In books read on June 16, 2011
Naked in Death by J.D. Robb
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
I’m up to R in my alphabetical challenge to read a book by a new author beginning with each letter of the alphabet this year. I turned down several good candidates for R authors to read this. Never mind – nothing stopping me reading the other R books I had my eye on. I decided to give this a whirl as I’ve been ignoring the ever growing JD Robb shelf in the middle of every bookshop’s crime section for years now. This seemed like a good opportunity to see if my feeling that these books weren’t something I’d really enjoy was right or not.
I expected romance with my crime, as Robb also writes romances as Nora Roberts, and hoped it would be okay, as well as science fiction which I thought would probably be awful. Science fiction wise – yes, apparently it’s 2058 but it feels like 1995 with extra voice controls, off planet living, a US gun ban and flying cars – about what I expected but then I’m never happy with science fiction. Romance – I was expecting this aspect of the story to be passable but all I can really say for it is that it could have been worse. Crimewise it wasn’t a bad story at all and I don’t think it pulled any “oh but we can do this in the future” sci-fi deus ex machina tricks. I quite took to Eve, the central detective, as a character. But no, overall it’s definitely not my kind of thing and I won’t be reading any further in the series.
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In books read on June 9, 2011
Every Last One by Anna Quindlen
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I picked this up to read mostly because I have got to Q in my challenge where I’m trying to read a new author beginning with every letter of the alphabet. I’d seen earlier books by Anna Quindlen on my search that looked quite interesting so I got the latest one without knowing anything about it and wasn’t expecting anything particularly special. Then it turned out the book was all over the place as one of Richard & Judy’s book choices of the summer. (On the whole I think R&J come up with a decent selection of interesting books, not all to my taste and the odd one that looks like a terrible clunker to me (one man’s poison…) but I find it an interesting selection to peruse if not necessarily to read.)
It’s definitely a book to read without knowing too much about what happens. It reminded me of authors like Anita Shreve and Jodi Picoult. Small town American family life with added disaster/trauma. I thought the author did a good job of the characters, their interactions, reactions to situations, motivations and what-not. I can see why it’s a book that some people would write off with a 1-star review and others will rave about with a 5-star review which would make me hesitant to recommend it. Personally I thought it all worked and I’m glad I knew very little of the story before I started reading. For me it was a moving read but stopped somewhere short of fabulous.
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In books read on June 7, 2011
The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is a tangled up tale that goes back and forward in time connecting up the life of Nell, who was found abandoned on a ship from England to Australia as a four year old in 1913. Nell traces her own past to Cornwall in the 1970s, and then her granddaughter Cassandra follows the trail after Nell’s death in the 2000s. I found it a bit slow going to start with but it quickly turned into a real page turner. At times the crossovers between the timelines of the story become a little too twee, and information seems to fall into people’s hands a little too easily, but overall it’s well paced. There are still surprises to be had in the final pages and they didn’t feel like they came out of the blue. Nice book to lose yourself in for a while.
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In books read on June 7, 2011
Grace Williams Says it Loud by Emma Henderson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I was a bit dubious about reading this to start with as it sounds all a bit gimmicky, but actually thought it was fabulous. It’s narrated by Grace, who is – I forget the exact details – but born with some kind of mental disability and then gets polio aged six which withers an arm and leg – she’s considered to be ‘ineducable’ and at the age of ten is institutionalised by her family. The author has managed to tell the story of someone who could never tell her own story.
The story is basically all about her friendship with a boy called Daniel, who has no arms. Though I think the depiction of Grace’s family through time is the best bit: watching how her parents and siblings relationships with her change over the years. I thought the relationship between Grace and her younger sister Sarah who was born after she went into the home was very well portrayed. Grace’s parents were more or less told to forget about Grace and try again with another baby.
It’s a sad story really, but full of uplifting happy bits and I’m pleased I read it.
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In books read on June 7, 2011
Cambridge Blue by Alison Bruce
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
The first installment in a new crime series. I found DC Gary Goodhew a bit too good to be true, and I thought there were a couple of holes in the mystery plot (or perhaps I was just missing things). But overall I enjoyed reading the book, it was a quick holiday read, and I will probably read another in the future.
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In books read on June 7, 2011
The Janus Stone by Elly Griffiths
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is the second book in a crime series that so far I like pretty much everything about. Ruth Galloway is a strong central character with some complicated relationships that bode well for storylines over several books. As an archaeological expert on bones she can get dragged into police investigations without it seeming too convoluted. This was a one day holiday read and I enjoyed it a lot.
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In books read on June 7, 2011
The Wyndham Case by Jill Paton Walsh
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Jill Paton Walsh writes follow up books to the Dorothy L Sayers Peter Wimsey books. They always sound quite interesting but the one time I tried Dorothy L Sayers I couldn’t stand Wimsey, so I didn’t really want to read a follow up. But this is a book featuring characters of her own so I thought I’d try it. I’m not sure if that makes any sense really, but that’s how it was anyway!
This is a fairly old fashioned type of mystery even though it was written in the 1990s. Imogen Quy is the college nurse at St Agatha’s College, Cambridge and does some fairly gentle old fashioned type of investigating when a student is found dead on the floor of a locked library. It’s nothing ground breaking, it’s entertaining and I’ll probably read another in the series at some point.
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In books read on May 20, 2011
For Richer, for Poorer: A Love Affair with Poker by Victoria Coren
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I’ve liked Victoria Coren ever since she wrote a column in the Telegraph when she was a teenager (and so was I). All the same I wasn’t really expecting to enjoy a book about poker as much as I did. But it’s a very entertaining read.
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In books read on May 20, 2011
I’ll Take You There by Joyce Carol Oates
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
According to the blurbs on the back of the book Oates is a candidate for “Great American Novelist”. I disagree. That’s about all you need to know. Not quite sure how/why I finished it.
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In books read on May 9, 2011
Private Papers by Margaret Forster
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
A good book, but didn’t engage me as much as other books by the same author have done. It’s basically a two hander, Rosemary is reading through her mother’s diary-cum-memoir and interjecting with her own views on events as Penelope relates the story of her life and family from her own point of view. Generally I like to see a story told from two different viewpoints neither of which can be relied on too much and I’m also quite happy to read about characters I don’t like or don’t find sympathetic. Although I liked the switching of the narration, and I alternately liked and disliked both the narrators I ended up disliking pretty much everyone in the book and not caring what happened to any of them. Ultimately I was happy to put it down and move on.
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