Book Review of If It Bleeds…

Stephen King and I have a mixed relationship – very often I love his stuff and marvel at the cleverness of the ideas, and at other times i just can’t get into it.  His latest collection of four novellas aptly reflects this – three I enjoyed and the other i skipped past (I listened to this one on audio).

The titular story is naturally the best, and the reason I was drawn to the book – it’s a Holly Gibney story – the secondary character of the Mr Mercedes series who became so popular she was featured in The Outsider as well.  She’s a decent, quirky and clever woman – and this was a powerful story that opens us up to the idea that there may be other “outsiders” in our world, feeding on suffering in different ways.  Jerome Robinson and his sister return in this familiar but new and exciting story that suggests there may even be hope for more.

The Rat is a story about a writer who makes the metaphorical deal with the devil to finish his novel Bitter River, and then has to deal with the consequences.  No doubt King sees much of himself in elements of this, and I enjoyed this one too, although not as much as the opening story Mr Harrigan’s Phone, which takes us back to when iPhones were new and imagines them connecting beyond the grave.  This was a great way to open the collection with something fresh, new and thought-provoking.  I couldn’t get into Life of Chuck.

A pretty solid listen on audio, worth a look if you are a fan.

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

As time got closer to its release, I found myself more and more excited by the prospect of Suzanne Collin’s new Hunger Games prequel, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.

The storyline takes us back to the tenth Hunger Games – a piece of history which the Capitol has worked hard to suppress.  We meet a young Coriolanus Snow – a young man desperate to prove himself and his impoverished family’s situation, but he is a long way from the President Snow we meet and loathe in Katniss Everdeen’s time.

Snow is one of 24 university students chosen to act as the first official mentors in the Hunger Games – and Snow is assigned to the female tribute in District 12 (the first in a series of eerie parallels which will no doubt explain his mistrust and fear of our beloved Mockingjay).  He considers this an insult, given that only Districts 1 and 2 are real competitors, but his imagination is captured by Lucy Gray Baird from the minute her name is called – and she plunges a snake down the neck of the dress of a young woman standing near her.

As time continues and he learns more about this extraordinary young lady’s story,  young Snow finds himself falling in love with her and going to greater and greater extremes to assist her to survive the Games.  Alongside this, he experiences some of the evils of the capital as his competing mentors are made to suffer by the Capitol machine. There are genuine chances here that our Coryo – a character I never really grew to hate, could have been a great hero.

Perhaps some of this is due to my continued suspicion about Lucy Gray, which i wonder now wasn’t a deft trick of Collins’  to throw me off the scent.  I never truly believed the face she showed Snow, but as I should have guessed – she is not the one I should have been examining after all.

I read in a review recently that The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes shows that while Collins has had many imitators – this book shows she has no real peer – and I tend to agree.  This book has all the joy of revisiting an old friend, and all the joy of discovering new ones.  This is a real character journey – and a real sense of a society emerging that we knew and feared in her previous books.  Although it will likely only appeal to fans…. i would challenge any fan not to find a lot to enjoy and chew over in this.  Looking now only for someone with whom to converse about it without the worry of spoiling it!

Book Review of Shadow and Bone

I continue to be really impressed by these Leigh Bardugo fantasy novels, set in her Grishaverse.

I started with the Six of Crows Duology, which I absolutely loved and then decided I might try this trilogy which explores the backstory of a minor character – Alina Starkoff.  I wasn’t sure Bardugo could capture the same magic as she had in the much applauded Six of Crows, but I found myself absolutely loving this story of the humble orphan with no knowledge of her power who comes to be one of the most feared and powerful Grisha of all time.

There is romance, mystery, betrayal, magic and self-discovery – a wonderful recipe for any kind of novel.  I have already downloaded the next installment and look forward to dipping my toe into this fantasy world and its well-realised characters again.  This is clearly some of the best fantasy writing out there today.

Book Review of Crooked Kingdom

Those of you who have known me for a long time will know that I have been a sucker for a good fantasy novel since my teenage years.  So last year, when I read Leigh Bardugo’s absorbing Six of Crows, I promised myself I would read the sequel that wraps up the duology.

