by Julia Kuttner
Blackout, by Connie Willis
The year is 2060. Time travel has been perfected and it is now possible for scientists and historians to travel back through time to ‘observe’ and experience defining times in world history. Oxford University is home to a thriving laboratory of highly skilled technicians who can send scholars anywhere to a century and an event that they wish to study and experience, complete with authentic clothes provided by wardrobe, and mannerisms, accents and information implanted for the period of time they will be away. Nothing can go wrong; all contingencies have been covered – except for a slight problem of ‘slippage’, the hours or even days that the arrival and departure times might be erroneous. Nevertheless, it’s considered a minor inconvenience and three historians travel back to 1940, to London and the Blitz, experiencing at terrifying first-hand the sleeplessness and fear, the grief of losing friends and loved ones, and the indomitable courage and collective good cheer of a people under terrible siege. Ms Willis describes the bombing raids to such good effect that the reader feels right in the thick of action that she really would never want to experience; there are many well-drawn and engaging characters, in particular two cockney child evacuees, dreadful but wonderfully engaging and Ms Willis, in spite of her American origins, gets all the accents and idioms right for the most part - any errors left can be attributed to careless editing . This is a rattling good read and we are inexorably drawn on to the sequel ‘All Clear’ for at the conclusion of ‘Blackout’, the worst has happened: the three historians’ access to their own time has been blocked; ‘The Drop’ is no longer working. They are trapped.
Sadly, Ms. Willis runs out of steam in ‘All Clear’, which appears to be a direct continuation of the story - that would be fair enough, were her plot not to become bogged down in a lot of extraneous detail, soul-searching and rhetorical questions which this reader found tiresome in the extreme. This is disappointing, for the first book is fast-paced and has genuine passages of quality writing: her description of the evacuation of Dunkirk is gripping and meticulously researched, her characters believable and brave in their ordinariness. A reader commented on the remarks sheet of ‘All Clear’ after reading it: ‘ One book too many’. Fair comment.
Freedom, by Jonathan Franzen
Ten years ago Jonathan Franzen wowed the literary cognoscenti with his superb novel ‘The Corrections’, and that world has been waiting with breathless anticipation ever since for the next opus. Jonathan Franzen writes about families: in ‘The Corrections’ he explored the lives of two protagonists in a very long marriage, and the relationship between them and their children to hilarious and stunning effect; the American nuclear family at the turn of the century was laid mercilessly bare by his astute and incisive observations, but all was softened by his wonderfully Dickensian humour.
Now we have the long-awaited second novel, once again about families, flawed and almost titanic in their awfulness, and again Mr. Franzen softens his ruthless dissection of contemporary American society with delicious and much-needed wit: sadly for this reader, the recipe doesn’t seem so wildly successful the second time around. I realize that I am a lone swimmer against the tide of literary adulation and sparkling reviews from those eminently qualified to know, but I still feel that Mr. Franzen has not done justice to his characters – his exploration of what defines freedom for each of them gets bogged down in nit-picking and navel-gazing, WHICH SHOULD NOT HAPPEN! For Walter and Patty Englund deserve better treatment from their creator. They meet in college; Walter is a shy, decent, hard-working intellectual, a passionate advocate for the environment studying for a law degree - and always attracted to the unattainable, in this case Patty Emerson, a talented basketball player and very damaged member of a high-achieving family. Naturally, Patty is barely aware of his existence, being much more attracted to Walter’s disreputable room-mate and friend Richard Katz, leader of a punk band of no repute. ‘Richard is an itch she must scratch’! Sadly this doesn’t occur until after Patty and Walter have been married for some years, Patty having been worn down by Walter’s goodness and deciding that to be an awesome wife and mother to his children is her destiny. What Happens Next, the awful consequences of a steamy tryst to scratch the itch, loses impact with long-winded digressions into the family origins of Walter and Patty, an equally verbose section devoted to their utterly self-centred (thanks to Patty) and odious son Joey and his long-running affair with next-door neighbor Connie, and Walter’s liaison with an impossibly glamorous Indian P.A. named Lalitha. I have to say that my eyes were rolling like marbles and the ‘Yeah, right!’s were coming thick and fast: Mr. Franzen’s characters weren’t just unlikeable, but scarcely credible,which is a great shame. A writer of his talents and undeniable artistry should have romped away with his story and the reader; instead he compels us all to amble slowly through a maze of time-wasting side-streets before reaching Home, and an impossibly pat and happy ending – not that I’m against happy endings per se, but why didn’t he end with ‘And They All Lived Happily Ever After’ and be done with it!
