Tag: Reading

#KeepKidsReading book review #3 – “Quiet Storm” by Kimberly Whittam

For my final #KeepKidsReading book review I would love to share with you a really wonderful book by a debut author, published by Usborne, who also happens to be local to me – Manchester based. Kimberly Whittam is a school teacher who has written a book for and about quieter shy children:

“Children who don’t raise their hand in class even though they know the answer, who don’t join in class discussion even though they’ve got something to say and children who are so, so talented and want to try out for the school play or join the school sports team and who are just too afraid to join in.”

Kimberly Whittam https://youtu.be/I8gtYq9zXu8

Many of us will recognise this child – that was me and it has at times been my own children, and certainly many children I know. Everyone is encouraged now to be loud and proud, to speak their truth and not be afraid of offending anyone, nor crave to be liked. But too often the people who say this have no idea how agonisingly difficult that can be. They were not “that” child. 

Storm Williams is twelve years old and in year seven at Daisy Mill Academy. She likes to keep a low profile and has clearly found settling in very challenging. Her best friend from primary school, Zarrish, was placed in a different form, leaving Storm feeling bereft, and she lives for the lessons where forms are mixed, such as PE, and they can be together. To make matters worse, Storm’s elder brother Isaiah is in year eleven and is an outgoing high-achiever, Head Boy and heavily involved in extra-curricular activity. All the teachers refer to Storm at “Isaiah’s little sister”; she has a lot to live up to. At the start of the book, Storm’s family faces a domestic drama – kitchen renovations lead to a burst pipe which makes their house uninhabitable – and the family has to move in with Storm’s grandma. 

It is during one of the PE lessons that Storm finds she has a previously undiscovered talent that she enjoys. The group begins athletics lessons and Storm finds that she is a very fast sprinter. The PE teacher encourages her to attend athletics practice and tells her he wants her to participate in an inter-school competition. The thought of going alone makes Storm feel queasy, but she decides that she will do it if her friend Zarrish comes along too. At first Zarrish says she will, but lets her friend down. Zarrish has become increasingly involved with a new girl at school, Melissa, who she was initially asked to ‘buddy’. But Melissa is sullen, manipulative and difficult and it soon becomes clear that she is pulling Zarrish away from Storm, persuading her into rule-breaking at school and deceitful and unkind behaviour. 

Storm finds herself in turmoil; lacking the confidence to participate in athletics without her friend’s support, but also finding for the first time that she excels at something and enjoys it, makes her reassess all of her assumptions about school life up to that point. 

Storm does find her voice and her niche and the difficult challenges she faces turn out to be a true turning point for her. She faces them with courage and with the support of her family and finds the strength of character to turn her back on what she knows to be wrong (treating people badly) and embracing doing what she loves, finding out a lot about herself along the way.

Storm is a lovely character and the situations she faces in this super book, the people around her at school, the teachers and the family situations (being mortified by her parents’ very public sense of fun!) will be familiar to lots of young people. 

Highly recommended for 9-12 year olds, or even a little older. 

#KeepKidsReading book review #2 – “The Dolls’ House” by Rumer Godden

I have a vague recollection of reading some books by Rumer Godden when I was a child, though unfortunately I cannot remember any specific titles. I was reminded of her a couple of years ago when reading fellow blogger Brona’s Books, who had a Rumer Godden reading week around the time of the author’s birthday. By coincidence I had happened to pick up an early edition of The Doll’s House in my local secondhand bookshop around the same time. Unfortunately, I did not get around to reading the book then and it has been sitting on my TBR shelf for too long. I decided to make it my ‘Off the TBR shelf’ book for June and now seems like a good time to review it as I am focusing on my #KeepKidsReading week. 

Rumer Godden was prolific and published over sixty books in a writing career that spanned seven decades. She wrote for both adults and children and also wrote poetry and non-fiction. A number of her books were adapted for film and television, most recently Black Narcissus which was released as a BBC mini-series in 2020. She was born in Britain but grew up in India where her father worked for a shipping company. 

The Doll’s House was Godden’s first book for children (published in 1947) and was turned into a film for children’s television in 1984. Godden wrote a series of books about dolls drawing parallels between their plight as passive and without agency, and the life of children, for whom adults make decisions, without necessarily consulting them. 

