez, the 1960s and into the 1980s. As Constance is married to an Irishman the Troubles play a significant part as well. The changing role of women can be observed over the years: “This was your day. My mother had come to see old Addiscombe. I never can persuade her to give up hoping for academic success for me. She feels she owes it to Daddy’s memory to squeeze every opportunity dry. According to her, she said – I squirm as I write this – ‘If Sheila Douglas can get into Cambridge, I can’t understand why Constance shouldn’t be accepted. After all her father was a doctor.’ The reply, which I hope pleases you, was ‘Sheila Douglas is a quite exceptionally gifted girl for whom we have great hopes. One of her poems has been commended by Walter de la Mare, who is a friend of the chairman of the Governors.’ Later in the conversation she said, and one can imagine the glacial smile which accompanied the words, ‘Constance is amusing, but she has no mind. She will get married.’ That snippet was from the 1930s! The lives contrast. Constance has seven children whilst Sheila becomes an acclaimed poet. There are the usual ups and downs of life: a certain level of humour and also some poignancy. On the whole I did enjoy this. The one-sidedness was a bit of an issue and the frequent gaps were noticeable. I was a little reminded of the novelist Elizabeth Taylor. There is a certain amount of charm to this, a portrait of a friendship. The pace is slow and there is lots about the children. I may read more, but not too soon. 7 out of 10 Starting Anderby Wold by Winifred Holtby

The Party Wall by Stevie Davies ‘You can never tell people what happened. What happened is locked up inside, there is no way in and no way out.’ This is a brilliant exposition of how coercive control can work by one of my favourite authors, Stevie Davies. The Party Wall in question is the dividing wall between two homes. There are two principal characters Mark Heyward and Freya Fox. At the beginning of the book Freya’s partner Keir is dying of cancer. He is an artist. Mark is their next door neighbour on one side. He is a museum curator, very intelligent and erudite, living alone. We spend half the time in Mark’s head and half in Freya’s. The reader, fairly early on, begins to gradually realise that Mark is not all he seems. He is helpful and supportive to Freya following Keir’s death. He even speaks eloquently at the funeral: ‘Our neighbour, Keir,’ Mark said, with expressive feeling. ‘We speak a name, don’t we?’ he paused. ‘And a person answers. From now on, when we name Keir nobody will respond. But souls live on – and here I am quoting the great George Eliot – souls live on in perpetual echoes.’’ Mark has secrets which become clearer as the book goes on. What happened to his first wife, Viola player Lily? Why is he living where he is rather than his real home Ty Hafan (this is set in Wales)? Who is the woman living in Ty Hafan? Mark very quickly sees Freya as his future, a central part of his life. Freya trusts him and he has a spare key to her house. This enables him to go in when she isn’t there and collect small mementoes. Freya only very slowly begins to realise what Mark’s real intentions are. It’s a difficult read as the reader does see what is going on in Mark’s head and the delusional nature of it. There are flashbacks to his childhood and his earlier relationships and the pieces are put slowly together. There is an element of psychological thriller about this. Up to now Stevie Davies has never disappointed and this is another great novel. If you want a non-theoretical exposition of coercive control, then look at this novel and the character Davies has created. 9 and a half out of 10 Starting A Hero of Our Time by Lermontov

Holy Ghosts: Tales of the Ecclesiastical Uncanny “The past seems so close here …” Another in the British Library Tales of the Weird series. These stories were published between 1851 and 1935. The authors are Sheridan Le Fanu, Mrs Henry Wood, Elizabeth Gaskell (contributing a novella), E. Nesbit, Amelia Edwards, Ada Buisson, Robert Hichens, Edith Wharton, Margeurite Merington, M R James (inevitably) and John Wyndham. The stories vary in type and quality. There are ghost stories, some that are just plain weird, some that are sinister with evil clerics and one novella. I had read one or two before and the M R James tale is one of his better known ones. In a number of these the Church is not the place of sanctuary it often is, but is a place of danger. There are plenty of twists and scares with the evil sometimes getting their comeuppance, but sometimes not. The stories are variable. The briefest and last by Wyndham is one of the most effective and the M R James is a classic. The one by Merington is much weaker. The novella by Gaskell is rather fragmented, but the open ending helps. A good selection of Victorian classic ghost/supernatural stories. 7 out of 10 Starting The House on the Borderland by William Hope Hodgson

