nocto

I really enjoyed Behind the Scenes at the Museum for its twisted up story and uncertain narration but I could never get into Atkinson's second book Human Croquet, I must try again. I picked up this book in the book shop in two minds about whether to try it and it grabbed me instantly and I've really enjoyed reading it.

As in Museum I was never quite sure where this story was going or what the main storyline was but the writing pulled me in and carried me along on a tide of interesting happenings and witty asides.

Most of the book is set at the University of Dundee in 1972 with a cast of characters as long as your arm. The many students and staff could have become an amorphous mass of academics but that is exactly what they are not and the individualness of each character is one of the book's major strengths.

Sometimes I felt it would have been nice to have had more of a hint of the destination of the runaway prose train but mainly this is the type of book where the reader is along for the ride and has to trust the author to put the pieces together eventually. Atkinson does put the pieces together superbly and this tale is a mystery of its own kind. Highly recommended if you aren't too concerned with knowing what's going on for the first 350 pages of a book.

Purchased on 4th February 2002.

I love first person narration. Not that I dislike other kinds of storytelling but I love being picked up and rather than looking over someone's shoulder being put right inside their head. This book is written as Cassandra Mortmain's diary and so far I'm just wondering why I've never got around to reading it before.

I put this book down for ages in the middle and it took me a while to pick it up again. It's definitely worth a read though. Since it has a seventeen year old narrator and the book's concerned with both her first experiences of being treated as an adult and about her elder sister trying to get the family out of the severe poverty that they've fallen into by marrying herself off to a rich new neighbour you can see why this book has been primarily marketed at the teenage girl market. I think it deserves it's place on the adult bookshelves though as there is so much more here than just a growing up and finding romance tale.

Purchased on 4th February 2002.

[on the characters]

I was finding Brock to be not quite himself at the beginning of the book and was pleased when this was explained by plot rather than by inconsistent writing. I think everyone else was consistently portrayed too, I'm really enjoying seeing the characters develop bit by bit.

I was really pleased that the woman in the red sports car from the first book appeared again, I was thinking that Maitland had forgotten about her. That's the kind of detail that draws me from book to book in a series and makes series books the great reads they often are. I was glad to see a few more recurring characters in Bren and Leon - I'm really intrigued by the fact that Leon uses a transvestite bar as a hideaway, I want to learn more about him in future books.

I didn't really miss anyone from previous books, I'd like to see more of the side characters to the police, like Kathy's Aunt Maryanne and Bren's family but I'm satisfied that Maitland will show us more in future books.

I thought all the characters were very well drawn, as have been the vast majority of characters in the series so far. I liked the addition of more police characters like McLarren, who I hope we will see more of, and all the people involved in the investigation seemed very real, Sammy, Eva, Sally, Marianna, the Fitzpatricks, Waverly, the stamp people etc. I didn't find myself having to suspend disbelief at all in this book.

[on the plot]

As with the characters I found the plot immensely believable and my disbelief only needed to be suspended at the minimum level needed for storytelling. Everything fitted together so well.

The major strength of the story to me was how well the stamp collecting theme fitted in, it was absolutely endemic to the story with links right back to Sammy's childhood and especially to the part about how Sammy "bought" Eva from her father. At the beginning I thought the ransom notes were a little contrived but by the end they seemed perfectly reasonable.

The parts that I found weakest were devices that seemed a bit repetitious when put next to the earlier books. I had a minor tantrum with Maitland when Kathy was taken off the case in the exact middle of the book. I was glad that this got explained within a handful of pages as it really irked me having happened at least twice before. Also the bent coppers theme reared it's head again, you can trust no one in these books.

The resolution worked for me, I liked the way Kathy brought White into the party for the showdown. That was consistent with her previous behaviour of going out on her own, but a lot safer this time. I got a little confused by Keller doing the shooting. I rather thought he wasn't really involved, was he just being manipulated by White? All in all I thought the ending was really good. I also like the bit in the hospital with Brock confessing and Leon smirking at Kathy for saying that she trusted him not to have stolen the cover, I thought that was a very neat and interesting part of the ending.

[on the setting]

My favourite scene was the part where Desai accused Brock of stealing the cover, lots of tension and sparky stuff. My least favourite was the bit with the head being discovered when the writing switched into the present tense. I don't know if Maitland has done tense switching elsewhere without me picking up on it but that bit really jarred and I had to keep rereading sentences to check that I wasn't just misreading things. I don't mind present tense writing in general but this switch just didn't work for me.

Lots of other scenes were good too, I liked seeing Brock at Battle Abbey with the children and wondering what was going on there, I liked nearly all the scenes at the end of the book, I liked the stamp collecting scenes at the auction, I liked Kathy at the Crow's Nest. There were few scenes that didn't work for me really.

The stamp collecting setting really worked for me, the best setting since Jerusalem Lane, and as I said in the previous question it was so good because it wasn't just a setting but totally wound up inside the plot.

[on themes etc]

For me The Chalon Heads was the strongest in the series yet and I'm really looking forward to reading more. I thought everything hung together very neatly in this book. The device of chucking Kathy off an investigation halfway through the story is getting tedious but that's about it for major annoyances. I feel Kathy is still the same character who wandered out onto building sites alone at night and took tea with murderers but she's learning appropriate ways to go out on her own now. That development is good.

I'm still annoyed with the names thing (that Kathy Kolla is Kathy whilst David Brock is Brock) but it doesn't jar so much after four books and we have been much closer to Kathy's point of view most of the time than Brock's so it doesn't seem so unreasonable a distinction as it did up front. In fact we haven't done much from Brock's point of view since The Malcontenta I think. I'd like to see more of Brock's point of view in future books.

I've only just realised that I can't remember any architecture details appearing in this book, I liked that theme in earlier books but I was so caught up in the stamp collecting that I didn't notice. I'd imagine we get another dose of architecture in the next book as I see it's set in a shopping centre and I've also seen that Maitland has written academic tomes on shopping centre design.

This was definitely the best in the series so far for me though.

Purchased on 15th January 2002.