The Twelve Tribes of Hattie

Oprah told me to read this, actually oprah told me a while ago but this first novel by ayana mathis hadn't been released here so I waited. And I waited. And then I waited a little more until the happy moment I spotted it in waterstones last Saturday. Alas the wait still was not over as I hadn't finished crime and punishment but eventually I did. I hurtled through this book. I couldn't read it quick enough, I'd come in from work throw my stuff down, feed the guinea pig thelma and then sit enraptured on my sofa with this for hours. So was the wait worth it? Absolutely. This book is about Hattie, a woman originally from Georgia who moves to north Philadelphia as a teenager. It is her story told via the lives of her children, all eleven of them. Each chapter deals with one or in some cases two of them and from the adults they become and the references about their mother we learn all about Hattie. It doesn't sound that exciting and I suppose it isn't exciting but it's something better than that. If a book could ever break your heart there's chapters in this that completely do, a lot of it is terribly sad but kind of hopefully at the same time. It's by no means a long book but the amount of subjects it deals with is quite incredible, there's death, madness, homosexuality, suicide, alcoholism, racism, poverty, adultery and even though mathis might only write about them through her characters for a couple of pages it never feels like she's skimping or throwing them in for the sake of it, she writes so clearly you understand everything about these topics grasp on the characters, its really pretty powerful stuff. This book kind of gets right to the core of you, it did me anyway and you don't come across writing this good often. I hope I come across another book as good as this one but it'll take some doing. People always say in reviews 'if you read one book this year make it this one' but I genuinely mean it this is a top read, if you know me i'll lend it to you but you have to return it, it's my new favourite.

Crime and punishment

Russia to me (not that I've ever been) is a great big country full of concrete, imposing buildings, rain and an overwhelming sense of gloom. This book written by one of the great Russian authors Fyodor Dostoyevsky is much the same. The basic jist of the story is a fella kills an old pawnbrokering woman and then gets a bit paranoid/mad not I think with guilt but more about getting caught, he thinks he's not just an ordinary human but a special person who can commit a crime without conscience getting in the way and go on to do extraordinary things a bit like napoleon. The main bulk of the book deals with his thoughts and frame of mind and how he really undo's himself. There is of course other characters but he is central to the whole novel and everyone else leads from him. My main problem was understanding who was who in this book, and yes I'm sure that makes me sound really dim but Russians have a lot of names each (well at least three) depending on the familiarity/formality with which they are talking so I did find it a bit hard to keep track of who did/said/thought what. Another small problem was that its really a bit miserable now I can be a bit miserable and misery loves company but this was a whole different level there was no light to all the dark, it was just unrelenting gloom. The author felt like he just had too much to say, he had all these opinions on the psychology of crime and it just got rather tedious after a while reading them. That's not to say the whole novel was tedious, some sections of it trundled along nicely, some were really quite exciting and in all honesty the scene involving the murder was the only time I've read something and wanted to shut my eyes the way you would at the cinema when somethings particularly horrific, I was just sitting reading on my sofa flinching at the words! So to sum up then, its not a bad book, and I understand why it's a classic, all the plotlines link well together and the characters couldn't be formed any better. The main characters plight makes sense and is plausible, to be fair the entire story is, and after you get used to the names it does get easier to read but it does go on a bit and I just stopped caring about halfway through. I don't know if I'd recommend it I guess I would but its not an immediately enjoyable book, you probably won't have much empathy for the characters and it takes a fair helping of concentration. It's not a likeable book but I think it's worth reading, 3 out of 5.

The Lacuna.

Once in a while you read a book and you think it's the greatest thing ever, and once in a blue moon you read a book and it gets under your skin and can change completely how you think about things. This novel by Barbara Kingsolver is firmly in the latter category for me. It is about a man Harrison Shepherd, and it's this fictional man's life story told using his notebooks, but it's set in a world comprising of non fiction, well the authors take on these non fictional events and people at least, so you have people cropping up who you might of heard of like Frida Khalo (who from reading this comes across as my favourite woman ever), J.Edgar Hoover, Trotsky and a few others. History is not something I've much of an interest in, I certainly wouldn't seek out a historical novel but this is I guess one I read without even realising, it deals with politics in Mexico, the rise in communism, America and the whole cold war caper and to be honest those things bore me something silly but reading this I was like huh this is properly riveting! But I'm losing my way a little, the setting, all this historical basis isn't even the main part the whole story is about this man Harrison and the different things that happen and change him throughout his entire life. Lacuna means missing piece, a page absent in a document, the something that isn't there, and there is a line in this book that I loved 'the most important thing about a person is always the thing you don't know'. Anyway why I'm I telling you that, well a part of his story is missing, one of his notebooks, I'm not going to give anything away on the off chance you might decide to read this book (which you most certainly should) but the thing that we don't know is the thing that changes him the most, the most important piece. I suppose as much as this book is the story of a man and it really is everything you could want for in a story, great characters, its funny, sad, exciting, thrilling its like an HBO production of a story to put it mildly but it also leaves you with a lesson on the power words have, for good and how they can tear people and lives apart as well. If I've ever read a book that has felt like the author has tailor written it especially for me, this is that book. 5 stars, hell 5 gold stars! It was epic in the truest sense of the word.

