Freewheeling Andy

I've read a couple of bits of Slanislaw Lem, and your description sounds about right - lots of ideas and humour, but perhaps failing in terms of structure and narrative. Oddly, as you say, Solaris is the exception. I've tried three times to "get it", and yet the book and both films seemed, well, utterly rubbish to me.

[i guess I'm going to have to edit this down, and change it around, for the Penguin Blog thingy] Malcolm X is one of those names that has a huge amount of legend built up around it. Yet, even as someone who is fairly politically aware, the substance of what Malcolm X did, or stood for, had largely passed me by, and he was merely "Some militant black power bloke who was killed in the 60s". This book finally gets my head around a man who was really just a name before. Interestingly, one of the most fascinating parts is in the intro by Alex Haley, who we would now describe as a ghost-writer. It explains the context of how the book came to be written, and therefore the changes in tone across the book. (The "serious introduction" for the Penguin Classics edition is turgid rubbish, as almost all the intros I've read in that series have been). The book itself is really split into three parts. The first is Malcolm as a child, and then a hustler, living on the edge in post-depression America, making his way to New York. This is by far the most entertaining section, with a great narrative drive as Malcolm goes further and further off the rails, mixing with dodgier and dodgier characters. It's great fun, but it gives the context of Malcolm's race-politics, and also how he was able, unlike others, to motivate and move the urban blacks. Oddly, the book it feels closest to, in my mind, is Woody Guthrie's "Bound For Glory"(with a hint of Damon Runyan) in the mixture of poor boy heading out, of dangerous shady characters, of depression background, and the mix of obvious truth and perhaps slightly dubious myth-making. The second part is Malcolm in prison, becoming part of the Nation of Islam, and his time creating most of the structure of that organisation, and preaching. This section of the book contains sections where, when talking to Haley, he obviously got distracted and went into "preacher" mode, describing the condition of the poor black man, and how he has to fight racist white America. The final part comes with his split from the Nation, and his move to his final politics (before he was assassinated) - his travels abroad, and particularly his Hajj, where he saw the differences between Nation of Islam and orthodox Sunni Islam, and changed some of his more racist views for a more moderate position. It's hard to separate the writing, which is largely Alex Haley transliterating Malcom's speaking fantastically clearly, from the narrative of Malcolm's life, which is utterly fascinating, from the politics which are contained within, most of which seem obsolete, and which carry nasty racial overtones, of racial separation. Even in the later chapters when he says he's seen white men being nice and he accepts them as brothers as long as they are not racist - he still advocates the African American (he continues to use the word Negro which is grating to the modern ear) to separate from the white man, and is apparently anti-integrationist; the same mentality that led to the atrocities of the "Black Homelands" in apartheid South Africa, for example. What is perhaps most shocking about this for someone brought up in the UK in the 70s and 80s, is quite how racist, and how segregated, and how nasty the US was until really very recently; that it was less than a decade before I was born that there was still legally enforced segregation (let alone the still practised de facto segregation based on wealth). Completely eye opening stuff, great social history, good narrative, and easy enough to read (apart from some of Malcolm's political rants).

I notice you're up there now, Happy and Dandy. Perhaps we should set up links to everyone on here's reviews on that site? I'm now a few pages from finishing mine, by the way.

I don't think I would. I'm more concerned about the things I've not done, and the things I've not said. I read to entertain or to learn, and I only want to learn as something I can use when I'm doing stuff. Missing out on some entertainment I don't care much about. And if I'm on the verge of death, I think the stuff that's not learned if not much use to me anyway.

Doris Lessing. It seems like a surprise (apparently the front runners were Roth and Murukami). But I can't really say much having never been inspired to read anything by her. ------- Oops. I meant Nobel. Of course.

I find the official introductions on the Penguin Classics tend to be pompous, dreary and annoying and detract from the books themselves. Certainly on mine for the blog, the real foreward written at the time by the co-author is fascinating; the introduction by the dreary academic is, well, dreary and academic.

