newbooks magazine / Winter 2014-5

Free books every issue see page 43

nb BOOK OF THE YEAR:

AND THE WINNERS ARE:

Voting Opens

ITV Crime Thriller Awards & Irish Book Awards

The magazine for readers

COSTA 2013 WINNER:

Nathan Filer ON DIFFICULT RELATIONSHIPS:

Christos Tsiolkas OUR MAGICAL NEW YA DISCOVERY:

Leslye Walton ISSUE 83 WINTER 2014 £5

Our nb recommended

reads FREE to you this issue …

IN ASSOCIATION WITH

and reading groups

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Th e Hunting Season Is Open ‘ F I N E R Y, F L A T T E R Y, F L I R T I N G A ND THE EROTIC CH A RGE OF THE HUNT ’ T H E S U N D AY T I M E S

W E L C O M E

B A C K

vieW here from

I am guilty of putting our readers through something of a trial over the summer.

Guy, I am not ashamed to tell you I had a great big lump in my throat after reading your mail!

I was so upset at the thought of no more newbooks, I've read every one since issue 4 and it is THE best magazine out there. I love books as much as I love coffee (that's big love!) and I read every issue from cover to cover, follow up loads of recommendations and then keep the magazines to re-read.

I just wanted to say thank you for everything, your magazine and knowing there is a community of readers out there who love reading as much as I do is a very special thing.

Love Stephanie Lander, Hatton, Derbyshire. Xx

line – not ideal when so many of you have told us that browsing the newly arrived latest issue is one of life’s little pleasures.

However, we have been lucky enough to partner with www.nudge-book.com - a website with very similar values to our own. In this issue we have dedicated several pages to nudge by way of introduction You may have noticed, over the last few issues, how the team to the delights you will find there. Given that so many of shrank, the interviews became you obviously now have iPads more DIY and the number of (other tablets are available) we pages dropped from 84 to 68. think together we’ll be able to When you compare the offer you the best of both amount of advertising in, say, worlds – the magazine you love Good Housekeeping (I wish!)

AND a website to surf for more and newbooks it doesn’t take a information on the books we genius to realize we were running out of money. We thought get excited about but don’t have the future was to go entirely on- space to cover as fully as we

might like.

Anyway, to Stephanie Lander and anybody else who we’ve discomfited, here’s a great big sorry so let’s get on with the next issue!

This has never been one of those editorials which has simply regurgitated the contents and directed you to the relevant pages. However, in effectively relaunching newbooks we went back to our reviewers and asked if they had any ideas for new ways to approach our content – and boy, did they! So you’ll see several new features in these pages.

Which only leads me to ask, if there is anything, anything at all that you want us to know about the new magazine then I look forward to hearing from you – whether it’s good, bad or downright ugly.

Happy reading,

PUBLISHER

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3

BIG INTERVIEWS FROM US TO YOU GUY PRINGLE

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Leslye Walton 3

Mel Mitchell meets Leslye Walton, author of 6 WHAT WE’RE READING our next big YA A whole new team dishes the dirt on discovery, Ava Lavender what’s keeping them awake

Publisher, nudge and newbooks ALASTAIR GILES

Managing Director, AMS Digital Publishing

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BERT WRIGHT

Nudge List Editor MELANIE MITCHELL

DANIELLE BOWERS

Project Production Manager CATHERINE TURNER

30

MATHEW RILEY

Christos Tsiolkas

author of international bestseller The Slap talks relationships with Guy Pringle

Website Content Editor To find out what the team is currently reading, turn to page 6.

Every effort has been made to trace ownership of copyright material, but in a few cases this has proved impossible.

Should any question arise about the use of any material, do please let us know.

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31 LOVED AND LOATHED Clare Donaldson shares what her group fall out over.

46 BLOG SPOT Jo Barton launches our new series

64 2014 MAN BOOKER Jade Craddock assesses the field – and picks the winner!

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Nathan Filer Sarah Akhtar meets the winner of the 2013 Costa with The Shock of The Fall

All raw materials used in the production of this magazine are harvested from sustainable managed forests.

25 BEST BOOKS ABOUT...

CHILDHOOD Colin Stanton makes his childhood choices

49 TO RE-READ OR NOT TO RE-READ? Maddy Broome sets the ball rolling on new think piece

IN ASSOCIATION WITH

newbooks 1 Vicarage Lane Stubbington, Hampshire PO14 2JU Telephone 01329 311419

IN SITU Sheila Ferguson reveals her hideaway in ravishing Ravello

21 HAS MANDY READ? Shouldn’t that be what hasn’t she read?

Publisher Liaison

Business Development Manager

THE VIEW FROM HERE ‘im indoors apologises for distress caused.

66 nb READERS DAY 2014 We had a ball, everybody did, honest!

69 THE DIRECTORY e one where the reviewers have their say.

81 WHEN I MET...

Reg Seward reveals what happened.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCING NUDGE 8

9

NUDGE – WHAT’S THAT ALL ABOUT? e guided tour starts here REAL READERS Marleen Kennedy explains what’s involved.

45 BOOKNOIR For your criminal investigation.

In the Light of Madness reviewed.

52 ABOUT 1,850 WORDS! It’s the difference between an nb review and a nudge review.

FEATURES 12 SPECSAVERS CRIME THRILLER AWARDS is year’s spectacle 22 PAM JENOFF on the mystery of the bones in e Winter Guest

RECOMMENDED READS 19 The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton

26 GRAEME SIMSION he of e Rosie Project - on how he copes with writer’s block 36 IRISH BOOK AWARDS! You can vote on this year’s shortlist 37 JANE SHEMILT on how her deepest fears as a mother inspired Daughter

58 BOOKDIVA It’s life enhancing.

Letters om Skye reviewed.

48 DENIS THÉRIAULT e Lonely Postman delivers our Q&A

59 BOOKLIFE Lots of new genres we’ve not covered before. is Book is Gay reviewed

54 NATALIE HAYNES finds a modern day use for those Greek tragedies in e Amber Fury

60 BOOKHUGGER For self-confessed bibliophiles. e Miniaturist reviewed

78 RETROSPECTIVE On Lizzie (that’s Ms Elizabeth, to you) Buchan.

68 BOOKGEEK SF, fantasy and horror!!!! e Cigar that Fell in Love with the Pipe reviewed

82 DAISY GOODWIN Five Classic Faves from the author of e Fortune Hunter

23 The Winter Guest

by Pam Jenoff

27 The Rosie Effect

by Graeme Simsion

38 Daughter

by Jane Shemilt

80 BOOKCHAP Non-fiction, sport, action!

Traitor’s Blade reviewed

55 The Amber Fury Natalie Haynes

CONTENTS

ISSUE 83 WINTER newbooks magazine

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IN OUR OPINION

Welcome to the new team!

You can see on page 4 what they officially do but by the time you read through what they have to say here you’ll realize two things:

GUY PRINGLE First published in 1977, The Brethren by Robert Merle was written in French but Pushkin Press have republished this ‘Dumas of the twentieth century’. Although I am less familiar with Monsieur Dumas’s writing than the film and TV versions I would agree. This is a thorough-going historical romp, reminiscent of the Angélique books by Anne and Serge Golon I raced through in my early teens. My only carp is the

involves and asks how you might react and this does so in spades.

It has an ending that will surprise and confound in equal measure, but a winner nonetheless.

BERT WRIGHT The Dog is the Booker longlisted new novel from US-based Irish writer Joseph O’Neill. It’s six years since Barack Obama name-dropped Netherland as a favourite and this one is as good if not better. It’s a razor-sharp satire on the sybaritic Dubai

What we’re reading we’re all passionate readers, and boy, do we have eclectic tastes!

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amount of French history which I suspect even a French reader would find a little overdone.

ALASTAIR GILES I’ve just come back from a quick break to beautiful Stockholm, so The Farm, the latest psychological thriller from Tom Rob Smith (he of Child 44 fame) was a highly appropriate read, set largely in Sweden. It’s one of those books that keeps you reading, guessing and desperately trying to read between the lines. I like a book that really

lifestyle in all its hideous vulgarity. Loved it.

MEL MITCHELL Not one of his best received I had wondered whether to bother with Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan. A dexterous spy story with an artful twist, it introduces us to Serena Frome, a Cambridge maths garduate recruited into MI5 in the 70’s. She becomes involved with a project code named Sweet Tooth, designed to appeal to her frustrated literary ambitions.

IN OUR OPINION

Determined to prove herself worthy she finds her commitment to the cause at odds with her growing attraction to the writer she has been assigned to covertly recruit. A literary novel of deception from beginning to end – clever and absorbing.

DANIELLE BOWERS I am currently reading The Humans by Matt Haig. I love Matt Haig’s writing – it is so easily accessible and because I have a 1 year old baby I currently find I have to dip in and out of books and fit them in whenever I can. The book is a great idea: an alien takes over a human body on a mission from his planet and has to learn and behave like a human. It is both funny and tender and makes you think about the way all humans behave but overall I have found it reminds me to treasure the joys of life.

CATHERINE TURNER I couldn’t wait to read The Secret Place by Tana French and I’ve not been disappointed so far! I don’t want to give anything away so I won’t but this is a gripping, psychological thriller that keeps the suspense running throughout its many pages. I am so absorbed in the detail of the eight main

characters, boarding school girls, one group are sweet and innocent, the other group, not so much. They are all suspects.

The setting is described vividly, the police officers, the victim, himself, just a boy. I cannot wait to say ‘I know who killed him’...

I wonder if I’m right!

MATHEW RILEY I’m reading the Kindle version of Acceptance, the first book in Jeff Vandermeer’s Southern reach triology. It’s not at all what I expected, but as I progress I’m realising it was

Barack Obama namedropped Netherland as a favourite and this one is as good if not better… what I was hoping for - the ambience of an Andrei Tarkovsky film (Stalker) and the (super)natural threat of Algernon Blackwood’s The Willows.

I’m also reading Scott Nicolay’s debut collection Ana Kai Tangata, to my mind one of the best weird fiction collections I’ve ever read.

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I

am now the publisher of both newbooks and nudge with an involvement in Real Readers. In bringing together these three bookish initiatives we believe that the combination of print, internet and passionate book reviewers will appeal to a wider constituency than each has achieved individually.

Research with newbooks readers has shown two interesting trends in the use of new technologies. Electronic books have met with a Marmite response – as a Kindle owner myself I still prefer the printed version. Ebook sales have plateaued in the last year as we’ve become used to how and when they suit us.

By contrast, tablets (and

smartphones) have been welcomed much more widely. My Mum was never too bothered about the laptop my Dad craved. A Christmas present of a tablet changed all that and she now surfs with style and panache. Even the most ardent luddite will admit the internet is a marvelous thing but the key for most of us is the ease of access tablets bring.

When I was a kid, my Dad, when asked a homework ques-

nudge releases us. This issue is crammed to the gunnels with editorial content but there’s loads more we wanted to tell you. Enter stage left nudgebook.com! It’s space, Jim, but not as we know it.

Secondly, publishing 6 issues a year meant we were never able to be as topical and current as we would have liked. I’ve just written the introduction to the nudge Update for November – an e-newsletter on several

nudge - what’s that all about? newbooks Publisher Guy Pringle fills in the details of his new role and the implications for newbooks readers.

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tion, would refer me to the prized set of Arthur Mee’s Children’s Encyclopedias that sat in pride of place on the bookshelf.

Oh, the dread. Rarely did I emerge with an answer I could use, just a head spinning with superfluous information.

Now, watching TV, in a conversation, reading a book or newspaper – a question pops up . . . and I reach for my iPad. And more often than not, not only do I find what I wanted to know but it leads me onto something else I didn’t realize I wanted to know.

There were two particular restraints with newbooks from which being involved with

about-to-be-published titles that we think you’d want to know about. And if you’ve got an iPad or an iPhone there’s also an app with our top ten picks for November.

Obviously, I’m a convert but I really think it’s a win-win situation: we’ve included several pages in this issue giving you a flavour of what nudge – and Real Readers – has to offer you.

But ultimately, you need to take a look and see for yourself.

Come on in, the water’s fine.

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A

lthough I live in Ireland I’m actually Dutch and have been an avid reader for as long as I can remember. Since April 2007 I have been reviewing books on my blog although I have book journals going back much further. I am lucky enough to indulge my passion in my work as well, since I am a librarian.

I’m not entirely sure how I discovered nudge and subsequently Real Readers, but have to say I haven’t regretted joining the wonderful team there for a single moment.

Real Readers is a surprise package - you never know in advance

How often and how many books you receive depends entirely on you. If you consistently read, review and respond within the four week period they come more frequently.

As I said, for me the surprise factor is the ‘hook’ (especially when I’m confident I won’t receive books in a genre I dislike).

On the other hand, not knowing what is coming means I have discovered authors new to me; authors I would never have come across. And, I have never received a book I didn’t like or couldn’t finish.

All my reviews end up on one or both of my two personal blogs, Amazon, Goodreads and

Real Readers is looking for new blood – but what’s involved?

Librarian Marleen Kennedy gives an insight.

Real Readers - are you one? what you will be receiving or when. It isn’t completely pot luck though: when registering you give detailed information about the books and genres you like which informs what you’ll receive.

Ideally, you write a review within four weeks of receipt and post what you thought on sites such as Amazon, Goodreads, Booklikes, Bookarmy and, in my case, my blog. Occasionally the publisher has specific questions to answer. Simultaneously, you file your review on the Real Readers website and record where you have posted it.

Booklikes as well as the website of the publisher. I enjoy writing reviews because it gives me a chance to relive the reading experience and share the wonders I’ve discovered. It also helps me to keep track of what I’ve read and enjoyed. Furthermore, authors really appreciate it when readers take the time to share their thoughts like this; as far as publicity goes those reviews can make the difference between somebody deciding to buy a certain title or not.

Real Readers is a wonderful programme for anyone interested in reading and discovering new (to them) authors and

titles. Having to write and post a review in return is, in my opinion, a small price, well worth paying.

Why not check out Marleen’s blog at meen-readingjournal .blogspot.com To sign up for Real Readers or just to find out more go to http://realreaders.co.uk/

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Sheila Ferguson shares her Italian summer retreat

R

avello may call itself ‘La Citta della Musica’ but its literary credentials are pretty impressive too. Fittingly I was visiting Ravello one summer when news came of the death of Gore Vidal, one of the giants of American literature, who had made his home in the town at Villa La Rondinaia for more than 35 years. Vidal may perhaps be the literary figure most readily associated with Ravello, but he was following in the wake of the many accomplished writers and artists who had discovered the magical charms of

arts, composer Richard Wagner also visited and apparently exclaimed on seeing the gardens of the Villa Rufolo that he had found the magical garden of Klingsor. Naturally, he too has his commemorative plaque.

Other plaques to be found throughout Ravello detail visits

by Truman Capote, Humphrey Bogart, and John Huston all of whom stayed there while filming Beat the Devil which was shot in the town. And the splendid Villa Cimbrone with its astounding vistas proclaims that Greta Garbo found secret happiness there with conductor

In situ – Ravello this small Italian hilltop town.

The narrow cobbled streets of Ravello radiating out from its main square bear the numerous plaques marking their visits.

André Gide, in whose footsteps Vidal had followed, is said to have written L’Immoraliste there according to the plaque on the lodging house wall which also commemorates EM Forster’s stay when he was writing his short story The Story of a Panic. While the building that Gardens of Villa Rufolo houses the Hotel Rufolo claims that DH Lawrence penned Lady Chatterley’s Lover during Send your In Situ his extended stay there. recommendation to guy.pringle@newbooksmag.com From another branch of the 10

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Leopold Stokowski away from the clamour of Hollywood – though (to famously misquote the screen legend) it would seem that in the early part of the twentieth century Ravello was the last place for someone who wanted to be alone.

DH Lawrence plaque

The view from Villa Rufolo where DH Lawrence reportedly wrote Lady Chatterley’s Lover

C RIME

THRILLER

AWARDS

In late October in the ballroom of London’s glamorous Grosvenor House Hotel, deep in the heart of Mayfair, the great and the good gathered for the dénouement of

THE SPECSAVERS CRIME THRILLER AWARDS 2014 THE CWA GOLDSBORO GOLD DAGGER CRIME NOVEL OF THE YEAR IS THIS DARK ROAD TO MERCY BY WILEY CASH Wade disappeared when Easter was six and she never saw him again until she turned twelve, the day he stole her and her little sister away in his car. As they drive through North Carolina, Wade has one more shot at being a good dad. Except someone is following them.

Someone who wants Wade dead, and doesn’t care who gets hurt…

Extract Wade disappeared on us when I was nine years old, and then he showed up out of nowhere the year I turned twelve. By then I’d spent nearly three years listening to Mom blame him for everything from the lights getting turned off to me and Ruby not having new shoes to wear to

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school, and by the time he came back I’d already decided that he was the loser she’d always said he was. But it turns out he was much more than that. He was also a thief, and if I’d known what kind of people were looking for him I never would’ve let him take me and my little sister out of Gastonia, North Carolina, in the first place.

My earliest memories of Wade are from my mom taking me to the baseball stadium at Sims Field back before she died.

She’d point to the field and say, “There’s your daddy right there.” I wasn’t any older than three or four, but I can still remember staring out at the infield where all the men looked the exact same in their uniforms, wondering how I would ever spot my daddy at a baseball game if he looked just like everybody else.

THE CWA IAN FLEMING STEEL DAGGER FOR THRILLER OF THE YEAR IS - AN OFFICER AND A SPY BY ROBERT HARRIS January 1895. On a freezing

morning in the heart of Paris, an army officer, Georges Picquart, witnesses a convicted spy, Captain Alfred Dreyfus, being publicly humiliated in front of twenty thousand spectators baying ‘Death to the Jew!’ The officer is rewarded with promotion: Picquart is made the French army’s youngest colonel and put in command of ‘the Statistical Section’ – the shadowy intelligence unit that tracked down Dreyfus.

The spy, meanwhile, is given a punishment of medieval cruelty: Dreyfus is shipped off to a lifetime of solitary confinement on Devil’s Island – unable to speak to anyone, not even his guards, his case seems closed forever. But gradually Picquart comes to believe there is something rot ten at the heart of the Statistical Section.

When he discovers

CRIM E

another German spy operating on French soil, his superiors are oddly reluctant to pursue it.

Despite official warnings, Picquart persists, and soon the officer and the spy are in the same predicament.

Narrated by Picquart, An Officer and a Spy is a compelling recreation of a scandal that became the most famous miscarriage of justice in history.

Compelling, too, are the echoes for our modern world: an intelligence agency gone rogue, justice corrupted in the name of national security, a newspaper witch-hunt of a persecuted minority, and the age-old instinct of those in power to cover-up their crimes.

ris’s career, it is his wholly admirable refusal to be typecast with regard to category.

THE CWA JOHN CREASEY (NEW BLOOD) DAGGER FOR BEST FIRST NOVEL IS – THE AXEMAN'S JAZZ

BY RAY CELESTIN Extract New Orleans, May 1919 John Riley stumbled into the offices of the New Orleans Times– Picayune an hour and a half after he was supposed to have started work. He sat at his desk, took a long slow breath, and raised his eyes to peer about the room. Even in his befuddled state he could see his colleagues stealing glances at him and he wondered exactly how unkempt Robert Harris was also inducted he must look. He had been out the night into the Hall of Fame, awarded before, at at the Specsavers Crime Thriller his usual Awards - here’s why . . . spot on The inexorable ascent of Robert Elysian Harris as one of the UK’s most Fields Avimportant popular novelists has enue, and been an unusual phenomenon, he raised a quite unlike the career path of hand to most of his peers. His breakhis face to through book was the powerful make sure Fatherland in 1992 (with its he wasn’t dark alternative view of history, in which Germany was the win- still perspiring. When his finning nation in the Second World gers rubbed against a stubble at least two days old, he felt a pang War), and from that time onof regret for not having sought wards, a sequence of striking out a mirror before his arrival. and genre-bending novels followed, for which the description He looked at his desk and his ‘thriller’ no longer seemed suffi- gaze landed on his typewriter.

Its black metal frame, its crescient: Archangel, Enigma, The cent of type-bars, its levers and Fear Index and the much-ackeys, all made the thing seem claimed The Ghost, filmed by daunting somehow, cold and Polanski. But if there is one hard and other-worldly, and he thing that has marked out Har-

THRILLER

AWARDS

realized he wasn’t in a fit enough state to start writing just yet. He’d need a few coffees and a packet of cigarettes, and maybe a lunchtime brandy before he was ready to tackle anything requiring a fully functioning brain, so he decided to kill what was left of the morning with something that approximated work. He rose and stumbled over to the in-tray where the letters to the editor were kept. He grabbed as many as he could, cradling them against his chest, and returned to his seat.

FULL WINNERS LIST Goldsboro Gold Dagger Wiley Cash for This Dark Road to Mercy Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Robert Harris for An Officer And A Spy John Creasy New Blood Dagger - Ray Celestin for The Axeman’s Jazz Best Actress - Keeley Hawes for Line of Duty Best Actor - Matthew McConaughey for True Detective Best Supporting Actor - James Norton for Happy Valley Best Supporting Actress Amanda Abbington for Sherlock Best TV Series - Happy Valley Best International TV Series True Detective Best Film - Cold In July Crime Thriller Book Club Best Read of the Year - Peter May for Entry Island Inducted into the Hall of Fame Denise Mina, Robert Harris and Midsomer Murders

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THE BIG INTERVIEW

Leslye Walton D

newbooks has an enviable track record in discovering YA reads that adults will enjoy and Mel Mitchell thinks we’ve found the next one.

