Sunday evening post...

One of the great perks (and drawbacks!) of being off work all summer is the flexibility I have with my time.  I am no longer confined by weekly structure to write my post on Sunday morning after cooking and baking.  But of course, by the time I’ve had a long, wonderful day of sun, sand, beach and swimming, I’m feeling too tired to post… it’s a challenge, but if this is the biggest difficulty in my life right now, I’m certainly a very lucky girl!

And I’m lucky to have discovered an awesome book last week, The Memento by Christy Ann Conlin, a Canadian writer from Nova Scotia.  In 2002, she wrote a novel called Heave - it was very popular, but I've never read it.  Then nothing until this book, described by the publisher as “haunting gothic elements… reimagined in this strange tale of madness, murder and dark secrets...” (http://penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/30656/memento#9780385662413).  Told from the point of view of the main character, Fancy Mosher, it tells the story of the summer Fancy turns twelve, when she and her friend Art went to work at Petal’s End, a huge mansion set on the rugged shores of the Bay of Fundy (although really, it could be just any old eerie mansion located almost anywhere).  Petal’s End is owned by the illustrious, infamous Parker family, who have been absent from the house for many years, and this summer, the elderly Mrs Parker is planning to return from the city for the season and revive the famous garden party.  As the Parker family members return to the crumbling mansion, Art, Fancy and the other household staff make an effort to restore order from the chaos into which the house and garden have descended. But the Parkers return bringing with them all their dark family secrets, which seep into the atmosphere of the house and garden as the summer days drift by.  And Fancy has her own family secrets, including her Grampie’s talent, which her drunken mother believes has been passed down to Fancy, the twelfth born, although Fancy herself is not convinced.  What this summer leads to is a downward spiral into madness and delirium for many of the key players, and that’s not even at the end of the book!  At about ¾ of the way through, I began to think things would have to take an upward swing, that they could not possibly get worse, but I learned that just when you think things could not possibly get any worse, they usually do.  This was certainly one creepy book!  Creepy children, creepy adults, creepy mansion, creepy garden… even the flowers and the swans were creepy!!  And don’t hold your breath for a happy ending.  It was a really compelling read, very atmospheric, but soooo long and included so much repetitive detail that I found myself losing track of the story on more than one occasion and having to go back to remind myself of what had happened.  The writing was excellent, although Fancy’s sporadic use of the vernacular threw me off a bit, as it was not consistent, and in my opinion, the book would have benefited from some serious editing - at nearly 400 pages, it seemed somewhat overlong.  Still, I couldn’t put it down, and would highly recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys reading gothic novels.  I would rate it a 7.5 out of 10.  One of my favourite parts was when, after yet another horrific tragedy befalls members of the household, Fancy’s friend Art, also just twelve years old, bemoans the passing of his summer and his youth and proclaims that he wants the summer to be fun:  “I just want it to be fun!”  That sums up the story perfectly - sorry Art, there is no fun to be had in this novel!  So if you are in the mood for a not-at-all-uplifting-but-very-creepy-and-compelling gothic novel, this is the book for you!  Enjoy!!

That’s all for now.  Daylight is fading and so am I.  Have a great week, and happy summer reading!

Bye for now…
Julie

Happy Monday!

It’s Monday morning, and I’m drinking my hot cup of steeped chai on a cool, quiet morning, the first I’ve enjoyed since my summer vacation began.  You know that children’s rhyme, “Rub-a-dub-dub, three men in a tub, the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker”...  Well, last week my rhyme was “Bang-a-bang-boom, four men in my home, the plumber, the painter, the patio-door makers”, all week long!  And so, not surprisingly, I got no reading done at all, not even the book we were discussing on Friday for my book club.  I’ll give you a short update on the discussion, then I will tell you about an audiobook I finished listening to last week.