Now: Your first requisite for reading this book is strong wrists – it’s a doorstopper. Your second is a complete suspension of ‘yeah, right!’ comments as I recount my heavily-abridged version of the plot, for this is a novel on the grand scale as well as huge physical size; it’s a tale of a scientific experiment gone dreadfully, fatally wrong, conducted by the U.S. Army in a remote location in the mountains of Colorado, the scientific objective being to create a race of ‘Super Soldiers’, impervious to heat, cold, disease and virtually indestructible, thereby conquering America’s terrorist enemies in Afghanistan and the Indian subcontinent. There would be no more wounded and dying to be returned home ‘eating up the defense budget in the veterans’ hospitals’; in short, it would be the answer to the Pentagon’s prayers – all that had to be done was to inject a new-found virus into chosen candidates, and after a short period of illness, a new, invincible warrior would be born. 
There is no end to Ms. French’s myriad talents – quite apart from her superb comic skills as an actress she has now proven that she is also a writer of insight and wit, capturing effortlessly in her amber the 21st century family: Mum Maureen Battle (Mo), capable and efficient, on-to-it child psychologist – except when it comes to her own children, about whom she clearly hasn’t a clue: Dad or ‘Husband’ as Mo invariably refers to him, hovering lovingly in the background, keeping the wheels turning in ever so subtle ways in his efforts to provide a loving and stable environment for his family. He has a job, ‘doing something with computers’, but everyone seems to be vague as to its specifics: Dora, about to turn 18 and full of teenage angst and self-loathing, is fretting about the humiliation of being dumped by her small but perfectly-formed boyfriend, being a virgin, being less than interested in a future career, and being FAT! Last but not least, Peter: call him Oscar please, as he is such a disciple of Mr. Wilde that he is sure he is his reincarnation. Peter is also tall, cherubic, flamboyant, academically brilliant and gay as a hat – and proud of it - no gender angst for Mr. Peter; in fact the only thing he agonises over is having to live in Pangbourne, the most deeply unfashionable place on earth.
This novel is not for the faint-hearted. It’s themes are as unforgiving and brutal as the Texas landscape in which the story is set – but WHAT a story: starting in 1895 with the death in childbirth of the beloved wife of Vaclav Sala, a Czech immigrant cotton farmer. The baby, the fourth son for the couple, survives but Vaclav is completely unmanned and embittered by his loss. His heart turns to stone and he regards his sons, particularly the youngest as intolerable reminders of what he once had. He becomes famous in the district for treating his horses better than his sons – in fact, he races his horses and makes his sons pull the plough in front of him, no better than human livestock, with all four reaching adulthood with permanently deformed necks. His sons hate Vaclav (not that he cares) but they are staunch in their love and support of each other – until their father accepts a wager from a very rich Spaniard newly arrived in the district: a horse race between Vaclav’s best mount, ridden by 15 year-old Karel, the youngest, despised cause of his wife’s death, and the Spaniard’s beautiful thoroughbred, ridden by his spirited youngest daughter. The prize if Karel wins: 600 acres of land. If he loses, the three eldest brothers must wed the Spaniard’s daughters. The brothers are ecstatic! It’s a win-win situation for them – escape from their tyrannical father, and legal union to three comely girls: what could be better – provided Karel will only lose. And Karel finds that he doesn’t want to, indeed can’t, because Vaclav threatens him with a terrible punishment if he dares to throw the race; he is caught between the devil and the deep blue sea, and Mr. Machart doesn’t spare us as he draws us inexorably onwards to the terrible conclusion of the wager and the end of the brothers’ loving alliance against their terrible parent.