Diary of a Provincial Lady by E M Delafield “January 22nd.—Customary painful situation between Bank and myself necessitates expedient, also customary, of pawning great-aunt's diamond ring, which I do, under usual conditions, and am greeted as old friend by Plymouth pawnbroker, who says facetiously, And what name will it be this time?"” I’ve been aware of this for years, probably decades and I have a virago edition (inevitably}, with a rather gushing introduction by Jilly Cooper. Delafield was a minor novelist who was asked by the editor of Time and Tide to produce a regular column, something slightly comic that could be described as “light middles”. Delafield remains a minor novelist, but this has never been out of print. It is in diary form and is narrated by a women in her mid-30s with a husband and two children. The family are middle to upper middle class with servants and periodic slight financial embarrassment. It is a mildly sarcastic internal monologue. And so it begins: “November 7th. Plant the indoor bulbs. Just as I am in the middle of them, Lady Boxe calls. I say, untruthfully, how nice to see her, and beg her to sit down while I just finish the bulbs. Lady B makes determined attempt to sit down in armchair where I have already placed two bulb-bowls and the bag of charcoal, is headed off just in time, and takes the sofa. Do I know, she asks, how very late it is for indoor bulbs?” It is all pretty domestic and sedentary with concerns that will not relate to most people. Managing servants and a French Nanny being one example. There is also a monosyllabic husband, who never listens to his wife, a selection of village worthies who constitute a social circle, two boisterous children and a variety of friends. There are occasional trips to London and one to the South of France. It’s all set in Devon: “Tea is brought in – superior temporary’s afternoon out, and Cook has, as usual, carried out favourite labour-saving device of three sponge-cakes and one bun jostling one another on the same plate – and we talk about Barbara and Crosbie Carruthers, bee-keeping, modern youth, and difficulty of removing oil stains from carpets. Have I, asks Our Vicar’s Wife, read A Brass Hat in No Man’s Land? No, I have not. Then, she says, don’t, on any account. There are so many sad and shocking things in life as it is, that writers should confine themselves to the bright, the happy, and the beautiful. This the author of A Brass Hat has entirely failed to do. It subsequently turns out that Our Vicar’s Wife has not read the book herself, but that Our Vicar has skimmed it, and declared it to be very painful and unnecessary. (Memo.: Put Brass Hat down for Times Book Club list, if not already there.)” It was and is much loved and was a sort of Bridget Jones Diary of its day. There are four books in all. It portrays a particular lifestyle that has disappeared. There are periodic references to popular books of the day and everyone is rude about Woolf and Proust. “Am asked what I think of Harriet Hume but am unable to say, as I have not read it. Have a depressed feeling that this is going to be another case of Orlando about which was perfectly able to talk most intelligently until I read it, and found myself unfortunately unable to understand any of it.” Generally I don’t mind books with little plot where not a great deal happens. It’s a poorer (fiscally) version of Downton Abbey without the drama and with mild sarcasm. It’s all pretty shallow and insubstantial: and did I mention that a number of kittens are drowned in the course of the book (by the husband). I didn’t really enjoy or appreciate this. 5 out of 10 Starting Letters from Constance by Mary Hocking

