Khurrum Rahman - Homegrown Hero

Rating: 5/5

Review:
Exceptionally good

I thought that Khurrum Rahman’s first novel, East Of Hounslow, was very good. Home Grown Hero, its sequel, is even better. (Although you can read Home Grown Hero as a stand-alone novel, I would strongly recommend that you read East Of Hounslow first – things will mean far more to you.)

We don’t actually catch up with the shocking ending of East Of Hounslow until almost a third of the way through the novel, as we see Jay reorientating his life. He is a cooler, rather more mature character after the events last time, but his narrative voice is still as real and entertaining (and expletive-strewn) as before. However, the decisions he had to make are catching up with him and a thrilling, twisty plot ensues as we get more insight into the nature of international terror and of home-grown conflict and hostility. There is a rich and mature treatment of the influences, biases and characters which make these matters so complex, and it is Rahman’s remarkable human insights which make this book so good – including a heartrending picture of the pain of being on the receiving end of racist abuse and thuggery, plus some genuinely touching moments concerning family and confounded stereotypes. It is also an absolutely cracking story which is full of tension, extremely exciting and which I found difficult to put down.

This is, in short, a really good thriller which also has genuine intellectual weight and important things to say about some of the critical issues of our time, while still being a pleasure to read. I thought it was absolutely excellent and can recommend it very warmly indeed.

(My thanks to HQ for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Jonathan Coe - Middle England

Rating: 3/5

Review:
Rather a struggle

I have enjoyed much of Jonathan Coe’s previous work and he writes as well as ever here, but overall I struggled with Middle England.

Having dealt with wealth, poverty and finance in modern Britain in Number 11, Coe’s latest state-of-the-nation novel takes us through the politics of the last eight years from the 2010 General Election to the political earthquakes in 2016 and beyond. As ever, he writes beautifully and readably and creates convincing, if slightly exaggerated, characters. The trouble is that there’s precious little in the way of the wit and satire which have made his previous books readable and enjoyable. Also there is such a wealth of detail both in the period settings and his characters’ lives that I began to get very bogged down and found myself skimming – something I’ve never done before with a Jonathan Coe novel.

All this meant that, although I am in sympathy with Coe’s point of view, I didn’t find much new insight, satire or enjoyment here and for me it became a rather dismal litany of all that has been wrong with British politics (with references to the US as well) in the last decade or so. Plainly, others have enjoyed Middle England very much but for me, while it’s certainly not terrible, it was a disappointment.

(My thanks to Penguin Books for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Matt Haig - Father Christmas And Me

Rating: 4/5

Review:
A good Christmas read

Father Christmas And Me is a little slow to get going, but once it does it’s a lovely, exciting Christmas story, full of Matt Haig’s usual humanity and wisdom.

In this instalment, Amelia (a human girl from a cruel workhouse now living with Father Christmas) goes to elf school and generally settles into life at Elfhelm. This opening section seemed a little slow to me, even though it is very imaginative and has important things to say about inclusivity. The pace picks up as the wicked Father Vogol begins to publish lies to try to whip up hatred of humans, and we enter another perilous race to save Christmas.

It’s a good read and has some very well-delivered messages about truth and how lies can be used to manipulate people. Perhaps one of Matt Haig’s true targets is revealed just once as Father Vogol says “I will make Elfhelm great again,” and adults will see all sorts of echoes of current political developments. However, it’s not so much a political as a deeply human and ultimately heart-warming story.

For me, this isn’t a true Matt Haig classic like How To Stop Time, but it’s a smashing book for children at Christmas and I can recommend it.

(My thanks to Canongate for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Cornwall & Trevelyan - Scoundrels 2, The Hunt For Hansclapp

Rating: 5/5

Review:
Funny and enjoyable

I enjoyed this second volume of Scoundrels even more than the first, about which I had some reservations. In Volume 2, the gross humour and absurdity is all still there but toned down a couple of notches most of the time, which to me made it a rather funnier parody of those Ripping Yarns of effortlessly gifted posh boys saving the world.

The plot...well, the plot is bonkers as our two heroes go on various “undertakings” for the club throughout the late 50s and the 60s, but it sort of hangs together, though, as they attempt to save the world from arch-villain Hansclapp. It makes for very entertaining reading which made me laugh out loud several times as they become absurdly embroiled in major (sorry) world events, with Hollywood stars and even in the Wimbledon Mixed Doubles Championship. It’s full of sexual and genitally-based humour and some of it (like the wedding photos) is just shameless schoolboy innuendo, so be warned – the more sensitive reader may find it crude and offensive. Personally, though, I found it well done enough to make me laugh rather than cringe. There are some very funny and innocent jokes, too (including a fine running gag about cigarettes), plus some rather touching events as well, so there’s a good deal more to it than just somewhat gross knockabout humour.

This may not be an immortal comedy classic, but I enjoyed it very much so I’ve rounded 4.5 stars up to 5. If it sounds like your sort of thing, do give it a try. I was a bit sceptical before I read Scoundrels, but found it a really amusing read and I can recommend it warmly.