The Dolls’ House is a short book, easily consumed by an adult in one sitting, but I tried to read as a child would, or as a child might have it read to them, one short chapter at a time. The story concerns the fate of four dolls who live together as a family – Mr Plantaganet, Birdie, his ‘wife’, Tottie, a girl-child doll, and Apple, a younger boy-child doll. They are the toys of sisters Emily and Charlotte, and live in shoe boxes, but wish for a house of their own. Their wishes come true and the two sisters acquire an old Victorian dolls’ house which once belonged to their grandmother. With the help of a family friend they clean, repair and update the interior and the furnishings. Unfortunately, the dolls’ house comes with an unwelcome addition, a china doll called Marchpane, who is also very old. Marchpane would have been an expensive and precious doll in her day, unlike the Plantaganets, and is both haughty and cruel. When she is brought to live with them all she seems to cast a spell over the elder of the two sisters, Emily, and gradually, the Plantaganets are sidelined and ousted from the better rooms in their new home. 

On the surface, this is a simple story, but it explores notions of class, fairness, kindness and justice in ways that will be easily understood by children. It was a real throw-back reading this charming little book. The language is a bit old-fashioned, but I think it could still appeal to younger children, between about five and seven years old, perhaps shared with a grandparent, who will be able to bring their own memories into a telling of the story. 

“It is an anxious, sometimes a dangerous thing, to be a doll. Dolls cannot choose; they can only be chosen; they cannot ‘do’; they can only be done by; children who do not understand this, often do wrong things and then the dolls are hurt and abused and lost; and when this happens dolls cannot speak, nor do anything except be hurt and abused and lost. If you have any dolls, you should remember that.”

Chapter 1, ‘The Dolls’ House’ by Rumer Godden

#KeepKidsReading – the summer holidays are here!

It’s too long since I did one of my periodic #KeepKidsReading weeks, where I write about what is currently happening in the world of children’s literature and post reviews of kids’ books that have caught my eye.

The premise of these themed weeks is to try and encourage people to spread the word about children’s books and perhaps even consider reading some themselves! It’s always such a treat to open a book that has been written with children in mind – it’s as good a min-retreat! We bookbloggers love reading – of course we do! – but when you get caught up in your stats, your reading speed (that feature on the e-reader is surely a thief of joy!) and how your ‘number of books read’ on Goodreads compares to last year, you can easily forget that reading is, at its most basic, just pure pleasure.

Generation Alpha (ie people born between 2010-24), aka ‘kids today’, have more competing pressures on their time than ever and, I would argue, more things to worry about. Reading educates, creates bonds, promotes wellbeing and empowers – as adults, parents and grandparents it is imperative that we do not allow this simple but oh so valuable pastime to slip away from them.

So, this is my teeny tiny little personal campaign!

If you know any children and they have not yet signed up for this year’s UK summer reading challenge, then get them along to the local library or point them in the direction of the website (Gen Alpha is, of course, digitally native!). This annual initiative is run by The Reading Agency and delivered in partnership with public libraries (because even though they are all digital natives, they don’t all have the hardware at home). Each year, the challenge has a theme and this year it’s Ready, Set, Read, with a sporting theme.

Later in the week I will be posting a few reviews of book suggestions for children, so look out for those.

In the meantime, happy reading and spread the word!

#KeepKidsReading

Audiobook review – “Red Notice” by Bill Browder

This was my book club’s June read. It wasn’t a title I suggested but I was happy to go along with it even though the blurb didn’t appeal that strongly. A true-life thriller about high finance and espionage did not seem like the kind of book I would normally read, but then isn’t that the joy of a book club, to make new discoveries? The book opens with the narrator (the author) giving a detailed account of his being detained at a Moscow airport without explanation, being held for endless hours without food or water. Attempts to contact friends, family, contacts in the British Embassy bear no fruit and finally his phone battery gives out. The intention of the Russian authorities seems to be to terrify their detainees, keeping them guessing about what might happen to them.

Finally, the author is allowed to leave and is put on a plane back to London, where he lives. This happened in the early 2000s, but there is a long history leading up to this event. Bill Browder then takes us on the long journey to explain how he came to be in this situation, beginning with his childhood in Chicago as the lowest-achieving child in a highly academic family. Young Bill clearly had something of the entrepreneur about him and despite his early difficulties in education (exclusion, boarding school, severe bullying) he eventually wins a place at Stamford business school. 