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espite having only just started to read The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender when I meet her, Leslye (we’ll come to that spelling) Walton is exactly how I imagined she might be other - worldly and almost child - like with huge, curious eyes.

Born and bred in the Pacific Northwest of America she assures me she is prepared for our temperamental weather conditions – “I’ve always lived where it rains all the time,” she laughs.

She is a debut author who still has a day job – teaching children between 11 and 14 years old – for now, anyway. What came first – teaching or writing?

“Teaching was my fallback career. I always wanted to write – I sing as well – but my father expected me to go to college so I ended up doing a teaching degree. Neither of my parents is creative. My sister and I have un-

usual names or unusual spellings but that’s about as creative as they got. They were like, ‘well, that’s nice but how are you going to pay your bills?’” Now her writing is taking off how does she balance the two?

“Writing is what I’m really passionate about, so eventually the teaching will probably fall to the side so I can put all my efforts into writing. That’s what I really want to do.”

WHERE DID AVA COME FROM? Ironically, it was during her teaching degree that Leslye the writer began to grow wings.”I took a semester off from education classes to take writing classes, just to see if I could do it.

Ava Lavender actually came from a short story I wrote then.

At first I didn’t think there was anything more to it but more characters came up and it grew and grew.” She went on to take

Debut author Leslye Walton the next big name in YA?

THE BIG INTERVIEW

“

an MA in writing, the youngest in her programme by eleven years, and that’s where Ava Lavender began to take shape as a novel. “Everyone else was writing short stories – they were winning competitions and getting published and winning awards – and I was just writing my sad little book. I’d moved to a new city and I was in my apartment with my cat and I just wrote this story.”

Had she planned to write magical realism? “Not really. I think it’s just how my brain

When the picture was taken it looked like she had wings works. It’s how I think. Originally I thought I was just writing historical fiction until I came up with the character Ava. She’s actually based on a picture of my younger sister when she was about eleven. She was always running and screaming and driving my dad crazy. She used to wear a t-shirt of his, which was much too big for her obviously, and it was billowing behind her as she ran and when this picture was taken it looked

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like she had wings. I thought, this is not fantasy, it’s not historical fiction anymore – I don’t know what it is.” One of her writing professors deduced that she was writing magical realism.

“So for the next month or so I read everything I could find on magical realism. Then I wrote the Roux family history and once I had that totally bizarre family I knew where the rest of it could go, it opened up. I didn’t set out to write magical realism, it just turned out that way.”

YA OR NOT YA IS THAT THE QUESTION? I assume that teaching must have given her the idea of writing for a younger generation.

“Honestly, I didn’t think I was writing Young Adult. I never thought then that it would actually come out, that it would be something that anyone would read. I just had to get it out of my system. Then I thought I’d see where I could get with it so I got an agent and it went from there. My agent really wanted to sell it as YA but I wasn’t so sure. But nothing happened in over a year so I

THE BIG INTERVIEW

relented and within days it went to auction. So what do I know?

That’s the controversy of it for me – is it YA, is it not YA. But I’m happy for anyone to read it.”

THAT MANY SPLENDOURED THING There can’t be many who wouldn’t identify with the novel’s strap line ‘love makes us such fools’. I ask her to summarise the themes of Ava? “Identity, resilience. Definitely resilience. Love...heartbreak – the things we do after heartbreak. But I don’t just mean love in terms of romantic love.

There are so many different forms of love. In the book there is love between siblings, and parents and children, and between friends. There is love between animals and humans.

One of my characters says just because love doesn’t look the way you think it’s going to doesn’t mean you don’t have it. I really hope that speaks to people. I think a lot of us feel that if we don’t have romantic love then we are unloved, which isn’t true at all. You just need to recognise it. It doesn’t mean that love is not there in some capacity or another.”

There is a suggestion of allegory in this description so I ask Leslye what she would like readers to take from the novel. She pauses as she considers. “I want them to see it as a book of hope.

Some people don’t. I think that has more to do with the reader than with me as a writer - the

mindset they’re in when they’re reading, I guess. I mean, sad things do happen – quite awful things! One person asked me why I called it the strange and beautiful sorrows when there is nothing strange or beautiful about some of the things that happen but the way I see it, and what’s beautiful to me, is that we survive anyway. We get over it. We become stronger, we get more resilient. That is what’s strange and beautiful. We keep going no matter what.”

BACK IN REAL LIFE I wonder then what her students make of it? “The age that I teach is a little younger than the age the book is aimed at – but most of them have read it.

Not all of them understand it.

They like to tell me when they’ve seen an interview but it’s more like ‘you were wearing that yellow sweater we’ve seen you wear’.” She decides it’s probably a good thing that she’s not too close to her target audience.

“I like to feel that I can write more freely and that I don’t have to worry that it might directly influence my kids or what I do in my own classroom.”

That said, she also thinks it’s important that young people are exposed to the darker side of life. “I suppose the dark things in my novel were why I dragged my feet about it being YA but I think it’s ok to give young adults dark themes and dark things to think about because age doesn’t protect you from

dark things. Something bad might happen to you or a loved one and if all we had were happy little happy OTHER YA stories TITLESabout WE HAVE things we wouldn’t be equipped KNOWN AND LOVED...

Our pick of YA

nb Publisher, Guy Pringle, singles out just some of his personal faves that have been Recommended YA Reads still worth seeking out

nb20 Mar 04 - Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time/Mark Haddon

nb22 July ’04 A Gathering Light/Jennifer Donnelly

nb71 Sep/Oct ‘12 Maggot Moon/ The Double Shadow/ I, Coriander - all Sally Gardner

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THE BIG INTERVIEW

Opinion THE STRANGE AND BEAUTIFUL SORROWS OF AVA LAVENDER Review by Mel Mitchell If you’re not familiar with the genre of magical realism you might be taken aback by the rather gruesome introduction to Ava’s fantastical history but it is worth persevering.

The heartbroken Emilienne Roux marries Connor Lavender and insists he takes her away from Manhattan and her memories of love lost. They end up in Seattle, in a house with its own peculiar past. This is where Viviane – Ava’s mother - is born, and in turn Ava herself along with her apparently mute twin brother Henry.

Family aside, Ava has more to contend with than most teenagers... she was born with wings. It is Ava who, by trying to make sense of her predicament, tells us her family story - but she is in more danger from the Roux family curse than even her protective mother could possibly have imagined.

There is a coming of age element to this magical tale that will certainly appeal to the YA market but its themes of heartbreak and survival will appeal to all ages and it is as uplifting as it is sad.

Probably one for the more romantically inclined but don’t mistake this for a love story – it so much more than that.

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dark things. Something bad might happen to you or a loved one and if all we had were happy little stories about happy things we wouldn’t be equipped to deal with anything bad happening. I really want people who are struggling with something – and teenagers always seem to be struggling with something – to find something in my book that will help them work it out. Another theme in my book is tolerance, which is also a pretty important thing to become aware of at that age.”

I ask how she feels about the feedback she’s had so far. “The older ones will ask me questions but the younger ones are just excited to make contact. It’s mainly positive. I’m ridiculously sensitive – I have to be as a writer – so the negative stuff can be hard to deal with. It’s very odd to me in a way that people care enough to have an opinion but as a writer you kind of do want that feedback. It validates you, whether it’s positive or negative.”

AND THE FUTURE? I’m interested to know, in this age of YA trilogies, whether there might be a sequel? She answers carefully. “I think Ava Lavender is a stand-alone. The story has been told. The next thing I’m working on is something completely different – new characters, new setting. I am writing it as YA, which has made me realise how glad I am that I didn’t do that for Ava. I

think I would have tried to dumb it down, not been quite as visual or metaphorical. But now that I know I can sell Ava as YA I feel liberated. I know I can use the same writing techniques, magical realism – yeah, that’s definitely my thing.”

And finally, how does a debut author, at the very beginning of their career, measure success?

“Gosh, I don’t know. My first goal was just to sell it. And then I wanted it to be enough of a success that I could get a second book deal.” She agrees she is a classic over-achiever. “Now I want the awards, I want it all – it’s what motivates me.” I think she’s on her way.

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The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

by Leslye Walton

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Y MATERNAL GRANDMOTHER, Emilienne Adou Solange Roux, fell in love three times before the eve of her nineteenth birthday. order this Born on March first in book for 1904, my grand-mère was the free first of four children, all born turn to page 43 on the first day of the third month, with René following Emilienne in 1905, Margaux in 1906, and ending with Pierette in 1907. Since each child was born under the sign of the fish, it would be easy to assume that the Roux family was full of rather sensitive and remarkably foolhardy individuals.

Their father, Beauregard Roux, was a well - known phrenologist whose greatest contributions to his field were said to be the curls of goldenrod hair atop his head and on the backs of his hands — and the manner in which his French was laced with just a hint of a Breton accent. Thick and large, Beauregard Roux could easily carry all four of his children dangling from one arm, with the family goat tucked under the other.

My great - grandmother was quite the opposite of her husband. While Beauregard was large, grandiose, mountainous even, his wife was small, indistinct, and walked with the blades of her shoulders in a permanent hunch. Her complexion was olive where his was rosy, her hair dark

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where his was light, and while every head turned when Beauregard Roux stepped into a room, his wife was best known for her capacity to take up no capacity at all.

On nights they made love, their neighbors were kept awake by the growls Beauregard made upon climax — his wife, however, hardly made any noise at all. She rarely did. In fact, the doctor in the small village of Trouville- sur- Mer who delivered their first child, my grandmother, spent the length of the delivery looking up from his duties just to be sure the mother had not perished during the act. The silence in the room was so disturbing that when it came time for the birth of their next child — my greatuncle René — the doctor refused at the last minute, leaving Beauregard to run the seventeen kilometers in his stocking feet to the town of Honfleur in a rush to find the nearest midwife.

There remains no known history of my great - grandmother before her marriage to Beauregard Roux. Her only proof of existence lay in the faces of her two oldest daughters, Emilienne and Margaux, each with her dark hair, olive complexion, and pale-green eyes. René, the only boy, resembled his father. Pierette, the youngest, had Beauregard’s rich yellow curls. Not one of the children ever knew their mother’s first name, each believing it was Maman until it was too late for them to even consider it could be anything else.

Whether or not it had anything to do with

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his large size, by the dawn of 1912 the small French village had proven much too petit for Beauregard Roux. He dreamed of places full of automobiles and buildings so tall they blocked the sun; all Trouville-sur-Mer had to offer was a fish market and Beauregard’s own phrenology practice, kept afloat by his female neighbors. His fingers ached for skulls whose bumps he hadn’t read time and time again! So, on the first of March of that year — which was eldest daughter Emilienne’s eighth birthday, son René’s seventh, Margaux’s sixth, and Pierette’s fifth — Beauregard began to talk of a place he called Manhatine.

“In Manhatine,” he’d say to his neighbors while pumping water from the well outside his home, “whenever you need to take a bath or wash your face, you just turn the faucet, and there it is — not just water, mes camarades, but hot water. Can you imagine? Like being greeted by a little miracle every morning right there in your own bath-tub.” And then he’d laugh gaily, making them suspect that Beauregard Roux was perhaps a little more unstable than they might have wished for someone so large.

It was to the dismay of the women in Trouville-sur-Mer — and the men, for there was no other character they liked better to discuss — that Beauregard sold his phrenology practice only one month later. He secured six third-class tickets aboard the maiden voyage of the SS France — one for each of his family members, with the exception of the family goat, of course.

He taught his children the English words for the numbers one through ten and, in his enthusiasm, once told them that the streets in America were unlike anything they’d ever seen before — not covered in dirt like the ones in Trouville-sur-Mer, but paved in cobblestones of bronze.

“Gold,” my young grandmother, Emilienne, interrupted. If America was really the impressive place her father thought it was, then certainly the streets would be made of something better than bronze.

“Don’t be foolish,” Beauregard chided gently.

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“Even the Americans know better than to pave their streets in gold.”

The SS France, as I’ve come to learn in my research, was a marvel of French engineering. Over twice the size of any ship in the French merchant fleet, she would set a new precedent for speed, luxury, service, and cuisine for the French Line.

Her maiden voyage departed from the bustling port of Le Havre, forty - two kilometers from Trouville-sur-Mer. Le Havre of 1912 was a place clearly marked by the distinctions of class. Surrounded on the east by the villages of Montivilliers, Harfleur, and Gonfreville-l’ Orcher, the Seine River separated the city from Honfleur. In the late eighteen hundreds, when the neighboring villages of Sanvic and Bléville were incorporated into Le Havre, an upper city developed above the ancient lower city with two parts linked by a complex network of eighty-nine stairs and a funicular. The hillside mansions of rich merchants and ship owners, all of whom had made their fortunes from Le Havre’s expansive port in the early nineteenth century, occupied the upper part. In the city’s center were the town hall, the Sous-Préfecture, the courthouse, the Le Havre Athletic Club, and the Turkish baths.

We have copies to give away FREE. See page 43 to claim yours.

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

by Leslye Walton is published in paperback by Walker Books, price £7.99 and is available now.

W

hen my friend Sheila Tomkins from here in Cheltenham told me she was thinking of suggesting some books that I might not have read, I knew immediately that she would come up with something interesting. And indeed she did – thank you Sheila! I’d already read Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter, and although I hadn’t read Faces in the Water by Janet Frame, I had read others of her books, so I decided to go for D M Thomas’s The White Hotel – a novel that I remember creating quite a stir when it came out.

However, page after page of erotic fantasy became too much for me and it is one of those rare books that I have had to abandon! Fortunately there was one more on Sheila’s list – Utz by Bruce Chatwin. I was fairly sure I would be safe with Bruce – and I was.

This wonderful short novel, first published in 1988, tells the story of Kaspar Utz, an obsessive collector of Meissen porcelain in Cold War Czechoslovakia. Somehow he has managed to hold on to his collection throughout all the vicissitudes of war and communism, and even manages to outwit the Czech authorities to travel to the west to add to his collection. Cramming it into his small two-roomed flat, it gives meaning and purpose to his life, and yet at the same time he becomes its victim, as it holds him a prisoner under a to-

talitarian regime more securely than any border could.

This carefully crafted and thought-provoking fable is one that can be read over and over, and each time offers the reader more to ponder. It examines the nature of collecting and the power of possessions; it questions whether obsessive collecting is something to be celebrated or is, on the contrary, a sickness or perversion. It looks at the often absurd consequences of state control – after all, private property is subject to confiscation, but perhaps porcelain can be considered household goods and therefore not subject to confiscation?

In a series of short chapters, with a spare and economic style, with comic episodes that so effectively lighten the mood, Chatwin conveys a whole world in just a few pages and with a simple plot and few characters creates a book that is both haunting and intriguing.

A great choice for book groups too – short but packed with ideas, and overall a really good read. I recommend it.

has Mandy read… newbooks readers are remarkably wellread – and then there’s Mandy Jenkinson of Cheltenham whose reading history we challenge each issue.

We need your suggestions of new challenges for Mandy.

If there’s a book or books you’d like us to put to her then email guy.pringle@newbooksmag.com

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RECOMMENDED READ : THE AUTHOR SAYS...

R

eaders of my earlier novels, including Kommandant’s Girl (a Recommened Read in nb73), may recall that much of the inspiration for my books comes from my years as a diplomat for the U.S. State Department in Krakow, Poland, working on issues related to the Holocaust. I was also moved by the many survivors I met during those years who entrusted their stories to me. I returned from my years in Poland profoundly changed, and wanting to write about those experiences.

The Winter Guest continues that tradition. It is the story of

complicated when Helena finds Sam, a downed American paratrooper who happens to be Jewish, in the mountains and hides him without telling her sister. As Helena nurses Sam back to health, feelings grow between them and they make plans against all odds for the future. But the secret Helena has kept from her twin and the peril it brings to their lives have unfathomable consequences.

The Winter Guest has two unique bits of true history which inspired it. The story opens in the present day, where an elderly woman in a New York senior home is confronted by the police regarding some

treated. These difficult questions provided part of the historical framework for The Winter Guest.

The second true inspiration for The Winter Guest came from my time before State Department, when I spent a year working at the Pentagon as the politically-appointed Special Assistant to the Secretary of the Army. During that year (which, to paraphrase Sir Isaac Newton, I refer to as the year I saw the world “from the shoulders of giants”) I had the opportunity to travel to events around the globe commemorating the 50th anniversary of World War II, from Bastogne in Belgium to

bones that have been found at a development site in Poland and whether she knows their origin.

The story then goes back to the Second World War where we learn through Helena and Ruth the history behind the bones.

The mystery of the bones in The Winter Guest was inspired by my work in Poland where human remains were sometimes unearthed at construction sites. Discovery of such remains, either because the Nazis had killed people in unmarked locations or because they had destroyed cemeteries, raised important questions of where the bones had come from and how the land was to be

Corregidor in the Philippines.

We attended a commemoration at a small cabin in the Slovak mountains where a young local girl had aided partisans and American secret agents. Her courageous story has remained with me for twenty years and inspired my character of Helena and her heroic decisions in The Winter Guest.

I believe that readers who enjoyed Kommandant’s Girl, as well as those who enjoy tales of love and courage set during the Second World War and are discovering my books for the first time, will enjoy The Winter Guest. I consider my books a tribute to that difficult time and the people who lived through it.

I hope you will agree.

Pam Jenoff

18 year-old twin sisters, Helena and Ruth Nowak, who are struggling to raise their three younger siblings in rural south ern Poland during the Second World War. Their lives are 22

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The Winter Guest

by Pam Jenoff NEW YORK, 2013 “They’re coming around again,” Cookie says in a hushed voice. “Knocking on doors and asking questions.”

I do not answer, but nod as a tightness forms in my throat.

I settle into the worn floral chair and tilt my head back, studying the stucco ceiling, turn to page 43 the plaster whipped into waves and points like a frothy meringue.

Whoever said, “There’s no place like home” has obviously never been to the Westchester Senior Center. One hundred and forty cookie-cutter units over ten floors, each a six hundred and twenty square foot L-shape, interlocking like an enormous dill-scented honeycomb.

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D

espite my issue with the sameness, it isn’t an awful place to live. The food is fresh, if a little bland, with plenty of the fruit and vegetables I still do not take for granted, even after so many years. Outside there’s a courtyard with a fountain and walking paths along plush green lawns. And the staff, perhaps better paid than others who perform this type of dirty and patience-trying work, are not unkind.

Like the white-haired black woman who has just finished mopping the kitchen floor and is now rinsing her bucket in the bathtub. “Thank you, Cookie,” I say from my seat by the window as she turns off the water and wipes the tub dry.

She should be in a place like this with someone caring for her, instead of cleaning for me.

Coming closer, Cookie points to my sturdy brown shoes by the bed. “Walking today?”

“Yes, I am.”

Cookie’s eyes flicker out the window to the gray November sky, darkening with the almostpromise of a storm. I walk almost every day down to the very edge of the path until one of the aides comes to coax me back. As I stroll beneath the timeless canopy of clouds, the noises of the highway and the planes overhead fade. I am no longer shuffling and bent, but a young woman striding upward through the woods, surrounded by those who once walked with me.

And I keep a set of shoes by the bed all of the time, even when snow or rain forces me to stay indoors. Some habits die hard. “How’s Luis?” I ask, shifting topics.

At the mention of her twelve-year-old grandson, Cookie’s eyes widen. Most of the residents do not bother to learn the names of the everchanging staff, much less their families’. She smiles with pride. As she raises a hand to her breast, the bracelet around her wrist jangles like ancient bones. “He made honor roll again. I’m about to go get him, actually, if you don’t need anything else…”

When she has gone, I look around the apartment at the bland white walls, the venetian blinds a shade yellower with age. Not bad, but not home.

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Home was a brownstone in Park Slope, bought before the neighborhood had grown trendy. It had interesting cracks in the ceiling, and walls so close I could touch both sides of our bedroom if I stretched my arms straight out. But there had been stairs, narrow and steep, and when my oldlady hips could no longer manage the climb, I knew it was time to go. Kari and Scott invited me to move into their Chappaqua house; they certainly have the room. But I refused—even a place like this is better than being a burden.

would have resisted, I’m sure, keeping hers long and f lowing. I smile at the thought. Beauty was always her thing. It was never mine, and certainly not now, though I’m comfortable in my skin in a way that I lacked in my younger years, as if released from an expectation I could never meet. I did feel beautiful once. My eyes travel to the lone photograph on the windowsill of a young man in a crisp army uniform, his dark hair short and expression earnest. It is the only picture I have from that time. But the faces of the others are as fresh in my mind, as though I had seen them yesterday.

A knock at the door jars me from my thoughts. The staff has keys but they do not just walk in, an attempt to maintain the deteriorating charade of autonomy.

I’m not expecting anyone, though, and it is too early for lunch. Perhaps Cookie forgot something.

I make my way to the door and look through the peephole, another habit that has never left me. Outside stand a young woman and a uniformed policeman. My stomach tightens. Once the police only meant trouble. But they cannot hurt me here. Do they mean to bring me bad news?

I open the door a few inches. “Yes?” “Mrs. Nowak?” the policeman asks.

The name slaps me across the cheek like a cold cloth. “No,” I blurt.

The name slaps me across the cheek like a cold cloth I look across the parkway at a strip mall now past its prime and half-vacant, wondering how to spend the day. The rest of my life rushed by in an instant, but time stretches here, demanding to be filled. There are activities, if one is inclined, knitting and Yiddish and aqua fitness and day trips to see shows. But I prefer to keep my own company. Even back then, I never minded the silence.