What a great pleasure it was to read this debut novel, judged to be one of the New York Times’ 10 best books of 2010, for Mr. Goodwillie has produced that rare thing; a superior literary thriller which combines great suspense with searching moral and ethical questions: which person or event provides the fire to the touchpaper of radicalism from within? What ‘last straw’ finally breaks the back of tolerance in an age of disillusionment and impotence? For Paige Roderick it is the death by friendly fire of her brother in the Iraq war – for Aidan Cole, jaded and going-nowhere-fast failed journalism student turned blogger, (phew, glad I wasn’t holding my breath when I wrote that) it is merely the fact that he wishes to rescue Paige (she’s a serious hotty, quite apart from her lofty ideals!) and keep her safe from the radicals she hitherto supported, after it becomes clear that they no longer want to blow up buildings: they want to kill people too. This novel is beautifully constructed, a split memoir with each chapter narrated by Aidan or Paige; Aidan has a very nice line in black humour, describing his New York lifestyle with ruthless honesty. Paige is also honest, remaining true at great cost to her integrity and ideals: she had firmly believed ‘that America had passed an invisible tipping point, strayed too far from the noble tenets of its founding; taking it back would require drastic measures.’ Now her radical friends have reached a tipping point of their own – radicalism has turned into terrorism and she knows too much for them to allow her to live. Mr. Goodwillie has written the thinking man’s thriller, fast-paced, highly suspenseful – and unafraid to ask the uncomfortable questions of a complacent, apathetic society. *****
This is the story of a newspaper, a newspaper founded in the 50’s in Rome by an industrial tycoon who had enough money to indulge himself in a flight of fancy, that of providing a superior international news organ for English speakers in Europe. It didn’t matter that it didn’t make money; what mattered most was that it be a benchmark always for the highest journalistic standards – and a means of being close to his one true love, the woman he installs as joint editor – with her husband. So begins Tom Rachman’s charming novel of the experience of living and working in Rome, producing a newspaper for English readers. He knows the business intimately, having worked as a correspondent and editor for Associated Press in New York and Rome, and for the Herald Tribune in Paris; in fact his characters have such a ring of truth about them I have to wonder how thinly veiled they are: how many of his former work colleagues recognize themselves in this book? There is the Editor-in-Chief, hugely intelligent, driven, and driving everyone else before her in a breathless attempt to produce a daily newspaper that people will read despite competition from the relentlessly encroaching electronic media; sadly, she also drives away the men in her life with her harsh judgements and scathing opinions of their worth. Her second in command Craig Menzies is a workaholic, living with a much younger woman whom he adores. He can’t believe that she wants to stay with him permanently – how could someone like him ever be THAT lucky? Through a tragic miscalculation of his own, he is eventually proven correct. Arthur Gopal, son of one of India’s greatest writers is in charge of ‘Puzzle Wuzzle’ and Obituaries; he knows he has more to offer the paper than the tasks to which he is set, and through a series of carefully calculated underhand moves manages to get the promotion he always dreamed of: culture editor, over and above the former holder of that title, Clint Oakley, a loudmouthed braggart and racist who is demoted in turn, to his fury and dismay, to Puzzle Wuzzle and Obits! Mr. Rachman’s debut novel is a delight, witty, convincingly written and peopled with great characters who are all linked by the work they do for the paper – which cannot last; the bosses in Atlanta are ready to pull the plug, with tragic consequences for one of their own. This is a very funny book, but the reader still gets sucker-punched along the way. I’m still thinking about some of the shocks I never saw coming, and this is how fine writing can be and should be. *****
Here’s something different in the Whodunnit category, and what a welcome – and different – breath of fresh air it is: Emily Tempest, the novel’s protagonist, is a half-aboriginal woman whose stamping ground is the Northern Territory. Her white father has worked in the mining industry all his life and never remarried after the death of his aboriginal wife 20 years earlier. Emily has received a unique upbringing in that her father has encouraged her to embrace both cultures ; consequently she is responsible, educated ( well, nearly: she went to Uni to study Earth Science, not with the intention of getting a degree but to understand better the ancient land that has its roots in her heart. When she felt she had learned all she wanted to know she left. Without the degree.), and fearless to a fault: her aggression and disrespect for authority is legendary, especially if she sees injustice – ‘that bint has got nice tits and a mouth like a blowtorch!’ – is a common opinion held by Emily’s suffering work colleagues, the local constabulary. For Emily is the district’s Aboriginal Community Police officer – a ‘Clayton’s Cop’, she calls herself, but conscientious in her representation of her people, those sad, aggressive, drunks and no-hopers who subsist in the humpies on the edge of town. Mr. Hyland doesn’t give us the hearts and flowers version of the uneasy alliance between the People of the Dreaming and the white usurpers; imbedded racism bubbles away under the surface and spills over it too; ‘those bloody abos’ contribute diligently to their own degradation, but the story is infused with great insight (Mr. Hyland worked for 10 years with aboriginal communities in Central Australia) and hope; with Emily as their champion ‘those bloody abos’ have more rights than they were aware of, and a reason to return and protect the great red land of their ancestors from something evil that is poisoning it and everything it sustains. An old miner is murdered before he can reveal what that poison is, and Emily relies on her prescience and instincts as much as her intelligence to solve the crime – along with a cast of Outback characters that put ‘Dad and Dave’ to shame. This is the third Emily Tempest novel; I hope the library will give us the treat of the other two: ‘Moonlight Downs’ and ‘Diamond Dove’: the action is hectic; the corpses pile up everywhere; the ducks are all lined up in a row at the conclusion, and the Ocker humour is unbeatable. One of the characters stops to think and ‘He gave a fair imitation of a budgie trying to pass an emu’s egg’. Can you top that? I don’t think so. ****
Stephen King needs no introduction. Some of his more fulsome admirers have likened him to a modern-day Dickens, which is certainly true regarding his output; fans can expect a new novel every year, faithfully arriving regardless of adverse personal circumstance (he had a near-fatal accident one year) and world calamity. It would no longer be politic to say that he is reliable as the weather, given the current apocalyptic floods occurring world-wide, but you can certainly set your clock by his ability to churn out yet another best-seller. Having said that, Mr. King’s novels, while not all of a high standard, are ALWAYS wonderfully readable, having just that right blend of the ordinary and macabre which never fails to make the hair rise on the back of the neck most pleasurably. He says that he has always been interested in exploring the reaction of ordinary people to extraordinary events, and this is never more ably demonstrated than in his latest collection of four novellas, all dealing with themes of retribution: the first is called ‘1922’, the year that a husband hates his wife so much that he plans what he hopes is her perfect murder, only to snare his son into being his accomplice with tragic results; ‘Big Driver’ is a cautionary tale of what happens to a lady novelist who accepts an offer of help to change her flat tire on a road to nowhere; ‘Fair Extension’ recounts the bargain a desperate and dying man makes with a stranger when he reveals to himself as well as the stranger that he hates and despises his so-called best friend; and ‘Good Marriage’, demonstrates that the true love between two decent people changes irrevocably when large sums of money are involved – and decency flies out the window, too. Yes, Mr. King has done it again, producing the cleverly plotted page-turner that I always expect of him: entertaining, readable, reliable: yep, that’s him!
Here is a story of South Africa, that wild, cruel, beautiful land, written by an Afrikaner woman about Afrikaners in the 50’s and 60’s and beyond. It is the story of a childless white woman, Milla De Wet, who is trapped in an unhappy marriage with her husband Jak, righteous upholder of Boer ideals and utterly convinced of white supremacy over his brown farm labourers: ‘Give a Hotnot your thumb and he’ll take your arm!’ Milla is lonely, unfulfilled and severely disillusioned with her young handsome husband; he’s not happy with her either, or his life on her inherited family farm. He beats and belittles her constantly. She sees as her salvation the adoption of a little coloured girl from her mother’s farm; Agaat has been ill-treated and abused nearly to death: Milla sees her rescue of the child as an excellent act of charity, a way of proving (especially to her forbidding old Boer mother and Jak) that she can be the perfect Christian, dispensing love and kindness to the needy and less fortunate, and a wonderful surrogate mother to the child who is not hers – and the wrong colour. The inevitable happens. Loving bonds are formed, then broken – her husband is jealous of the new-found affection Milla has for her little charge and decrees that Agaat must be trained and treated as a servant - then a miracle occurs: after many years Milla is finally pregnant, but after the birth of the longed-for son, Agaat is jettisoned, exiled to an outside room ; her favoured status is over.
Louis Kahn, internationally renowned American Architect, died of a heart attack in Penn Station, New York in 1976, aged 74. He had just returned from India, and because he had insufficient identification on him his body was unclaimed for three days. He had also been declared bankrupt, owing half a million dollars at the time of his death and he had two mistresses, each with a child to him – and a wife of many years at home.