After completing his college education and a stint at a couple of consultancy firms he decides on an adventure, following somewhat in the footsteps of his eastern European grandparents. From an early age he shows clearly his entrepreneurial streak and a nose for an opportunity. He moves to Russia in the 1990s, as that country is emerging into the post-Soviet Union era. Browder begins to see the huge financial benefits that can be secured by being an early investor in the privatisation of national industries and he persuades a number of wealthy individuals to come on board with him. His Hermitage investment fund is extremely successful and he makes a lot of money, for himself and his investors. 

[Spoilers below]

Browder bases himself between Moscow and London, where he also starts a family, but it is clear that the pressures and demands of his lifestyle take their toll on his marriage. Eventually, he and his wife divorce – there is a lot of very personal material in this book too. Browder will eventually meet and marry a Russian woman with whom he has two daughters.

To support his finance business, Browder has to set up a strong team of lawyers and advisors, as well as colleagues with connections and insights into Russian society. In the time that Browder is operating in Russia, the country changes dramatically and a small number of people begin to make a lot of money – the rise of the oligarchs. Corruption was always part of the system, but now becomes endemic. As a foreigner (even worse, an American) profiting handsomely from Russia’s embrace of capitalism, Browder becomes a marked man. His life becomes endangered (hence the detainment at the airport) and he has good reason to believe that Putin himself is behind efforts to eliminate him. The ‘red notice’ of the title refers to the Interpol arrest warrant that the Russians tried to have exercised on him (which was eventually  withdrawn, much to the ire of the Russian authorities for whom this is a huge embarrassment). Browder realises that the Russians might attempt to get at him through his associates. He persuades most of them to flee the country, sometimes under cover, but one of his lawyers, Sergei Magnitsky, refuses. Browder tells us that he simply “loved his country too much”. Magnitsky is arrested, charged with trumped-up accusations of fraud, and imprisoned in a labour camp. His treatment there, including beatings, eventually leads to his death. 

This event shapes Browder’s life from then on and occupies the final third or so of the book. The author’s attempts to fight his friend’s case, and then to seek justice for him become the cause of his life. He devotes his time to raising awareness of human rights abuses in Russia and eventually succeeds in persuading the American Congress to pass ‘Magnitsky’s law’, with the help of key politicians such as the late John McCain, which permits sanctions against those guilty of human rights abuses, such as freezing of overseas assets and refusal of visas. Bill Browder continues to devote his life to persuading other countries to adopt similar legislation. 

This is a fascinating story and after my initial scepticism I have to say that I was completely hooked. In the context of Russia’s current behaviour it has extra resonance and gives an insight into the psyche of those in power in that country. I had heard of Magnitsky’s law, but had no idea of the background. Browder and his team were one of the first to use the then new platform YouTube to great effect as a publicity tool to raise awareness of their cause, when Sergei Magnitsky was still alive. The videos can still be seen on there and are powerful. Also, powerful, is the final chapter of the book, narrated on the audio version by the author himself. It is chilling when he tells us that if he is killed, we the readers will know who did it. 

A stunning and unique story, highly recommended.

Women’s Prize book review #4 – “Trespasses” by Louise Kennedy

The smart money was on Barbara Kingsolver to win the 2023 Women’s Prize for Fiction, announced a fortnight ago, and the predictions were correct. Kingsolver is the first person to win the prize twice (she won previously with her highly acclaimed 2009 novel The Lacuna). I have not yet read Demon Copperhead – when I decided on the order I wanted to read the Women’s Prize shortlist I decided to leave it till last since it is by far the longest of the six books. So it is definitely on my TBR list and I am looking forward to it even more now.

I did manage to get through four out of the six shortlisted books, which I am happy with, given that it has been a very busy couple of months. The day job has been quite demanding, as has home and family life so I’m impressed with myself that I even managed to get through that many! Audio did the heavy lifting here, and the fourth book, which I am reviewing here, was another that I listened to on audio. 

I don’t know much about Louise Kennedy, other than that her Twitter feed is witty and self-deprecating! Trespasses is her debut novel which gives me some hope given that she is around the same age as me I think! It seems her writing career took off relatively late in life and she spent most of her working life as a chef. Kennedy grew up near Belfast and her intimate awareness of the impact of the troubles on ordinary people in Northern Ireland in the 1970s, ‘80s and ‘90s is a powerful theme in this book.