One drop, then another, comes from the kitchen faucet that Cookie did not manage to shut. I stand with effort, grimacing at the dull pain that shoots through my thigh, the wound that has never quite healed properly over more than a half century. It hurts more intensely now that the days have grown shorter and chilled.

Outside a siren wails and grows closer, coming for someone here. I cringe. Now, it is not death I fear; each of us will get there soon enough. But the sound takes me back to earlier times, when sirens meant only danger and saving ourselves mattered.

As I start across the room, I catch a glimpse of my reflection in the mirror. My hair has migrated to that short curly style all women my age seem to wear, a fuzzy white football helmet. Ruth 24

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“Your maiden name was Nowak, wasn’t it?” the woman presses gently. I try to place how old she might be. Her low, dishwater ponytail is girlish, but there are faint lines at the corners of her eyes, suggesting years behind her. There is a kind of guardedness that I recognize from myself, a haunted look that says she has known grief.

“Yes,” I say finally. There is no reason to hide who I am anymore, nothing that anyone can take from me.

“And you’re from a village in southern Poland called…Biekowice?”

“Biekowice,” I repeat, reflexively correcting her pronunciation so one can hear the short e at the end. The word is as familiar as my own name, though I have not uttered it in decades.

I study the woman’s nondescript navy pantsuit, trying to discern what she might do for a living, why she is asking me about a village half a world away that few people ever heard of in the first place. But no one dresses like what they are anymore, the doctors eschewing white coats, other professionals shedding their suits for something called “business casual.” Is she a writer perhaps, or one of the filmmakers Cookie referenced?

Documentary crews and journalists are not an uncommon site in the lobby and hallways. They come for the stories, picking through our memories like rats through the rubble, trying to find a few morsels in the refuse before the rain washes it all away.

No one has ever come to see me, though, and I have never minded or volunteered. They simply do not know who I am. Mine is not the story of the ghettos and the camps, but of a small village in the hills, a chapel in the darkness of the night.

I should write it down, I suppose. The younger ones do not remember, and when I am gone there will be no one else. The history and those who lived it will disappear with the wind. But I cannot. It is not that the memories are too painful—I live them over and over each night, a perennial film in my mind. But I cannot find the words to do justice to the people that lived, and the things that had transpired among us.

No, the filmmakers do not come for me—and they do not bring police escorts.

The woman clears her throat. “So Biekowice— you know of it?”

Every step and path, I want to say. “Yes. Why?” I summon up the courage to ask, half suspecting as I do so that I might not want to know the answer. My accent, buried years ago, seems to have suddenly returned.

“Bones,” the policeman interjects.

“I’m sorry…” Though I am uncertain what he means, I grasp the door frame, suddenly lightheaded.

The woman shoots the policeman a look, as though she wishes he had not spoken. Then, acknowledging it is too late to turn back, she nods.

“Some human bones have been found at a development site near Biekowice,” she says. “And we think you might know something about them.”

We have copies to give away FREE. See page 43 to claim yours.

The Winter Guest by Pam Jenoff is published in paperback by Mira Books, price £7.99 and is available now.

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R E C O M M E N D E D R E A D : T H E AU T H O R S AY S …

Graeme Simsion’s The Rosie Project caught the imagination of readers worldwide at the turn of the year and a movie is already ‘in development’, as they say in Hollywood. In his follow up, The Rosie Effect, the action moves to New York – so why not write it there?

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had about half of The Rosie Effect drafted, and a clear idea where it was going, when I arrived in New York for three weeks in December 2013. We had spent seven months there in 2010, and this was a chance to catch up with friends and revisit favourite places. A holiday: but I had vague intentions of working on the novel, which I felt would benefit from being written ‘on location’. By the time we arrived, those intentions had crystallised into a plan: I would

morning, writing diligently. We had champagne with the turkey.

I wouldn’t recommend the regimen as a long-term approach, but getting the writing done while in direct contact with the setting rather than relying on memory was a definite benefit. Don’s world is largely cerebral, and he’s not particularly observant of his surroundings in an aesthetic sense, but he does take note of the practical environment: weather, transport, commerce.

New York is an iconic city, and I

Photo Credit: James Penlidis

Has Graeme Simsion found the answer to Writer’s Block?

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try to write two thousand words every day and finish the draft. As motivation, I promised myself that any day on which I failed to meet the target would be an alcohol-free day.

One of the pleasures of NYC is its bars and restaurants, and I’m a reasonably enthusiastic consumer of wine and the occasional cocktail (‘occasional’ meaning ‘on the occasion of being in New York and it being evening’). I didn’t miss a day. My wife was particularly impressed to find me up at 7 a.m. on Christmas

needed to put it on the page, albeit through Don’s eyes.

My US editor commented that after reading The Rosie Effect, she had to metaphorically wring herself out, alcoholically speaking. As did I after writing it.

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The Rosie Effect

by Graeme Simsion

Orange juice was not scheduled for Fridays. Although Rosie and I had abandoned the order this book for Standardised Meal System, resulting in free turn to page 43 an improvement in ‘spontaneity’ at the expense of shopping time, food inventory and wastage, we had agreed that each week should include three alcohol-free days. Without formal scheduling, this target proved difficult to achieve, as I had predicted. Rosie eventually saw the logic of my solution. recom

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Fridays and Saturdays were obvious days on which to consume alcohol. Neither of us had classes on the weekend. We could sleep late and possibly have sex.

Sex was absolutely not allowed to be scheduled, at least not by explicit discussion, but I had become familiar with the sequence of events

likely to precipitate it: a blueberry muffin from Blue Sky Bakery, a triple shot of espresso from Otha’s, removal of my shirt, and my impersonation of Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch in To Kill A Mockingbird. I had learned not to do all four in the same sequence on every occasion, as my intention would then be obvious. To provide an element of unpredictability, I settled on tossing a coin twice to select a component of the routine to delete.

I had placed a bottle of Elk Cove pinot gris in the refrigerator to accompany the divers’ scallops purchased that morning at Chelsea Market, but when I returned after retrieving our laundry from the basement, there were two glasses of orange juice on the table. Orange juice was not compatible with the wine. Drinking it first would desensitise our tastebuds to the slight residual sugar that was a feature of the pinot gris, thus creating an impression of sourness. Waiting until after we had finished the wine would also be unacceptable. Orange juice deteriorates rapidly – hence the emphasis placed by breakfast establishments on ‘freshly squeezed’.

Rosie was in the bedroom, so not immediately available for discussion. In our apartment, there were nine possible combinations of locations for two people, of which six involved us being in different rooms. In our ideal apartment, as jointly specified prior to our arrival in New York, there would have been thirty-six possible combinations, arising from the bedroom, two

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studies, two bathrooms and a living-roomkitchen. is reference apartment would have been located in Manhattan, close to the I or ATrain for access to Columbia University medical school, with water views and a balcony or rooop barbecue area.

As our income consisted of one academic’s salary, supplemented by two part-time cocktailmaking jobs but reduced by Rosie’s tuition fees, some compromise was required, and our apartment offered none of the specified features. We had given excessive weight to the Williamsburg

within the expected range for Brooklyn in late June.

The reduction in room numbers, combined with marriage, meant I had been thrown into closer sustained proximity with another human being than ever before. Rosie’s physical presence was a hugely positive outcome of the Wife Project, but after ten months and ten days of marriage I was still adapting to being a component of a couple. I sometimes spent longer in the bathroom than was strictly necessary.

My reflections were interrupted by Rosie

My reflections were interrupted

by Rosie emerging from the bedroom wearing only a towel.

This was my favourite costume assuming ‘no costume’ did not qualify as a costume. location because our friends Isaac and Judy Esler lived there and had recommended it. There was no logical reason why a (then) forty-year-old professor of genetics and a thirty year-old postgraduate medical student would be suited to the same neighbourhood as a fifty-four-year-old psychiatrist and a fifty-two-year-old potter who had acquired their dwelling before prices escalatated.

The rent was high and the apartment had a number of faults that the management was reluctant to rectify. Currently the air-conditioning was failing to compensate for the exterior temperature of thirty-four degrees Celsius, which was 28

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emerging from the bedroom wearing only a towel. This was my favourite costume assuming ‘no costume’ did not qualify as a costume. Once again, I was struck by her extraordinary beauty and inexplicable decision to select me as her partner. And, as always, that thought was followed by an unwanted emotion: an intense moment of fear that she would one day realise her error.

‘What’s cooking?’ she asked.

‘Nothing. Cooking has not commenced. I’m in the ingredient-assembly phase.’

She laughed, in the tone that indicated I had

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misinterpreted her question. Of course, the question would not have been required at all had the Standardised Meal System been in place. I provided information that I guessed Rosie was seeking.

‘Do you need me to do anything?’

‘We all need to get some sleep tonight. Tomorrow we go to Navarone.’

The content of the Gregory Peck line was irrelevant. The effect came entirely from the delivery and the impression it conveyed of leadership and confidence in the preparation of sautéed scallops.

‘And what if I can can’t sleep, Captain?’ said Rosie. She smiled and disappeared into the bathroom. I did not raise the towel-location issue: I had long ago accepted that hers would be stored randomly in the bathroom or bedroom, effectively occupying two spaces.

Our preferences for order are at different ends of the scale. When we moved from Australia to New York, Rosie packed three maximum-size suitcases. The quantity of clothes alone was incredible. My own personal items fitted into two carry-on bags. I took advantage of the move to upgrade my living equipment and gave my stereo and desktop computer to my

brother Trevor, returned the bed, linen and kitchen utensils to the family home in Shepparton, and sold my bike.

In contrast, Rosie added to her vast collection of possessions by purchasing decorative objects within weeks of our arrival. The result was evident in the chaotic condition of our apartment: pot plants, surplus chairs and an impractical wine rack.

It was not merely the quantity of items: there was also a problem of organisation. The refrigerator was crowded with half-empty containers of bread toppings, dips and decaying dairy products. Rosie had even suggested sourcing a second refrigerator from my friend Dave. One fridge each! Never had the advantages of the Standardised Meal System, with its fully specified meal for each day of the week, standard shopping list and optimised inventory, been so obvious.

There was exactly one exception to Rosie’s disorganised approach. That exception was a variable. By default it was her medical studies, but currently it was her PhD thesis on environmental risks for the early onset of bipolar disorder. She had been granted advanced status in the Columbia MD program on the proviso that her thesis would be completed during the summer vacation. The deadline was now only two months and five days away.

‘It’s because I’m concentrating on my thesis, I don’t worry about other stuff. Nobody asks if Freud checked the use-by date on the milk.’

‘They didn’t have use-by dates in the early twentieth century.’

It was incredible that two such dissimilar people had become a successful couple.

We have copies to give away FREE. See page 43 to claim yours.

The Rosie Effect by Graeme Simsion is published in hardback by Michael Joseph, price £14.99 and is available now.

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THE BIG INTERVIEW

newbooks Publisher, Guy Pringle, meets Christos Tsiolkas, author of international bestseller The Slap that caused ructions in reading groups around the world

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hristos Tsiolkas is about 5 foot 10 and even better looking than his press photographs. Former colleague Karen Duffy introduces us and I comment on his healthy Australian complexion, comparing it to the wet and miserable January in which we’re meeting. He's on the last leg of a 10 day visit during which he has been everywhere and done everything that publicity could line up for him. As well as visits to Dublin and Edinburgh he has apparently been backwards and forwards to Broadcasting House seven times for different programmes including Radio 3, the World Service, Book Club and Front Row. We meet in a large open space in the Guardian’s offices, the venue for this evening’s Guardian Book Club. By way of setting up the event, the previous Saturday's edition included a piece by Christos about the

writing of The Slap. The focus this evening will be on that book even though his newest book, Barracuda, is already published and is the reason why I am here to talk to him this afternoon. Elsewhere the broadsheet reviews of Barracuda have been embarrassingly good - which is nice given that it was a featured title in our January/February issue. I can’t help wondering if he’s feeling slightly schizophrenic, not knowing if he’s talking about The Slap, Barracuda or both!

Our interview is preceded by an extensive photo shoot initially down beside the Grand Union Canal and then on the rather architectural chairs in the corner of the room. The photographer decides that Christos might look particularly good if he were to sit cross legged on the coffee table in the middle. I am given the role of lamp holder although it fails to flash at all the worst possible mo-

Photo Credit: Writer Pictures

Christos Tsiolkas C

The power of yoga: Christos sat – comfortably cross-legged like this for at least twenty minutes

THE BIG INTERVIEW

“

Recommended Read in nb79 when reviewer Martyn Illingworth found the story, ‘captivating and moving . . . chapters alternate between first and third person, with the third person set during Danny’s schooldays while the first is during varying points after the incident which lands Dan (as he is now known) in prison. . . . stick with the sometimes confusing structure [and] you will find a brilliant story waiting. Don’t let the focus on sport put you off either; as a self-confessed sport-phobic, I was expecting to be bored, but Tsiolkas writes the swimming aspects of the story brilliantly.

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ments. As the minutes drag on I marvel at this author’s ability to sit cross-legged - apparentlycomfortably - for what I think must have been 15 if not 20 minutes.

We start with The Slap, actually his fourth book but his first in the UK. The blurb tells you as much and as little as you need to know to whet your interest: “At a suburban barbecue one afternoon, a man slaps an unruly boy. The boy is not his son. It is a single act of violence, but this one slap reverberates through the lives of everyone who witnesses it happen.”

He agrees that his previous book, Dead Europe, was something of a burning experience, being very dark and not winning many friends and admirers.

So it must have been a welcome surprise that The Slap became a worldwide bestseller. Was there a moment when he realised The Slap was starting to take off ?

“It was just a gradual sense . . . an experience I had never quite had before, that I had found my place as a writer in Australia. I had won a few awards, there was a certain respect I had won as a writer. Certainly not in the centre of Australian literature, more on the margins looking in.

And I was quite happy with that space. Dead Europe was a very, very difficult novel to write but writing it was a confirmation that this was my vocation – to write. But there was a moment when people started ringing me up. ‘I've just seen somebody on

the bus reading The Slap.’ Or ‘I've just been to the beach and everybody is reading The Slap.’

That's when I realised my book was circulating like none of my previous novels had. There was a new audience for my work.”

I accuse him of being something of a polymath because I have read that not only is he an author but has also worked in theatre and written film screenplays. He modestly qualifies this and simply says he likes the idea of collaboration and finds that he works well with other people.

“I love the way collaboration takes you out of yourself, if you feel this safety to test yourself, to try things that might be harder to pull out of yourself.

But fiction is the craft that I am most at home with.”

What about the solitariness that goes with writing? “I think that's one of the reasons why I move between fiction and collaboration. As an older man I like the idea of working in a retreat, in the shed if you like.”

This blokeish reference is accompanied by a broad smile.

We talk about the process of breaking away from family and what younger men go through in order to fully understand their sense of self. Father and son relationships are obviously central to this. Is it a truism that mother/son relationships are simpler, I wonder? The fact we stay longer on the subject of fathers suggests so.

Continues on p.34

THE BIG INTERVIEW

Christos Tsiolkas at The Guardian Book Club GUY PRINGLE TICKS ONE OFF HIS BUCKET LIST.

As well as its Saturday Review supplement, which comprehensively covers the literary waterfront, the Guardian website has compiled an enviable collection of author podcasts.

(Something to which I now aspire in conjunction with nudge.) Earlier this year I had the opportunity of attending one of their book clubs, which, for a dyed-in-the-wool Guardian reader like me, was akin to ticking off item number one on my bucket list.

In the Scott Room of their flash new offices on the high side of King’s Cross I’d come past security and was ensconced 15 minutes ahead of kick off. To be fair, I’d spent the late afternoon cosseted in here with Christos Tsiolkas (pron. Cholcass) but now I was as excited as anyone else in the rapidly filling room.

Seven widespread arcs of chairs already held a good sprinkling of men – more than usual at author events in my experience. Perhaps they were Guardian staff stopping off for a glass of red and free entertainment before heading home? The two chaps in front of me discussed the film of Cloud Atlas (which I found more impenetrable than the book – and I gave up on that 80% of the way through).

Christos had been a delightful interviewee but professed to nerves before a speaking event. I wasn’t sure I believed

him given the media exposure he’s had since The Slap.

There’s a plain white top table on a dais with microphones and water glasses; in the back corner a professional mixing desk is attended by a chap with headphones draped round his neck.

More men have come in and the penny finally drops – this is a gay author and, like Patrick Gale in Winchester, has obvious appeal to this community.

At a table to my left a very bored looking young lady sits behind piles of The Slap and Barracuda but the fact I’ve just noticed her suggests she’s not selling many at the moment.

Seven o’clock comes and goes allowing a few latecomers to fill the gaps. It occurs to me that how we fill seats in an auditorium would make a fascinating study of human behaviour. Two young women in almost matching and truly magnificent fur hats have walked confidently through the throng and set themselves down in the front row – you can almost hear the sighs of the people in the rows behind worrying about a restricted view.

7.05 Christos enters preceded by a silver haired man who neglects to tell us who he is but is obviously the host for the evening. (I later confirm that he’s John Mullan, professor of English at University College London. He regularly chairs these sessions). As the evening

progresses the dialogue is almost evenly split and Christos looks quite pensive, obviously carefully considering his answers – perhaps there are nerves after all. He’s talking more to the chair than engaging with the audience at this stage. I sympathise with Mr Mullan – you want your guest to speak directly to the audience but this isn’t a natural reaction if nerves are at play. However, what Christos says carries weight: “The Slap gives voice to what men think but don’t say.”

“We’re confused about how we discipline children.” How he wanted to present multiple viewpoints. “My generation has proved to be the selfish/materialist generation.” His hand goes to his cheek suggesting he’s discomfited and he’s concentrating even more on the chair. When he describes his book as “Neighbours on acid.” there’s laughter and a knowing recognition of the Australian soap opera.

As someone who’s hosted more than my fair share of events – and made many mistakes along the way – I’m conscious that it’s 7.45 and we haven’t broken for questions yet. I look along my row and all four women are playing with their mobile phones. At the first reasonable point I quietly duck out of the room and go for my train feeling I was lucky to be able to talk to Christos one on one.

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often I fail). Gratifyingly he runs through the many and various ways he, too, fails but concludes with “I’m always surprised by the righteousness of people’s response to fiction but also the world in general, as if they are incapable of a shameful act.”

This leads us on to Bettina, a character who leaps off the page with her certainty that she is right and only her way can be right. Once again Christos gently gives a master class in the way an author approaches their characters – regardless of how large or small a part they are to play – trying to make them rounded people who have a viewpoint for those willing to dig below the surface and not just the first impression. My shallowness as a reader is revealed, and yet, I’m not offended, I’m charmed.

There are three or four episodes in Barracuda where I as a reader had my breath taken away – some of them I should even have seen coming, but I didn’t, and I quiz him as to how deliberately he had compiled the narrative to achieve such an effect. “What happens is that you begin at a certain point and I could hear [the character’s] voice . . . and then I begin to think how can I make these people work together.’ He pauses in frustration at his inability to articulate his craft and I worry I might be letting light in on magic. But he goes on to talk about the first draft which – he says – was such a rough

piece of writing that it was almost unrecognizable to the published book. And surely therein lies the skill of being a writer – taking an idea and honing it until it achieves what you want it to deliver. People often ask me if I’d like to write a book, given the last fourteen years – and they’re surprised when I adamantly decline, knowing my own limitations.

When you meet the real article – which Christos Tsiolkas surely is – then it is only right that you stand back and admire.

Throughout this conversation Christos has talked directly to me; he hasn’t patronized or assumed I’m misguided. And how many times must he have done this in the last 10 days, let alone in the merry-go-round that he’s been on since The Slap grew wings? Take a look at Barracuda or The Slap if you haven’t already – this is an author who is only just hitting his stride and I’m convinced there are even greater things to come.

Photo Credit: Writer Pictures

“

I moved out of home when I was eighteen which was really difficult for my parents. They grew up in a very traditional Greek world where family stays together. I knew from a very early age because of my sexuality, [Christos is gay.] because of the life I wanted to lead, it would be a dishonest life to live within the family home. It was a very difficult period but it was a necessary break.”

This moves us neatly on to Barracuda where the relationship between Danny and his father is crucial to the book, and I fall for the classic reader’s conclusion that this is based on Christos’s relationship with his own father. He gently corrects me: “It’s clear [to me] that Danny Kelly isn’t an autobiographical character. [However,] there is something about the notion of debt to family, that what you owe, it’s not a weight, it’s not a burden, it’s a responsibility that is part of my story.”

He elaborates on the additional factor of being part of an immigrant family where he was conscious that his parents had worked so hard to “provide an education and opportunities that were dreams to them. So yes, maybe that’s the element of the story that has resonances with my own.”

We go on to talk about an aphorism he has on the wall above his desk – ‘How to be a good man?’ - and I ask how he lives up to that (thinking how

W

e know our readers have the best taste in books (and magazines!) so we’re calling on you once again to share with us your favourite personal or book club reads from 2014. We think good books are worth shouting about and according to our recent survey results where you named the nb Review Directory as your favourite feature of the magazine – so do you.

Recent winners have included The Return by Victoria Hislop (2009), The Help by Kathryn Stockett (2010), Room by Emma Donoghue (2011) and

think have made the biggest impression. Will you go for the blockbuster thriller and nb Recommended Read I Am Pilgrim?