Travellers by Helon Habila “Not all of us have that luxury, of a past. My history doesn't offer me much in that respect.” ““Are you traveling in Europe?” he asked. I caught the odd phrasing. Of course I was traveling in Europe, but I understood he meant something else; he wanted to know the nature of my relationship to Europe, if I was passing through or if I had a more permanent and legal claim to Europe. A black person’s relationship with Europe would always need qualification—he or she couldn’t simply be native European, there had to be an origin explanation.” This is a novel split into six interlinked stories. It is about refugees in Europe and those migrating to Europe. The first part is “One Year in Berlin”. It concerns a Nigerian student completing his PhD (not named). He becomes friendly with a group of protesters, one of whom is Mark from Malawi, a trans man, who is “out of status” and in danger of being deported. He also meets Manu, a Libyan doctor working as a bouncer. He is looking for his wife and child who may have been lost in a boat crossing the Mediterranean. The second part, “Checkpoint Charlie” follows Manu as he goes to Checkpoint Charlie each Sunday, the appointed meeting place with his wife and child. Part three is entitled “Basel”. Here Portia, a Zambian student, daughter of a dissident poet, sets off with the narrator in part one to visit and speak to the woman who married and then killed her brother. In “The Interpreters” (4), Karim narrates his flight through Yemen, Syria and Turkey, into a Bulgarian jail whilst trying to protect his sons. Part five, “The Sea” tells the story of a woman crossing the Mediterranean in a small boat which sinks: she ends up on the island of Lampedusa with amnesia. In the final part (Hunger) the narrator from part one and Portia are in London. They meet Juma, an asylum seeker on hunger strike who is on the run from immigration officials. Habila is a great story teller and this is a good book. It tells stories about the human flotsam and jetsam who move around and through Europe. We see migrants as strangers excluded from belonging (“Even in Berlin I miss Berlin”). In the novel the Med is a liquid frontier, but it is porous and permeable and a place where many nationalities intersect and interrelate. There are a number of borders: Checkpoint Charlie is another. It is no longer the dividing line between East and West, more a tourist attraction. However, it represents possibility and Habila plays with Derrida’s notion of “democracy to come” whilst narrating an awful present. There are literary references everywhere, plenty of Shakespeare. Milton’s plea not to leave Lycidas “unwept” (unmourned) is now a plea not to leave unmourned all those lost in the Mediterranean. Arnold’s “On Dover Beach” is reimagined from The Jungle in Calais. Flaubert, Dostoyevsky and Eliot’s Wasteland are also referenced. “As far as they were concerned, all of Africa was one huge Gulag archipelago, and every African poet or writer living outside Africa has to be in exile from dictatorship.” Great storytellers can tell heart-rending stories and at the same time make their point in a way that even good journalism cannot. 9 out of 10 Starting The House at Sea's End by Elly Griffiths

The Wild Geese by Bridget Boland Another find from Virago. This is an epistolary novel set in Ireland, running from 1733 to 1746. Bridget Boland was an Irish playwright, screenwriter and occasional novelist. She was a screenwriter on such films as Gaslight, War and Peace and Anne of a Thousand Days. This novel was written in 1938 when she was twenty-five. She reflected on her life in the 1980s: "Although I hold a British passport I am in fact Irish, and the daughter of an Irish politician at that, which may account for a certain contrariness in my work. Many playwrights have become screenwriters; so I was a screenwriter and became a playwright. Most women writers excel on human stories in domestic settings: so I am bored by domestic problems, and allergic to domestic settings. I succeed best with heavy drama.” The novel follows the fortunes of the Kinross family: brothers Brendan and Maurice and sister Catherine. They are a Catholic family and are therefore not allowed to own their own land because of the Penal Laws. The land is held for them by their Protestant cousins (the Ahearne family). The background to the novel is the ongoing struggle of the Jacobites against the British throne. The title refers to the flow of young men from Ireland who went to France to school and to join continental regiments. Boland portrays the tensions and stresses put upon Irish Catholics. This is pre famine, although there are still years when there is a dearth. There is exploration of the political situation. There is also a deal of young men being young men. The epistolary structure of the novel makes it interesting, but it also limits the focus as well. It’s an easy read which I enjoyed despite some limitations. 6 and a half out of 10 Starting Diary of a Provincial Lady by E M Delafield

