Death in Captivity - Michael Gilbert

I have resisted the temptation to binge on the trio of Michael Gilbert books I received from the British Library. I’ve been pacing myself. Inadvertently I seem to have left the best until last! This one is a corker if I may slip into the vernacular of the period. Double delight; a crime/mystery story and a prison camp escape story! Both beautifully interwoven by the skilful pen of Michael Gilbert.

It’s a complex labyrinth of a mystery plot with so many possibilities of what might have happened. as to what actually happened, well, the final denouement is scrumptiously unexpected. All the way through the reader is led down so many different paths that you end up suspecting everyone, even the dead man! It slots neatly in the locked room mystery genre which seems somehow very fitting for the setting is that of a prisoner of war camp. The research is so convincing you never doubt for a moment that you are in an Italian POW camp trying to escape with sand in your nostrils and under your fingernails.

An ‘us’ and ‘them’ dynamic is a given in such a setting but the ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’ are maybe not quite as clearly defined as would seem obvious. I guess Henry ‘Cuckoo’ Goyle is the stand out good guy, he’s one of the main camp tunnellers and takes up the mantle of amateur sleuth as well. I should point out that I did suspect him too but very, very briefly! 

It’s  marvellously sustained piece of writing, evenly and, I would say, perfectly paced with an authentic cast of characters that you can hear as well as see to the extent that you believe you would recognise them if you found yourself in their company. I found myself as interested in whether they escaped or not as to whether the crime was solved! I’m still not sure if that was intentional on the part of the writer!

It’s one of those books that when you’ve finished you feel lost because you’ve been so absorbed in the characters and the story that you want it to go on forever. 

My thanks to British Library Publishing not just for this Michael Gilbert book but for all three!! Reader, I loved them!

Stanley and Elsie - Nicola Upson

Nicola Upson wasn’t a writer I was familiar with although I was aware she had written some detective stories. This novel caught my eye because of the art theme and because it was historical fiction. I was aware of the work of Sir Stanley Spencer and the love he had for his home village of Cookham. But I was unaware of the details of his life and if this novel has done anything it has me scurrying to further explore the work and life of this great British painter. 

The title is bit of a misnomer for whilst the thrust of the book does clearly examine the relationship of Elsie Munday, housemaid to Stanley Spencer that relationship is a catalyst to put Spencer’s other liaisons under the microscope, namely his marriages; first to Hilda Carline and then to Patricia Preece. The ‘secret’ bonding of Patricia Preece and Dorothy Hepworth is sensitively and compassionately portrayed in the book as well. Elsie is the solid, pragmatic and unifying presence in the lives of these people. Her observations lead the reader to learn much of the man who was Sir Stanley Spencer.  

But you get the feeling that this fictionalised account is merely touching upon Spencer and his eccentricities. It’s a book that makes you want to find out more. Since finishing it I have subsequently googled the Spencers and their children, googled Patricia and Dorothy, and the Sandham Memorial Chapel at Burghclere which I am now desperate to visit and view the murals Stanley painted! If that’s not the mark of a good book I don’t know what is!

The book is divided into three parts with a prologue. Part 1 which is the longest part is seen primarily from Elsie's perspective. The second part is from Dorothy’s perspective mainly and the final part is a conclusion of sorts. Each part is prefaced with a pertinent quote from Stanley Spencer. 

‘We blew about five years like a couple of rooks in that cottage in the field by the railway cutting.’

‘Love is the essential power in the creation of art and love is not a talent.’

‘All things seem to have to be memorials for me to love them.’

There is an underlying poignancy in the book for the portrayal of Spencer sees him as a  paradox, infuriating and egocentric one minute, childlike and loving the next. It is a  fascinating portrayal of the man and there was a point where I wondered if PTSD from WW2 affected both his creativity and his eccentricity, his painting was a way for him to try and understand what war had done, not just to him 

but to others as well.  However it would be wrong to view him as ‘just’ a war artist and I think the book does a good job of persuading the reader to consider his entire oeuvre. 

The writer’s research of Spencer is thorough and it would be easy to focus just on that aspect of the book but it would be a disservice to overlook the social history that examines the protocols of the age. The research here is also extensive and convincing. The appeal is therefore broadened to art lovers and history lovers.