Or were you blown away by The Shock of the Fall by Nathan Filer, interviewed in this very issue (see p.62)? Americanah has already won awards aplenty – but will it win this one? The incomparable Khaled Hosseini triumphed with The Kite Runner in 2006 and A Thousand Splendid Suns just two years later in 2008 – can he make it a hat trick in 2014 with And the Mountains Echoed? See the full list and details of how to place your vote below:

Let us know...by snail mail, email or online •You can use your order form to vote, or write to us separately at newbooks, 1 Vicarage Lane, Stubbington, PO14 2JU •You can email us at info@newbooksmag.com •Or vote online at nudge-book.com

You have until the end of the year to make your selection and the winner will be announced in the Spring issue of newbooks magazine.

nb BOOK OF THE YEAR 2014 The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce (2012). Last year the honour went to Barbara Kingsolver’s Flight Behaviour, which you were so enthusiastic about we just had to make it a Recommended Read. Those who voted commended her memorable characters and elegant, compelling prose, the powerful images and challenging ideas – a surefire recipe for success, it would seem. I suspect those who were tempted into placing an order were just as impressed.

This year, in order to help you along, we’ve drawn up a shortlist of ten titles all published in paperback this year that we

Who gets your vote?

Americanah Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Apple Tree Yard Louise Doughty

The Lie Helen Dunmore

The Shock of the Fall Nathan Filer

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves Karen Joy Fowler

The Humans Matt Haig

I Am Pilgrim

Mel Mitchell names the runners and riders in our 13th nb Book of the Year outing

Terry Hayes

And the Mountains Echoed Khaled Hosseini

Flight Behaviour

The One Plus One

Barbara Kingsolver

Jojo Moyes

The Thing About December Donal Ryan

nb Book of the Year 2013 winner

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Four Irishmen, one Irishwoman and an Englishman are fighting it out for this year’s Irish Novel of the Year Award – who will you vote for?

Mary Costello’s Academy Street is her first novel after the success of The China Factory, a book of ‘Stories’. Maggie O’Farrell has said the new book brings to mind ‘the elegance of Colm Tóibín and the insight of Alice Munro’ – not a bad combination to have on your CV. And good enough to be chosen as a BBC Radio 4 Book at Bedtime.

Tóibín himself makes an appearance with Nora Webster, set in late 1960s Ireland where Nora is living in a small town, looking after her four children and trying to rebuild her life after the death of her husband.

At 320 pages, it is considerably longer than his novella, The Testament of Mary, but no less

Bone Clocks surprisingly didn’t make the Man Booker longlist.

He qualifies here as an Irish resident of longstanding.

So, all are primed and the winner will be announced on Wednesday 26th November.

And believe it or not, you can vote. You don’t have to be Irish.

Nor do you have to be resident in Ireland. Much like ourselves, the Irish Book Awards want to engage with you, the reader, to genuinely find the best Irish novel of 2014.

To vote all you need to do is visit www.irishbookawards.ie The shortlist has just been announced and you have until midnight on 21st November to cast your vote.

How Irish Are You?

I

naugurated in 2000, the Irish Novel of the Year, sponsored by Eason, the major bookshop chain in Ireland, was the foundation stone of the Irish Book Awards. John Boyne – you’ll have read The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, right? – was a speaker at the recent Guildford Readers Day. John talked passionately about A History of Loneliness and why it had taken him so long to get round to writing about Ireland: nine previous adult novels and four more for younger readers. He had obviously had time to distill his thoughts.

As the lone woman in the pack, 36

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impressive.

You may recall how Bob Geldof well and truly launched the Richard & Judy Book Club back in 2004 when he eulogized Joseph O'Connor’s Star of the Sea. So it comes as something of a surprise that none of O’Connor’s many other novels have won this prize previously. Perhaps The Thrill of it All is worth a punt at the bookies?

As for Joseph O’Neill, having been longlisted for the Man Booker with The Dog perhaps this is the moment when fate smiles? Our own Bert Wright recommends it (see page 6).

Which leaves us with the Englishman, David Mitchell, whose

The Shortlist A History of Loneliness John Boyne

Academy Street Mary Costello

The Bone Clocks David Mitchell

The Thrill of it All Joseph O'Connor

The Dog Joseph O'Neill

Nora Webster Colm Tóibín

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RECOMMENDED READ : THE AUTHOR SAYS

D

aughter came from life: real life and the fantasy one we all carry in our heads. The interface between the two is often so tightly meshed; it can be difficult to separate them. Stories are always complex to construct, but in the case of Daughter, I know exactly what came from experience and what was made up I’ve been a doctor, a GP, for most of my adult life and so I turned to the medical world for an authentic voice, for drama, for story. Patients come to a doctor’s surgery to be helped and also heard. Everyone has a unique story but, listening to

what lay beneath these, I began to recognise a narrative of loss.

Loss takes many forms: it comes with chronic disease when we lose our sense of who we thought we were, ageing does the same. We lose inner content with depression and anxiety; I worked in a practice

by Bristol docks and we saw many immigrants; each life was a kaleidoscope of loss. And of course, there were wives grieving for husbands who had died, men who’d lost beloved partners, parents crushed by the loss of a child.

Beyond the loss I saw resilience, the way people endured, survived and got

my imagination off the leash, following my deepest fears as a mother. I asked the question that haunts many parents: what if I lost a child but I didn’t know where? What if a child went missing and didn’t come home? What would I do, where would I turn? How would I keep going? Making it up was the exciting part, I could do what I wanted. I could even create a whole new family who, unlike my own, did exactly what I told them to.

My new family is a very busy one. Both parents work, there isn’t much time to go round; no one is really listening; no one is watching closely enough. The

Photo Credit: Philippa Gedge

Jane Shemilt stronger. I was humbled, curious too. I wanted to explore how it worked, what endurance actually meant. This was the seed for the story of Daughter.

It was sown, as I remember, in a class exercise late one evening on the diploma course in Creative Writing at Bristol University Soon I needed a plot. By then I was doing the MA in Creative Writing at Bath University. I wanted my colleagues in the group to want to turn the pages week by week, as we shared our work. So I looked at the other part of my life, the most precious part – my family – and this was the moment I let

family in Daughter is privileged, but the issues they face will be familiar to many people: needing to provide, fulfilling ambition, wanting above all to be good parents, are issues so many people juggle with, hoping that nothing will fall from their grasp, unnoticed.

But then there are secrets; we all know about secrets because we all keep them.

Children are particularly skilled – a private, inner life is vital to growing up in a family. Some secrets are dangerous though. In Daughter I wrote about the dangerous kind and what happened to the people who kept them.

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RECOMMENDED READ: EXTRACT

Daughter

by Jane Shemilt DORSET 2010 ONE YEAR LATER The days grow short. Apples litter the grass, their flesh pockmarked by crows. As I carry logs from the stack under the overhang today, I tread on a soft globe; it collapses into slime under my feet. turn to page 43 November.

I am cold all the time but she could be colder. Why should I be comfortable? How could I be?

By evening the dog is shivering.

The room darkens; I light the fire and the flames pull me near as the regrets begin to flare, burning and hissing in my head.

recom

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ended

order this book for free

I

f only. If only I’d been listening. If only I’d been watching.

If I could only start again, exactly one year ago.

The leather-bound sketchbook Michael gave me is on the table and in the pocket of the dressing gown there is a bitten red stub of pencil; he told me it would help to draw the past.

The pictures are in my head already: a scalpel balanced in trembling fingers, a plastic ballerina twirling round and round, a pile of notes neatly stacked on a bedside table in the dark.

I write my daughter’s name on the first unmarked page and underneath I sketch the outline of two black high-heeled shoes lying on their sides, long straps tangled together.

Naomi.

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BRISTOL 2009 ONE DAY BEFORE

She was swaying to music on her iPod so she didn’t notice me at first. Her orange scarf was looped round her throat, schoolbooks scattered everywhere. I closed the back door quietly behind me and slid my bag to the floor; it was heavy with notes, my stethoscope, syringes, vials and boxes. It had been a long day, two surgeries, home visits and paperwork. Leaning against the kitchen door, I watched my daughter but another girl was in my mind’s eye. Jade, lying in a bed with bruises on her arms.

That was the chilli in my eye. They squirt chilli juice into an elephant’s eye to distract him while they mend his wounded leg. Theo told me that once. At the time I didn’t believe it could work, but I should have taken it as a warning. It’s easier than you think to lose sight of what matters.

As I watched Naomi, I imagined painting the curve of her cheeks as she smiled to herself. I would outline them with a paler shade for the light trapped against her skin. With every step her blonde fringe jumped softly against her forehead. When it lifted, beads of sweat along the hairline glistened.

She had pushed up the sleeves of her school jersey; the charm bracelet moved up and down, up and down the smooth skin of her arm, almost slipping off. I was glad to see her wearing it; I thought she had lost it years ago.

‘Mum! I didn’t see you there. What do you

RECOMMENDED READ: EXTRACT

think?’ She pulled out her earphones and looked at me.

‘Wish I could dance like that . . .’

I stepped forward and quickly kissed the velvety bloom along her cheek, breathing her in.

Lemon soap and sweat. She jerked her head away, and bent to pick up her books in a swerving movement that had her quick, glancing grace. Her voice was impatient: ‘No, I mean my shoes – look at them.’

They must have been new. Black, very high heels, with straps of leather binding her feet and wrapping tightly round her slim legs; they looked wrong on her. She usually wore pumps in coloured leather or converses.

‘The heels are incredibly high.’ Even I could hear the criticism in my voice, so I tried to laugh.

‘Not like your usual –’ ‘They’re not, are they?’ Her voice was triumphant. ‘Totally different.’

‘They must have cost the earth. I thought you’d spent your allowance?’

‘They’re so comfortable. Exactly the right size.’ As if she couldn’t believe her luck.

‘You can’t wear them to go out, darling. They look far too tight on you.’

‘Admit you’re jealous. You want them.’ She smiled a little half smile that I hadn’t seen before.

‘Naomi –’ ‘Well, you can’t have them. I’m in love with them. I love them almost as much as I love Bertie.’ While she was speaking she stretched down to stroke the dog’s head. She turned then, and yawning widely went slowly upstairs, her shoes hitting each step with a harsh metallic noise, like little hammers.

She’d escaped. My question hung, unanswered, in the warm air of the kitchen.

Opinion DAUGHTER BY JANE SHEMILT Review by Sue Hardiman, Bristol This is a contemporary novel examining the fall out within a family when the daughter disappears in mysterious circumstances.

Written from the viewpoint of the mother it alternates both in time and location. We find the family living in Bristol in the immediate aftermath of the disappearance and then we discover the family situation a year later after the mother has moved to the Dorset Coast.

This is a novel which challenges assumptions and expectations. As the plot moves forward there are many unforeseen twists and turns.

The difference between the challenges of living in a city to the calm and soothing effects of living on the coast are examined but it is clear that the author is familiar with and has a fondness for both. The difficulties of the modern family are also observed, with both parents working in highly stressed professional roles and the effect that has on the family unit.

I really enjoyed reading this, it was pacy and well written and kept surprising me right up until the end.

Personal read......................................★★★★ Group read ..........................................★★★★

I poured myself a glass of Ted’s wine. Naomi didn’t usually answer back or walk out while I was talking. I stashed the doctor’s bag and notes in the corner of the cloakroom, then, sipping my drink, started walking around the kitchen, straightening towels. She used to tell me every thing. As I hung up her coat, the sharpness of the

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RECOMMENDED READ: EXTRACT

alcohol began to clear my mind; it was part of the bargain and I’d weighed it all up long ago. It was simple. I did the job I loved and earned good money but it meant I was home less than some mothers. The bonus was that it gave the children space. They were growing up independently, which was what we’d always wanted.

I pulled the potatoes out of the cupboard.

They were covered in little lumps of soil so I rinsed them quickly under the tap. Thinking about it, though, she hadn’t wanted to talk properly for months now. Ted would tell me not to worry. She’s a teenager, he would say, growing up.

The cold water chilled my hands and I turned off the tap. Growing up or growing away? Preoccupied or withdrawn? The questions hummed in my mind as I hunted in the drawer for the potato peeler. Last summer in my surgery I had seen an anxious adolescent; she had carefully sliced the delicate skin of her wrists into multiple red lines.

I shook my head to drive the image away. Naomi wasn’t depressed. There was that new smile to set against the impatience. Her involvement in the play against the silences at home. If she seemed preoccupied it was because she was older now, more thoughtful. Acting had given her maturity.

Last summer she’d worked with Ted in his lab and she’d become interested in medicine. As I began peeling potatoes it occurred to me that her new-found confidence could be key to success in interviews. Perhaps I should celebrate. The starring role in the school play would also increase her chances of getting a place at medical school.

Interviewers liked students with outside interests; it was known to offset the stress of becoming a doctor. Painting worked like that for me, dissolving the stress of general practice. With the tap back on, the brown mud swirled around and around in the sink and then disappeared. I’d almost finished Naomi’s portrait and I could feel the pull of it now. Whenever I painted I was in a different world; worries melted away. My easel was just upstairs in the attic, and I wished I could escape more often. I dumped the potato peelings in the bin and took the sausages out of the

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fridge. Theo’s favourite had been bangers and mash since he was a toddler. I could talk to Naomi tomorrow.

Later Ted phoned to say he was held up at the hospital. The twins came back home ravenously hungry. Ed lifted his hand in silent greeting as he took a heaped plate of toast upstairs. I could hear the bedroom door close behind him and pictured him turning on music, falling onto his bed, toast in hand, eyes closed. I remembered that about being seventeen: hoping no one would bang on your door or, worse, walk in and talk to you. Theo, freckles blazing in his pale face, shouted out the day’s triumphs as he crunched biscuits, one after another, emptying the tin. Naomi came back through the kitchen, her wet hair lying in thick points on her neck. I hurriedly pushed sandwiches into her rucksack as she was on her way out, then stood at the open door for a few minutes, listening to her footsteps going slowly down the road, gradually becoming fainter. The school theatre was a street away but she was always late. She’d stopped running everywhere now; the play was sapping her energy.

‘Though just fifteen Naomi Malcolm’s Maria is mature beyond her years.’ ‘Naomi mixes innocence and sexuality in a bewitching performance as Maria; a star is born.’ Being tired and wound up was worth it for those reviews on the school website. Two more performances after this: Thursday then Friday. Soon we would all get back to normal.

DORSET 2010 ONE YEAR LATER

I know it’s Friday today because the fish lady comes to the cottage. I crouch down under the stairs as her van draws up outside, the white shape smudged by the old glass of the door. The woman rings the bell and waits, a squat, hopeful figure, head bobbing as she searches the windows. If she sees me I will have to open the door, compose words, smile. None of these are possible today. A small spider scrabbles over my hand.

RECOMMENDED READ: EXTRACT

Bending my head further, I breathe dust from the carpet and after a while the van rumbles away down the lane. It’s a day for being on my own. I lie low and wait for the hours to pass.

Fridays still hurt.

After a while, I get up and find the book I left on the hearth last night. I turn over the page with the picture of her shoes and, on the next one, draw the little overlapping circles of a silver ring.

BRISTOL 2009 THE NIGHT OF THE DISAPPEARANCE

I knelt on the kitchen floor, opening up my medical bag to check the drugs against a list to see what I needed. This job was easier away from the surgery; there were fewer interruptions if I picked my time. I was groping into the depths of the leather pockets so I didn’t notice her come silently into the kitchen. She walked past me and the bag she was carrying knocked against my shoulder. I looked up, keeping a finger on my list; I was running low on paracetamol and pethidine. Naomi glanced down at me, her blue eyes clouded with thought. Even through the thick make-up she’d already put on for the play there were dark lines under her eyes. She looked exhausted. This wasn’t the moment to ask the questions I’d wanted to.

‘You’re almost done, sweetie. This is the second-last performance,’ I said brightly.

Clothes were spilling from her carrier bag; the heels of her shoes had made little holes in the plastic.

‘Dad and I will be there tomorrow.’ I sat back on my heels and looked up, studying her face. The black eyeliner made her look much older than fifteen. ‘I’m longing to see if it’s changed since the first night.’

She looked at me blankly, and then gave me the new smile; only one side of her mouth lifted so it looked as if she was smiling to herself.

‘What time will you be back?’ I gave up and got to my feet reluctantly; I never managed to finish anything. ‘It’s Thursday. Dad usually picks

you up on Thursdays.’

‘I told him not to bother ages ago. Walking with friends is easier.’ She sounded bored. ‘The meal will finish around midnight. Shan will give me a lift.’

‘Midnight?’ But she was tired already.

Despite myself, my voice was rising. ‘You’ve got the play again tomorrow, the party straight after.

It’s only a meal. Ten thirty.’

‘That’s not nearly long enough. Why do I always have to be different from everyone else?’

Her fingers started tapping the table; the little ring that some boy at school had given her was glinting in the light.

‘Eleven, then.’

She stared at me. ‘I’m not a baby.’ The anger in her tone was surprising.

We couldn’t argue all night. She would be onstage soon and needed to calm down; I had to finish sorting the medicines before cooking supper.

‘Half past eleven. Not a second later.’

She shrugged and turned, bending over Bertie where he lay at full stretch, sleeping against the stove. She kissed him, pulling his soft ears gently; though he hardly stirred, his tail thumped the floor.

I touched her arm. ‘He’s old, sweetheart. He needs his sleep.’

She jerked her arm from my hand, her face tense.

‘Relax, it’s okay. You’re a triumph, remember?” I gave her a quick hug but she turned her face away. ‘Only one more day to go.’

We have copies to give away FREE. See page 43 to claim yours.

Daughter by Jane Shemilt is published in paperback by Penguin, price £7.99 and is available now.

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book review slightly edited - from nudge-book.com This third novel from crime writer and nursing Renaissance woman Hemmie Martin is also the first featuring planned serial heroine DI Eva Wednesday. In her opening case, Wednesday investigates the murder of a Cambridgeshire schoolboy, a crime that exposes the darkness and duplicity beneath the surface of the local community.

come a police officer?

Those weaknesses are, perversely, the great strength of this book; a novel about people and their flaws, their desires, their hang-ups.

For all this plausibility though, there are moments where Martin disregards the old advice, choosing to tell rather than show. On occasion, charac-

Booknoir is where you can ‘interrogate the informants to bring you the most intriguing and exciting Crime and Thriller titles.

BookNoir solves the mystery of what book to read next.’

in the Light of Madness by hemmie Martin In a genre littered with antiheroes, wilful screw-ups and morally dubious detectives, Wednesday is a rarity. She and DS Jacob Lennox are blessed with the everyday saintliness required of people working on the thin blue line. When confronted with parenting that’s negligent to the point of madness, they keep their cool. When abused by members of the public, they remember procedure. As readers, we’re used to seeing coppers give free rein to their id; Martin is about something more subtle, reminiscent of the “Could You?” police recruitment campaign.

Could you, dear reader, set aside your own weaknesses and be-

ters’ thought processes are laid bare when their actions have already made them clear, and on others Martin uses three words where two would do.

Nevertheless, In the Light of Madness is an engaging read.

There are enough themes and subplots in play here to fuel a series, and on the strength of this outing, Wednesday and Lennox clearly have much more to offer down the line.

Mike Stafford In the light of Madness by Hemmie Martin is published in paperback by Winter Goose Publishing, price £10.25

Recently on BookNoir • A Q&A with the author of – and an extract from Barcelona Shadows by Marc Pastor • Watch a video clip of the film The Keeper of Lost Causes • Read the Official Specsavers Crime Thriller Club & Awards magazine Review of • The Kill by Jane Casey FIND BOOKNOIR AT

www.nudge-book.com

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blog spot

Jo Barton In the first of a series on nb readers who are also bloggers we would like to introduce you to Jo and Jaffa. Jo’s the one who does the hard work and Jaffa's the one who sleeps in a box. They’d be glad to have your company at jaffareadstoo.blogspot.co.uk

Jo Barton has been a subscriber to newbooks since 2007 and one of our reviewers since 2008 having accepted pretty much everything we have thrown at her in 60+ review assignments to date. But that is only part of the story because since 2010 Josie has run her own blog and it is something of a delight.

Maintaining a blog can be a herculean task – but not for Jo (or Jaffa, apparently).

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We urge you to take a look and admire Jo’s systematic approach to setting herself challenges.

You’ll find lists of many hues but we present here the daddy of them all – the best book she’s read, month by month through 2014. And for each you’ll find a supporting blog post.

Jo’s generosity even extends to hosting author interviews, guest posts or a stop on a blog tour – and on the facing page we include some of her Q&A with Karen Maitland, author of The Vanishing Witch, a book we’ve been quite keen on.

Jo’s Challenges

Jo’s books of 2014

January Frost Hollow Hall Emma Carroll February The Undertaking Audrey Magee March The New Arrival Sarah Beeson April The Memory Book Rowan Coleman May Crimson Shore Gilliam E. Hamer June Written In My Own Heart's Blood Diana Gabaldon

Just For Fun - to read one book from my to be read pile every month

July Keep Your Friends Close Paula Daly

My Eclectic Book Challenge – one each from the likes of any book published in 2014

August The Silversmith's Wife Sophia Tobin The Vanishing Witch Karen Maitland

Around the World - to read 12 books over the course of the year, each set in a DIFFERENT country.

September The Guernsey Retreat Anne Allen Your Beautiful Lies Louise Douglas

My 100th Anniversary of WW1 - fourteen books with a very current theme.

