To Kill a Mockingbird at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre

There is something about the classic coming-of-age story, the bildungsroman, that we just cannot get enough of. Whether it's Charlotte Bronte's brooding Jane Eyre, CS Lewis's magical tales of Narnia, or Suzanne Collins' modern dystopian answer to the genre with The Hunger Games trilogy, the concept is something we can all relate to on one level or another. Whatever age, wherever we live, whatever class we're born into - we can all remember a moment, series of events or time in our lives when childhood seemed to slip from our grip and the murky, less black-and-white (excuse the pun...) adulthood showed itself.

For a friend of mine, Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird is her absolute favourite example and I can completely see why. For those who don't know, the novel is a touching, loosely biographical tale that follows Scout and her brother Jem as a series of events unfold in their hometown in Alabama during the Great Depression. A young black man is accused of raping a young white woman and their father is the defence lawyer and Scout is suddenly thrown into the town's bitter brawl.

It has since won the Pulitzer Prize and been added to the curriculum in schools all over the world but what do you do when you want to adapt a book that well-read, that well-loved?

The answer, for me, was at the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre this summer and luckily for anyone who missed it - it's going on tour!

Sat in the audience wrapped up in my blanket and hoodie on the sunny but chilly September Sunday evening with my hot chocolate, I won't lie that I was a bit taken aback when a middle-aged woman in a mac and scarf stood up on her chair in the row in front and started speaking to the audience in a distinctly Northern accent, not Deep South America by any stretch.

'Oh god,' I whispered, 'they're going to try and mix it up and set the story in a council estate in Manchester aren't they?' Luckily, I spoke too soon. A few minutes in and the stage comes alive with children and trees and invisible picket fences, the village all cleverly brought to life with some simple props, a few pieces of chalk and a man floating in and out of scenes strumming an atmospheric soundtrack by Phil King (which, I might add, I bought on CD and is now playing in my car - recommended).

The cast is brilliant, the staging spectacular, and all in all it was the perfect way to spend a late summer evening. My snooty anxiety that 'you can't successfully adapt a truly good book' was put to shame and instead, I've gone away and curled myself up with the novel itself. Success story (pun intended this time) I think you'll agree, and all tied up very nicely with an on-site barbecue dinner and subsequent hot chocolate.

Where'd You Go Bernadette? by Maria Semple

Bernadette Fox is notorious.

To Elgie Branch, a Microsoft wunderkind, she's his hilarious, volatile, talented, troubled wife.

To fellow mothers at the school gate, she's a menace.

To design experts, she's a revolutionary architect.

And to 15-year-old Bee, she is a best friend and, quite simply, mum.

Then Bernadette disappears. And Bee must take a trip to the end of the earth to find her.

For me, I have to be really in the mood for comedy for me to enjoy it. Arguably you could say that about any other genre but it’s particularly the case with humour. As a result, this novel has been started and restarted a number of times but I can now tell you I have finished it. I know you’ve been waiting for that piece of news and you feel SO great right now that you can read this review.

If someone asked me whether they would enjoy this novel, I would ask ‘Did you enjoy Paul Torday’s Salmon Fishing in the Yemen?' The book that is, not the film. If you were one of those people that absolutely hated that book DON’T PICK THIS UP.

What do I mean by that? Well it’s true that the plot couldn’t be more different. Where Yemen has a distinct lack of water, Seattle has its fair share, there’s no real romance in this – the main relationship you’re interested in is that between mother and daughter. Where'd You Go Bernadette? for me, however, had a very similar tone and sense of humour. Slightly wacky and off the wall while remaining brilliantly observant and it has that scrapbook quality where we gather the plot from a series of different perspectives and through a variety of different mediums – newspaper cuttings, emails, post-it notes, log books etc.

I did enjoy it and I would recommend it to people. If you don’t enjoy embracing the quirky (I made the mistake of recommending When God Was a Rabbit to a friend thinking it was a gentle tale only to be told how VERY WEIRD it was…), don't read this but if you fancy something a little different to break up your usual reading habits, do give it a go – I think you’ll appreciate it. I generally think that our favourite novels are rarely comedies because the ‘heart’ is so often sacrificed. I think that happens here too. It does all get a bit silly by the end and, as the Observer describes ‘[the book] is constructed from a collection of self-absorbed perspectives’, but the heart is there somewhere and if you were feeling particularly hormonal, you may even well up a bit at the bonds made and broken and the dreams surrendered… I wasn’t feeling emotional so that didn’t happen for me but it’s a laugh, easily above average and worth a read: 6.5/10.

Other reviews:
Salmon Fishing in the Yemen by Paul Torday

A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood

In this brilliantly perceptive novel, a middle-aged professor living in California is alienated from his students by differences in age and nationality, and from the rest of society by his homosexuality. Isherwood explores the depths of the human soul and its ability to triumph over loneliness, alienation and loss.