The book we discussed this month was One Summer:  America, 1927 by Bill Bryson.  I’ve read several of Bryson’s books in the past, travel writing about his experiences in different countries, as well as book about his attempt to walk the Appalachian Trail.  These books were light and humourous and easy to get through.  I realize he has written others that I haven’t read, including a book on the history of the English language and a short history of “nearly everything” (I think that’s actually the title of the book!)  But One Summer was a lengthy look at the events that took place in America during the summer of 1927, including the nonstop transatlantic flight of Charles Lindbergh, the Great Mississippi Flood, Babe Ruth and the baseball season of the NY Yankees, the presidency of Calvin Coolidge and the beginning of the talking-film era with the release of “The Jazz Singer”.  The part that I read (the first 49 pages out of 450), was well-written and clearly well-researched, and I look forward to reading the whole book and savouring every detail.  Only two members were able to come out on Friday, and they had, thankfully, both read the whole book.  They discussed Bryson’s presentation of Lindbergh as both the heroic aviator and the not-so-favourable fascist-sympathizer.  His complicated personal life is also discussed in the Epilogue of the book.  They discussed the Cotton Club, an elite club where black entertainers performed for all-white clientele.  One of the ladies listened to this as an audiobook, which was narrated by the author - that doesn’t happen very often.  She said he did a good job, and of course, since he wrote the book, he would know how he would want it to be read, what parts to emphasize, what tone the book should have, etc., which are all factors that influence how a book is narrated.  I told them that, in preparation for the book club meeting, I watched the film “Double Indemnity” with Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurry, based on the James M Cain novel of the same name, which was inspired by the tabloid sensationalized murder by Ruth Snyder and Judd Gray of Ruth’s husband, Albert (this story is related in detail within the first 49 pages of the book).  I told the ladies that Bryson had written these other travel books, and one member asked if he had ever written anything about travels in Canada, or if I knew of any book about this topic.  I have to look into this, but I’m sure such books have been written.  Both ladies agreed that it was an interesting, detailed book, perhaps a bit long, but well worth reading.

And last week I finished listening to a gothic murder mystery by Chris Ewan called Dark Tides.  I know nothing about this author, but the book was interesting, if a bit predictable.  It takes place on the Isle of Man and tells the story of Claire Cooper, a young woman whose mother disappeared on Halloween night when Claire was just eight years old.  Celebrating the Manx tradition of Hop-tu-naa on October 31st, Claire and her mother went out visiting houses and singing songs for treats. When they came back home, she put Claire to bed, and that was the last time she ever saw her mother.  Into her teens, Claire becomes part of a gang of friends who each take turns coming up with a dare for the group every Hop-tu-naa, dares both fun and dangerous.  One such dare gets out of hand and unexpected violence occurs, creating potential ruin for all six friends.  But only one friend suffers from the event, and life seems to go on unimpeded for all the others… until, years later, one friend dies on Hop-tu-naa.  This could be an accident, but the following year, another “accident” happens and Claire, now a detective with the Manx police, begins to investigate further.  As another Hop-tu-naa approaches, she and her remaining friends become anxious and try to safeguard themselves, but can they outwit the psychopath who seems bent on eliminating them all, one year at a time?  The tone of this book reminded me of Daphne DuMaurier’s Rebecca, gothic and descriptive and atmospheric.  Because it began with shifts in time periods, from present to past to sometime in-between, it was challenging to make sense of the story at first, but then I clued into how it was being told and how to fit all the bits together, and I could follow from then on.  It was complex and interesting, and dealt with a group of friends with a secret from their past, just my type of book!  The narrator did a good job of capturing the atmosphere of the story, too, using different tones to build tension and suspense when necessary.  I’d recommend it to anyone who enjoys gothic mysteries, and would advise that you keep reading or listening, even if it seems confusing at first, because it will all make sense in the end.  I’d rate it a 7 out of 10.

That’s all for today.  Enjoy the sunshine!

Bye for now…

Julie

Mid-week post?

It’s the middle of the day, in the middle of the week, and I’m writing my post now because I can!  This is my first week of summer holidays, and every day has been super busy, with no break in sight for a few days.  We decided to go to the beach on Sunday at the last minute, so I couldn’t blog at my usual time, and then things kept coming up to prevent me from writing.  But here we are, with a steeped cup of tea (but no treat *sigh*) as I think about the last book I read.