October The Perfect Affair Claire Dyer

War Poets – an extensive selection

If you have a blog to share with us then simply email guy.pringle@newbooksmag.com

Photo Credit: John C. Gibson

Here’s a taster of the Q&A that Jo had with Karen Maitland-

When do you find the time to write, and do you have a favourite place to do your writing?

My first novel was written in the evenings and weekends around a full-time job, but now I write full time. Deadlines mean I try to start at 9am and finish at 6pm with half an hour for lunch. That time is solid writing. In the evenings I research those questions that have cropped up while I’ve been writing, because I can’t break off in the middle of a scene to research them, it destroys the atmosphere. So in the evenings I look up things like – Was it fashionable in that year for a man to wear a belt round the hips or round his waist? If you poisoned someone with dwale (deadly nightshade) how long before they start to feel the effects.’ Weekends often involve a trip to a museum to look at medieval objects or to a location or a building of the type

in which I plan to set a scene.

I have converted a small derelict workshop in the tiny garden to write in, which means I can go away from the house even if it’s only a few yards. I sit facing a blank white wall, so that I can almost project the scene I’m watching in my head onto the wall. My writing hole has all kinds of replica medieval things in it which I can handle as I write, no phone so I can’t be interrupted, and if I want an internet connection I have to sit with the door wide open even in mid-winter, but at least that stops me being tempted to look at dancing ferrets on you-tube.

What inspired you to write The Vanishing Witch and how many rough drafts did it take before you were happy with the story?

There were three elements that came together to inspire the novel. The first was years ago I came across the records of a wealthy medieval woman accused of murdering four husbands by witchcraft. She never came to trial, and I always wondered was she wicked, or entirely innocent and falsely accused?

The second element was watching the news reports of the London riots of 2011 which shared many elements of the Peasants Revolt of 1381, when thousands of ordinary people started looting, killing and burning buildings in towns all over the country. People claimed the London riots of 2011 were fuelled by use of social media, but there were no mobiles or even telephones in 1380’s, yet word

somehow spread nearly as fast.

The third element came from going on ghost walks in Lincoln.

Lincoln is a city of ghosts, almost as if a parallel world has burrowed in and hidden among the living. But what do the ghosts think about the living?

I redrafted The Vanishing Witch more than any other novel, probably about 20 times in total, because as the novel evolved the character I thought was going to be the at the heart of the story convinced me that they weren't, and it was another character’s story. So only about a quarter of the original novel remains in the published version. I have a very patient editor!

Your book covers are very distinctive - do you work in collaboration with the cover designer, and if so how much input do you have in choosing the final design?

I love the book covers, but I can’t take any credit for them. I don’t have any input, which is just as well, as I don’t have any artistic talent at all. The editor and artist collaborate over the covers, so they are always a surprise to me. I was delighted when one reader pointed out that the runes on the tongue of the wolf on the cover of Company of Liars spells out the name of murderer.

The Vanishing Witch by Karen Maitland is published in paperback by Headline Review , price £12.99 and is available now.

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What inspired you to write The Peculiar Life of a Lonely Postman?

Q+A with the author Remember haikus? ‘a type of very short Japanese poem, having three parts, usu.

17 syllables, and often about a subject in nature’ Denis Thériault found them an inspiration.

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Often the inspiration for what I write comes from my dreams, but in this case it was different: the original idea came to me after the postman had been. I noticed an envelope whose corner seemed partially unsealed, as if somebody had tried to open it, and that was what started the creative process.

I immediately imagined an indiscreet postman who kept certain personal letters for himself and brought them back home, steamed them open and read them with curiosity: Bilodo was born, and his story rapidly took form in my mind.

What made you choose to focus on Japanese culture and the art of haiku and tanka writing?

This immersion in the universe of haiki and Japanese culture was not part of the original plan of the novel. It is a discovery that I made when the manuscript was already well advanced. In the first version, the letters from Ségolène that Bilodo intercepted were written in prose, but I was not satisfied with the effect it produced – I thought it was not special or ‘magic’ enough to really impassion Bilodo. I sought another solution, a better idea, and it is in a book of haiku, opened a little by chance, that I found it. I knew immediately that it was what I needed: haiku, these small moments of eternity in seventeen syllables, could really fascinate Bilodo to the point of falling in love with a woman that he did not know. I thus made the decision to rewrite the whole manuscript, integrating this new poetic dimension, and all the rest, the evocation of the Japanese culture and the focus on Zen

philosophy, followed naturally, giving the novel a depth which was missing until then.

Which other writers inspire you?

Hergé, Homer, Jules Verne, Edgar Poe, Maupassant, G.G. Marquez, Kafka, Boris Vian, François Villon. My favourite novel of all time? I would hesitate between Perfume (Süskind), Alice in Wonderland (Lewis Carroll), Malpertuis ( Jean Ray), and Les chants de Maldoror (Lautréamont).

The book is very cinematic, in your mind, who would play Bilodo and Ségolène in the film?

While I wrote the novel, I imagined Bilodo as a young Adrian Brody, and Ségolène as a young Halle Berry. Of course, these excellent actors aren’t the appropriate ages for the roles. It would be necessary to choose actors of the same ‘type’ in a younger generation.

What are you working on at the moment?

I am currently finishing a novel I started last year, not knowing by that point that The Peculiar Life of a Lonely Postman would be published at Hesperus Press: in fact, it is volume two of this story.

It is the continuation of Bilodo’s adventures, and more precisely those of Tania, the young waitress of the restaurant Madelinot in the first novel, who secretly loves our postman…

The Peculiar Life of a Lonely Postman is published in paperback by Hesperus Press, price £7.99.

A

ll library members are free to join our reading group which means that we are a very diverse – and opinionated! – group. We frequently disagree on the merits of the books we read but I find myself fascinated by the Marmite books – those that leave no one indifferent but which are loved or loathed.

Can such books be predicted, perhaps sharing some characteristics? Experimental writing for example, can alienate readers but Nell Leyshon’s, The Colour of Milk, despite its lack of punctuation, was universally liked.

Is lengthy, old-fashioned

Interestingly, this lack of redemptive characters also split the group when we read Patricia Highsmith’s, The Talented Mr Ripley. Those who loathed it felt that reading about an unpleasant character who doesn’t get his come-uppance, is not a pleasurable activity and her contrived use of coincidence was derided. A fascinating discussion ensued as to whether the quality of the writing must be good in order for us to care enough to dislike characters.

We accepted that the quality of Highsmith’s writing and the calibre of Flynn’s plotting elevated them to “loved” status. Interestingly, different people loved and loathed these books.

Clare Donaldson, reviewer of this parish, explores the reasons behind those titles that split her group right down the middle with strong feelings on both sides. In other words, perfect reading group books!

Loved and Loathed prose perhaps too much for the modern, time-starved reader?

No, Wilkie Collins’, The Woman in White, was another general favourite.

Does genre play a part? We read across genres and out of our comfort zone but the books we have loved and loathed cross genre boundaries.

Perhaps it would be easier to look at the books that have evoked this reaction and see if they share anything in common.

Gillian Flynn’s, Gone Girl, split our group. Some refused to persevere beyond the first third - highly unusual, we’re a persistent bunch. Those who loved it appreciated the clever handling of the plot and the storyline; those who loathed it didn’t like the writing style or the characters.

Similarly, different people loved and loathed two recent magical realism reads. Erin Morgenstern’s, The Night Circus, was lauded for evoking all the senses and bringing the circus to life yet others found it tedious in the extreme. Seemingly you either “got it” or didn’t and we never managed to pinpoint quite what it was that produced this effect. Robin Sloan’s, Mr Penumbra’s 24-hour Bookstore, was loved for its portrayal of a book quest yet loathed for being just another, unimpressive, quest book!

Despite there seeming to be no accurate way of predicting them, those books that are loved or loathed arouse the most passion in our group.

Which books split your group and why? And is there a pattern? Email guy.pringle@newbooksmag.com

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Doreen Furze of Bridgwater in Somerset suggested a column about our reviewers might be of interest to other readers – so we immediately asked if she’d be willing to be the first!

Tell us a little about yourself Here in Somerset one day can be spent in England’s smallest cathedral city of Wells and the next visiting the seaside at Weston Super Mare.

Since 2011 I’ve been a newbooks reviewer and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the books I’ve been sent. Several I wouldn’t necessarily have chosen from a bookshop.

So far they have all been fiction but have covered a variety of subjects from the 9/11 terrorist attack to the ghost of Marie Antoinette. Obviously some have been more to my taste than others but I’ve finished them all so I haven’t done too badly! I’ve also been introduced to a couple of different authors leading me to read other titles by them.

What would you recommend to a friend or book club?

Lucia Lucia by Adriana Trigiani an endearing story of lost love and missed opportunity.

What’s on your book shelf?’

My bookcase contains an eclectic mix from classics by Jane Austen to chick lit by authors such as Carole Matthews and Lynda Page.

There are also biographies and memoirs of Constance Wilde (wife of playwright Oscar), Pam Ayres and Dyan Cannon.

Reference books about the royal family, sewing and gardening can also be found together with one or two relating to family history research.

Nice to meet you What kind of reader are you?

Since retiring I have more spare time so I read on average 2 or 3 books a week. Luckily I can read almost anywhere even in the lounge with the TV blaring away! As I don’t drive I find I often read while travelling in the car or on the bus and I’ve even been known to read while riding the exercise bike at the gym. On holiday I tend to read short stories or books with lots of brief chapters. That way I can make a convenient stop at the same time as the car. I particularly find the crime thrillers of Mary Higgins Clarke or MC Beaton good holiSo now you know the questions – day reads. Strangely I’ve been although you’re welcome to add known to read books that are set in a couple of your own. the area I’m visiting. In the past All you have to do is email I’ve read Georgette Heyer Regency guy.pringle@newbooksmag.com romances while in Bath and once with your profile and we’ll try to in Cornwall I read Pennmarric by Susan Howarth. put you in the next issue.

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What are you currently reading?

Northanger Abbey by Val McDermid - so far I’ve only read the first chapter and I’m finding it a little odd: a regency romance heroine who uses a mobile phone and social networks. I intend to keep reading until I either start to enjoy it or give up and re-read the real thing written by Miss Austen herself.

Fact or fiction?

It depends on my mood and how much time I have. Often if something has triggered my interest such as a visit to a stately home or museum I will read a book on that subject. I find factual books take much longer to read as they require more concentration so I often have both types of reading active at the same time.

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S

ome books I reread because it’s been a while and I can’t really remember them that well but know that I enjoyed them the first time round. Other books I reread more frequently because they are like familiar old friends and engender a feeling of comfort and guaranteed enjoyment. One that falls into the latter category is Summer People by Marge Piercy. I love all her books but this one I return to again and again. It’s not as challenging as some of her ealier more feminist novels like Braided Lives but shows a real insight into the ups and downs of relationships.

Susan, Willie and Dinah – all artists/musicians – have been living a comfortable menage a trois for 10 years on Cape Cod. Then one year the annual intrusion of the ‘summer people’ shows up the widening cracks in their relationship and over the course of the summer new friendships and loyalties are formed. I particularly like the character of Dinah and sympathise with her love of nature. I think the reason I like this book is how real the people in it seem. If you haven’t read any of Marge Piercy’s books, this is a good one to start with.

A book I used to reread each December is Tidings by William Wharton. It’s a great build up to Christmas if you like all the traditions involved.

But there’s a twist as it’s about an American family living in

rural France. As my children grew up, my enthusiasm for Christmas waned, so I don’t reread it now, but I sometimes revisit it in my mind, which in a way is another form of rereading.

I recently lent all my Anne Tyler books to a friend. She returned them in ones and twos as she finished them and I reread each one before putting them back on the shelf. It was a real pleasure – she is such an excellent writer. ‘Bingeing’ on an author in that way can really help you to appreciate their style. She writes in such a considered but humorous way about quite ordinary events and people.

Another book I like to reread now and then is May Sarton’s The Education of Harriet Hatfield. Following the death of her lover of 30 years, Harriet sets up a women’s bookshop. As this is set in the late 80’s, many people in the community do not like this, feeling threatened by ‘women’s lib’ and rightly suspecting that many of the patrons of the shop are lesbians.

Harriet herself is forced to become more radical and open about her sexuality. However, it’s not so much the politics that make me reread it, it’s the idea of setting up such a bookshop!

A never-to-be-realised dream that I can sublimate by reading this book. In fact, having now got it off the shelf, I think it’s time to submerge myself in it yet again.

To re-read or not to re-read?

Some books are too good to only read once.

But with so many to choose from how do you decide which?

Maddy Broome lets us in on her modus operandi.

So how do you choose which books to reread?

Why not email your thoughts to guy.pringle@newbooksmag.com

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NUDGE

R EV IEWS

What’s the difference between a nudge review and a newbooks review?

About 1,850 words!

I

n all our research it is our reviews which you, our readers, value most highly. You appreciate that our reviewers are readers like you. Our favourite nb review of all time was by Hazel Bell which began, “Why on earth did this man think he could write a book?”

Not that we deliberately trash books – our philosophy has always been to focus on those worth seeking out rather than books to avoid. However, Hazel is such a good example of the integrity and objectivity that our readers expect from our reviewers. They tell it as they find it so you can make an informed decision. And for the last fourteen years we’ve set the bar pretty high.

Our new partners, nudge, have a similar integrity but they have the advantage of us in one important respect: space. On a website this is virtually inexhaustible. By contrast we cram as much as we can within the pages of newbooks, inevitably disappointing some of our contributors because we haven’t got elastic sides. Meanwhile, nudge reviewers have free rein to express themselves so Susannah Perkins’ review of Elizabeth of York by Alison Weir clocks in at just under 2,000 words (nb reviewers have previously been asked to work within 150 words or so!).

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So, forgive us, new nudge friends, for foreshortening your reviews, but what follows is meant to be a taster of the six nudge communities. Elsewhere in this issue we look in more detail at each, presenting a [nearly] full review for your edification.

ELIZABETH OF YORK Alison Weir

Legend has it that the Queen of Hearts image in the deck of cards is based on Elizabeth of York and indeed that lady's blank face does rather recall the popular impression of Elizabeth of York. She is consigned to history as Henry VII's wife and Henry VIII's mother, beautiful but silent. Yet, she was daughter, sister, niece, wife and mother to kings and, as Weir points out in this biography, if Elizabeth had but been born a man, she would herself have ruled. Like so many of the women of the Houses of Lancaster and York, it was her fate to survive those turbulent times but to have little control over her own fate...

There are weaknesses to this biography; as with any book that focuses on someone who existed beyond the margins of

recorded history, Weir relies heavily on supposition and many sentences include the words 'probably', 'may have' and 'could have'.

Reviewed by Susannah Perkins

Read the full review on BookHugger THE FINAL SILENCE Stuart Neville

When Rea Carlisle inherits a house from an uncle she can barely remember, it doesn’t take her long to clear out the dead man’s possessions.

There is one room she can’t get into though. The door is different from all the others and locked so securely she can’t open it without injuring herself.

Once she does gain access she almost wishes she hadn’t. The leather bound book she finds is filled with horror stories of killings, locks of hair and fingernails; it is one shocking and heartbreaking tale after another . . .

In short, this is a book for anyone who enjoys an in depth, well written and thrilling story written by an author who weaves magic with his words.

Reviewed by Marleen Kenedy

Read the full review on BookNoir

NUDGE

ELECTRIC DREAMS Jim’ll Paint It

shores as soon as he turns fifteen, in order to provide the fiercely believed in sea god with a sacrifice.

The Man with the Compound Eyes has been beautifully written, and one of the real strengths . . . is the way in which Ming-Yi personifies nature from the very beginning...

This is a delectably rich novel, both in terms of its minute details and its prose, which has been both marvellously written and translated. The elements of magical realism are wonderfully woven in, creating a storyline which both surprises and excites.

If you're going to try and peddle weirdness on the internet, you're up against some pretty stiff competition. This is the bizarro realm where miserable looking cats can become megastars and where - according to rule 34 - if you can possibly imagine it, there's already a pornographic parody of it. Nevertheless, as anyone who's followed him on Tumblr, Facebook or Twitter in recent Reviewed by Kirsty Hewitt months knows, Jim'll Paint It has clambered to the top of the Read the full review on BookGeek mountain of bonkers timekillers the web has to offer, armed with nothing more than Microsoft THE LADIES Paint and the warped imaginaOF LYNDON tion of his army of fans...

Margaret Ask yourself though, as you Kennedy gaze on the exasperated face of The Ladies of Anthony Worrall-Thompson Lyndon, first trying to shoplift gerbils from published in Pets at Home - can your Photo1923, was MarShop do this? garet Reviewed by Mike Stafford Kennedy's first novel. The proRead the full review on tagonist of the piece is Agatha BookChap Cocks, who, despite her impending marriage, can think of THE MAN nothing but her brief love affair WITH THE with her cousin Gerald.

COMPOUND The Ladies of Lyndon is highly EYES involved with the family dyWu Ming-Yi namic, and thus we find that Without giving many characters are introduced too much of in just a few pages. It can consethe tale away, quently be a little difficult to the premise of keep up with the relationships the novel is thus: on an island, forged between everyone... somewhere far away from the Whilst the novel is well crafted, mainland and prying eyes, every of the stories from the 1920s single second son must leave the which are currently being

REVI EWS

reprinted by major publishing house, The Ladies of Lyndon is certainly not amongst the strongest.

Reviewed by Kirsty Hewitt

Read the full review on BookDiva THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS Kate Adie

Make no mistake, this is very much a life and times autobiography.

We get a view into Adie’s childhood, but mainly within a cultural context. She was born into a north-eastern post-war community where the scars of WWII were still evident - including shrapnel embedded in the kitchen countertop. Sunderland folk worked hard, kept their heads down and had little understanding of - or interest in the world outside. Hardly ideal surroundings for a journalist to grow up in...

This is a trenchant study of the past, present and future of journalism; a social history of England in the second part of the twentieth century, and behind-the-scenes look at the BBC. It’s also a portrait of a truly remarkable woman. With each page that passes, one can only wonder at the lack of a damehood. If you’ve an interest in journalism, global events, British history, or of course Kate Adie herself - buy this book.

Reviewed by Mike Stafford

Read the full review on BookLife

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53

RECOMMENDED READ : WHAT THEY SAY

W

hen Alex Morris loses her fiancé in dreadful circumstances, she moves from London to Edinburgh to make a break with the past.

Alex takes a job at a Pupil Referral Unit, which accepts the students excluded from other schools in the city. These are troubled, difficult kids and Alex is terrified of what she's taken on.

There is one class - a group of five teenagers - who intimidate

When you open up, who will you let in? fate and bloody revenge, she even begins to worry that they are taking her lessons to heart, and that a whole new tragedy is being performed, right in front of her...

‘Haynes' debut is not only a gripping, can'tstop-turning-pages thriller, but also a beautifully drawn portrait of grief and how we find our way back to life.

Along the way, she offers a paean to Classics and teaching, perfectly capturing the fraught and funny rhythms of a challenging classroom. I loved it’ Madeline Miller, author of The Song Of Achilles Heel

Natalie Haynes ‘I stayed up all night to finish The Amber Fury.

It's gripping and compelling, a real page-turner, written with humanity and warmth’.

SJ Watson

Alex and every other teacher on The Unit. But with the help of the Greek tragedies she teaches, Alex gradually develops a rapport with them. Finding them enthralled by tales of cruel 54

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‘A handsomely structured psychological mystery, and a moving exploration of grief.’

Lionel Shriver

‘Being a 'troubled teenager' myself for the past fifty years I thought I knew who would have my sympathy in this gripping first novel. But The Amber Fury plays a brilliant, complex game with the reader, making it impossible to put down.’

Herman Koch, bestselling author of The Dinner ‘Raw emotion matches the raw potential of Haynes’s ambitious first novel’ Independent on Sunday

RECOMMENED READ: OUR VIEW AND EXTRACT

The Amber Fury

by Natalie Haynes recom ended

Personal read...................★★★★★ Group read........................★★★★★

The first thing they’ll ask me is how I met her.

They already know how we met, of course.

But that won’t be why they’re asking. It never is.

m

nb reviewer, Josie Barton in Wigan says: Following a devastating personal tragedy, Alex Morris returns to Edinburgh to take up a teaching post in a unit for troubled teenagers.

The work is as challenging as it is difficult, and at first Alex despairs of ever making a connection with a particularly demanding group of five young people who seem intent on making her life even more miserable. By using a series of Greek tragedies, which mimic events in their own lives, Alex starts to build a connection.

However, the stories of spiteful fate and malicious revenge soon start to have a profound effect on the dynamics of the group.

What then follows is a deeply disturbing psychological drama which builds imperceptibly and which soon becomes all consuming. There is a real rapport with Alex who is vulnerable and delicate, and whose tenacity in dealing with her personal emotional pain quickly becomes the driving force of the novel. However, the teenagers are a force to be reckoned with, they are all deeply offensive in many ways, and yet each demonstrates a susceptibility which is heartbreaking. The story doesn’t pull any punches and some strong profanities litter the dialogue.

The gradual layering of the narrative is skilfully achieved, the tension is expertly managed and the dénouement is cleverly crafted. Overall, this is a commendable and exciting debut novel, and I am sure that reading groups are going to be clamouring to read it.

order this book for free turn to page 43

I remember when Luke was training, he told me that you only ever ask a question if you already know the answer.

Lawyers don’t like surprises, least of all when they’re on the record. So they won’t be asking because they want to know the date, the time, the address, all the little details. They will have done their homework, I’m sure.