The main character is Cushla, a young woman who teaches in a Catholic primary school. She lives alone with her widowed alcoholic mother and helps out at the family pub, which is now run by her angry and domineering brother. The regulars in the pub make up a motley band of locals, some political some not, and include British soldiers from the local barracks who come across as insensitive, cruel and exploitative. 

There are two main strands to the novel, connected with Cushla’s two jobs. In school, Cushla’s pupils report their daily news and the vocabulary of military events, hardware and death, are shocking when they come out of the mouths of, literally, babes. One particular pupil that Cushla connects with is Davy McGeown, bullied (as is his entire family) because he is the product of a ‘mixed marriage’. Cushla takes Davy somewhat under her wing, giving him lifts to and from school for example and becomes closely involved with the family, particularly after Davy’s father suffers a brutal beating at the hands of paramilitaries. 

The second strand of the novel is the affair that Cushla begins with Michael Agnew, a prominent Belfast barrister, who although he is a protestant, manages to remain a powerful neutral force, drinking in Cushla’s family’s pub, for example, defending young Catholic men who become embroiled in paramilitary activity. Cushla and Michael are instantly attracted to one another but their affair is scandalous on many levels – he is married, he is older than her, socially they are from very different backgrounds and, of course, they have different religious affiliations, though neither of them is particularly attached to their religion. Their affair takes place in secret, mostly at Michael’s ‘town’ apartment. His wife remains mostly at their family home and there are hints that she is an alcoholic; certainly he tells Cushla that his marriage is “complicated” and he cannot offer her any commitment. To help provide cover for the affair, Cushla starts going out with another teacher at school, Gerry, who, it later transpires, has secrets of his own. 

Kennedy writes beautifully about the tender and passionate relationship that Cushla and Michael have. She also writes beautifully about the love and care Cushla has for Davy McGeown and his family, and the complex relationship she has with her difficult and mentally unstable mother. This is a novel about people, about love, and about family, and yet Kennedy weaves in some profound truths about life in Northern Ireland at that time – the messy politics, religious prejudice, the dominance of the church (and alludes to abuse in the Catholic church) living in constant fear, and yet, also, fear becoming normalised. It is an account of a kind of hell, but one in which love can still thrive, like weeds popping up through cracks in concrete. 

I loved this book and it is a brilliant debut. The audio version was also brilliantly read by Brid Brennan. Highly recommended.

Winner of the Women’s Prize for Fiction announced tonight

Well, I did not hot my target, but I had fun trying! When the shortlist for this year’s Women’s Prize was announced a few weeks ago, I set myself the goal of reading all six titles, much as I do with the Booker Prize in the autumn. The Women’s Prize is at least as big as the Booker now, so why not. (Dare I say it is also a bit more accessible?)

I’ve read three out of the six novels and have posted reviews on Fire Rush by Jacqueline Crooks, Black Butterflies by Priscilla Morris, and The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell. I have almost finished my fourth, Trespasses by Louise Kennedy. I have not yet started Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver or Pod by Laline Paull, although I will definitely read both of them.

I have loved all the books I have either finished or am reading. Two are debut novels, and in only one instance (Maggie O’Farrell) have I read anything previously by the author. I have heard a great deal of praise for Kingsolver, but have not heard much about Pod, though it sounds a very unusual and innovative work.

The winner will be announced this evening at 7.10pm by Chair of Judges Louise Minchin, and it can be watched live on YouTube.

Of the four that I have read or am reading, all would be a worthy winner. They are fantastic novels. For me, the one that has stood out though is Fire Rush. It has such a raw energy and the author creates a world that draws you in and is completely compelling.

Only a few hours to go – let’s see if the judges agree with me!

Women’s Prize shortlist review #3 – “The Marriage Portrait” by Maggie O’Farrell

Maggie O’Farrell won the Women’s Prize in 2020 with her eighth novel, Hamnet. It would be quite a coup if she won the prize again in 2023 with her ninth novel. Hamnet is without doubt one of my favourite novels of recent years. Beautifully written, moving, and an astonishing subject. In The Marriage Portrait O’Farrell takes a somewhat similar approach: taking a real historical figure, about which very little is known, and inventing their back story. This time, O’Farrell takes us to 16th century Italy. 

