Bernard Cornwell - Sharpe's Tiger

Rating: 3/5

Review:
Disappointing

This is the first Sharpe book I have read and I’m afraid I don’t share the general enthusiasm for it.

Sharpe’s Tiger is chronologically the first Sharpe story. We find him as a private in India in 1799, first in serious trouble with his regiment and then involved as a spy in the siege of Seringapatam. It’s a fairly rollicking tale with plenty of action but it didn’t really engage me. I suppose I was hoping for a land-based version of C.S. Forrester or Patrick O’Brian, but I didn’t think this was a patch on them; it seemed stodgy and over-explained by comparison with none of the excellent characterisation or superb storytelling of either of the naval series. There is a good deal of pretty implausible action – for example, Sharpe endures 200 lashes which cause so much damage that actually expose a rib, but he’s fit for active duty almost immediately. There is a villain who is positively pantomimic in his clichéd antics...and so on.

I know I’m out of step with the majority on this one, but I wasn’t impressed. It’s not terrible, but I ended up skimming fairly extensively without feeling I was missing much and I probably won’t be bothering with the rest of the series.

Liz Moore - Long Bright River

Rating: 3/5

Review:
Disappointing

I’m sorry to say that I didn’t get on well with Long Bright River. I like Liz Moore’s work and thought that Heft in particular was excellent. This one didn’t do it for me, I’m afraid.

The story is narrated by Michaela (“Mickey”) who is a police officer in a tough, drug-riddled part of Philadelphia. Mickey’s sister Kacey is a drug addict and is missing, it emerges that there is a killer preying on such women and we get her search for Kacey intercut with Mickey’s history, while the police investigation feels rather like a minor side-issue.

Liz Moore’s books aim for deep, insightful character studies and this is a study of Mickey and a picture of the drug culture in some parts of the USA. It’s pretty good at both, but I didn’t find it all that original this time and it is extremely slow to the point of turgidity in places as we also get pictures of lots and lots of other characters including Mickey’s extended family - which seems to extend forever at times – while the crime story is a bit thin and unsatisafctory. I’m afraid I got pretty fed up and began to skim.

I’m genuinely sorry to be critical of an author whom I like and who is writing about important matters, but the truth is that I didn’t like this one much. If you haven’t read Heft I’d strongly recommend it, but although others have enjoyed it more than me, I can only give Long Bright River a very qualified recommendation.

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

Edward Carey - Little

Rating: 5/5

Review:
Terrific

I thought Little was terrific. It’s beautifully written, utterly engaging and extremely interesting.

This is the somewhat fictionalised story of the childhood and younger adulthood of Madame Tussaud, narrated by her. Born Marie Grosholtz in Switzerland we get the story of this small, odd-looking orphaned girl who finds a talent making wax anatomical models. Moving eventually to Paris, her story is of servitude, the desperation to express her talent and her yearning for love and humanity. There is a beautifully created atmosphere of pre-Revolutionary Paris, of life in the Palace of Versailles and of the Revolution and The Terror. All is seen from Marie’s – or “Little’s” plain point of view and described in quite simple, unemotional language, which makes it all the more impactful and real.

I found the story and its telling wholly gripping. It is sometimes macabre, sometimes fascinating, sometimes profoundly touching and is wonderfully illustrated with the author’s drawings, done as a part of Marie’s narrative. The characters that Edward Carey creates are complex, human and completely convincing and his research into both Marie’s life and the historical background is plainly extensive but never intrudes; it simply paints a wonderful picture of the woman and her times.

Little is one of the best books I have read this year. Very warmly recommended.

Emma Donoghue - Akin

Rating: 3/5

Review:
Rather disappointing

I was rather disappointed in Akin. Emma Donoghue certainly writes well, but I found the book a bit of a mish-mash of themes which in the end didn’t say anything very new.

The story is of Noah, a retired, recently widowed professor, approaching 80 with a comfortable life in New York and on the verge of a sentimental journey to Nice where he was a child before the war. He becomes temporary guardian of Michael, his great-nephew whose mother is in prison, whom he has never met and who comes from a much tougher background and they head to Nice together.