They’ve spoken to Robert, my old boss, already. So they know when I arrived in Edinburgh, and which day I started work.

They probably have a copy of my timetable. If they wanted to, they could pinpoint our first meeting to the minute.

They won’t be asking because they want to know what I’ll say, they’ll just want to know how I say it. Will my eyes go right or left? Am I remembering, or inventing? They’ll be measuring my truth against the one they’ve built from other witnesses. Gauging whether I can be trusted, or whether I’m a liar.

So when they ask, I’m not going to roll my eyes and tell them they’re wasting my time. I’m not going to tell them that I can hardly bear

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RECOMMENDED READ: EXTRACT

A Second Opinion It is important not to give away too much about the plot of this book, but it is very topical, as it relates to recent discussions about the impact that a certain kind of unexpected death has on families. Much of it is set in a pupil referral unit for young people having difficulties dealing with traditional educational situations, and the author tries to demonstrate how young people cope with being in that situation and some other teenage issues. It does this very well, and it is easy to relate to the situation that the main character and the young people find themselves in.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

Despite its themes, I found the characters very believable, and even though I had an inkling of the way it was going, it kept me interested all the way through. I think it would make an excellent book group read and will recommend it to my own, many of whom work with young people in difficult circumstances.

Reviewed by: Ann Birks, Chesterfield Personal read...................★★★★★ Group read........................★★★★★

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to go over this again, that every time someone asks me, I have to live through it all over again.

I’m not going to ask if they know what it feels like, holding up the weight of everything that happened. I won’t make a fuss. It wouldn’t help.

I’m going to take a small breath, look straight ahead, and tell them the truth. I can’t get nervous and start rattling on about how I didn’t plan to be in Edinburgh. I won’t ask them to remember what had happened to me, and why I’d had to run away from London, why I was in Scotland at all. I won’t remind them that I could have had no inkling of how terribly things would turn out.

Besides, even if I had, I wouldn’t have cared. I didn’t care about anything then.

I’m just going to answer as simply as I can: I met them on the 6th of January 2011, in the basement room at 58 Rankeillor Street. And I wouldn’t have believed any of them could do something so monstrous.

That isn’t quite true, of course. Even by the standards of the Unit, they were a difficult group.

But Robert had warned me that they would be challenging, so my expectations were low.

I went to meet Robert the day before term began, at the pupil referral unit on Rankeillor Street. The building was empty except for the two of us, but I had to pick up forms and files and registration lists, most of which were covered in Post-it notes linking children’s names to medical conditions. At first glance, at least half of them were allergic to something: nuts, pollen, air pollution, gluten, mould spores.

‘They don’t seem very sturdy,’ I pointed out, skimming the top few pages Robert had just given me. His office was a huge, high-ceilinged room whose elegant proportions had been sliced in two by a partition wall. One half had been converted into his secretary’s office. It was lined with filing cabinets from the door all the way to the far wall. In front of these stood her symmetrical desk: a computer in one corner was matched in the opposite one by three wire trays balanced on top of one another and marked ‘In’, ‘Out’ and ‘Pending’; all of them were empty.

Next to them was a picture of two young children, dark-haired and grinning in front of a loch

RECOMMENDED READ: EXTRACT

in the pouring rain. The frame was clearly handmade – in bright, misshapen purple clay – presumably by one of the children it contained.

Robert’s office was the yin to Cynthia’s yang.

Bulging files were piled up on every flat surface, including the floor. Torn scraps of paper with names or initials were balanced on top of them.

Where Cynthia’s only light source was the greenish long-life bulb overhead, Robert’s room had two huge sash windows which looked out onto Rankeillor Street. Look up to the left, and you could see Salisbury Crags, the dark cliffs which

glower down over Edinburgh, reminding you that there will be no nonsense here. The windows were framed with thick, theatrical curtains, their dark crimson folds coated with a thin film of dust, through which narrow, wandering tracks of curtain showed. Someone had taken an erratic vacuum cleaner to them but had lost the will before victory could be claimed.

‘Don’t believe a word of it,’ he panted, as he hunted around the desk, the table and the mantelpiece over the long-dead fireplace, trying to make sure he had gathered everything with ‘Alex’ or ‘A.M.’ written on or near it. ‘I mean, do believe it,’ he corrected himself. ‘Don’t test them by throwing peanuts at them, or asking an asthmatic one to run up the stairs. But rest assured, Alex, these children will not be felled by a mere allergen. These details come up when they’re assessed by doctors and social workers, of course, for their specific educational needs and challenges, and we have to keep full records of everything, even if it seems trivial. I doubt,’ he glanced down at

the file he was holding, ‘if Jenny Stratton will meet a sticky end from her lychee allergy in your classroom. You’d have to go a long way to find a lychee anywhere in this city, come to that. It makes you wonder how they found out she was allergic at all. Most of them will be fine when they get to know you. Some of them might be less keen on doing drama or dramatherapy than others. Some of them are very confident, some are, you know, shyer.’

‘How many kids do you have here?’ I asked him, looking at the paper chaos. There couldn’t possibly be room in the building – a vast converted terraced house spread over four floors, its yellow bricks blackened with dirt – for the number of children needed to generate this many forms.

‘There are about thirty of them here at any one time, but they come and go, obviously. New children will be referred here from about the second week of term, I expect. And we’ll lose some of these ones as we go along.’

‘Lose them?’

‘Rankeillor Street is a charity. Children come here when nowhere else will take them. Thanks to our benefactors, we can take a few children out of the system which is failing them. Most of them have been expelled from at least one school, though we do take some children before that point.’ He began hunting around for something under the papers on his desk. ‘Their parents or guardians apply to us, and if we think we can help, genuinely help, we try and make space for them. Our admissions procedure was enshrined in the original gift of the building and the fund: we don’t take children who are simply struggling academically. There are plenty of other options available to them. Not all of them are good options, I know, but they do exist.’

We have copies to give away FREE. See page 43 to claim yours.

Amber Fury by Natalie Haynes is published in paperback by Corvus, price £7.99.

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At BookDiva you can, ‘Take time out to indulge yourself with life-enhancing, escapist, relaxing and inspiring reads.

Whatever you seek in a book, we’ll provide you with your perfect match and give you a lot more of what you like.’ is that you?

Recently on BookDiva • A video trailer from the film of The Fault in Our Stars by John Green • An extract from Life After Life by Kate Atkinson Reviews of • Together and Apart by Margaret Kennedy • A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing

by Eimear McBride Taylor FIND BOOKDIVA AT

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book review - slightly edited - from nudge-book.com This debut novel spans two continents and encompasses both of the world wars, which, as one might expect, has a profound effect upon both of Ms Brockmole’s protagonists.

The author’s intention here is to demonstrate 'the transformative power of a letter - the letter that shouldn't have been sent, the letter that is never sent

American male and Scottish female. Fitting words related to their dialects and upbringings have been used throughout the letters, which helps to build a sense of place and time. Brockmole adds to this by the way in which she touches upon historical events to ground her novel the wars, of course, being the main contribution. Spanning

Letters from Skye

by Jessica Brockmole and the letter the reader will keep forever'. The [imagined] correspondence within the pages of Letters from Skye is between a young Scottish poet, Elspeth Dunn, and a 'fan' of hers from Illinois, named David - Davey Graham. Their letters begin in 1912 and along the way the pair, rather predictably, begin to have feelings for one another. However, this part of their relationship is handled carefully, managing to preserve a refreshing originality within their predicament.

The voices she has crafted for her protagonists are distinctive, and there is a definite stylistic difference between the

several decades, the areas in which the letters are written shift with the years and situations of the characters. As well as discussing the importance of correspondence, Brockmole thoughtfully examines just how important relationships can be, and how they are able to be built up in many different ways. The format in which she does this works very well indeed.

Kirsty Hewit Letters from Skye

by Jessica Brockmole is published in paperback by Windmill Books, price £6.99

book review-slightly edited-from nudge-book.com Sometimes you read a book and find yourself wondering why it took so long before someone wrote it. Occasionally you come across a book and you’re grateful to have the opportunity to not only read it but also be in a position to tell others about it. This is such a book.

Written for young people who may find themselves questioning their sexuality or afraid of the conclusions [and the im-

should be given to all kids once they reach the age where sex and sexuality come into play. In fact, I would advocate putting this book on the curriculum of secondary schools. Imagine how it must feel if you are a teenager who is not attracted to the opposite sex, or sure about their gender identity. I’ll go one further and say this book would probably make things a lot

This Book is Gay

by James Dawson plications] for them, the author tackles every aspect of the LGBT spectrum. He doesn’t shy away from uncomfortable truths but doesn’t turn this into a sob story or a scary tale...

The drawings in this book, combined with the author’s voice keep the tone light and the message loud and clear. The personal testimonies shared throughout give this book an intimate feeling while showing that there are no one-size-fits-all answers or solutions. What is true or works for one person may not be the best solution for another, and that too is fine.

This book should have pride of place in every (school) library,

clearer for the average adult, too.

I would like to think is Book is Gay could be another step towards that world in which sexuality and gender stop being an issue and all of us can be free to be who and what we are, without fear and discomfort. It is in that spirit that I applaud this author on a job very well done, and thank him for writing a well conceived and brilliantly executed book.

Marleen Kennedy This Book is Gay by James Dawson is published in paperback by Hot Key Books, price £7.99

BookLife is where you can, ‘Discover books that educate, inspire and enrich lives. From travel writing, business guides, children’s books and the natural world, to health & wellbeing, food & drink and popular culture.’

Genres we’ve not covered widely in newbooks.

Recently on BookLife • Review of Cheltenham Literary Festival including sessions by Naomi Kelin, Shami Chakrabarti and John Lyndon

Review of • The Poetic Edda translated by Carolyne Larrington FIND BOOKLIFE AT

www.nudge-book.com

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Bookhugger is ‘a literary magazine for serious book buyers, committed book clubbers and self-confessed bibliophiles. Be first to discover great new authors and uncover the latest titles.’

We couldn’t agree more!

book review - slightly edited - from nudge-book.com It is easy to write a review about a book that I love, and this is definitely one of those stand-out novels.

Set in the late autumn of Amsterdam in 1686, the plot revolves around young Nella Oortman, newly married, as she arrives at her husband’s house in a wealthier neighbourhood of Amsterdam. She has expectations of a husband, hopes that he does not fulfill. He is distant, he prefers travel and work to spend-

to tell Nella something? How does she know the secrets of the Brandt household?

The cover gives a great sense of the story . . . clues to the period the book is set in, so the subject . . . and overall feel of the novel comes across . . .

The only negative I can point to is that the story tends to move away from our young protagonist, Nella, and focuses more on the other characters, particularly

The Miniaturist

by Jessie Burton

Recently on BookHugger • Win copies of The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy by Rachel Joyce • Video clip from romantic thriller In Secret

Reviews of • Us by David Nicholls • The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan

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ing time with his eighteen-yearold wife. Nella is disappointed; she is in a new place without anyone to turn to. Her new sister-in-law, Marin, is equally as distant, and seems to run the household, which should be Nella’s job...

She is in despair about her new life when her husband suddenly calls her downstairs one morning and greets Nella with a wedding present . . . a miniature house, an exact copy of Nella’s new home (pictured in the opening pages of the book - be assured, it is no simple doll’s house).

Things take a strange turn when the miniaturist starts to send Nella items she didn’t request. Items that are too close for comfort. Is the miniaturist trying

the fate of Johannes and Marin.

You wouldn’t guess from the start of the novel how everything ends up, such are the twists and turns. A great novel about the secrets we all keep behind closed doors. You’ll be surprised, and you’ll definitely fall in love with The Miniaturist.

Kirsty Hewit

The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton is published in hardback by Picador, price £12.99

B E S T B O OK S AB OU T. . .

Childhood

In what we hope you will make into a series, reviewer Colin Stanton shares his personal favourites on childhood; a canny selection from an adult reader’s perspective rather than the usual books we all read and loved as children.

THE BOOK OF LOST THINGS John Connolly

BOY’S LIFE Robert McCammon

This tale is One of my set in a favourite small books about childhood southern town in involves a boy called America. Cory witDavid. At the beginning nesses a murder one of the story, David loses morning whilst helping his mother to cancer his father on his early and his father re-marmorning milk round. ries, which creates a very The murder really takes strained relationship a backseat to day to day with his step-mother. life in Cory’s town as he David moves to a encounters the trials of strange new house growing up. At one whose residents include point you wonder why some memorable talkthe murder is in the ing books! He then book, but the author discovers an alternative cleverly answers that world through a passage within the story. The at the end of his garden. book is beautifully writAt this point you may ten and will stick with be thinking that this all the reader for years. I sounds familiar, but this never wanted this book is where the story really to end! Although relabecomes something tively unknown in this very different. The country since its first book is a coming of age publication some 20 tale, dealing with loss of years ago, Boy’s Life is innocence and the dark considered somewhat of truths of life. A very a classic in America. haunting book with a beautiful last chapter that left me with a lump in my throat.

DEADKIDSONGS Toby Litt

ALWAYS THE SUN Neil Cross

This story, set in the 1970’s concerns a group of boys whose love of war is played out in the fields around their village. When one of the group dies the boys seek revenge, blaming the adults for their perceived lack of action for their friend’s death. The book has different narrators, some of whom are not reliable witnesses. A compelling book with a gripping story and you never quite know its destination. It really explores the gang mentality of young children and how strong characters can exert themselves over others.

Although the main character of this book is not a child, it deals with the issue of bullying from a parent’s perspective. Sam and his son, Jamie move to a new area and soon Jamie shows signs of being bullied. Sam decides to take matters into his own hands and confront the bully’s father. Events soon spiral out of control and things quickly escalate.

But is Sam really listening to his son? The ending is very powerful and it really feels as though the rug has been pulled out from under the reader. This book really stuck with me, long after I finished.

You choose the theme, you choose the books.

Then email guy.pringle@newbooksmag.com What are you waiting for?

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INTERVIEW

nb reviewer, Sarah Akhtar, interviewed Nathan Filer, winner of the 2013 Costa Prize for the National Women’s Register

O

ther people who interview authors usually meet them over coffee in a luxurious hotel but when I had the pleasure of chatting to Nathan Filer it was in front of an audience of almost three hundred NWR members at our annual conference. Nathan has been high profile since January when he won the Costa Prize with his first novel The Shock of the Fall, a story narrated by Matthew Homes, a teenager with mental health problems.

I began by asking Nathan how the character of Matthew ar-

schizophrenia and a dead big brother who won’t stay dead.

The novel is very much Matthew’s story, told in the first person, Nathan agrees that the narrative needs Matthew’s voice to make it what it is, a story more about the voice than the plot. We went on to talk about the other main character in the book, Matthew’s grandmother, Nanny Noo. A composite of both Nathan’s grandmothers, he admits she is his favourite character and, although originally only in one chapter, she took on a larger role both because she was such a

Nathan Filer rived in his head and he explained that about ten years ago he was walking home after his shift on an acute psychiatric ward when two lines of prose came into his head – “I had no intention of putting up a fight but these guys weren’t to know that and nobody was taking any chances.” The character saying these lines felt very clear to Nathan and he gave him a name, Matthew - because that was the name he was almost given - and Homes because he was reading a novel

by A M Homes at the time. So Matthew was born, a nineteen year old with a chipped front tooth, a tentative diagnosis of 62

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delight to write but also as some sort of respite for poor Matthew who, for most of the novel, has a very difficult time.

NATHAN: THE BACK STORY Nathan grew up in Bristol, the son of a foreman at Rolls-Royce and a healthcare assistant.

Dropping out of a degree in theatre he moved into health and in 2004 completed a degree in mental health nursing. In 2007 he moved into academia and became a research assistant into treatments for depression while in addition writing poetry to perform at events and festivals. He no longer does this feeling that his brain is not big

enough to write both a novel and poetry but acknowledges that the training poetry gave him helped with finding the pace and rhythm of the book and he admits to missing the immediate gratification poets enjoy when they perform even if it’s only to two men and a dog down the pub!

All this experience of mental health issues means Nathan will have met many patients but I asked him how much contact he had with the families and whether this had helped him to create Matthew’s family in the book. Of course his answer was that you cannot treat someone with these sorts of problems without involving their carers and he always felt that meeting with relatives on the ward was an important part of his nursing role. Since the book came out he is encouraged by the number of carers who have been in touch mostly with positive comments, confirming that Matthew’s story rings true.

While not written as part of a campaign, Nathan is gratified by the way people are discussing mental health issues after reading his book and he told us about the member of one reading group who, while discussing The Shock of the Fall, had felt enough confidence to share with the group that she had been caring for forty years for a son with mental health problems.

Someone in the audience commented about the theme of grief in the book and Nathan agreed

that he sees it mainly as a book about grief but, inevitably, as writers tend to write about what they know he took his knowledge of mental health and used schizophrenia as the hook to the story which is, in fact, much more about a family coming to terms with their grief and about Matthew’s relationship with his mother.

The way we read may change in his lifetime, but for now his prizewinning book is being read in twenty seven languages and Nathan rightly feels this is his permanent legacy to the world.

THE PROPOSAL Nathan and his girlfriend did some volunteer work in Palestine a few years ago for the International Solidarity MoveCREATIVE WRITING ment. While there they took COURSES part in a peaceful protest during With Matthew Homes ‘resiwhich their passports were dent’ in Nathan’s head for seven taken and details recorded so years, he finally enrolled on a that, when they returned a few creative writing course at Bath months later, they were deSpa University to make finish- tained and interrogated at Ben ing the novel his priority. I Gurion airport. Separated for raised the subject of creative hours under close questioning, writing, reminding everyone they were finally reunited and that back in the spring Hanif Nathan was asked to empty his Kureishi – himself a teacher of pockets. Unknown to Emily, he creative writing – dismissed it as had with him an engagement “a waste of time.” Not surprisring intending to propose duringly, Nathan defended such ing the trip but he hadn’t courses and expressed surprise planned for it to be in an Israeli at the criticism, wondering why detention centre. Forced into asking the question, Emily resimilar objections were never sponded with a resounding made about the teaching of “Yes” and the guard graciously music or art. Now a teacher of fetched them a bottle of Sprite the craft himself, also at Bath to celebrate before deporting Spa, Nathan insists that it is possible to teach such things as them. the writing of dialogue and the The Shock of the creation of suspense. Naturally, Fall by Nathan some students will have more Filer is published natural affinity than others but

by The Borough it is always possible to improve Press. For more with hard work. on Nathan see So, what next for Nathan? He is working on a film script at pres- www.nathanfiler.co.uk and for more on the National Women’s ent and has not ruled out Register see www.nwr.org.uk another novel at some time.

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And the winner is …

Jade Craddock, reviewer of this parish, assesses this year’s Man Booker shortlist – having ploughed through all six titles between the initial announcement and that for the outright winner. And to make life a little easier - if you don’t have her stamina - Jade even nominates her winner.

E

very year I await the announcement of the Man Booker Prize nominations and every year I vouch to read, first, (optimistically) the longlist, then (realistically) the shortlist and then (desperately) the winning title, but every year to no avail. As any avid reader will know there’s always another book vying for your attention and you find yourself parroting that old adage, ‘I’ll just read this first’. So when I had the opportunity to shadow this year’s prize for newbooks, I finally got myself into gear and took on the shortlist.

The Man Booker Prize celebrates the best in what it describes as ‘quality fiction’, the literary end of the publishing spectrum. And whilst I count myself as a fan of literary fiction, genre and commercial fiction are my main fare, so I was interested to see whether the shortlist would engage, entertain and inspire the general 64

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reader. And whether the Man Booker is really everything it’s cracked up to be.

The great thing, but paradoxically also perhaps the daunting thing, about shadowing the Man Booker list is that it takes all reading choices out of the reader’s hands, you find yourself completely at the mercy of the judges, for better or worse.

When it works, it challenges readers’ habits, pushes them out of their literary comfort zones and fosters new appreciation as was the case for me with Howard Jacobson’s J. Not being a fan of dystopian fiction, this is a book I would otherwise not have read but it was my surprise find on the shortlist – cryptic, intriguing, and the right side of challenging. Jacobson who has already won the prize with The

Finkler Question makes a convincing case for winning it again with J. Personal read......................................★★★★ Group read ..........................................★★★★

Neel Mukherjee’s The Lives of Others was released to great critical acclaim. An epic Indian family saga interwoven with class politics, it is uncompromising in both content and scope. With some darkly unsettling scenes and a narrative of tensions and troubles, it is a sombre, bleak read that for me strayed on the side of the slow-going. After an astonishing, if disturbing, prologue, the novel took too long to grip me and I never felt entirely taken in by it. Whilst it’s easy to see what an impressive job Mukherjee has done,

for me this wasn’t an especially rewarding or sustaining read.

Personal read .........................................★★★ Group read ..............................................★★★

In contrast Richard Flanagan’s The Narrow Road to the Deep North is one of the most affecting and powerful novels I’ve read in a while. Centred on the horrendous plight of Australian POWs forced to work on the Death Railway during the Second World War it is unflinching in its honesty and brutality. A haunting book that pervades the reader and won’t be easy to forget, nor should it, I echo Evie Wyld’s sentiment that everyone should read it.

This was the sort of book I was hoping to find on the Man Booker shortlist and made my experience all the more rewarding.