I actually started reading a great book last week by Canadian author Peter Behrens called Carry Me, but unfortunately it was due back at the library and I couldn’t renew it as it was on hold for someone else, so I had to bring it back after reading only half of it.  It is a historical novel set between WWI and WWII and tells the story of Billy Lange, son of the skipper, and Karin von Weinbrenner, the daughter of the Baron for whom Billy’s father works.  As they grow up, they develop a difficult, awkward relationship that spans pre-war and post-war days, and results in an unexpected pregnancy during the rise of Hitler to power. The narrative consists of flashbacks and jumps in time that at first seem random and confusing, but which make sense as you get further into the novel.  I can’t really comment on this book as I haven’t finished it, but I’ve placed it on hold and hope to get a chance to do just that very soon.  It certainly grabbed my attention and kept me wanting to read, which surprised me because I’m not usually a fan of historical fiction.  More on that book when I finish it.

Then, in honour of Canada Day, I read a debut novel by Canadian author Amy Jones, We’re All in This Together.  This novel is set in present-day Thunder Bay and tells the story of the Parkers, one of the most dysfunctional families I’ve come across in fiction (well, maybe the Lamberts in Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections are nearly as messed up!). Finn Parker calls her brother Shawn and finds out that their mother, Kate, has gone over Kakabeka Falls in a barrel and is in a coma.   Finn knows she has to leave her Mississauga home and her “normal” life and go back to be with her family, the family she fled from three years earlier, with no warning, in the middle of the night, the family she has not been back to see since her flight.  But she really, really doesn’t want to.  And who could blame her?  Her sixty-three year old mother jumps over the Falls in a barrel and is caught on video, a video that quickly goes viral and her mother is dubbed “The Conqueror of Kakabeka”.  Her twin sister Nicki has four children all fathered by different men, one of whom was Finn’s long-term boyfriend at the time of conception.  Nicki is currently married to Hamish, a man ten years younger than her who makes bootleg whisky and sells used stuff on eBay.  Her mother’s behaviour is becoming more and more bizarre, her father is becoming more reclusive, and her oldest niece, London, has been arrested for drug possession.  And the most normal couple of the family, Shawn and Kristiina, along with their two boys, have their own deep-seated problems.  And Shawn isn’t even Finn’s real brother, just a stray lad Kate took in when he was fifteen years old with nowhere to go, a boy who always had one foot out the door… until finally he became more of a Parker than the Parkers.  Can they all learn to overcome their differences and finally become what they’ve fought against for so long, a real family?  I have to say this book started off really strongly.  It was funny, insightful, and wise.  Told in alternating chapters by various characters, it seemed to offer real insight into the experiences of everyone across the three generations of Parkers, and I couldn’t put it down… until it got to the point where I had to put it down.  There was so much “quirkiness” and bizarre behaviour thrown into the book that, at one point, I thought I’d like to plunge over Kakabeka Falls myself!  I think the author tried too hard to fit in everything she could think of, and she offered chapters written by characters who were not really central to the story, which I felt detracted from the story rather than informing the reader.  Overall, it was a light, fun summer read that reached a poignant and emotional conclusion and left this reader feeling satisfied.  It was funny, quirky, emotional and thought-provoking, as only the best Canadian fiction can be.  I’d give it a 7.5 out of 10, and would recommend it to those readers who enjoy “chicklit” (I actually hate that term) or lighthearted, humourous family narratives. I have a favourite section I wanted to share with you. Shawn is thinking about his time with the Parker family: "He has been there for the birth of four children. A wedding. A cancer scare. A difficult goodbye. An epic plunge over a waterfall. But is it the big moments that make up a family? Or is it the quiet conversations on the front porch over a hand of cards, playing Star Wars in the back yard, the mundane arguments, the shared meals and baseball games and cups of tea with a shot of whisky? He doesn't know, so he has to be there for all of them, collect them all and hope in the end they add up to something that feels like a real family."

