Five wonderful books read this month, two of them I have awarded five stars and that rarely happens! Let's take a deeper dive into this month's beauties. If anyone's keeping count, I'm on 7/52 for 2024.
In Memoriam - Alice Winn
This is Alice Winn’s debut novel and what a way to introduce yourself to the literary world.
It’s 1914 and our two main protagonists, Henry Gaunt and Sidney Ellwood are at boarding school, innocents jollying along in life, reciting Tennyson and playing jokes on their pals. They are too young to enlist but nonetheless are fighting a secret battle, a deep infactuation for each other that they are both unaware of.
With Geman heritage and in a bid to protect himself and his family from anti-German sentiment, Gaunt signs up and is sent to the front line. The war is beyond horrific - one of Gaunt’s jobs is to write letters home to parents after friends and fellow soldiers are killed in action - and the description of life in the trenches is vivid and shocking. Missing Gaunt, Ellwood signs up and in the mess of war, the two manage to find moments of togetherness.
This is an epic tale that explores the fluidity and commitment of friendship and love - unrequited, intense and urgent, happy and scarred. Winn’s treatment of the horrors of WWI, during battle and afterwards and the shock of how young many of the soldiers were killed hasn’t left me. It’s superbly written, tender, raw and real.
Rating - 5/5
Olive Kitteridge - Elizabeth Strout
A novel comprised of short stories with a connection; they all involve to varying degrees a woman called Olive Kitteridge. The stories observe many human emotions - loneliness, love, jealousy, desire - and Olive’s marriage and fractured relationship with her only son are major themes. She is stoic, often lacks any empathy or compassion and she seems larger than life - perhaps that was the intention, why Strout chose to set the book mostly in a small town in Maine. I didn’t like the woman at all and struggled with the lack of connection between some of the stories but the writing was good. It’s a Pullitzer prizewinner for fiction but I feel I’ve read books where the protagonist has been better observed and where I’ve been made to feel more.
A close-up look at human interactions and reactions.
Rating - 3/5
Our Hideous Progeny - C E McGill
Another debut novel!
This time, we are taken back to Victorian times where Mary, great niece of Viktor Frankenstein, and her husband Henry, hatch an ambitious plan to make a name for themselves in scientific circles.
Henry is a gambler, unsupportive, selfish and just not a nice person. Mary is clever, curious, outspoken and frustrated by the Victorian era limitations and perceptions of women. In fact, she comes across as man-hating except in her friendship with father-figure and mentor Mr Jamsetjee.
As well as being an ardent feminist, Mary is also sexually curious and develops a fondness for her husband’s sister, Maisie. I’m not sure we needed Mary to explore her sexual feelings, I don’t think it adds anything to the story; she is already an interesting, well-rounded character so I question the point of that.
This book is a great yarn, full of twists and turns and Shelley-esque darkness and I would recommend it.
Rating - 4/5
Shakespeare - Bill Bryson
Bryson takes us through the streets of Elizabethan England, into theatres and explores the language of the day. He examines the hard facts and evidence that exist about Shakespeare’s life, his family, his writing and contemporaries and tries to wheedle out the truth behind some of the many rumours about his plays and sonnets.
It’s a little book - mostly because there isn’t actually that much factual evidence about the Bard himself - but I learned lots of interesting snippets of trivia (Shakespeare’s plays mention love 2259 times and hate just 183) and I enjoyed reading it very much.
Rating - 3/5
Murder on the Orient Express - Agatha Christie
I picked up a secondhand copy of this classic murder mystery for £1 as I loved the retro cover design and it’s been years since I read a book written by Agatha Christie.
A very enjoyable story from start to finish with a fast-paced flow that we don’t see very often in modern literature. I could not put the thing down! The style of the writing is classic Christie, economic and direct descriptions with brilliant dialogue and interaction between her characters. All set on a train, the Orient Express, it brings together 12 travellers of different nationalities, one famous detective and a murdered man.
Obviously the ending is a surprise as Christie was a genius at keeping her readers guessing and Monsieur Poirot unravels the mystery in his own unique style. As this book was written in 1934, you can expect it to be of that age, and gives insights into the way people travelled, their expectations, their language and how stereotypical and judgmental people were - I found it all refreshingly un-PC. How much I enjoyed it was a surprise and I’m now on the lookout for more book bargains to enjoy!
Rating - 5/5