Again, this was a wonderful read with detailed and incredibly clever plotting as well as well-realised characters and a compelling fantasy world.

We return to Kaz Brekker’s ramshackle team dealing with the aftermath of the Ice Court plot gone wrong.  They need to work to get Inej back from villian Jan Van Eck, but they also need to work towards a cure for the adverse affects of jurda parem – the addictive drug that has Nina in it’s grasp and will potentially enslave all Grisha.

Each character continues to grow and develop.  Matthias must confront his feelings for Nina. Wylan searches for his supposedly dead mother while Jesper must tell his father his gambling addiction has put the family farm at risk.

The plot has plenty of twists and turns and loads of interest.  Definitely worth a look. Now, I will be exploring the Grishaverse further, and looking forward to Netflix’s take on Bardugo’s work.

Book Review of The Institute

There are two types of Stephen King – the scary and the psychic.  This belongs to the latter category – no killer clowns here.  No sleuths either – this feels like King back in his niche.

The Institute is a very readable vintage King which explores the lives of young people who are kidnapped from their lives to harness their barely-existent psychic powers for unknown purposes.  At the institute, they are subjected to shots and experimentation in order to bring out and amplify these abilities – until they are deemed ready to go to the mysterious “back half”.

But two boys are about to arrive at the institute who will change everything.  Luke Ellis is a certified genius – with incredibly minor telekinesis.  But that intelligence will lead him to successfully find a way to escape the institute’s clutches, and try to find a way to tell the world about what is going on.  The second is Avery Dixon – a boy with the greatest telepathic potential the institute has seen in a generation.  Together, they are able to bring together all the other stolen children and attempt a coup – which leads them to a disgraced New York City Cop working as a small-town Night-Knocker.  Only he believes their story.

This was a chilling and enthralling read which I think anyone would enjoy.  And just when you think you’re at the end of this unthinkable crime – the true purpose of the Institute is revealed… and you’re left with even more to ponder.  Definitely should be on your list.  I listened on audio.

Book Review of Six of Crows

I’d heard a few things about this fantasy adventure novel (and it’s follow up), but added it to my Audible playlist on a bit of a whim.  It had been a while since I had indulged in any fantasy, although as an older teen and young adult I devoured them.

Leigh Bardugo is no Raymond E Feist, but this was a totally entertaining story with fascinating characters and electric relationships.  It’s set in a fascinating world of slum lords and crime – and magical Grisha who have an inborn talent.  Kaz Brekker is a criminal prodigy who is offered an impossible task and a dazzling reward – steal back the scientist who created a formula that exaggerates Grisha powers but at a very high cost to the subject – addiction and finally, death.  To succeed, he has to assemble a crack team.  Each has a special talent and eventually – a special connection to another member of the group.

The task is planned with brilliance – but nothing goes to plan.  Only the combination of all their wits, skills, love and even sacrifice will help them survive.  And even that is not assured in the end.

This is the first of a duo and I was definitely left wanting to pick up the next book.  An absorbing read.

 

 

Book Review of The Wall

I’m not really sure why this is on the Man Booker longlist… I kept waiting for it to excite me but it just never happened.

The most exciting thing about the book is the premise – and the tantalising similarities to A Game of Thrones.  It starts with young people doing 2 years of compulsory military service on a frozen wall, where they are charged to keep out the mysterious “Others”.  But that’s where the similarities end.   The others are people from other countries who have suffered some unnamed horror – and unfortunately, people who have been expelled from their own country.  It’s a controlled society maddened by the government to hate the others.  And just when our narrator starts to enjoy his time and the role his service plays in his character development – the unthinkable happens… some Others get over the wall.  And he falls prey to the consequence of this…

Okay, so it’s sounding good even as I write it up.  But it’s a book that goes nowhere.  There is no real dramatic reveal or gut-wrenching moment of clarity.  If this makes the short-list – I’ll have to read every other single book that does to judge their quality.