That’s all for now.  Stay cool and keep reading!

Bye for now…
Julie

Two books on a hot summer day...

It seems like a long time since I’ve written about books.  Unfortunately I’m suffering from an unpleasant summer cold and so, instead of a hot cup of steeped chai tea, I’ve got a steaming cup of Neo-Citran in front of me as I write.  Not so nice, but necessary.  

I have two books to tell you about this week.  The first one I read was one I recommended as a purchase for my public library, The Day She Died by Catriona McPherson.  This psychological thriller begins with Jessie Constable, part-time charity-shop worker, bumping into a tall red-haired man with his two children buying groceries in Marks and Spencer.  She’s seen him before in passing, but he doesn’t appear to recognize her as she offers to assist him with his purchases.  He appears to be dealing with a crisis, and Jessie is good at helping people deal with crises.  She herself has to deal with her own overwhelming phobia, her fear of feathers (but she’s not afraid of birds).  Although at first it looks like the man, Gus, will refuse her offer, with a crafty and subtle turn of phrase, Jessie is suddenly installed at their secluded cottage near a caravan site far from her own home in Dumfries, and is making dinner for Gus’ two children, Ruby, aged four, and Dillon, aged two.  Gus, a sculptor, reveals that his wife, Becky, has disappeared, and they find a suicide note on the dresser in their bedroom.  Then police show up at the door to inform them that Becky has apparently driven off the cliffs - her car and body have been recovered.  Gus goes with them to identify the body, and comes home bereft, determined that Becky would never have killed herself.  Jessie is coerced into spending the night, and one day becomes two and then three, as she is seduced by Gus and by the gorgeous seaside setting.  Gus and Jessie quickly become lovers, and he reveals that he never really loved Becky, that their relationship was all a sham.  Jessie would love to believe this, but some niggling details bother her.  For one thing, there is the sudden departure of Becky’s best friend, Ros, whom Gus says just decided to return home to Poland.  Then there is the strange Polish man hanging around the caravan site who informs Jessie that Ros would never have gone back to Poland.  Why does Gus keep taking different ways to the cottage, first the back way, then the main route - is he trying to confuse Jessie or elude the farm workers and stay under their radar?  And what's with his obsession with the baby monitor? As more pieces are revealed, we become more entangled in the plot, until we don’t know what to believe, and nothing is as it seems.  We are led through a maze of details until the final satisfying conclusion, and while we as readers may find Jessie a bit too gullible at times, she shows herself to be a strong, resourceful and capable woman at the end and redeems herself, at least in this reader’s eyes. This is the second standalone novel I’ve read by this Scottish-born author (who now lives in Texas, I believe), and while it’s not great literature, it sure is creepy.  I’d give it a 7.5 out of 10 and would recommend it to readers who like mysteries where all is not what it seems, and hidden pasts play havoc on the present.  Note: I want to pass on my favourite quotation from this book.  Jessie is talking to Steve, a volunteer at the charity shop where she works, about having the contents of her dreams under control.  Steve, who has taken “every social sciences Open University course ever invented", says “The problem with positive thinking as a therapeutic device… is that it’s so depoliticized that it, in effect, privatises misfortune and turns it into blame” which, according to Jessie, “was a very typical Steve kind of thing to say and ended the conversation like only Steve can” (p 139).

And I read a book by Canadian writer Iain Reid, his first book of fiction, called I’m Thinking of Ending Things.  This book begins with an unnamed girlfriend confiding in the reader that she is thinking of ending her relationship with Jake, her boyfriend of about six weeks.  They are headed along a country road to his childhood home to see his parents, whom she has never met.  She recounts how she and Jake met, and the pros and cons of their relationship so far.  She is unsure about ending things, and thinks this may be a turning point for them, that this visit may just help her decide one way or the other.  But the reader senses that something is not quite right about this scenario, and these suspicions grow deeper as they arrive at the old secluded farmyard and farmhouse.  The interactions the girlfriend has with his parents over a hasty dinner, and her conversations with each parent individually as she explores the house deepen our suspicions and we want to warn her… but to do what?  We have no real proof that something strange is brewing, nor are either of her options good ones - stay with his parents or get back into the car?  As the tension mounts, we are led further and further into this unreliable narrator’s psyche as she tries to save herself from what she fears may be in store for her.  And then the final twist of an ending, which was, for me, a bit of a let-down, but I’m not sure what other ending would have worked.  It was not brilliant, but parts of the book were brilliantly written and made this reader think deeply about life and relationships.  I think I would rate it a 7.5 out of 10, and would recommend this short novel to readers who enjoy books where, once again, all is not what it seems, and whatever the narrator says should not be taken at face value. (Oh boy, so many books about ending things! Maybe I should choose something uplifting next!!)