This classic little Swedish movie was made in the 80’s but it has lost none of its impact; nothing is dated – the world according to adolescents is still unexplored, wondrous – and frightening. 12 year-old Ingmar and his older brother can no longer live with their beloved mother; she is very ill. Older brother goes to their Granny and Ingmar is sent to his uncle in a little town a long train ride away. He is forced to leave his beloved little dog behind but is assured it will be taken care of: that is the first betrayal. Despite missing his pet terribly, Ingmar makes friends easily, and looks forward to going back to live with his mum and ‘making her laugh again’ when she is better. The trouble is – well, Mum doesn’t get better and Ingmar and his brother are forced to learn some of life’s very hard lessons whether they want to or not. Lasse Hallström directs and guides his actors effortlessly through low comedy and high drama and all his actors respond accordingly, especially Ingmar – he is a delight: I can’t believe that this wonderful child will now be getting on to forty; he will always be twelve to me, mischievous, poignant and funny. Be warned (those who don’t like them!) there are subtitles, but they will be secondary after the very first scene. What a beaut little movie! 
ean Gilkyson has been round the block more times than she cares to admit after the accidental death of her 21 year-old husband Griff in a car which she was driving. The child of their union, 9 year-old Griff never knew her father but knows with certainty the relationship her mother is in now will end in violence and tears – if they are lucky. 
When I began this book, I didn’t think I’d be able to continue with it; I wasn’t in the mood for the unbearable poignancy of the first couple of chapters which set the scene for what happens to Molly Allgood, a once-famous actress using the stage name of Maire O’Neill. How fortunate I am that I chided myself for my faint-heartedness and pressed on beyond the squalor and misery of Molly’s old age, to be utterly beguiled by her memories of her youth and beauty, and her once-in-a-lifetime love for John Millington Synge, the famous and controversial Irish playwright. Synge was a co-founder with William Butler Yeats and Lady Augusta Gregory of the famous Abbey Theatre in Dublin and produced his works there until his premature death at the age of 37; Molly and her older sister Sarah received their dramatic training there and both went on to fame and fortune in the early part of the twentieth century, Sarah making a name for herself in Hollywood and Molly becoming a notable stage actress. Tragically, Molly cannot forget her reclusive and brilliant lover, and as her life enters its decline she sees him everywhere – in the mirror, on the street – and was that his voice just whispering behind her? Mr. O’Connor recreates these real-life characters with superlative skill; he is careful to stress that he has written a work of fiction, and profusely apologises to Synge scholars for the many errors and licence he has taken with dates and facts - all in the name of a good story - but there is no denying the life and the breath he has given his protagonists. In true Irish fashion, he can be the Master of Melancholy in one chapter, then in the next he ambushes the reader with a seduction scene that is side-splittingly funny. Mr. O’Connor can wear the masks of Tragedy and Comedy with equal ease, and the elegance and musicality of his prose is a delight. He ‘can make a glass eye cry’, or let the reader be ‘as happy as a threaded needle’. What more could we ask? FIVE STARS
Costa Zannis is a Senior Police Officer in Salonika, Greece, in 1940. World War 2 is underway and Hitler is massing his forces in the Balkans, ready to push south. Costa is very good at his job; he is a decent man, blessed with an empathy and excellent judgement of his fellow citizens and their failings - but Costa’s world has become a very dangerous place, and feels even more so when he is approached by a very rich lady, a German Jew, who wishes his assistance in smuggling Jews out of Berlin, where she lives with her husband, a high-ranking Wehrmacht officer. So far, she is untouchable by the Gestapo – her husband is powerful - but her friends are not; she has the money to finance their flight, but not the contacts, until she hears of Costa and his very special network of friends and colleagues. Thus begins Costa’s reluctant expansion of his talents; from canny policeman to clandestine operative, for he cannot refuse her request for his help – no decent man could. Mr. Furst takes the reader on a fascinating, suspenseful journey through the Balkan countries as the first Jews make their tentative way to Greece and safety; he has a particular talent for establishing atmosphere and mood, essential elements in a spy story – BUT! – (and it’s a very big one) – in the latter half of the story Costa’s talents become known to others who require him to further the war effort in a different, risky, even more life-threatening way and though the novel’s tension should heighten at this point to an unbearable level the story suffers and the suspense starts to sag with the introduction of glamorous, beautiful Demetria , wife of a cruel shipping magnate. It is love at first sight for hitherto down-to-earth and sensible Costa; he falls for her like a blind roofer (which brings me to wonder cynically why no-one ever seems to fall in love at first sight with a woman who has, say, a wall eye or is slightly mustachioed. Demetria is also blonde and has a big bottom, but this is 1940: big bottoms are IN). The plot’s impetus suffers accordingly. Having said that, ‘Spies of the Balkans’ is still an enormously entertaining read; Mr. Furst is too clever a writer to produce a flop – it’s just not quite as good as his previous novels, in particular ‘The Spies of Warsaw’. Read that one as well!