Book Review of Lily and the Octopus

I had this saved on my Audible wishlist and when it came on sale I thought I might give it a try.  I’d obviously marked it some time last year as an interesting reading possibility.  The result was both beautiful and devastating. This is a book both for, and not for dog lovers.

Lily is a much-loved dachshund, and one day her owner notices an octopus on her head.  It seems to be attached there and not coming off.  After several minutes of confusion it becomes clear to the reader that the octopus is some form of tumour or cancer that the narrator, Lily’s owner, does not want to confront.

What follows is a blend of the realistic and the fanciful – the magical realism of battling an ‘octopus’ for mastery of Lily’s body (including a bizarre scene set at sea) and the hauntingly real scenes of love and loss as the narrator realises nothing he does can save Lily from her fate.  The novel talks about their whole life together, including their weekly routines of watching TV and gossiping about boys (the narrator is gay and Lily can speak to him).  Lily was his first real love in so many ways.

As a dog person, I both loved and wanted to switch this off in so many ways.  I cried at the difficult moments and loved the relationship Steven Rowley portrayed so painstakingly between the man and his dog.  Definitely worth a look.

Book Review of Killing Commendatore

I’ve seen reviews describe Haruki Murakami’s latest opus as ‘rambling’, and I would have to agree.  Killing Commendatore is a slow-paced and lengthy odyssey into a traditionally mysterious and unresolved Murakami wonderland.  This time, I struggled to keep my eyes open for long sections in the early and middle sections of the book. But this is just something you have to accept about a Murakami novel – he spends painstaking time creating both the ordinary and the extraordinary worlds his characters inhabit.  But I’d suggest this is one for the fans only – his earlier works are a little punchier.

Isolation is a key theme of many of Murakami’s novels, and the unnamed protagonist here is a portrait painter unceremoniously rejected by his wife.  Seeking refuge and solitude, he ends up living in the remote mountains of Odawarra, in the home of a once famous painter, Tomohiko Amada.  There he uncovers a painting that was never made public.  It depicts a Japanese portrayal of a murder in Don Giovanni (opera being another key element in many of Murakami’s works).  The discovery of the painting sets off a chain of unusual events that are never really brought completely into the light.  he befriends a rich stranger , who encourages him to paint the portrait of a young girl – a girl he believes may be his daughter.  Alongside this, a mysterious bell chiming in the middle of the night leads him to a tomb and a mysterious little figure, an ‘Idea’ personified in the form of the Commendatore of the picture.

While the painter is inspired anew and begins several new works, yet each disturbs him somehow.  He senses he is being drawn into a mystery that ties together Amada’s piece, Amada himself and the young girl he befriends. Eventually he must quest to save her when she disappears from the world to a place only he can enter.

The painter likes to keep many of his portraits unfinished – a reflection of Murakami’s own desire not to tie up the ends of his narrative neatly. Once again this is a lyrical, strange and beautiful novel, but one that may have been more satisfying.

Book Review of Rose Madder

I decided to fill in one of my Stephen King gaps by listening to Rose Madder, a title that hadn’t caused a lot of interest in the past.

Rose Madder differs from many other Stephen King novels in two ways; firstly, it is largely set in an um-magical world.  The focus is on Rose, a woman who escapes her abusive husband a corrupt and violent policeman.  Secondly, the supernatural element is closely connected to Greek Mythology which isn’t a clear direction for much of King’s work.  This is brought about through a visit to a pawn shop to sell her engagement ring (which turns out to be cubic zirconia), where Rosie encounters a painting of a woman wearing Greek dress.  She is drawn to the power and self-possession of the figure and takes the painting home.  She is later drawn into the landscape the painting depicts and sent on a mission to rescue a baby from the maze of the bull Erinyes.

Eventually the two worlds collide and Rosie’s husband Norman becomes Erinyes and must be confronted and destroyed in the world of the painting to protect those Rosie loves in the read world.

Readable, dark and mildly disturbing, this isn’t one of King’s best (apparently he agrees) but it is a reasonably good way to spend a few hours.