The unlikely pilgrimage of Harold Fry

Read between the 6th and 9th January this novel written by Rachel Joyce really is quite lovely. And sad. And unputdownable. The main jist of the story is that of a man Harold Fry, a pensioner living in the South of england with his wife Maureen when he receives a letter from an old work colleague, the delightfully named Queenie Hennessy. It's really a goodbye note as she is ill with cancer in a hospice up in Berwick upon Tweed which is pretty much right at the top of England. Harold takes it upon himself to walk to Queenie, because if he keeps walking she'll keep living, all whilst wearing a pair of yachting shoes and no preparation, plan or map. Through this journey we learn about Harold, his life, relationship with Queenie, Maureen, his estranged son David and more besides. There's twists and turns throughout. Things are revealed which are really quite startling and in parts it is terribly moving. As the main character Harold is very likeable and well rounded as our the others we meet throughout his travels, I particularly liked how his and Maureens relationship changed throughout, and how it rang true to both characters. No parts of the novel felt rushed and even though what Harold sets out to do is quite extraordinary it never feels unbelievable. All in all this is a book that is funny, inspiring, touching and in parts terribly sad. It is Rachel Joyce's first novel but reading it you would thing she's a old hand at this sort of craic. Highly recommended, 4.5 stars out of 5.

Alys, always

I read this book by Harriet Lane between the 3rd and 5th of Jan (i'm a quick reader and it's not terribly long). From the cover and all the little recommendations from various magazines and other authors I was expecting this to be a thriller. It was not thrilling. It wasn't a bad story by any means, it was actually fairly enjoyable but it just wasn't marketed quite right. It's about a woman, Frances who stumbles upon a car accident on her way home one evening and how this encounter changes her life from a stagnant career as a book editor for a newspaper to a world of elite literary types and how she wriggles her way to success. She is a well developed character and there was a certain underlying not quite sinister-ness to her. Whist reading it I did keep wanting to find out what she'd do next so there was a certain amount of intrigue to the story. The majority of characters held my interest, although there where a couple I would've liked to have heard more about as they where introduced well but not used much beyond that. My main qualms with the book was the ending and how quickly loose ends where tied together. I don't want to give anything away but a relationship that occurs towards the end I found completely implausible and it just seemed an easy way for the author to end the story, it was disappointing and despite a promising start I ended up not too fond of this novel. So the rating for this one then it's somewhere between 2 and 3, like someone who lets you down with so much promise as opposed to a person who never tried at all I guess it was more disappointing cause I thought from its start and the reviews it was going to be great, so it'll just be the 2 out of 5 then.

A visit from the goon squad.

I read this between the 28th Dec and 3rd Jan so I'm half cheating including it here but I guess my club my rules right? I jest of course, I just enjoyed this novel by Jennifer Egan quite a bit so wanted to include my review here. After reading it I still can't quite come up with a synopsis for it. People asked as people do what it was about whilst I was reading it and I couldn't find a way to describe it. It's an interesting novel, terribly well written and jumps back and forth in time throughout the chapters. There is also a huge amount of characters who pop up some more frequently than others at different stages of their lives, from different viewpoints. This non linear way to tell the story makes it a bit confusing to start with and its hard to know which characters matter and are going to pop up again BUT the characters are so well developed the confusion is worth it. Sasha is really the main protagonist although I'm not sure if that's the right way to describe her, she turns up the most frequently and links a lot of threads together so as I read I found myself looking for her parts in particular. I suppose this novel is really about the passing of time, what getting old brings and takes away. It's funny, it's sad and its perfectly balanced it is confusing and takes a little effort but it's one of the few books I may well read again. I suppose some star rating should be given so out of a 5 I'd have to say this is a very strong 4.