That’s all for today.  I hope to be feeling better next week as I write my first post for the summer vacation.  Stay cool and keep reading!

Bye for now…
Julie

Let's try this again...

For some reason, yesterday's post did not get delivered to my email as it usually does around 4pm, so I'm going to repost as if it were a new post and see if this will fix things (don't know what happened - I was looking at my email settings yesterday, so hopefully I didn't mess things up!!) Thanks for your patience.

Yesterday's post:

I’m certainly appreciating my steaming cup of chai tea this morning, as it’s a brisk, windy 13 degrees, quite a change from the extra humid day we had yesterday.  

I have a book and an audiobook to tell you about today.  The book is one I read just for fun, Thursday’s Children (alternate UK title Thursday’s Child), a psychological thriller by Nicci French.  I must have read a review of this book somewhere, as I can’t imagine why else I would have requested it from the library.  I’ve read other books by this British husband-and-wife writing team, but not for quite a few years.  This book is the fourth in the “Frieda Klein” mystery series, and opens with Frieda having tea with a friend while waiting for an old school mate to show up.  It is clear from the first few pages that Frieda is not very open about her past, and that she is reluctant to share any information about it with those who are currently in her life, which is interesting since Frieda is a psychotherapist, someone who helps others come to terms with their past and take control of their lives.  Maddie shows up at Frieda’s door seeking help for her teenaged daughter, Becky, who claims to have been raped in her home a few days before.  Maddie doesn’t believe her, and thinks that Becky is just seeking attention and being dramatic, but asks Frieda to assess her and try to help, as she has stopped eating and has become withdrawn.  When Frieda hears Becky’s story, there are details that ring true and Frieda believes her, because when she was sixteen, Frieda herself was a victim of the same rapist.  She offers to do a proper assessment of Becky and then recommend a therapist, and Becky seems to be getting a bit better and even agrees to go to the police, but Maddie is more angry than ever, because she still doesn’t want to believe that her daughter was raped and feels that Frieda is just encouraging Becky in her attention-seeking behaviour.  Then Becky commits suicide, and Frieda must go back to Braxton, the small town where she grew up but a town she has avoided since she left suddenly shortly after her own rape.  Her mother, too, did not believe her, but she eventually went to the police anyway, although that investigation led nowhere.  Frieda visits her mother, whom she hasn’t seen in 23 years, and it becomes clear where Frieda learned to be so antagonistic.  She reaches out to Maddie for information because she doesn’t believe that Becky committed suicide, but Maddie just wants her to go away.  So, forced back into her old life, she sets herself up in Braxton and tries to contact people from her past who could help her piece things together from that night 23 years ago when she was raped in order to figure out who the rapist/murderer is.  All of this leads to a nail-biting conclusion that makes me want to read the first three books in this series, as well as the next two.  While not everything was totally believable, and Frieda’s character was not terribly likeable, the story was complex enough and fast-paced enough to keep me anxiously turning pages and looking for extra opportunities to read.  It definitely would have been helpful to have read the earlier books in order to better understand the relationships between Frieda and most of the male characters in the book, who all seem to be a little in love with her, but you could read this one on its own and still get most of it.  I was reminded of the awesome British film, “Truly, Madly, Deeply”, about a woman who can’t seem to get over the death of her partner, who comes back to haunt her flat and help her move on.  There are many men in her life who are also a little in love with her, and all want to help her with her grief (and her rat problem).  There are many similarities between the characters in the book and in the film, except that the main character in the film, Nina, is wonderful, while Frieda is, well, not-so-wonderful.  Anyway, I’d give it a 7.5 out of 10, and would recommend it to anyone who likes a complex, fast-paced psychological thriller.  As an aside, since I finished reading this book, I haven’t been caught in the rain!