Unfortunately, my favourites are red: expensive white: expensive

Cloud Atlas as glorious as I remembered. Still the best book written this century that I've read. Now onto Malcolm X's Autobiog. Had one "Why are you reading that? You're not black," so far. Expecting more.

Having finished re-reading it, it's everything I remembered and more. I suppose it's reasonable that some people will have problems with the stylistic shifts, but that's one of the things I loved about it, the move from slightly effete 1930s letter writer to Korean SF and so on. I think Sloosha's crossing is essential to the book - you need it to be the other bookend in the Pacific to the Moriori and Adam Ewing, the return, almost, to where it started. But really, the two "key" sections of the book are Sonmi and Zedelgem; those seem to be the areas that the other stories spill out from, almost. Arguably, although I loved reading Timothy Cavendish, his is the odd story out, the one which doesn't so much repeat the themes of the others, although his has imprisonment, it doesn't have the slavery aspects at lpay in Sonmi, Sloosha and Ewing; or the Pacific links of Ewing, Sloosha and Luisa; or the unrequited love in Luisa, Sonmi and Zedelgem, and so on. I love the way the themes repeat, not just the comet birthmark, and the particular stories dropping into the subsequent ones. But also the way that Buenos Yerbas is mentioned in Sloosha and Silvaplana Wharf in Ewing; the way that the Prophetess crops up in Luisa Rey, and so on. I love, basically, the way that the book mimics Frobisher's description of the Cloud Atlas Sextet (p 463): "sextet for overlapping soloists: piano, clarinet, 'cello, flute, oboe and violi, each in its own language of key, scale and colour. In the 1st set, each solo is unterrupted by its successor: in the 2nd, each interruption is recontinued, in order. Revolutionary or gimmicky? Shan't know until it's finished, and by the it's too late." I particularly love the post-modern aspect to that, the knowingness of the author. Also, later, on p479, Frobisher continues about the sextete: "Boundaries between noise and sound are conventions, I see now. All boundaries are conventions, national ones too. One may transcend any convention, if only one can conveive of doing so." I understand where people will struggle with the book, but I still love it as well as admire the cleverness.

Oh, and The Autobiography of Malcolm X arrived on Saturday.

I would think that you dip in and out of it, and use that as part of your review. State that you find it impossible to read poetry as prose, and that this is the kind of book you dip in and out of rather than reading all the way through as a single narrative. And, if it's actually also unreadable say that you find it practically unreadable, and although most books you dip in and out of have some role in the toilet, perhaps this book would be better used as a different kind of roll in the bathroom.

Still nowhere to be seen

And now I'm on to Sloosha's Crossing, and I keep spotting loads of things that I don't think I spotted first time. It's not just the Frobisher Sextet, but also a jazz sextet that's playing at the beginning of Timothy Cavendish, and the new year period of Sonmi which is called Sextet, all playing with the fact that it's six interwoven stories. Also spotted that Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire is mentioned in both Cavendish and Sonmi, which is probably not a coincidence as we get an "empire" that starts off basic and gets more and more sophisticated bit also more and more bloated before ending up in a new "dark ages". And, again, I love the way that each element is of dubious veracity (or genuinely fictional) - that Frobisher doesn't trust Adam Ewing; that Frobisher himself seems genuinely untrustworthy, that Luisa Rey is clearly a fictional novel, that Timothy Cavendish is in a fictionalised film in Sonmi's world. And, at first glance in the Sloosha's Crossin' section, the Kona compared to the valley dwellers seems to mirror the Maori/Moriori, although I need to read more to be sure. It's so rich and full of great detail, along with having 6 separate great stories.

Damn, it's completely glorious, isn't it? I love Frobisher, I love Luisa Rey, I love Timothy Cavendish. I love the way the stories connect, the way that most of them seem like fiction or at least fabrications of the truth, I love the comet birthmark tumbling through. I love the little things, like the fact that the piece Frobisher writes is "The Cloud Atlas Sextet", and that it's the six parts playing together that makes the whole, like the book. I love little things like Timothy Cavendish's whine about post-modern fiction and how he disapproves of backflashes and foreshadowings and tricksy devices. I'm not in the least disappointed so far on second reading.