I always think it is a brave writer who tackles an historical character and subject within the framework of a work of fiction. Get some salient fact wrong and the world can come down upon you! But to enjoy a work of fiction any desire to go fact checking is perverse in my opinion! So convincing was Ms. Upson’s narrative I swallowed it all. The writing has a flowing, easy pace to it. The characters are engaging, you care about them (even thought at times I could have slapped Stanley!).  I conclude as I began; I have a desire to seek out Spencer’s paintings and find out more about him. 

Thanks Nudge for a copy of this fascinating fiction. 

The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna - Juliet Grames

Reminiscent initially of Elise Valmorbida’s The Madonna of the Mountains because of another family growing up in a pre Mussolini Italy, and Angela’s Ashes because of emigration to the United States, this is a family saga of an Italian/American family with considerable depth. Spanning several generations the titular Stella Fortuna is the heroine or maybe anti heroine of this impressive debut novel.

Stella takes being accident prone to a whole other level as we learn the details of her deaths. The reader is lured hypnotically into the novel right from the start because we learn straight away that Stella and her sister are alive and well and elderly and living in Connecticut! So the concept of the seven or eight deaths is tantalising as you really don’t know if this going to be some kind of spiritual, karmic, reincarnation story  - or not! And I’m not saying, you’re going to have to read it!

What I can tell you though is that it is extremely well written. It’s a pithy narrative that doesn’t falter, with some well-defined characters you either love or hate. You get a palpable picture of a poor Calabrian family surviving in a picturesque part of Italy.

To try and escape the worst of the poverty they eventually relocate to America. So geographically the story is in two parts, life in Italy and life in the States. And that would make quite a story just in itself but this is much, much more. This book has a lot to say about the place of women in a society, about those who accept their lot, and those who try to kick against the conventions laid down for them. The attitudes of generations are examined. Considerations of a patriarchal household play a big part. And various types of abuse are detailed which make for uneasy and uncomfortable reading but the incidences are crucial to the plot. I sometimes thought that the deaths referred to a living death for Stella given the situations she found herself in. 

There was a sense sometimes of the autobiographical. There is a narrator who synthesises the story and so palpable were the descriptions and the understanding of the various characters that I suspect this author is retelling scenes from memory. Not all, I fervently hope. Something in the narration style reminded me a little of a quirky Marcus Zusak type commentator.It served as a viable contrast to the third person narration of Stella and her life. 

It is Stella who is the lynchpin and the driving force throughout the story. For after all, it is her story -  the story of her deaths. There is something very sad about her and not the death aspect at all but the sense that she spends her life being unfulfilled, it’s quite heartbreaking. But I think that is the point of the story. 

‘Was she just going to let it happen? Let her whole life be the choices other people made for? But she never made a choice for herself -  that had been her mistake. She never knew what it was she wanted out of life, only what she didn’t want. People can’t understand negative convictions.’ 

That sums up very concisely Stella’s dilemma. But also sprinkled throughout the book were some though provoking maxims which appealed to the philosopher in me.

‘What if we said the power of human faith in making things real even when they’re not - that by giving imaginary entities our credence we allow them to assume power over us - to step into being? Because what is faith but a willingness to believe?’

‘You step on the boat knowing it is forever, one way or another. But understanding what forever means - that is something your heart tries to protect you from.’

Mention needs to be made too of the arrangement and naming of the parts and chapters. Easy to overlook them in a readers’ zeal to read on but I thought they offered a clever summary of the whole book in a way that headings and chapter namings don’t always. 

In some ways it seemed an overlong book but on reflection I found the length another device to suggest that life itself is sometimes overlong? 

It’s an impressive debut with an unusual premise and a moving conclusion. My thanks to Louise Swannell at Hodder and Stoughton for an advance proof of the book.

The Fourth Courier - Timothy Jay Smith

(This was part of a Love Reads Blog Tour for Nudge Books)

Hold on to your hats for this is a snappy and speedy ride into the murky world of a post cold war Eastern Europe. FBI and CIA join forces to solve a series of related murders that suggest a plot of atomic proportions, quite literally. 

Timothy Jay Smith has penned a gripping, intelligent thriller, atmospheric, and effectively creating an uneasy picture of a Poland emerging from the last war. Palpable portraits of ordinary people living in this environment and all dealing with it in their own way whether turning to the wrong side of the law or harbouring dreams of a better life elsewhere provide an energetic background to the main thrust of the tale. 