Huey Dunstan has murdered a man in a violent and frenzied attack; his case is regarded as open-and-shut and despite a spirited defense from his counsel, he is sentenced to life imprisonment. Dunstan is 23 years old, reserved, even withdrawn, but regarded as a good man, respectful to authority and his elders and the last person to be considered capable of such a crime. His counsel feels that there is more to the case than meets the eye and enlists the assistance of an old friend of his, Psychologist Charlie Chesney, to interview Huey, and see if he can prise his secrets from him, thus leading to an appeal and a retrial where the charge of murder could be reduced to manslaughter, with a defence of provocation. Mr. McNeish is a most competent writer and presents his characters well, particularly ‘Ches’, who narrates the story - and happens to be blind. I have to confess that I found Ches’s daily struggles and compromises with his disability to be more fascinating than the crime itself, important though it is in light of current events: thanks to the infamous Clayton Weatherston trial, where he would admit only to manslaughter not murder because he was ‘provoked’ into stabbing his girlfriend 216 times, the law of provocation as defence has now been abolished in NZ. This law still applies in Mr. McNeish’s story, however, and he produces a satisfying courtroom drama with all the twists and turns that we would expect in such a case. Because Ches is 82 when he begins the story I can’t expect him to be resurrected in a second book - he is reminiscing, really, about a particularly intriguing case in the body of his life’s work – but that’s a shame: the reader is the poorer for not reconnecting with Charlie Chesney, in his official capacity or otherwise, in the future.
Dima is a Russian gangster, and proud of it. He is also an expert money-launderer for the Russian Mafia and has amassed huge wealth for them, and for himself – but a new young ‘Prince’ is coming to the fore in the Mafia Hierachy, and the Prince doesn’t like Dima; Dima is too ‘Old-School’, he dwells too much on the old Vor code of Honour amongst thieves (and murderers) and after one last, biggest laundering operation – the opening of a new ‘respectable’ bank in the City of London – Dima and his family will be eliminated, as were several of his dear friends and colleagues already: it’s time, thinks Dima, to defect with all his secrets and sell them to his preferred country of asylum, Great Britain. Yet again John Le Carré has crafted an impeccable story of secret service diplomacy, political corruption and life-and-death back-room dealings; his characters are superb, almost Dickensian in range and description and utterly, utterly believable. Mr. Le Carré has the best eye and ear for accents and body language in the business, and his wit, interspersed even at times of great suspense in this beautifully plotted story, is delicious. This is the master at his best: FIVE STARS.
The Lathams are your typical upper middle-class suburban American family: father Glen is a respected Ophthalmologist; Mary-Beth his wife is content if not wildly happy with her comfortable role as his consort and mother to their three bright children, beautiful Ruby and twins Alex and Max; she has her own little side business designing gardens for her neighbours – everything in the Latham family garden should be rosy, but it isn’t. There are secrets in this family; damaging secrets: 14 year old Max suffers from anxiety and depression and Ruby is a recovering anorexic. There are some who would regard these illnesses as typical 21st century diseases; that may be so, but family suffering is not lessened because many children are now bound by such commonality: the Lathams try to respond to and overcome their problems with as much love and good common-sense as they can muster – until a tragedy, more unbelievable and horrifying than they can ever imagine overtakes them all. Ms Quindlen, in her spare, lucid prose guides us through the unspeakable events that change the Lathams’ lives forever. She tackles the core subject, grief, with great delicacy and skill; in fact she writes so intimately of her characters that I wondered if she had suffered a similar tragedy and used this story as a catharsis: regardless, she has produced a novel of great insight, empathy and intelligence. This is a harrowing read, but it’s also a story of courage, familial love and most importantly, hope. Highly recommended.