The main character in the novel is Lucrezia de Medici who lived a short life from 1545-1561. She was the daughter of the then Duke of Florence and his noble Spanish wife. She was their fifth child, and is portrayed in O’Farrell’s novel as somewhat unruly. Little was really expected of her, apart from a decent marriage, but as the third daughter, she would not have been considered for the highest ranking match. Her brothers, of course, were schooled in the arts of ruling. Lucrezia is portrayed as sensitive, and passionate about art and nature. She is taught to paint, since she shows some aptitude for it and it at least keeps her out of trouble. Painting is the one activity in which she finds true happiness.

Lucrezia’s elder sister Maria is matched with the nobleman Alfonso, the heir to the Duke of Ferrara, but when Maria dies suddenly, Lucrezia is forced to step in as a substitute. The children’s nurse, Sofia, sensing Lucrezia’s horror at the prospect, manages to persuade the Duke to hold back from marrying his daughter off, on the basis that she is still a child and not yet begun to menstruate. There is only so long that Sofia can protect her charge, however, and at the tender age of 15, Lucrezia is married to Alfonso, who, by then, is Duke of Ferrara. 

Lucrezia is terrified to leave her family. Initially, she is taken to her husband’s country residence, the delizia, where, as Duchess, she enjoys a little more freedom than she had in Florence. Her husband Alfonso, is constantly preoccupied with matters of state and a schism in his own family and largely abandons her. It is clear, however, that her expected role is to bear heirs and Lucrezia endures the consummation of their marriage with fear and horror. 

When the couple return to court to begin married life proper, Lucrezia becomes increasingly aware of a more sinister side to her husband. It is clear that her initial fear of him was not simply girlish trepidation, but a deeper sixth sense. Very soon she begins to fear for her safety. 

The novel opens at a banquet, where Lucrezia is being fed various delicacies by Alfonso. It is 1561, the year that she died and Lucrezia tells the reader that she believes her husband wishes her dead. Thereafter, the novel flits back and forth between Lucrezia’s early childhood, giving a sense of how her character and her place in the household evolved, and 1560-61 and the progress of her brief marriage. 

Having enjoyed Hamnet so much, I was really looking forward to this book and treated myself to a signed hardback copy. It moves at a much slower pace than Hamnet and I found it quite difficult to get into at first. There is more scene-setting and building of character than there is plot, but then we are talking about a very short span of time in the life of a person who did not have very much to do with their days! About halfway through, once Lucrezia is married, I think it improved – the sense of threat builds, the insular nature of courtly life becomes more apparent, and Lucrezia’s isolation all add to the feeling of danger for her. Even those she might reasonably think of as ‘friends’ – her husband Alfonso, his sisters, the servants – all in fact represent a potential threat. Her only confidante is her ladies maid Emilia, but she is also powerless and vulnerable. It is only when a group of artists arrives to set about making a commemorative portrait  of her (the marriage portrait) that Lucrezia realises the deep peril of her situation. As the novel darkens, it improves.

I would recommend this novel although for me it did not have the powerful impact of Hamnet, but then it must be very difficult to follow something that brilliant.

At the Hay Festival 2023

I had a busy half term week, spending time with my children and some friends, and a glorious couple of days at the Hay Festival, so no time for blogging. I didn’t make it to Hay last year; with both my daughters doing important exams, I just felt I couldn’t be away from home at such a crucial time. So it was especially sweet to go back this year. I went for two days, staying overnight in a tent – I am NOT a camper! – at the official Hay campsite, which I felt was preferable to a B&B miles away. It was an experience. Perhaps the coldest night of my life. Hay on Wye is in quite an exposed position, with a cool breeze, even though the sun shined the whole time. Night time temperatures dropped to around 5 degrees, so it was not comfy, even beneath the many layers I had packed. The good value and the proximity to the festival site made it worthwhile though. I’m not sure what it would have been like if it had been raining.

I saw some really interesting presentations, very little on the fiction front this year, strangely. To be honest, I don’t think I picked the best days with regard to the programme of events. My fantasy is to spend the whole week there, to dip in and out, participate in some of the off-site events, perhaps do some of the walks in the area, but that will have to wait until I am free of the tyranny of the the school calendar! It’s also not cheap: drinks and meals on the site are expensive, so if you could self-cater somehow and take packed lunches it would be much more manageable.

Below are some of my photos from the event. If you’ve never been I highly recommend it. If travelling to Hay is not possible, you can watch many of the events on the Hay Player, which is very reasonable at £15 a year and gives you access to a huge back catalogue of events too.