What follows is a mixture: the rather unoriginal story of the two hopelessly unmatched people beginning to understand and bond with each other, a love-letter to Nice, some history of the dreadful events of the Nazi occupation of the city and a rather unconvincing mystery about Noah’s mother’s activities during the war. I’m afraid it felt like a bit of a mess to me because it lacked focus as it jumped from one theme to another, and the supposed mystery didn’t convince at all as Noah jumped from one tenuous, ill-founded conclusion to another. I found Michael’s character and voice pretty unconvincing as he quite often showed an astuteness and vocabulary well beyond his years. I was also slightly uneasy at the use of some of the Nazi and Holocaust material which felt just a little exploitative to me – although that may be just a personal view as my antennae are rather sensitive to that because of my own family’s history.

Donoghue is a good writer, so it’s all readable and I did finish it (with a little judicious skimming), but I wasn’t bonkers about it and it’s certainly not a patch on the brilliance of Room.

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

Philip Parker - The A to Z History Of London

Rating: 4/5

Review:
Beautifully produced

This is a beautifully produced book with a lot of interesting stuff in it.

The first thing to say is that this history of London in maps really only covers the last 100 years, since the A to Z was born. I was a little disappointed to find such a thin covering of London’s rich history before then, but in fairness this is an A to Z history, so I can’t really complain. The bulk of the book is set out in topics like Entertaining London or Moving London which cover the development of a specific aspect of London life over the last 100 years or so. It is all very well researched and in general nicely illustrated with maps from different periods, posters and advertisements and the like, and there are plenty of nuggets of interesting information.

This is very definitely a coffee-table book rather than a serious work of history, but it is well founded in good research. It looks lovely and is very well printed and made. It would make an excellent gift for anyone interested in the history of London and I can recommend it.

H.F. Ellis - The Papers of A.J. Wentworth B.A.

Rating: 4/5

Review:
An amusing read

I thought that The Papers Of A.J. Wentworth BA was gently amusing, but the cover quote of “One of the funniest books ever,” from the Sunday Express is stretching it a bit.

Wentworth is a hapless, inept and hopelessly unaware schoolmaster in a small boys’ boarding school in 1938. Mainly told in the first person by Wentworth himself, we get accounts of various “mishaps” as the boys amuse themselves at his expense, while Wentworth pompously tries to preserve his dignity, oblivious of the fact that the rest of the world is laughing at him. It is very neatly done and cleverly written, so that I recognised some traits of teachers I have known and the attitudes of the boys.

For me this a brief, lightly amusing read rather than laugh-out-loud funny, but there is actually some rather acute character observation underpinning it. Not a classic, then, but certainly worth a read.

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

Rosamund Lupton - Three Hours

Rating: 4/5

Review:
Gripping and thoughtful

A lot about Three Hours was excellent. I found it very gripping and well done a lot of the time, but it did have its flaws in the end.

This is the story of a school siege by initially unknown gunmen. The school is in an isolated part of north Somerset and it is snowing heavily, giving the story extra atmosphere which Rosamund Lupton does very well. It begins dramatically with the shooting of the headteacher and from there we get several points of view as it unfolds: various students including a refugee from Syria with PTSD, a parent, a police officer and so on. These are all excellently handled and feel very real so that even filling in the back-stories, a device which can sometimes feel very clumsy and tired, seems natural to the narrative. Lupton also writes very well much of the time; as an example, capturing the intensity of teenage love (before the siege has begun), “A white snowflake landed on a fiery gold strand of her hair and for a moment he saw the beauty of it,” which I thought very evocative and there’s plenty more of a similar quality.

For much of its length this was a five-star read for me – gripping, exciting, intelligent and thoughtful. In the last third or so, though, there began to be just a few too many unlikely contrivances for the sake of a tense plot which weakened it for me. Also, there is suddenly some rather heavy-handed political evengelising. I agree entirely with what Lupton is saying and she is making very important points, but it did feel a little clumsy and over-polemical to me.

That said, Three Hours is still very good. It is very well researched, I found it hard to put down and Lupton’s thoughtful and sensitive portraits of her characters are excellent. Recommended.

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