You'd be excited, wouldn't you? A book by Irvine Welsh, of Trainspotting fame. About sex and food? I was excited. Unfortunately, the anticipation was about as good as it got. The book had nothing like enough food, or enough sex, or even enough of the traditional Irvine Welsh malice. It was like a watered down parody of an Irvine Weslh book. Which is not a good thing. The premise is silly - Danny Skinner, drunken wide-boy health-inspector, hates new, shiny bright young thing, who is far too clean living and dull, Brian Kibby. He hates him so much that he casts a spell where all of Skinner's hangovers are visited on Kibby, and all of Kibby's good living is visited on Skinner. And so on. With the usual mix of swearing and football violence and drinking and drug taking that you get in Welsh's books, you can imagine what happens to dull Brian. Meanwhile, Danny is on a quest to find his dad, the only thing he knows is that "dad" is a chef. And, you know, that's about it. The story moves along implausibly. The characters and flat and trite and cliched (Oh, come on Irvine, you don't need to tell us that the boring boy is excited by going to Star Trek conventions and listening to Coldplay and U2 - how bloody original are you?). The one redeeming feature is that it moves along fast enough that you can finish this diluted Marabou Stork Nightmares fairly quickly. Don't read it. Use your time wisely elsewhere.

Anyone who's previously read any JG Ballard will be very familiar with the trajectory of this book. The ideas remain fascinating but it feels like almost a pastiche of a JG Ballard novel. If you were coming fresh to it, it might still be exciting and shocking, but if you're coming to it after reading Super-Cannes, or the excellent Cocaine Nights, or earlier stuff like High Rise or Concrete Island, it will be a let down. The writing is less strong, the characterisation weaker, and it feels like someone is writing a "JG Ballard novel" rather than it being JG Ballard writing a novel. As always, it seems, it starts in quiet suburbia, in a relatively normal environment. This time the central point is a shopping mall out near Heathrow. Richard Pearson, advertising executive, visits the mall after his father, and ex-airline pilot, is shot in what appears to be a random shooting. The more time he spends there, the more he realises the disconnect with "normal" London society, and how the society in the orbital towns is fragmenting. Here, the fragmentation is a near-fascist reorganisation, but based around consumerism. And perhaps the problem is that Ballard tries too hard to explain it, and tries too hard to make it current, whereas with Cocaine Nights just the very fact of living in the isolated "perfect" modern society is enough to see the decay. The advertising executive begins to engage with the strange neo-fascist processes atatched to the shopping center, whilst various apparently normal people both help and hinder. Even the culmination is uninspiring. As someone who loves Ballard's work, I have to say I was very disappointed. This is Ballard-by-rote, rather than Ballard the genius innovator.

And I've finally shifted on to the Letters from Zedelghem. Too much work. I want to go on holiday again so I can read more. Anyway, I absolutely love this section. I love the dripping sarcasm and all the comedy in the letters. And, if anyone's also read Black Swan Green, this will be where you first pick up one of those little David Mitchell foibles that I love. I'll say no more, yet...

Because I loved the rest of the book so much, I'd forgotten how tricky it was to get stuck into the beginning of the Adam Ewing journal. But it slowly begins to pick up.

For those interested, I'd forgotten there was an earlier review and discussion here http://www.bookclubforum.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=1887 which shows how my opinion has shifted after actually reading the book.