George Monbiot (journalist and climate activist) and Minette Batters (head of the NFU) discussing farming and the environment – a very heated debate!

On the few occasions when I have met famous people I have not been very good at it! They say you should never meet your heroes. This time I managed to mumble a few words of conversation in the brief encounter to get my book signed.

BBC colleagues Jeremy Bowen and Frank Gardner discuss their experiences in the Middle East
The Hay Festival at night when all the day’s crowds have gone

BBC correspondent Lyse Doucet gives the Christopher Hitchens memorial lecture, covering the future of journalism and the concept to truth in reference to AI. A panel of historians discusses how we represent history, particularly in reference to Britain’s stately homes, with the CEO of the National Trust.

And of course, the obligatory book haul – another of the expenses at Hay! I believe I was quite restrained…

As usual, Hay 2023 was inspiring, fascinating, at times controversial and always stimulating.

Audiobook review – “Cleopatra and Frankenstein” by Coco Mellors

I’ve had my eye on this book for a while. It has been highly praised in the United States, winning lots of plaudits for its debut novelist Coco Mellors, and in the UK it was a Sunday Times bestseller. The blurb was tantalising; set in New York city it tells the story of a whirlwind romance and its consequences, and comparisons with Sally Rooney have been drawn. My book club liked the sound of it too. We mostly do audiobooks these days as we are busy ladies of a certain age with families and work, etc, and I downloaded it excitedly.

It is essentially a novel of character studies. Cleo is a twenty-something artist struggling to make ends meet in New York where she has a low-calibre job while making her art in her spare time. Cleo is troubled and drifting. She is British but feels no connection with her home country where she has no friends and very little family. Her mother died by suicide when she was in her final year at university. Her parents separated when she was young and her father remarried a ghastly woman and has a new family.

Cleo’s US visa is about to expire and she has no idea what she is going to do next when she meets Frank at a party. Frank is twenty years her senior and owns a successful advertising agency. The opening chapters focus heavily on their initial meeting and the intense chemistry between them, and the inevitability of their getting together. The opening is clever and satisfying to read while also telling us a lot about these two people. It sets the scene really well. Despite the age difference Cleo and Frank seem well-suited. It is tempting to say that Cleo is looking for a ‘father-figure’, but I don’t think that would be correct; she is looking for stability though. Her life experience also makes her older than her years. Frank also had a troubled upbringing, his mother was an alcoholic, and he says he has never met anyone like Cleo before. He is perhaps a little younger than his years. Needless to say, their relationship blossoms. The impending expiry of Cleo’s work visa creates a literary turning point in the plot of the novel. Frank asks Cleo to marry him in a kind of ‘what have they got to lose’ way and they have a quickie ceremony at City Hall, witnessed by an emotional hot dog seller.

So far so good, but for me, the book goes somewhat downhill from here. It is clear that the rest of the novel is going to be about their marriage – will they repent of having married in haste? 

Spoiler alert!

The next few chapters focus a lot on Cleo and Frank’s circle, rather than the couple themselves, and I felt I rather lost the two main characters here. Coco Mellors goes into detailed character portraits of their friends Santiago, Anders and Vincent, and Frank’s younger half-sister Zoe, and we meet Cleo’s father and his wife Miriam, who were cringingly two-dimensional for me. There were times when I wanted to give up on this book because I was so deeply irritated with the secondary characters. I found them lazy stereotypes and I could not fathom why we needed to know so much about them. My only conclusion is that they were there to tell us a bit about “life in New York city”, which I found a bit patronising. It all seemed like something out of Wall Street! Or they were there for padding, to take the focus off Cleo and Frank for a few months, the period during which they were relatively content with one another, until the author could legitimately turn to problems arising in their marriage after the first flush or romance. 

About half way through a further character is introduced. Eleanor is a forty year-old copywriter who goes to work in Frank’s agency. It is clear she is much more ‘ordinary’ than the ‘extraordinary’ Cleo (looks-wise) but there is something about her that attracts Frank’s attention. They share an easy companionability that contrasts with the more intense relationship he has with Cleo. Not unexpectedly, Frank and Cleo’s marriage begins spectacularly to disintegrate, as do the other characters in the book, in a kind of parallel decline. To be fair, the book gets better again from here, although I found the ending disappointingly predictable.

