The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury

The Martian Chronicles read like a history of place, they are almost- short stories which hang together, and occasionally continue on from one another. They vary between true short stories; photographs of lives in a particular moment or change and sketched out ideas of what could happen if the human race ever were able to colonise Mars. Fully fleshed out world and deeply coloured characters, even the ones we are only with for a few pages. 

Heartburn, Nora Ephron

I'd heard a lot about Nora Ephron's writing in general and this novel in particular, so I was aware of expecting too much from it. As soon as I'd read the first pages though I was completely gratified. It is a novel based on the break-up of Ephron's second marriage (similar to The Enchanted April in some ways). Our narrator is Rachel, who is seven months pregnant with their second child when she finds out her husband is having an affair.

It is a heartbreaking and joyous novel, Rachel is witty and personable. The whole novel makes you feel as though Rachel is sat next to you, chatting about what's happened. She immediately pulls you into her world and is irreverent and aware of all the neuroses and shortcomings and idiosyncrasies of it. She is broken and conveys a messy confusion shot through with humour.

A Single Swallow, Horatio Clare

Here Clare follows the migration route of swallows, ones that nest in his mum's rafters in Wales in the summer and winter in South Africa. He sets off from South Africa in February and arrives in Wales in May, travelling off the cuff by car, bus or plane. Layers of anecdotes and meetings from the road with  chat about swallows in literature and cultures.

The lovely thing though is that the swallow idea enables and excuses the trip and it is certainly an obsession for Clare, but the trip and route is haphazard and loose. Clare seems like a lost 20 something, wandering in search of anything, and does return changed, broken down a little and re-formed.

Lullaby, Leïla Slimani

Lullaby opens with the death of two childern at the hands of their nanny.
A beautifully written, heavy and bleak vision of modern parenthood and the juggle between work and family life - for both parents and nanny. The author astutely and simply picks holes in expectations and presents a Catch 22 without offering any solutions, or seemingly even sympathy. Slimani creates understandable, unlikeable characters you don’t want to identify with. They paint portraits of personality and power, the situation is bigger than the characters. The mood is deftly and subtly changed through the novel, both the reader and characters fail to notice or stall the shift until it is too late. Full, bleak and worrying modern fiction.

Why didn't they ask Evans? Agatha Christie

 

As expected this is a great murder mystery. Likeable ‘plucky’ characters and twists and turns, much more adventure than other Christie novels I’ve read. Hairs prickled on the back of my neck when we did finally discover who Evans was.

The Typees, Herman Melville

Typee tells the story of sailors who desert ship on islands in the South Sea and their contact with the ‘primitive’ people there. It is part adventure story, part amateur anthropological study, and very of it’s time.
Melville slips into long passages of description which can get very tedious, but on the whole it is a good read, all the more interesting as it is based on Melville’s own experiences.

The Western Wind, Samantha Harvey

A mystery of a man having disappeared, probably drowned, told through the eyes of the village Priest. The novel moves backwards in time and deftly reveals both the character of the narrator and the answer to the mystery. The Priest is flawed but a good man and is compared to the over-zealous Dean; a medieveal chief inspector to the Priest’s detective. The novel is pre-occupied with the idea of forgiveness, both from a god, a community and self-forgiveness, it explores mistakes and sins- all though the internal monologue of the narrator´s empathetic, medieval mindset. Rich and compelling, full of questions.