Personal read..................................★★★★★ Group read ......................................★★★★★

If Flanagan’s novel was what I hoped to find, Ali Smith’s novel How to be Both was what I was expecting to find. A novel of which there are two versions, with the two halves of the novel printed alternately in various editions, it is playful, fluid and experimental. Both narratives, one focused on the modern day story of a teenage girl and the other on a renaissance artist, offer completely disparate experiences but Smith coheres them into a wonderful whole.

Although form wins out over plot in this one, Smith’s success is that her novel does prove how to be both: both original and avant-garde yet accessible and appealing. A hurdle at which many aspirational works of literary fiction fall.

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves Personal read .........................................★★★ Group read ..........................................★★★★ To Rise Again at a Decent Hour Personal read .............................................★★ Group read..................................................★★

And so to the verdict. In terms of the shortlist as a whole, it was a bit hit-and-miss for me. Only three of the books really impressed and only one of these truly affected me, whilst the Personal read......................................★★★★ Group read ..............................................★★★ other three left me feeling indifferent or disappointed. I must In the first Man Booker Prize to admit I was expecting more, welcome American authors, maybe too much. However, on both Karen Joy Fowler with We a positive note, I was pleasantly Are All Comsurprised that whilst challengpletely Beside ing and provoking, none of the Ourselves and books were too abstruse or Joshua Ferris alienating for the general reader, with To Rise and as a process shadowing the Again at a De- prize offers a rewarding and cent Hour stimulating personal reading exmade it on to perience as well as a readymade the shortlist. project for reading groups. And And to me they both felt quite whether or not the books live conspicuous. Whilst Fowler’s up to expectations, part of the novel looks at the question of enjoyment of the experience is family and dynamics and sibling judging the shortlist, positive rivalry from a completely reand negative, and being part of freshing and provocative the debate. I’m already penperspective and Ferris’s at a den- cilling in the dates for next year. tist’s existential and spiritual crisis in a darkly comic vein, We asked Jade to put her reputaneither really reaches the tion on the line and nominate heights of the other books. But her winner BEFORE the official their inclusion announcement. To which she does add vireplied, ‘my winner is... The Narbrancy and row Road to the Deep North by variety to the Richard Flanagan. This is everylist and offers thing a winning novel should be something more and more. A real asset to the at the commer- Man Booker Prize.’ cial end of the Yes, indeed, Jade, you were abspectrum. solutely right – it won!

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In these dark wet days of autumn, the lovely summer of 2014 seems a lifetime ago so we thought we’d take a look back at...

The audience settles for the long haul

The best Readers Day yet superb food and plenty of it All speakers equally fascinating and a contrast to each other.

As always Guy you brought out fascinating facts from them.

Jane Makin, Petersfield

slightly trepidatious after accepting the generous invitation.

Would anyone even show up?

If they did, would they be at all interested in what I had to say? I needn't have worried. There was a standing-room-only crowd of over 80 I would say, and Guy Pringle was the best, most generous interviewer I've ever encountered. He brought out many aspects of my career and experience and invited a range of unusual and engaged questions from the audience. And to close off he suggested that readers might wish me the publisher to sign some of the books I'd introduced into English – a first for both of us! To my surprise (and I confess delight!) at least a dozen readers had me sign their

Our readers Day, Winc Speaker Adam Freudenheim, MD of Pushkin Press

The 2015 Readers Day will be announced via the nudge newsletter. To receive this – and lots of other book news go to: www.nudge-book.com /receive-the-nudge-update

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On a rain-soaked Saturday in late June I took the train from London to Winchester, a lovely little city I'd never previously had occasion to visit. The good people of newbooks magazine had invited me to talk about my career in publishing and particularly my experience at Pushkin Press since taking over the company in early 2012 after more than eight years as Publisher of Penguin Classics.

Authors are of course very used to encountering readers these days but publishers far less so.

I had no idea what to expect, and I must confess that I was

copies of The Letter for the King and other Pushkin titles. It was a wonderful way to spend half a Saturday.

Guy and Adam answer a follow up question

Once again a really superb Readers' Day! Everything about it was enjoyable, from the mix of speakers, the admirable interrogator, the good company and, of course, the refreshments throughout the day. I particularly enjoyed Adam

Freudenheim and was pleased to see the range of books by Pushkin Press, but I also enjoyed the interview with Katie Fforde even though I doubt if I will ever read one of her novels. All the speakers were delightful and I hope that I will find time to read something of Sara Sheridan and Jake Wallis Simons. I bought two Pushkin Press books and will certainly buy some more if I can smuggle them into the house!

Please also thank Mel for looking after all our needs.

urday. All the speakers were excellent and Katie Fforde is such a delight that she sent us all off with smiles on our faces. Interesting to have a publisher, too, as he can give another view of the book world.

Venue and catering as always were perfect and everyone seemed to be happily chatting away.

Karen Weatherly, Guildford

Rev. John Reardon, Newport Pagnell

Speaker Katie Fforde, author of The Perfect Match

It was pouring with rain but the moment we arrived at St Peter’s I

Lunchtime discussions continue

I have come away full of information and inspiration! (although Sara Sheridan's quick success story in print still jars!!!) and will be delighted if Jake Wallis Simons comes to our Parliamentary Book Club!

Philipa Coughlan, Bexhill on Sea

Just a quick note to say how much we all enjoyed your readers’ day.

A superbly chosen group of four guests, who were not only entertaining and informative but tangibly passionate about their crafts.

The ‘reading’ audience obviously drank in all that was on offer, and your team were relaxed, friendly and professional throughout.

Well done!

Eila Huxford, Hook, Hants

hester June 28th 2014 knew it was going to be a lovely occasion. The atmosphere buzzed with book talk, the sandwiches and cake were delicious and with Guy at the helm everything always runs smoothly. I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Katie enunciating clearly

I just wanted to mail you to say how much we all enjoyed last Sat-

I

Speaker

Sara Sheridan, author of England Expects

I loved meeting readers at newbooks magazine’s fab event in Winchester. It was a genuinely friendly and fun day with a balanced programme and no stinting on delicious cake and coffee. It was great to meet such reading enthusiasts and have a chance to chat about the fine art of stories.

Just wanted to say thanks to you and Mel of course! for organising this.

It was my first and although I thought it might be a bigger audience (they missed a great day!) I wanted to say how diverse but interesting all the speakers were.

Jake Wallis Simons in full flow

Many thanks to yourself and Mel and all the others who made the Readers’ Day so enjoyable. The catering was excellent, as usual, and the whole event was fantastic. The guest speakers were really interesting and a good mix of styles and subjects.

Ruth Ginarlis, Winchester

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BookGeek – ‘For the serious SF, Fantasy and horror Fiction addict, BookGeek opens a unique portal for discovery.

With independent reviews, in-depth author and artist interviews and exclusive inside knowledge, we’ll help you get right under the skin of all the latest releases.’

Recently on BookGeek reviews of • Sand by Hugh Howey • Half Bad by Sally Green • Dark Wolf by Christine Feehan • The Graveyard Book Graphic Novel Volume 1

by Neil Gaiman • The Clown Service

by Guy Adams FIND BOOKGEEK AT

www.nudge-book.com

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book review - slightly edited - from nudge-book.com Since torcedores are paid by the cigar, it’s better to have big hands, meaty thighs and strong arms if you want to make money in the cigar-rolling biz. Fortunately for Conchita Marquez, she was the biggest, mightiest and fastest of all the torcedores in Cuba. Also, being a big lass working in a humid environment, she was constantly drenched in sweat and the sweet smell of her cigars was unlike any

worth happy too, of course.

The Cigar That Fell in Love With a Pipe is a wonderful, inventive graphic novel from David Camus and Nick Abadzis.

Camus has crafted a bizarre fairy tale featuring a host of peculiar characters (some real, some not).

Although Marquez and Welles are well drawn, some of the supporting characters would have benefited from being more fleshed out - Conchita’s hus-

The Cigar that Fell in Love with a Pipe

by David Camus and Nick Abadzis others – making her cigars prized above all others. Alas, Conchita’s cigar-related glory was destined to be short lived - a fatal allergy to nicotine meant she died before she was able to receive treatment.

As the cigar smokers of the world mourned Conchita’s passing, it soon became clear that the last of her cigars would become incredibly valuable. Imagine Orson Welles’ delight then when, fresh from filming The Lady from Shanghai, he receives a gift of a box of these most prized La Vuelta Abajo cigars one of which contains more of Conchita Marquez’s soul than anyone could have expected.

Now all he must do is avoid the temptation to smoke them all.

Well, that and keep Rita Hay-

band/boss is something of a onedimensional cartoon villain while Orson’s nephew-in-law is a clichéd young troublemaker.

Nick Abadzis’ artwork is lovely to behold. His vibrant, colourful style really brings to life the magical realism of David Camus’ story, his splash pages, especially those at the end of the book, being particularly delightful.

Erin Britton

The Cigar That Fell in Love with A Pipe

by David Camus and Nick Abadzis is published in hardback by SelfMadeHero, price £14.99

directory The reviewers have their say

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reviews

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f it wasn’t for newbooks...

In the absence of a ‘proper’ Directory this issue, due to the hiatus of the summer months, we asked our reviewers for the best book they would never have read if it hadn’t been for newbooks.

It was gratifying – and somewhat humbling to be swamped by kind words and fervent recommendations from which we’d like to suggest you add to your own ‘books I want to read’ list.

Guy Pringle, Publisher

Lynda Price summed up the feelings of many when she wrote ‘It’s fair to say that newbooks has provided a form of reading group in that a very high proportion of the books offered have been those which subscribers in general would not necessarily have chosen from the book shelves, but went on to read, enjoy and look for the authors’ other work.’

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On reflection the main story must take place over days or no more than a couple of weeks, but it seemed much longer.

My first thought was that it probably wasn’t a good choice for reading groups, but now I’m writing a review I can see questions that could lead to discussion, within the group.

Lynda Price

THE HOUSEKEEPER Melanie Wallace Vintage Publishing

This is a very grim story and it soon becomes obvious that there can be no happy ending. There is a terrific amount of descriptive narrative, which needs real perseverance at the start. However, all the description does show another side to America, that of a harsh and icy winter in a remote part of the country that is difficult to identify.

All the characters have something in their past and have become isolated, each in their own solitary existence.

The story begins with a boy being untied from a tree, which at face value would be the humane thing to do, but nothing in life is simple, and from this point all the horrifying events begin to unfold.

By the end of the book I was no wiser as to what the boy’s original problem was – had he been treated cruelly by his family, did he suffer some sort of mental disorder, how old was he? He must have been tied to the tree to keep him under control, but what had he done previously?

Why were other characters so keen to get to him?

THE SPINNING HEART Donal Ryan Doubleday Ireland

Philipa Coughlan, from Bexhill on Sea chipped in, “I’d have to say Spinning Heart by Donal Ryan is not only my best book as suggested by newbooks - but because you love it too! It was small and perfectly formed and showed the immense promise of a wonderful new talent from Ireland.’

Although Philipa didn’t review this book for us four other reviewers gave their opinion on newbooksmag.com, scoring a total of 33 stars out of a possible 40.

And anyway, here comes Phil Ramage from the Isle of Wight choosing it as his all-time favourite and giving us an idea of what it’s like to be a reviewer on a good day...

reviews Back in January 2013, in the dead time after New York, I was sent a copy of this book to review. It was not a book I would have chosen to read myself, a contemporary Irish novel from a debut author. Within a few pages I was hooked. Ryan uses twenty one narrators to develop the plot piecemeal. The departure of a bankrupt builder from a recession-hit small town leads to a great hole in the community.

All the characters have one turn in telling their story and the way in which the characterisation is built up in a short space of time is superb. It is a book of voices, everyone clear and vibrant. I was blown away. I felt that everyone should know about this book. I posted my five star review and hoped others would discover it. And they did.

Within a short time a book chain had picked it out as a book to watch and Guy Pringle began to champion it in newbooks. The magazine had an interview with the incredibly talented author and my review appeared alongside that. By the middle of the year the Booker longlist arrived with Ryan’s name upon it. I don’t think I’ve actually read that many Booker longlisters before they have been announced. It felt like I was in at something big right from the beginning. It didn’t make the shortlist but did end up in the coveted “newbooks Top 10 Books of the Year” and was certainly my favourite read.

This book took me by surprise and I was thrilled with its success and wanted to see it getting bigger and bigger. Since reading it I’ve discovered there is a wealth of contemporary Irish writing talent out there and I’m looking forward to getting a copy of

THE BEGGAR AND THE HARE Tuomas Kyro

Vatanescu is an impoverished Romanian construction worker, who wants a future for himself and a pair of football boots for his son. He decides to head north to a cold, dark country where there is little money to be made. Finding his way to Finland, he takes up with Russian human trafficker Yegor Kugar.

However, Kugar is a crook and conflict arises between the two men. This means Vatanescu is soon on the run from an international crime organisation and the police. Striking up a friendship with a fellow outcast, like rabbits fleeing pest control, the two of them travel the length and breadth of Finland crashing into other people’s lives.

This is a lovely, lovely book, which I fell in love with as soon as I saw it. The book itself has a striking cover which makes you think of the books you read as a child. However, this isn’t a child’s fairy story but one for adults. You have to read it with an open mind and not question some of the things which happen too closely. It is a book to lose yourself in.

It is profound and moving and is a book about making your way in the World and the goodness of strangers. Like all good fairy stories, it has a ‘happy ever after’ ending.

In conclusion, this is a grown up book that tinkers with the child-like imagination inherent in adults.

This is no bad thing in the real world we live in today.

Thank you newbooks for giving me the opportunity to review books and widen my reading habits. I no longer stick to the ‘same old’ books and authors.

Short Books

Dorothy Flaxman

Ryan’s second novel, The Thing About December. Don’t miss out on his debut.

Phil Ramage

(Ed: December’s as good if not better!)

Dorothy Flaxman in Bude gave us an insight into the process of reviewing from her perspective, ‘Where to start? I have reviewed nearly 40 books for newbooks and have enjoyed them all for different reasons. Reviewing a book is very different from buying a book, maybe written by an unfamiliar author or genre, and making a wrong choice and giving up before the end. There is a commitment and therefore an incentive to continue with a book for review.

Personally, this makes a big difference, and if I am honest a couple of books I would have given up on after a chapter or two but I persevered and was pleased I did.

One of the books which stand out for me is The Beggar and the Hare

by Tuomas Kyro. Visually, this book is very attractive and distinctive. However, I haven’t seen it for sale in our local bookshops so doubt I would have come across it had it not been for newbooks.’

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reviews Marjorie Coles in Witney makes her confession, ‘A book which I would never have chosen is Not Only The Good Boys by Jo Eames.

A war book written as a novel about large scale equipment is not my idea of a fascinating book, BUT how wrong was I? I found it riveting, exciting and compelling.

Thank you so much for the opportunity to read this, and several others I may not have chosen.’

Because of the wide media coverage of the commemorations this book was highly pertinent at the time of reading and I have no trouble in believing all of it (fact and fiction). I live about 10 miles from Hobo’s house but knew nothing of him and I am now utterly convinced that he was a hero, who greatly influenced the war outcome.

This book is essentially two love stories - one between Dixon and Charlotte, the other between Hobo and his battle tanks and equipment. I did not want the book to end, although I think that a helpful addition would be to have military ranks listed for reference.

Marjorie Coles

NOT ONLY THE GOOD BOYS Jo Eames Peach Publishing

What a fantastic read! I am probably biased as I read this account of the build up to D Day during the week of the 70th anniversary of this event AND I live in Oxfordshire.

Usually war stories are not what I would choose, but right from the beginning I was fascinated, and it continued to the very end which unusually for these days, feels satisfactory.

Jo Eames’ style I found stimulating from one word sentences to the dry humour throughout.

World War II history is not always riveting but the facts were so successfully woven in that I was anxious to read of the outcomes to various problems.

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Maddy Broome in Stanhope, Co Durham takes us back to a Recommended Read of nb14 in March, 2003 - Five Past Midnight In Bhopal by Dominique Lapierre and Javier Moro. It’s amazing how deep an effect some books have on us – note the urgency of Maddy’s final sentence. ‘This book relates the events leading to the terrible catastrophe in the Union Carbide plant in Bhopal on 3rd December 1984. Many people died that night but thousands more have died or suffered since.

The book made a big impact on me. It also made me frustrated because there was little I could do apart from give a donation or tell other people about it. So I’m telling you all again!’

ne sais quoi for the female members of the audience is the height of understatement. And for Vivienne, who I asked to interview him for the magazine, it is obviously a treasured moment. I reminded her that the interview took place in the gallery overlooking the hall, to which she replied, ‘Yes, and I didn’t want to come down!!’

Vivienne takes up the story: ‘There are so many books which I simply don’t remember just a few weeks after I’ve finished them, and I have to read my notes to remind myself what they were about – this is so definitely NOT one of those! As soon as I read the title, I remembered what the book was about, and want to start eulogising about it all over again!

I’ve just re-read my review, plus my interview notes and they still ring true.’

THE STORY OF FORGETTING Stefan Merrill Block Faber and Faber

For Vivienne Jarvis in Andover it’s The Story of Forgetting by Stefan Merrill Block - his debut and we were lucky enough to have this enigmatic young American visit for an author event in Winchester. To say he had a certain je

The novel consists of three threads which merge together at the end. The first is the story of Abel Haggard who lives with his brother Paul, his brother’s wife Mae, and their daughter Jamie. Paul developes early-

reviews onset Alzheimer’s, but his predictable behaviour is initially put down to the shock of seeing his best friend die in the army. The second thread concerns Seth Waller, whose mother is also diagnosed with Alzheimer’s after years of apparently flighty behaviour, and Seth’s determination to conduct empirical research into the disease.

The final thread is a fairy story about the land of Isadora, a parallel world where people are happy simply because they cannot remember what there is to be sad about.

The author is only 25 years old, and this is his first novel, so it is no surprise to find that he is writing about what he knows – he has a number of relatives who suffered from the disease. However, he writes about a huge subject in an intensely personal way. The aged Abel’s chapters ring as true as those of the more upset young Seth’s and while both talk poignantly about their lives, neither voice is sentimental. There are many scientific references in Seth’s chapters, but they do not read as lecturing or complicated; they simply mirror the way in which Seth is approaching the problem he faces.

The author certainly has writing talent, so it will be interesting to see what subject he tackles next, and whether he can put as much of himself into it as he has into this book. Highly recommended.

Vivienne Jarvis

Claire Thomas of Leighton Buzzard singles out They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? By Horace McCoy. ‘First published in 1935 and set in Hollywood, if this were not true, it could never have been made up but people really did enter

marathon dancing competitions during the twenties and thirties out of desperation. No sequins in sight but participants received food, board and medical attention, even sponsorship and prize money, if successful. After a chance meeting Gloria and Robert enter as they both want to work in movies and are looking for that elusive break; directors and film stars are often part of the audience and they hope to be noticed.’

Although it is a stark book in many ways, Robert’s optimism, despite his understanding of the human condition, does shine through. This is a timeless book of huge relevance that book groups would surely find of interest.’

Claire Thomas

More contemporaneously, Ann Hill of Pontefract chooses a favourite of mine which I tried very hard to secure for the magazine but failed.

‘The book that I would not have read if it wasn’t for newbooks is The Universe versus Alex Woods by Gavin Extence. I reviewed this some time ago then went on to recommend it to our readers group, where everyone read and enjoyed the book.’

THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON’T THEY? Horace McCoy Serpent’s Tail

I read this in one sitting and found it absolutely gripping.

McCoy creates an entirely believable world despite the bizarreness of the situation. We know how the story ends as the book is told in flashback and it does feel that you are sitting on a powder keg as the book works towards its inevitable conclusion. McCoy was a bouncer at one of these events and constantly struggled throughout his life to have stories or scripts commissioned; you do feel he understands the frustrations and desperation he is writing about.

THE UNIVERSE VERSUS ALEX WOODS Gavin Extence Hodder & Stoughton

A funny, quirky read, the book starts with 17 year old Alex just returning to Dover from Switzerland. Having driven all the way, he is arrested as soon as he arrives back in a car with quite a lot of money, quite a lot of marijuana and an urn containing the ashes of his former friend,

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reviews Mr. Peterson. Prior to this Alex had lived with his mother, a clairvoyant, and had a not exactly conventional upbringing.

Alex is an extremely intelligent, nerdy character, and because of this he is frequently bullied. He has problems finding friends of his own age group and under unusual circumstances he meets and befriends Mr Peterson, also intelligent, but a bad tempered recluse. I would recommend this book for both personal or readers group read.

tinted nostalgia in fact!

The book Olive Hathaway would never have read if it wasn’t for newbooks is The Book of Fires by Jane Borodale, back in December 2010. ‘The comment that I made in my Reading Notes book was ‘First novel. Learnt a lot about Fireworks. Very well written.’

book that I definitely would not have considered interesting (but) I found it fascinating. 4 years on I could not tell you how to make a firework, but if I ever wanted to I would know where to look.

Olive Hathaway

Jan Jeffery from the Vale of Glamorgan just couldn’t decide...

Anne Hill

THE BOOK OF FIRES Jane Borodale HarperPress

THE WORLD IS A WEDDING Wendy Jones Constable & Robinson

Doreen Furze from Bridgewater says ‘The book I would never have read if it wasn’t for newbooks is The World is a Wedding by Wendy Jones (but it’s fair to say) there are several books that I would never have read if it wasn’t for newbooks.

Some I have enjoyed and others I have struggled to finish.