And the audiobook I want to tell you about is March Violets by Philip Kerr, narrated by my favourite reader, John Lee.  I mentioned this book last time in relation to All Quiet on the Western Front and book banning in Nazi Germany.  Well, I’m not quite finished, but I don’t think I will have time to write a post next week, as I will be going away for a “girls’ weekend” and will be getting back late on Sunday.  Bernhard “Bernie” Günther is a 38-year old ex-cop-turned-private investigator in 1936 Berlin who is hired by Hermann Six, a rich industrialist, to track down the diamonds stolen during the home invasion that led to the murder of Six’s daughter and son-in-law and the fire that destroyed their house.  Günther’s investigation leads him to discover that Six and his son-in-law, Paul Pfarr, were at odds with one another, and that Pfarr was planning to reveal Six’s shady dealings to the SS.  One discovery leads to another, including corruption within the government and illicit relationships.  All of this takes place against the backdrop of Nazi Germany just before the outbreak of WWII, and the horror of what is happening is ever-present.  It really hits home during the disturbingly detailed scenes in Dachau camp.  If you are like me, your understanding of the conditions in Germany at that time have been informed largely by films and popular books that depict these conditions.  I have not read extensively outside of the usual material, but this section of the book gives me a fresh look at the horrors that took place in the years leading up to the war.  This seems to be a major theme, the everyday violence, as well as horrific conditions, Jews and others faced at that time, and the inability or reluctance of ordinary Germans to do anything about it.  I’m nearly finished, and it’s certainly been an interesting listening experience so far.  This is Book One in the Berlin Noir trilogy featuring Bernhard Günther.  I’ve listened to Book Two, Pale Criminal, recently, and will definitely check to see if the third book, A German Requiem, is available as an audiobook.  I give it an 8 out of 10, and would recommend it to anyone who likes reading detective novels set in WWII, especially if you enjoy the Philip Marlowe novels (Bernie is definitely his German counterpart).  

Time to get outside and enjoy all the gorgeous sunshine!

Bye for now…
Julie

Book and audiobook talk on a cool, bright morning...

I’m certainly appreciating my steaming cup of chai tea this morning, as it’s a brisk, windy 13 degrees, quite a change from extra humid day we had yesterday.  