Nothing is quite as it seems and the reader needs to keep abreast of all the characters and their six degrees of separation and happenstance. The reader also needs to fully absorb each event in order to make sense of the unfolding dramas . The characters are boldly imagined, some flawed, victims and aggressors but all have a functional part to play in the narrative. Most of the action take place in Warsaw, so much so that the city becomes an additional character, too, almost. The writer’s affinity with the country is obvious and immediate and infectious.

The book is obliquely informative without that information obscuring the fiction. Said fiction contains several subplots with themes of greed, romance and sex that also do not detract from the main intention of the story, rather they complement it but give the reader an opportunity to think as well. Although blurbed as an espionage thriller any spying aspects were underplayed and it was more about greed, corruption and ambition from the highest to the low that fuelled the thrills. 

Brutal in places there is an underlying humour that lightens the mood too and the balance works. It’s a satisfying, no punches pulled read that drags you willingly through to its conclusion.

Secrets of the Dead - Murray Bailey

In the tradition of Dan Brown and Indiana Jones Secrets of the Dead establishes Murray Bailey firmly as a competent writer of adventure fiction, for me anyway. What I want to know is why the hell this guy isn’t up there heading the best seller lists? 

Stories like these are my ‘fast food’ reads if you will. I sit down and I read and I enjoy. I am transported  out of my cerebral self for several hundred pages and I let myself be carried along the crest of an adventure where many swashes are buckled!! 

Spanning two continents Secrets of the Dead links an FBI agent, sorry, Special Agent Charlie Rebb, an indomitable female sleuth and Alex MacClure an archaeologist with a penchant for interpreting ancient symbols and an Egyptology expert. They’re linked because of a unprecedented number of murders by a serial killer dubbed The Surgeon. And more than that I refuse to tell under pain of torture. Read the book!

It’s pacy, it’s action packed, it’s complex and intricate and it’s exciting. There’s a dual narrative with the present day action unfolding alongside a tale from Ancient Egypt. What is so impressive is the author’s expansive knowledge and obvious love for Egypt and its history. So much research has gone into this book which makes it so convincing and readable. Mind you, you need to be on your toes! There’s much discussion regarding some parallels between Christianity and Egyptology which is fascinating but complex. There is so much information given here that it will spiral around your brain as you try to make sense of it all. 

The descriptions are palpable and atmospheric. There were a couple of sequences that reminded me of the film Midnight Express. The characters are interesting and fulfilled their roles without being stereotypical. The final denouement is satisfying without leaving any loose threads and almost hints of a further book? 

My understanding is that this is the second story to feature Alex MacClure but in no way was my enjoyment of this  inhibited by not having read the first although I think I’ll have to now!!

My thanks to Librarything for the opportunity to read this book and to Mr. Bailey for kindly signing the book for me. 

Tiger - Polly Clark

‘Tyger! Tyger! burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?’

Okay, maybe a bit of a cliche, but somehow Blake’s poetic homage to the paradox of creation, with its tiger the symbol of spiritual revolt backed by uninhibited natural energy, seems to encapsulate something of the mood created in this stunning second novel by Polly Clark.

I imagine every novelist strives to create that elusive of things - the perfect novel. What is the perfect novel? I’m not sure. I have no definitive answers but my gut is telling me that this story sure as hell comes close. 

It’s beautifully structured for a start. A mood setting prologue. Three seemingly, disparate initially, people stories. Four sections. All beautifully written with an economic yet substantial prose style which effortlessly conveys a depth of emotion allowing the reader to peel back the layers of these people and care about them. Subtly understated and nuanced is the thread that links these three people. It’s never obvious but the astute reader will start to make the connections and will ultimately be rewarded for it as the book heads towards its conclusion.  Underlying it all though, is a deep, profound love and reverence for the natural world and its inhabitants. And the tigers. Always the tigers.

‘Not far, now. Trailing glittering dust from its wing tips, an owl lifted. Two planetary gazes met. Two intelligences: one of air and night; one of snow and dawn.