I’m really not sure about this book. It is well-written and I liked the characters of Cleo and Frank, and Eleanor. I disliked most of the others though and found the novel a bit unbalanced in that respect. It’s not a bad read, though it could be quite triggering for some, covering themes of suicide, addiction, and childhood trauma. 


My main complaint is that it seems to favour sensationalism over authenticity and other books I have read recently cover similar themes better (for example, any of Sally Rooney’s books and Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason). I came across an LA Times review which said that Cleopatra and Frankenstein read as though it had been written to be adapted for a Netflix series, and I think I probably agree.

Reading challenge book review – “All Quiet on the Western Front” by Erich Maria Remarque

The April book in my ‘Trying not to be too challenging’ Reading Challenge for this year was All Quiet on the Western Front, the best-known novel by Erich Maria Remarque which draws on his experience as a German soldier in the First World War. First published in 1929, only ten years after the end of that war, it has become one of the most iconic novels about war, all the more poignant because it is written from the perspective of an ‘enemy’ fighter. The book was banned in Germany, where the National Socialists were capitalising on the villification of their country in defeat and felt the book made Germany appear weak. 

My copy is a well-thumbed 1977 reprint that came from my husband’s collection when we got together. I did try reading once before years ago, but as a mother of young children at the time it was just too much for me to bear. I suppose the horrors of yet another senseless and destructive war in Europe appearing in the daily news bulletins, plus the release of a film adaptation that did very well at the Oscars recently, meant the book caught my eye as I was browsing the TBR shelves this time. 

The central character and narrator of All Quiet on the Western Front is Paul Baumer, a young soldier at the Front, serving with other young men who, only weeks earlier, were his friends at the school they attended in a quiet German town. They were persuaded to sign up by their fervently patriotic schoolmaster Kantorek, who told them of glory to be had in serving their nation; their illusions are quickly shattered once they are posted to the Front. Parts of this book are very difficult to read. The vivid accounts of hideous deaths, of gruesome injuries, and of the trauma of enduring such terror, fear and physical pain are stomach-churning, but one is compelled to read almost from a sense of guilt that young men had to, often still have to, endure the horror while the rest of us sit at home in comfort or mourning. One cannot help but think of Ukrainian and Russian soldiers at this point.

Besides the accounts of trench warfare, what is equally shocking is how little progress either side seems to make in exchange for their losses. You have to ask how any of it could be called a victory. The pace of the book is also extraordinary: the periods of fierce and brutal conflict are short episodes of violent action amidst a wider tedium. Most of the soldiers’ time (those that survive the battles) seems to be spent doing very little, just trying to survive. Or in Paul’s case, thinking. The rations are poor and the food is often rank, the conditions are appalling – the descriptions of the ongoing battle to keep rats at bay at night is particularly awful – and no detail is spared in describing toilet habits, for example. 

When Paul returns home for a period of leave, the contrast between his life on the Front and that of civillians is stark. Distressingly, Paul feels that he can no longer relate to his family, that he must spare them the reality of war, but that in doing so he is a co-conspirator in concealing the truth. He cannot wait to get back to the Front, to be with those who can understand him, who share his experience. 

Paul survives almost the whole war, dying only weeks before its end, on a relatively calm day when the single line report from the military authorities read simply “In westen nichts neues” (translated as “All quiet on the Western Front”) from which the book takes its title. In reality, Paul could never have returned to his old life and his family, not after what he had seen and experienced. 

We are not youth any longer. We don’t want to take the world by storm. We are fleeing. We fly from ourselves. From our lives. We were eighteen and had begun to love life and the world; and we had to shoot it to pieces. The first bomb, the first explosion, burst in our hearts. We are cut off from activity, from striving, from progress. We believe in such things no longer, we believe in the war.

Paul, in All Quiet on the Western Front, Chapter 5

There have been two translations of the book into English; my edition will be the original by Arthur Wesley Wheen. The second was by Brian Murdoch in 1993. It is interesting that my edition does not include any credit to the translator. Nowadays, translation is considered almost an art in itself, bringing the out the intention and talent of the author to those unable to read books in their original language. 

I recommend this book highly. It is practically essential reading, though it is not an easy one. 


The next book for this challenge from my TBR shelf is The Bloody Chamber by the late great feminist author Angela Carter. I think I got this as part of a set of three books by her (along with Nights at the Circus and Black Venus) back in the day when I used to subscribe to a postal book club (remember those?) It’s another of those books I’ve been ‘meaning to read’ for years – at last an excuse!