Jeffrey Taylor sets off on a journey through the troubled but hardly ever reported Sahel. The Muslim areas south of the Sahara, on the "front line" between Muslim and Christian Africa. This book should be fascinating, as he heads through Chad, Niger, Mali and Senegal (and a bit of Nigeria), meeting people and seeing the cities of the great gold, salt and slave trading kingdoms that grew up around the Caravan routes from West Africa to Arabia and Europe. And although Taylor writes interestingly, and knows his subject, the problem with this book is that, really, there are no redeeming features to the areas he travels though. The best travel writing shows at least some affection for the areas visited, but here it's all shanty towns, strict islamic rules, risk of crime, risk of being attacked because he's American (although there is an irony that almost everyone he meets says he's at risk of attack because he's American, yet every individual says that they understand the difference between person and country and it's just everyone else who's threatening...). All of the ancient cities, with the exception perhaps of Timbuktu, is just desert now. There is nothing to see. The people are generally friendly, but not exceptionally. It's just a bleak, bleak picture and eventually the book isn't enjoyable as a result. It's fascinating to read of these places, which are so rarely mentioned in literature or news, despite being the poorest countries in the world, often in the midst of civil war. But unless West Africa is your area of interest I don't think I could really recommend the book. It's just too bleak.

I think it's a fairly concerted read, and the arguments tend to carry on from each other, so yes, it's probably not a pick-up put-down kind of book. I was reading it on my holidays, though, so it went past quickly.

Plot? Is there one? I just want to remind myself for this month's discussion.

Just back from the Hols, and finished Lost Kingdoms comments above; and read Irvine Welsh's The Bedroom Secrets of the Master Chefs which was OK, but didn't really have enough bedroom secrets, or master chefs, and was a bit like a generic Welsh book - nastiness and coincidence and drugs and violence - and didn't say a lot to me other than being a fairly energetic read. Then it was Kingdom Come by JG Ballard, who I love, but who again seems to be treading water here. You kind of know that the book is going to be in a similar vein to SuperCannes or Cocaine Nights, both of which were probably better; interesting, as always, though to read of the collapse of society where there's too much disconnect from reality. Finally there was Dawkins The God Delusion, which was a cracking good read for what it was, and made lots of thoroughly good points nice and clearly. Review up in the reviews section. Lots of good thought provoking stuff. Now onto re-reading Cloud Atlas.

So much has been written about this book, I'm not sure that a new review is really needed. But then a lot of the stuff that's been written about The God Delusion is utterly misplaced. A brief precis is that Dawkins, renowned UK Darwinist and atheist has written an atheist's handbook. Many people have read it as if he's trying to convert the religious. But I think that's wrong. The book, as I read it, is more an effort to show that the proofs of god that are usually presented are deeply flawed; that the argument-from-design is, if anything, strong evidence that there isn't a god; that the arguments for religion (even if there is actually no god) are also deeply flawed. The case is made strongly, and not in the usual slightly bolshy tone that Dawkins has when you hear him in debate on the radio. It's measured and sensible, and gives non-believers the tools they should need to survive the common attacks of the various religions who can't believe there are people who don't believe. Only in Chapter 9, on the effects of bringing children up in a particular religion, does Dawkins beging to attack the behaviour of the religious. And he's on pretty strong ground, too. I have a number of criticisms of his arguments - there's way too much of an obsession with Darwinism, I think; both in his suggestions of ways that science can offer the consolations removed by removing religion; and in his arguments for an evolutionary basis for religion - something that is not really necessary. And occasionally the writing is a little self-aggrandising: there's a lot of talk of various eminent friends. But this is a great book, and will hopefully begin to open up avenues for those who don't believe to admit that they don't believe. It is astonishing that in the UK we've never had an atheist prime-minister. It's even more astonishing that there is only one member of the 600-odd strong US senate who claims not to believe. The God Delusion is one step of many to making lack-of-belief as acceptable as belief in the eyes of the public. A word of caution - it's probably not going to be happy reading for the religious, particularly those strongly Christian, where Dawkins has a fun attack on various bits of Old Testament nonsense. But the book isn't really aimed at you. The details of the old Testament stuff are also irrelevent to the broad argument being made - that people pick and choose bits of morality they want from Bible or Koran, and therefore morality even from religious texts is still relative and not absolute.