I have a book and an audiobook to tell you about today.  The book is one I read just for fun, Thursday’s Children (alternate UK title Thursday’s Child), a psychological thriller by Nicci French.  I must have read a review of this book somewhere, as I can’t imagine why else I would have requested it from the library.  I’ve read other books by this British husband-and-wife writing team, but not for quite a few years.  This book is the fourth in the “Frieda Klein” mystery series, and opens with Frieda having tea with a friend while waiting for an old school mate to show up.  It is clear from the first few pages that Frieda is not very open about her past, and that she is reluctant to share any information about it with those who are currently in her life, which is interesting since Frieda is a psychotherapist, someone who helps others come to terms with their past and take control of their lives.  Maddie shows up at Frieda’s door seeking help for her teenaged daughter, Becky, who claims to have been raped in her home a few days before.  Maddie doesn’t believe her, and thinks that Becky is just seeking attention and being dramatic, but asks Frieda to assess her and try to help, as she has stopped eating and has become withdrawn.  When Frieda hears Becky’s story, there are details that ring true and Frieda believes her, because when she was sixteen, Frieda herself was a victim of the same rapist.  She offers to do a proper assessment of Becky and then recommend a therapist, and Becky seems to be getting a bit better and even agrees to go to the police, but Maddie is more angry than ever, because she still doesn’t want to believe that her daughter was raped and feels that Frieda is just encouraging Becky in her attention-seeking behaviour.  Then Becky commits suicide, and Frieda must go back to Braxton, the small town where she grew up but a town she has avoided since she left suddenly shortly after her own rape.  Her mother, too, did not believe her, but she eventually went to the police anyway, although that investigation led nowhere.  Frieda visits her mother, whom she hasn’t seen in 23 years, and it becomes clear where Frieda learned to be so antagonistic.  She reaches out to Maddie for information because she doesn’t believe that Becky committed suicide, but Maddie just wants her to go away.  So, forced back into her old life, she sets herself up in Braxton and tries to contact people from her past who could help her piece things together from that night 23 years ago when she was raped in order to figure out who the rapist/murderer is.  All of this leads to a nail-biting conclusion that makes me want to read the first three books in this series, as well as the next two.  While not everything was totally believable, and Frieda’s character was not terribly likeable, the story was complex enough and fast-paced enough to keep me anxiously turning pages and looking for extra opportunities to read.  It definitely would have been helpful to have read the earlier books in order to better understand the relationships between Frieda and most of the male characters in the book, who all seem to be a little in love with her, but you could read this one on its own and still get most of it.  I was reminded of the awesome British film, “Truly, Madly, Deeply”, about a woman who can’t seem to get over the death of her partner, who comes back to haunt her flat and help her move on.  There are many men in her life who are also a little in love with her, and all want to help her with her grief (and her rat problem).  There are many similarities between the characters in the book and in the film, except that the main character in the film, Nina, is wonderful, while Frieda is, well, not-so-wonderful.  Anyway, I’d give it a 7.5 out of 10, and would recommend it to anyone who likes a complex, fast-paced psychological thriller.  As an aside, since I finished reading this book, I haven’t been caught in the rain!

And the audiobook I want to tell you about is March Violets by Philip Kerr, narrated by my favourite reader, John Lee.  I mentioned this book last time in relation to All Quiet on the Western Front and book banning in Nazi Germany.  Well, I’m not quite finished, but I don’t think I will have time to write a post next week, as I will be going away for a “girls’ weekend” and will be getting back late on Sunday.  Bernhard “Bernie” Günther is a 38-year old ex-cop-turned-private investigator in 1936 Berlin who is hired by Hermann Six, a rich industrialist, to track down the diamonds stolen during the home invasion that led to the murder of Six’s daughter and son-in-law and the fire that destroyed their house.  Günther’s investigation leads him to discover that Six and his son-in-law, Paul Pfarr, were at odds with one another, and that Pfarr was planning to reveal Six’s shady dealings to the SS.  One discovery leads to another, including corruption within the government and illicit relationships.  All of this takes place against the backdrop of Nazi Germany just before the outbreak of WWII, and the horror of what is happening is ever-present.  It really hits home during the disturbingly detailed scenes in Dachau camp.  If you are like me, you’re understanding of the conditions in Germany at that time have been informed largely by films and popular books that depict these conditions.  I have not read extensively outside of the usual material, but this section of the book gives me a fresh look at the horrors that took place in the years leading up to the war.  This seems to be a major theme, the everyday violence, as well as horrific conditions, Jews and others faced at that time, and the inability or reluctance of ordinary Germans to do anything about it.  I’m nearly finished, and it’s certainly been an interesting listening experience so far.  This is Book One in the Berlin Noir series featuring Bernhard Günther.  I’ve listened to Book Two, Pale Criminal, recently, and will definitely check to see if the third book, A German Requiem, is available as an audiobook.  I give it an 8 out of 10, and would recommend it to anyone who likes reading detective novels set in WWII, especially if you enjoy the Philip Marlowe novels (Bernie is definitely his German counterpart).  

TIme to get outside and enjoy all the gorgeous sunshine!

Bye for now…
Julie

Post on a cool, overcast morning...

As I sit down to write, I’m enjoying a steaming cup of chai and some fresh Ontario “first-pick” strawberries that I got at the market yesterday, along with a slice of freshly baked Date Bread.  Although I know it will get warmer and more humid this afternoon, we had thunderstorms last night so this morning it is cool and overcast and looking like it could rain again at any moment… very fall-like, and just the kind of weather I love!  