In Two Minds by Alis Hawkins This is the second in Hawkin’s Teifi Valley Coroner series, set in Wales in the mid nineteenth century. The setting is around Pembrokeshire, Cardiganshire and Carmarthenshire. The main protagonists continue in this novel. Harry is the young lawyer who is going blind and has had to return to his father’s estate in Wales and decide what to do with his life. Following the first novel he is appointed acting coroner until there can be an election. John is still the trusty sidekick, literally Harry’s eyes. He is acting coroner’s assistant, although still officially a solicitor’s clerk. He is concerned about his future and whether he will have one working for Harry. There is a good combination of history and detective mystery. There were emigration schemes for people to move to the US like the fictitious one in the novel. The author is a Welsh speaker and so the people and place names are accurate and authentic. The author has also done her research into anatomy, physiology and autopsy. I felt this was definitely better than the first in the series. The relationship between Harry and John is developing and the minor characters were all well developed. There were sufficient red herrings and clues to satisfy those into detective novels. 7 and a half out of 10 Starting The Children of Gods and Fighting Men by Shauna Lawless

From the depths and other strange tales of the sea edited by Mike Ashley "...the sea is another world and one of which we should be wary." Another collection from the British Library Tales of the Weird, this time based on the seas and oceans and those who sail on them. There are fifteen in all and the focus is on lesser known writers. The only ones I was aware of were William Hope Hodgson and Elinor Morduant. The editor took these stories mainly from magazines of the period. The settings are mainly late Victorian and early to mid twentieth century. There are some of the usual tropes: abandoned ships, ships seeking revenge, a couple based around the Sargasso Sea, one with a sea monster, haunted ships, more revenge and some that are variously bizarre and inexplicable. The standard does vary. There is one about spiritualism which is truly awful. There are three which do stand out. Devereux’s last smoke is a classic ghost story written by Izola Forrester, allegedly the grand-daughter of John Wilkes Booth. No Ships Pass by Eleanor Smith is a variant on an afterlife story which is quite interesting. It is also quite striking that this story has a very similar plot to the TV series Lost (although written in the 1930s). The best story in the book is the oddest: The Soul Saver by Morgan Burke and that one is bizarre. Watch out for the psychotic parrot in the first story! 7 out of 10 Starting Holy Ghosts: Classic Tales of the Ecclesiastical Uncanny edited by Fiona Snailham

Prize for the Fire by Rilla Askew This is a historical novel about Anne Askew, a Protestant martyr burnt at the stake for her faith in 1546 at the age of 25. She is one of only two women known to have been tortured in the Tower of London. Askew was born in Lincolnshire and was married at fifteen. It was an unhappy marriage. Her husband was a Catholic and at one point he threw her out because of her faith. She reverted back to her own name whilst in London. She was prominent among the more radical Protestant reformers for her knowledge of the scriptures and as a preacher: most unusual for a woman. Inevitably all this got her into trouble as Henry was at that time rowing back on reform in order to try and work out a treaty with the Emperor. Askew is also one of the earliest known female poets who wrote in English. Her own account of her examinations by prominent clerics is renowned for the way in which she wound them in knots verbally. Those who compiled lists of prominent Protestant martyrs (Bale and Foxe) toned down her responses in their accounts as they felt it wouldn’t do to portray a woman as so forward. The novel itself builds on the historical account and it is interesting to see some of those who appear in Mantel’s novels (Richard Rich, Gardiner and Wriothesley for example) popping up here a few years later. There is a local interest for me as it is set in parts in Lincolnshire: the fens and North and South Kelsey. There are sections in Lincoln itself on streets that I know. Askew has played this novel about her namesake fairly safely. She has built on the bare bones, added a few characters (particularly Beatrice the maid), but it seems to be a faithful account. Given the subject matter it may well be taken up by faith groups, as indeed Askew has been over the centuries. It’s an interesting account, certainly not up to Mantel’s standards, but it sheds light on a lesser character in the Tudor backdrop. 6 and a half out of 10 Starting Captain Swing by Thompson and Rude