The World is a Wedding is one book that would not have leapt off the shelf at me which would have been a shame as I thoroughly enjoyed it. The narrative was good and it brought to life a previous era that is now long gone. Rose

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The story is about a woman who becomes apprenticed to a Firework maker and gradually learns his trade.

I like books that whilst being fiction have an element of fact that fills in a gap in my knowledge.

Recently, I have read several books about war situations in various parts of the world and several I am sorry to admit I knew nothing about. Two were about the occupation of the Channel Islands which gave an insight into the horrors of that situation. But The Book of Fires fell into a quite different category. I have to admit to being in the minority of those who are not really very keen on Fireworks – it’s the noise more than the colourful display. So this was a

A MONTH BY THE SEA Dervla Murphy Hodder & Stoughton

In 2011, this feisty elderly lady, an intrepid traveller, who at eighty, describes herself as ‘old, white-haired, semi-toothless, slightly stooped’ journeyed alone to the Gaza Strip, and spent a month there, detailing her adventures in this book. She faced long delays at the only entry point and anxieties about threats of kidnap and murder, in a society in which women, and certainly ‘improperly dressed’ women, without escorts, are at risk.

The book supplies a useful map, glossary and Middle East conflict timeline, all of which are necessary to understand the present situation. I was left feeling nothing but admiration for

reviews for this Irish lady who does not speak Arabic, for putting herself through this dangerous experience and for writing about it so lucidly. Some of her principles, such as taking only hand luggage and using public transport where possible, are also admirable.

The title of the book is ironic; the beaches by the sea are littered with war debris and sewage and the areas overcrowded and poor, far from a Western idea of a holiday beach.

Jan Jeffery

Titanic and the rescue boat at the time.

The characters in the book are based on 14 Irish emigrants, known as the Addergoole Fourteen, who left their homes in County Mayo to travel to relatives in America. The loss of eleven passengers from the group represented the largest proportional loss of life from one region.

(However, Gaynor’s characters) are ficticious: Maggie is 17 years old and in steerage class with the rest of the group but is rescued becasuse of her friendship with a crew member who heeded his own mother’s instructions to look after the third class passengers just the same as the wealthy Americans in first class.

But she does not talk about her expereinces until as an old lady she speaks to Grace, a journalist and her great granddaughter.

There is an unexpected twist at the end of the story which adds to the charm.

I recommend this book to individuals and to groups - there are some discussion questions at the end.

THE GIRL WHO CAME HOME Hazel Gaynor

Jan Jeffery

William Morrow Paperbacks

And if that wasn’t enough, there was a poetry title to fit in...

‘I was thrilled to be asked by newbooks to review Sparrow Tree by Gwyneth Lewis as she is my favourite modern poet and she composed the words on the front of my favourite building Cardiff’s Wales Millennium Centre. (This is the opera and concert centre, not to be confused with the stadium.) Gwyneth has also written (among other works) Sunbathing in the rain: A Cheerful Book about Depression, a prose title, which has been helpful to so many sufferers to whom, as a

It is rare that I feel able to give top marks for a review, but I found this novel totally gripping and absorbing. I do not think I have been as moved by a novel for a long time. Partly this is because of the plot, which is based on a true story of a 1912 Titanic survivor, as recounted to her great granddaughter in the 1980’s, and partly it is due to the easy flowing style of the narrative. Additional extras are copies of the actual Marconigrams (telegrams?) sent from the

counsellor, I have recommended it. So it is a privilege to have this new slim volume of poems in my hands and be asked to review it.’

SPARROW TREE Gwyneth Lewis Bloodaxe Books

Sparrow Tree did not disappoint. I found the poems - about a third on birds, (with titles like Murmuration, Small Brown Jon, and Field Guide to Dementia) a third on quilting patterns (Log Cabin, Tumbling Blocks and Tension Square) and other fabric topics and a third on other things, colourful, poignant, funny and thought provoking.

It is difficult to review a book of poetry - no plot to comment on... no characters to follow... yet every poem has characters who come alive with Gwyneth’s gifted use of words and the only real way to comment is to choose some quotes. One of my favourite poems is called How to Knit a Poem: “The whole things starts with a single knot And needles. Word and pen....”

I recommend this book to all readers who love poetry and to those who don’t.

Jan Jeffery

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reviews and to the point, not languishing for 50 pages before the plot kicks in. Then again you could say I had a short attention span.)

And then there are those who are extra dilligent...

‘Hi Guy I hope I am not too late, I had to go through all my reviews so it took a bit of time.

THE CLOUD HUNTERS Alex Shearer Hot Key Books

Ann Birks in Chesterfield nominates The Cloud Hunters by Alex Shearer ‘(which) inspired me to read more teen/crossover books.

Aimed at teens, the book is set in a world where humans live on islands floating in the atmosphere, and a lack of water means cloud hunters have to collect water to ensure the human race can survive. The story covers current world issues like segregated living, climate change and crime, but also includes familiar topics like school, family and pets. Without newbooks offering it as a review book, I wouldn’t have even considered it, and I recommended it to the children of friends, and adult members of my book group, along with other teen/crossover books I have read since. So thank you newbooks.’

A book I would never have read if it hadn’t been for newbooks would have to be The Masque of the Red Death by Bethany Griffin [another YA title]. I had never heard of it before, which is surprising considering how many book circles, groups and blogs I am attached to.

Yours, Lainy Swanson.’

THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH Bethany Griffin Green Willow Books

Ann Birks

(Ed: Many thanks Ann, YA has become something of a personal favourite – and one for which we’d claim some successes: Annabel Pitcher being the most recent until this issue’s Leslye Walton. Most YA novels are short

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Imagine trying to survive a world filled with disease, fear, murder, and drugs, and ruled by a tyrant who will stop at nothing to get what he wants.

Araby is living as best as she can, trying to fulfill a promise to her brother whilst under the

same roof as her scientist father and aloof mother (both of whom, Araby feels, wish she had expired and not her brother). Whilst trying to find escape and peace at Debauchery with her best friend she can’t help but notice Will, handsome and aloof who makes her feel something other than the effects of drugs or sorrow for the lives lost with disease. Eventually she meets Elliott who is dangerous, sexy and ruthless and believes he can give hope to those left alive and save what is left of the city.

This is quite a story; Araby is a great character who has many levels to who she is and how she came to be the person she is. My problem with the story is that I felt I was missing something a lot of the time (although by the end of the story I had a better understanding on everything). When someone went missing and there was no interrogation or real answers given to what had happened and where they had gone. Also it seemed some of it was in riddles, something would happen or be mentioned and we wouldn’t discover why or what until later in the book. The relationships between Araby and the boys had, for me, some highs and lows and I switched my opinion on them a few times.

Near the end there are a few twists and it does keep your attention but I didn’t like how I didn’t get my answers until the end of the book and even then I was left with questions. This is the first in a series and I will look for the next book to find out what happens next with Araby.

Lainy Swanson

reviews Judith Ayles in East Bolton, Tyne and Wear takes us off to the very far east.

‘One book I would never have read without newbooks is Strange Weather in Tokyo by Hiromi Kawakami. When choosing books, I tend to be conservative and go for authors that I know or have had recommended but with newbooks I often choose ‘Guy’s Maverick Choice’ [an option we offer reviewers who want to be surprised] and sometimes, as in this case, I am well rewarded. I loved this book. It’s my first by a modern, Japanese writer but if this is in any way typical, I can’t wait to read more. I highly recommend it.

realised that they are lonely.

Short and a deceptively easy read, but it contains so much. It is beautifully written and some credit must be given to the translator. It has a dreamlike quality and takes the reader through the full range of emotions, leaving a good feeling at the end. It has left me with a great love for the characters and wanting to know more about them. Even the cover is unusual and attractive.’

Judith Ayles

Back in 2004, Sue Hardiman in Kingswood, Bristol was ahead of a theatrical phenomenon... “Without newbooks I never would have read Wicked by Gregory Maquire.

I approached this novel with some trepidation. Normally I try to avoid anything in the fantasy genre and was even considering giving this one a miss. I’m glad to say I persevered!’

Witch was named) and the difficulties she faced in her childhood and adolescence. The author presents this character sympathetically and tries to impress upon his audience that she was never an intentionally evil person; she was more a victim of events and her desperation to do the right thing.

The novel is witty and thought provoking. It also introduces the reader to some memorable characters.

I would highly recommend it for reading groups and this delightfully produced book even contains a Reader’s Group guide at the end.

Since then I have enjoyed reading all of the other Oz books by Gregory Maguire: Son of a Witch, A Lion Among Men and Out of Oz and I have even been to see Wicked: The Musical which was brilliant. Reading these have opened up a new direction in fiction for me but I think it shows that good writing and characterization will make for a good read no matter what the genre...

Sue Hardiman

STRANGE WEATHER IN TOKYO Hiromi Kawakami Portobello Books

The story is set in present day Tokyo. Tsukiki Omachi, now in her late 30s, bumps into one of her school teachers, Haratsuna Matsumoto who is some 30 years older than her.

She tells the story of their relationship which develops in a very haphazzard way. They are two lonely people who have not

WICKED Gregory Maquire

Our reviewers occasionally receive assignments which are too much to take on. And when that happens our reaction is we’d rather write off a duff book than lose a good reviewer. However, on the evidence above I’d like to think there are more occasions when the reviewer discovers a gem.

Headline Review

It tells the story of the Wicked Witch of the West from the Wizard of Oz. It’s a prelude to the adventures of Dorothy and charts the life of Elphaba (as the

So it only remains to thank the many contributors (and apologise to any we didn’t have sufficient space to include) for their dedication and the insight they give us all into our future reading.

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RETR OSPEC TIVE

RETROSPECTIVE

Elizabeth Buchan Elizabeth Buchan reviews for The Sunday Times and The Daily Mail. As a patron of the Guildford Book Festival and the National Academy of Writing she is a distinctly influential figure in the literary world. Elizabeth has chaired the Betty Trask and Desmond Elliot literary prizes, has been a judge for the Whitbread (now Costa) awards, and now sits on a committee for the Reading Agency. But here we focus on her most recent novels including her latest . . .

I CAN’T BEGIN TO TELL YOU ... is the first book by Elizabeth Buchan that I have read and it will not be the last.

The book is a real page turner [telling] the story of English born Kay/Freya and her Danish husband Bror, [and their] two children Tanne is a feisty young woman and studious son, Nils. [Set] during the early years of the Second World War when Denmark was occupied, it is a tale of espionage and counter espionage, ciphers, encryption, messages and secrets. Who can you trust? Kay is torn to pieces by divided loyalties.

She is shocked by the inhumanity of the occupying force and finds it hard to believe her husband sides with them. The book introduced me to a world I knew little about and how important the people in this country were and how things

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were kept secret. . . . I was initially disappointed by the ending but the more I thought about it perhaps it was fitting.

Barbara Harrison, Mold Personal read........................................★★★★ Group read .......................................★★★★★

During the Second World War various characters try to come to terms with wartime existence and, each in their own ways, fight for freedom and hope. It is really refreshing to read a novel that centres on military intelligence and espionage and in which the majority of the protagonists are women – and strong women at that, who may in some ways be flawed but are all the more admirable for it!

The novel completely drew me in and Buchan’s fantastic writing immersed me completely in wartime life, with its ups and many downs. Though at times the pace slowed a little, the narrative continued to engage me . . . fantastic, believable characters really opened my eyes to the undercover, understated fights

against dictatorship and repression by ordinary (and not so ordinary) people during the Second World War. I hugely enjoyed [this book] particularly as it addresses the choices women were forced to make during wartime, both in England and Denmark. It was really interesting to read about the way war affects relationships, both romantic and familial.

Highly recommended.

Laura Nazmdeh, Norwich Personal read........................................★★★★ Group read .......................................★★★★★

DAUGHTERS

Although some of the themes of this book have been explored before, the combination of the themes makes this novel more thought provoking than usual.

Despite several relationships for

RETROSPECTI VE

Bill, the father of three girls, and the death of his only son, the central character Lara manages to maintain a level of dignity for herself. She is endlessly supportive and equitable to her two step-daughters and her own daughter through their life milestones and crises.

What is most surprising is Lara’s tolerance towards Bill’s second wife when she inherits a beautiful Georgian manor house, the result of which is a reduction in the level of Lara’s maintenance This new situation does not seem to give rise to feelings of jealousy or animosity. In addition, Lara is content to bury her son’s ashes in the grounds, even though she does not live [there]. Maybe her work in the counselling field gives Lara an ability to be more generous and understanding to others needs than the average abandoned wife? This a very interesting novel from Elizabeth Buchan.

and, at times, hate Minty, his former friends keep their distance.

The second marriage is not working. Then Nathan dies and Minty grows up. Fast. The main themes are deceit, jealousy, revenge followed by low self esteem. Minty changes through her bereavement and [becomes] the central character in Nathan's former family, supporting his daughter and making peace with Rose.

This could have been a great novel with such a topical plot.

But, the characters are flat and superficial. There are too many designer names dropped to take Minty seriously and Nathan is just too much in the background. Finally Minty is transformed, after a period of anger, into a considerate and deep thinking character. A little too late. But, despite this, the novel will create lively discussions in a group.

. . . a light, easy read, but one that raises important questions about a woman’s role in society and whether ideas have really changed that much over the past few decades. All the characters were so well written, especially the two main women. This novel would certainly stimulate an interesting debate amongst book group members and makes for a great personal read.

Christine Rolls, Bury St Edmunds Personal read........................................★★★★ Group read ...........................................★★★★

THE GOOD WIFE Was being the good wife worth it, after all? Buchan takes us through Fanny Savage’s life from even before she met [husband to be] Will, and up to the present day when her father has Bente Hall, Ampthill died.

Lorna Jarman, Beaconsfield Personal read...........................................★★ Fanny has made a lot of sacrifices Group read ...............................................★★★ Personal read...........................................★★★ to be the 'good' wife Will needs Group read ...........................................★★★★ by his side, as he advances his caTHAT reer as a politician. Human THE CERTAIN emotions are key to the success SECOND AGE of this book and the scenes deWIFE In the 1950’s, scribed feel real and honest.

Minty has Barbara is a snatched housewife and I felt this book was not too serious and the perfect 'holiday' Nathan, mother who read, despite the all too serious twenty years has been subjects of alcoholism, death and her senior, brought up to from her boss, believe that a woman’s place is in adultery that are covered. A Rose. They are now married the home. Developing a relation- reading group would find lots of different themes to talk about with boisterous twins, Felix and ship with a younger man opens Lucas [living] in Nathan's first up her world to new possibilities. and would ultimately have to decide whether it was worth being marital home and therein lies the In contrast, Siena is a 21st centhe 'good' wife. problem. The ex-wife is hovering tury career woman with a Victoria Niccolls, Holbury in the background, still ruling husband who wants her to give the roost. up her high-profile job in fashPersonal read...........................................★★★ Group read ...........................................★★★★ Nathan's grown children resent ion and start raising children.

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BookChap poses the question...

‘For the best and latest in Non-Fiction, Sport, Biographies and Action Adventure, BookChap gets straight to the point so you won’t waste time browsing or starting books you won’t finish’...

We can’t help asking, do you know somebody who might find this useful?

Recently on Bookchap • An Interview with Jim’ll Paint It reviews of • The Last Dragon by M.K. Hume • War of the Roses: Trinity by Conn Iggulden FIND BOOKCHAP AT

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book review - from nudge-book.com Fast, furious and wearing a Greatcoat. Falcio’s Greatcoat (note not Greatcloak, never that, superheroes with cloaks meet sticky or chewy ends) is a big leather thing with overlapping bone plates sewn in and lots of hidden pockets. It’ll stop swords, arrows, bolts and sometimes even bullets, yet doesn’t inhibit movement or fast swordplay.

Falcio is a magistrate. A peri-

the King’s law has ceased to exist and the magistrates have been disbanded. Not so good for Falcio and his two sidekicks then.

It’s all plot number three, go from A to B protecting the beautiful-but-naive mystery woman and her beautiful-and-knowing servant, fighting off bandits and Dukes whilst avoiding ambushes, traps, poisons and magic, and picking up a few waifs and

Traitor’s Blade

by Sebastian de Castell patetic combination of detective, judge, jury and executioner, travelling the lands and enforcing the King’s law. His verdicts have to be sung. Most peasants can’t remember the law - if they ever knew it in the first place - but they’ll remember the song giving the verdict and punishment.

Punishment has a tendency to be immediate and permanent.

Now it turns out that the King’s laws are broken mainly by the Dukes, powerful magnates who exert almost absolute authority over their own domains.

Magistrates are not terribly popular with Dukes. Hence the magistrates’ need for Greatcoats and deep weapons skills. Also, the Dukes executed the King, so

strays along the way. With a bit of sub-plot 2 thrown in, restore the King’s law and defeat the evil doers who want rid of the magistrates and don’t want the King’s law back.

All great fun and perfect summer escapism.

JJ Redfearn

Traitor’s Blade by Sebastian de Castell is published in paperback by Jo Fletcher Books, price £8.99

B

ack in 2004, whilst enjoying my own company at home I was roused by a ring of the door bell. Instead of the salesman I expected, there stood a well tanned gentleman of beyond retirement age, short and slight of build, almost too much so. He was sporting a baseball cap, a blue singlet and abovethe-knee khaki shorts. Below there were long white socks and a pair of bright red loafers. I missed his name completely but I shook his hand as he launched into his reason for calling.

Jack A Paternoster was a trained 'erk', A/C2 (Aircraftsman 2nd Class) during World War 2. He spent from 1941 until 1944 based on the island of Malta at Ta-Qali. He was there, working on fighter planes during the worst of the enemy action on the island. Malta's story is told elsewhere with much gravity. However, Jack saw planes shot down, the ruination and despair of the populace taking place before his very eyes. In 1995, he went back to Malta on holiday, and while there visited the Malta Aviation Museum.

Just two days prior to his visit the museum had lifted from the bed of the Mediterranean, a Hawker Hurricane for restoration. This became an all encompassing mission when Jack checked his work log and found that he had worked on that very plane before it was shot down.

Once home again, he put pen to paper and recorded his mem-

oirs, albeit briefly, but at his own expense entirely. His retirement mission became knocking on doors and accepting token sums of money for a copy of his book.

(Commendably, all monies were forwarded to the museum.)

I had asked him in because his story was something I wanted to hear and he regaled me with all manner of tales and memories. I showed him a picture I had at the top of the stairs, of a Spitfire in flight (this picture now resides in a local RAF clubroom).

We talked for hours and the time sailed past: his tale of when a German 3,000 lb bomb landed in the high altar of the church near their camp, but didn't explode. "It's still preserved to this day," he said. Then there was the rather darkened picture of Chateau Bertrand or 'The Mad House' as he called it. Built as a palace for some Baron in the past who had the horse stables installed at the top of winding staircases up the turrets, space he and his colleagues had used as the Officers Mess.

I paid him a handsome sum and took delivery of his book, signed and dated by the author.

Although the book only has few pages and some pictures, the wealth of information and experience speaks volumes.

Apparently Jack was writing another book before he died a couple of years back, a sad end, but I was so glad he knocked on my door back in 2004.

Reg Seward, Leiston, Suffolk

When i met…

Given the wideranging social circle of our readership we thought we’d ask if any of them had met an author and if so, what the experience was like. Step forward Reg Seward with a typically quirky take on the idea.

If you’ve met an author – or famous person – in unusual circumstances then why not send us your account? Email guy.pringle@newbooksmag.com

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My Five Faves You probably know Daisy Goodwin from the Nation’s Favourite Poems but she also writes fiction, her latest being The Fortune Hunter.

Here she shares her five favourite classics.

A LITTLE PRINCESS BY FRANCES HODGSON BURNETT This book about a little girl, who after the death of her father is forced to work as a maid in the school where she was once a parlour boarder, had a profound effect on my imagination. I was transfixed by the scene where Sara Crewe wakes up to find that her drafty garret has been transformed into a bedroom fit for a princess. I read those chapters every night for about three years. It was a great training for my career in makeover tv.

I CLAUDIUS Discovered this in my early teens and was completely hooked by the story of the rise to power of the most unlikely Roman Emperor. Graves was a classical scholar , but he never forgets that his primary role as a novelist is to tell a story. He inhabits Ancient Rome, as surely as Hilary Mantel breathes the air of the Tudor Court. Great historical novels are the ones that show us the past rather than tell us about it.

PERSUASION I love Jane Austen with a deep and enduring passion, and I think the story of Anne Elliott’s second chance is possibly my favourite. The way that she revives as a character like a flower soaking up water is quite miraculous. It is also has a plot of clockwork perfection. I read

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this book at least once a year and I always find something new to marvel at.

THE PALLISER SERIES – ANTHONY TROLLOPE Dickens is the prose stylist, but Trollope is the psychologist.

His characterisation is subtle and surprising and he is particularly good at creating convincing female characters. I love Lady Glencora in the Palliser series, she is the embodiment of what today we would call ‘soft power’. I have written two novels set in the nineteenth century and I read Trollope continually as a language barometer.

SCOOP BY EVELYN WAUGH Anybody who wants to learn how to write dialogue should read this novel. It is a masterpiece of comic precision. I still laugh when I read about William Boot’s expedition kit which includes a collapsible canoe and cleft sticks ‘invaluable for carrying messages’. And it contains my favourite Waugh character Mrs Stitch, who like Lady Glencora, is a pin sharp depiction of femine ruthlessness cloaked in charm and chiffon.

The Fortune Hunter by Daisy Goodwin is published in paperback by Headline Review, price £14.99 and is available now.

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