My volunteer book group met yesterday to discuss All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque.  This is one of the books that I’ve had on my shelf for years and falls into Italo Calvino’s category of “books you’ve been meaning to read for ages and now it’s time to finally read them”.  Written by a German who was a former soldier during WWI, it tells the story of Paul Bӓumer, a German soldier in WWI.  But unlike other “war stories”, it is, as he writes on the first page before the novel begins, “neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure, for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it.  It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped shells, were destroyed by war.”  There were, of course, battles and attacks, and leaves to go home, and card games, and trysts with French women, and hospital stays, and dealing with the wounded, both German and French, in the field.  But there were also many scenes of philosophizing about war and life amongst the men of Bӓumer’s battalion, as well as contemplation about the nature of war, and how it affects soldiers, both during the war and afterwards.  While on leave, Paul finds that he has difficulty fitting into his old life, and just wants to get back to his men.  This leads to consideration about what he will do after the war, how that sort of life is almost impossible to imagine.  My group was definitely glad to have read it, although, as is typical for us, it was certainly not an uplifting read.  We discussed the nature of war as we understand it.  I read aloud a section of the book when the men in Paul’s group are discussing war, and one man, Kat, is pointing out that, in war, unlike in real life, “(a man’s) head is turned by having so much power”.  Someone brought up that famous quotation, “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely”.  Paul considers his experiences so far, as he is barely nineteen years old, and says “We are forlorn like children, and experienced like old men, we are crude and sorrowful and superficial - I believe we are lost.”  This really speaks to the point Remarque states at the beginning of the book, that even the men who are spared the shell are destroyed by war, that they will never have a chance to grow up and experience life as others have, they will always be separated by this horrific period in their lives.  We spoke about the poetic language of the book, and one member who read this many years ago in the original German said that the translation she had (translated by A. W. Wheen in 1929, which is the one we all had) was not a very good one, that some of the English words used were not accurate, particularly when the men are speaking.  But she said that the sections concerning philosophy and contemplation were fairly well translated. We all agreed that this book made us feel deeply, and think deeply about war and politics.  I’m listening to an audiobook that is a historical detective novel called March Violets by Philip Kerr, set in Berlin in 1936.  When I’m finished listening to it, I’ll write about it more fully, but it was interesting that just as I was finishing Western Front, which was one of the first books banned and burnt by the Nazis in 1933, one of the characters in the Kerr novel tells the main character, Bernhard Günther, that he should read a particular book now while it’s back in print.  He says that the book was banned by the Nazis and she agrees, telling him that it’s back in the bookshops to make the tourists in Berlin for the Olympics believe that things are not as bad as they have been led to believe.  That was a curious coincidence, and made me feel that I was meant to read this book now.  And with tomorrow being D-Day, thoughts of war linger.  We discussed the difficulties of readjusting to civilian life a soldier had, after different wars, and how the affects of war were not really acknowledged by family members, that former soldiers were expected to come home and just get on with things.  We talked about the different major wars, and how public responses varied according to how the causes of that war were perceived.  This led the group to think about other novels about war, and some of the titles we mentioned were Regeneration by Pat Barker, Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut, and The Wars by Timothy Finley.  This is, of course, a very short list.  I also mentioned a German film that this novel brought to mind, “Das Boot”, based on the 1973 novel The Boat, by Lothar-Günther Buchheim.  I would definitely recommend this book as essential reading if you want to understand the experiences of soldiers in WWI, and would rate it a 9 out of 10.

That’s all for today.  This cool, overcast, rainy weather perfectly suits the book I’m reading right now, Thursday’s Children by Nicci French, a British mystery where the characters seem to always be getting caught in the rain.  

Bye for now…
Julie

Later: I went out briefly this afternoon and, as if predicted by my reading selection, I did, in fact, get caught in the rain! I find it kind of eerie when my books mirror my life...