Of course the stars of the show are the tigers, rightly so. Is this the literary ‘Year of the Tiger’? Yangtze Choo’s The Night Tiger hasn’t left my system yet! Most impressive is not merely the meticulous research but the perceptive understanding of how such a majestic and magnificent animal exists. Somehow this writer has gone beyond simply describing the tigers to the extent you feel she has been able to get inside their heads and share with the reader exactly how these animals live and think. The descriptions are real, they’re palpable. Yet it seems that the tigers are there as symbols for our fragmented lives. The tigers’ ability to kill physically belies their potential to heal emotionally. 

It’s a book about survival; extreme conditions, freezing temperatures, scarcity of food. The hunter and the hunted. The raw insignificance of a human compared to the natural world and the tigers. 

‘The hunter exists outside nature. He changes nature to suit himself. He burns it, chops it, digs it, destroys it. He disguises his own weakness with things he has made: snares, traps, guns.’

But however much reverence for the tiger is the integral thrust of the book Ms. Clark never loses sight of the human condition and as such you have a fiction that is beautifully balanced. 

‘My mistake was not that I didn’t try to give my all, myself… whatever the fuck way you just put it. It’s that …it’s that…’ She put her fists to her temples in frustration. ‘It’s that I did!’

The balance is further struck because the book can be appreciated on a number of levels. ‘Just’ a story if that’s all you want but it also raises issues of conservation and the human responsibility for species in jeopardy. It’s about the natural world, the paradox of an hostile beauty that makes survival perilous. And It’s a story of people, our need and dependence on each other no matter how much we hurt or get hurt in the process, It’s about love. 

The closest most of us will get to a tiger are perhaps our domestic tabby cats?!?! Somehow reading a book like this changes the way you think about them! 

My thanks to NB Magazine/Nudge Books for a proof of this remarkable story.

The Office of Gardens and Ponds - Didier Decoin

Beautifully translated by Euan Cameron this captivating story transports us to an almost otherworldly Japan with this tale of Miyuki, a bereft widow, who has to transport her deceased husband’s catch of carp to the Imperial Palace. To do that requires an arduous journey; a journey that soon becomes metaphor. 

I don’t want to ‘carp’ on about it but the symbol of the Koi is important in Japanese culture and beyond, embracing such virtues as spirituality, knowledge, longevity, loyalty, and wisdom. And especially the black carp symbolising love and overcoming adversity. Are there black carp in this tale? Maybe. Best you read it and check.  

Whilst we are on the subject of love there are erotic passages here that whilst not quite out of the Karma Sutra might be viewed as somewhat titillating. However tastefully so and quite in keeping with the overall ambience of this fable like story. There’s certainly nothing gratuitous, it's more a celebration of passion and love in the broadest sense. It demonstrates the depth of emotion within Miyuki and Katsuro.

With a sub text in the penultimate sequence that almost gives Patrick Susskind a run for his money this story offers us a fairy tale like evocation of the protocols of courts. ambassadors and rituals with a subtle, almost imperceptible humour as backdrop. The final denouement is practically apocalyptic in its intent and creates a dystopian type finale to a carefully crafted story. There’s something of the musical symphony as the different movements of the novel fuse together with a defining crescendo.

 According to the cover blurb it took Decoin fourteen years to write. I imagine in part that’s because the amount of research required to create this authentic portrait of an ancient Japan must have been immense. But it’s so thorough and so believable. The narrative flows in that encompassing way that natural storytellers achieve with a plot that is yin and yang in its simplicity and complexity. 

Characters are subtly created and developed with the nuances of themselves and their ethnicity merging to offer the reader a rounded and pictorial experience.  Miyuki in the starring role is both resourceful yet humble, innocent yet wise, she never loses her dignity, no matter what situations she finds herself in, nor the defining love she has for her dead husband, Katsuro. It is to her that the reader’s allegiances are directed and we go willingly. Images and metaphors abound as we see the delicate balancing act she undertakes to protect the precious carp on their journey. 

This is storybook story telling and you can appreciate it on that level alone. But you can also dig a little deeper beneath the veneer of the text and find some insights and philosophies pertinent to people and the world they inhabit. It’s an unusual and enthralling read.

A further shout out for the translator here. When you have a good translator the reader becomes largely unaware that they are reading a translation. That's how it should be? That's how it is here. Decoin's sumptuous and expansive prose is prominent. This book is a delight to read. 

Many thanks to Corinne Zifko and MacLehose Press for a greatly appreciated proof copy.