(My thanks to Farrago for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Philip Kerr - Greeks Bearing Gifts

Rating: 4/5

Review:
A good read

I realise that this is tantamount to sacrilege, but I didn’t get on very well with the early Bernie Gunther books and haven’t read one for some time. I thought I’d try Greeks Bearing Gifts to see whether the later books suited me better and was pleasantly surprised to enjoy it.

It is 1957 and Bernie (under an assumed name) is eventually helped into a job as an insurance investigator, which he proves to be very good at. He is sent to Greece to look into the apparently accidental sinking of a boat and becomes embroiled in a plot involving German war criminals, gold plundered from the Jews murdered in Greece and so on. It’s a complicated, twisty plot, but a good one, which is rich in Kerr’s research into the subject and which makes for an involving read.

I have to say that the book is too long and Kerr is very keen to show off his research in lengthy speeches by various characters which, while accurate, don’t really ring true as dialogue. However, the relentless hard-boiled wisecracking of the earlier books is largely absent and the gratuitous misogyny is dialled down to the level of sexism which might be expected from someone like Bernie in 1957, both of which were a considerable relief to me.

So, for me this is a good read rather than a brilliant one, but well worth a look; there’s plenty to like and to think about here.

(My thanks to Quercus for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Deon Meyer - The Woman In The Blue Cloak

Rating: 4/5

Review:
A good mystery

I enjoyed The Woman In The Blue Cloak. It’s a well done police procedural with an excellent backdrop of modern-day South Africa.

This novella is the latest in a series featuring Captain Benny Greisel. I hadn’t read the previous ones, but it works very well as a stand-alone book. It’s a good mystery beginning with the discovery of a body covered in bleach by the side of a country road and leads to a story of Old Masters and greed. I liked the quiet tone of the prose, which gives the book a sense of reality, as does the excellent picture of South Africa today as a very convincing but never intrusive backdrop. Meyer’s characters are well painted and the story, while perhaps not entirely plausible in the end, held me and kept me reading.

This is a brief book, and all the better for it, I think. It’s an enjoyable read and I’m encouraged to look out previous Benny Griesel novels. Recommended.

(My thanks to Hodder & Stoughton for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Geoff Dyer - Broadsword Calling Danny Boy

Rating: 5/5

Review:
A delight

I loved Broadsword Calling Danny Boy. It’s funny, affectionate but knowing and rather insightful in places.

Fairly obviously, this is written for people who know the film Where Eagles Dare and preferably who love it – a group which includes most of us who were teenage boys when it came out in late 1968. I still remember seeing it for the first time at the cinema, and, for example, the roar of laughter when Richard Burton announces that he has uncovered a plot to assassinate the Führer. Geoff Dyer approaches the film in the same way – loving its absurdities while pointing them out and relishing the gleeful excitement, dated attitudes and haircuts and so much else. He made me laugh regularly, while also providing some genuinely interesting and illuminating background. He perhaps dwells a little too much on Burton’s drinking and fading-star status, but otherwise I think he gets the tone just right.

Not all reviewers agree with me; several don’t share Dyer’s sense of humour, for example, but I found it a delight, which also has the immense merit of being under 130 pages long and not over-stretching itself. Personally, I can recommend this very warmly.

(My thanks to Penguin Books for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Jonathan Pinnock - The Truth About Archie And Pye

Rating: 4/5

Review:
Readable and funny

I enjoyed The Truth About Archie And Pie. It’s a comic mystery which is actually funny and which has some genuine content to it as well.

Be warned, the plot is bonkers. Tom Winscome, a rather smug pillock in PR (who narrates the book) comes into possession of some mathematical manuscripts, and as his life then comes apart he finds himself in the middle of murder plots, possibly being threatened by the Belarusian mafia and so on while having to solve some mathematically-based mysteries to find out what is going on and save himself and his friends. Put like that, it sounds pretty terrible, but it’s well written, witty enough to make me laugh out loud several times, the maths elements are enjoyable and simply explained, and it has a plot which is just (just!) coherent enough to make a decent mystery.

Jonathan Pinnock has an easy, readable style with neatly-painted (if sometimes absurdly extreme) characters, like the vicar who “had a plummy, earnest voice that managed to sound sympathetic and judgemental at the same time,” and he gets Tom’s hopeless lack of self-awareness very well. I liked this little line after he has been a pain to his girlfriend who has left him a note saying that she has gone out with Samantha to discuss man problems: “Samantha’s boyfriend was an arse, so I wasn’t a bit surprised by this.” Tom does develop a little during the book, which is also a good aspect.

Pinnock also takes some neat, humorous swipes at a lot of modern idiocies, like

‘What if he’s got a gun?’

‘We’re in Hoxton, Tom. If anyone found a gun in Hoxton, they’d use it in some kind of post-ironic artwork.’

OK, it’s an easy target, but it’s nicely done and there’s plenty of enjoyable stuff in the same vein about internet behaviour, conspiracy theories, absurd corporate language and so on.

This isn’t a comedy classic for me; I couldn’t quite give it five stars because I felt it could do with a little tightening up in places, but it’s a very enjoyable read and I will be looking out for the sequel.

(My thanks to Farrago for an ARC via NetGalley.)