Admitting defeat
I don’t often admit defeat when I’m reading. I tend to slog away to the end of a book, even if I’m not enjoying it much. Partly this is stubbornness, partly pride, but partly also a belief that most books…
“Saturday” by Ian McEwan
Not my favourite McEwan – that is Atonement by a long way. This was OK, a more meditative book, full of long meandering passages from the head of Henry Perowne, a successful neurosurgeon living in Marylebone with his successful wife…
“Evening is the Whole Day” by Preeta Samarasan
Update: I interviewed Preeta Samarasan about this book and her writing in general – to listen to the interview, click here. This book grew on me. At first I found the amount of detail overwhelming, and thought the pace was…
“Written on the Body” by Jeanette Winterson
There is a lot of beauty in this book. Every sentence is like a poem. You can feel the care and attention that went into every choice of word. For the first few pages, I was blown away and thought…
“Remarkable Creatures” by Tracy Chevalier
This is a historical novel about Mary Anning, a young fossil hunter in early 19th century Britain. I quite enjoyed it, but it didn’t do anything special for me. It’s funny – although I studied history at university and have…
“The Pesthouse” by Jim Crace
Poor Jim Crace. Almost every review I’ve read of this book compares it to Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, and I’m going to do the same. I can’t help it. They’re both novels set in post-apocalyptic America with two people struggling…
Books vs. nuclear submarines
I paid a visit to the excellent Big Green Bookshop in Wood Green recently. The owners put out an appeal to everyone to buy an extra book from the shop to help them survive and pay off their bank loan.…
“Long Time, No See” by Dermot Healy
Have you ever read a book all the way through and felt that you missed something really big? You get that unsettling feeling that perhaps the whole thing is one big allegory that you failed to get. Or maybe you…
“Brick Lane” by Monica Ali
Not sure what to write about this. I enjoyed the story and it was well-written, but to me nothing special. Hated the ending – don’t worry, I won’t give it away, but the last line just sounded so corny I…