'He strikes a note of great intimacy with the reader as if with a close personal friend, and a sense of total honesty is sought. This style - witty, observant, nostalgic, exact - was Isherwood's great contribution to modern literature' Financial Times

'Very sad and yet at times wildly funny' Daily Telegraph

I picked up A Single Man again a few weeks ago. I love this novel but to describe why is so difficult. Not because I can’t put my finger on it, but because my reasons are so boringly clichéd.

It’s just beautifully written and brilliantly immersive; you really feel you ‘get’ George. You can place him, you can place his neighbours and his academic colleagues. You know who he is, what he’d do next – you can paint a very good picture in just the 170 pages that make up this book.

It of course helps when painting said picture (I didn’t actually paint… just to be clear…) that you’ve seen the film. Which I have. Three times. Also, extremely good. I mean Colin Firth, Julianne Moore, Matthew Goode and Nicholas Hoult are never going to disappoint but director Tom Ford brings his relentlessly cool style to the table that gives it that extra summitsummit. I suppose you could maaybbeee say that Ford’s direction fills the void of Isherwood’s writing in the film.

While making the story visually striking, I also think Ford gets across George’s moments of detachment that Isherwood creates so beautifully in his novel. Ishwerwood’s decision to describe everything from George’s perspective helps illustrate how George, for the most part, is removed from his community. He is secretive and aloof – a deliberate decision, I think, to protect himself, which he enjoys but all the while he unconsciously yearns to be included, be social, be loved. Probably a bit of that in us all…

In short, though, he’s a softie who is wonderfully screwed up. As a child from the Harry Potter generation, I was brought up with Snape, Lupin, Dumbledore, Harry himself, and so feel I am now always destined to fall for screwed up male characters (hopefully just in books…).

Being so short, there is absolutely no excuse not to read this. Even if you hate it. Which I hope you don't… and if you do, watch the film. I give you permission.

8.5/10

The Fault In Our Stars - John Green

Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel's story is about to be completely rewritten.

Insightful, bold, irreverent, and raw, The Fault in Our Stars is award-winning author John Green's most ambitious and heartbreaking work yet, brilliantly exploring the funny, thrilling, and tragic business of being alive and in love.

I first bought this book for my cousin, having seen it decorating every bookshop for several months. Looking at the blurb, though, I didn't really have any urge to read it myself - young love, cancer? It all sounded a little pre-teen, a little American.

At this point I slipped into the kind of person I have despised for so long - a literary snob. Blghrrrr. So after seeing it's huge success and hearing nothing but high praise for this novel, I decided I really should have a go and damn it, it really is good.

Sure it is a little teenagery but it's done with such heart (and not the gooey fluffy kind, grittier and more painful than that). The protagonist, Hazel, has all the wonderful grumpiness and pretentiousness of that breed of teenager but she is not a caricature and I feel that must have been extremely important for Green when writing her. She's funny, she's intelligent, she has things she likes and things she doesn't, she's desperate to be understood but also desperate to be misunderstood, and she gets into grumps like any other person, teenager or otherwise, but actually has a *reasonably* decent excuse. The love interest, Augustus, is perhaps a little too perfect. But that's ok. Why? Because if Hazel is me, then in my little moment of escapism, there's an Augustus for me too. It's as simple, as cheesy and as sugar-sprinkled as that.

There is something about going through something awful like a serious illness, death, war, whatever it may be, that is very dreamlike; you don't ever believe it will happen to you, even when it has. Therefore, while my cynical side rolled its eyes at the seemingly perfect love story, the other part of me felt that it all kind of fits - cancer, love - they're pretty much both dreams, albeit opposite ends of the spectrum. Ok so now I sound like the pretentious teenager with very poor vocab but I hope you see what I'm getting at.

One of the best things about this book, and I think what makes it feel all the more real and not what I would call 'cancer-schmultz' is that Green and his characters are not afraid of humour. Nothing like a bit of black humour when everything is going wrong. Sure, it isn't for everyone, but it sure as hell is the drug for me.

By the end, though, I have to say I felt angry. Not at having wasted my time or anything - this was a beautiful book, it was funny and touching, enlightening and well-written - but because I felt manipulated. How dare Mr. Green make me feel emotional. Streaming with black mascara tears at various intervals, it felt like I had been drugged by Nicholas Sparks and that I was getting emotional against my own will. But actually, if I'm honest, sometimes that is exactly what I want - to be able to get in touch with those emotions in a safe environment. And there's no better way than reading this book. And it's not trashy, either. It's good quality, literary YA fiction that should be read by everyone. Ultimately, kids books do things that adult books can't. I can't put my finger on it but this book is surely a perfect example.

9/10

The Truth About The Harry Quebert Affair - Joel Dicker

August 30, 1975. The day of the disappearance. The day Somerset, New Hampshire, lost its innocence.

That summer, struggling author Harry Quebert fell in love with fifteen-year-old Nola Kellergan. Thirty-three years later, her body is dug up from his yard, along with a manuscript copy of the novel that made him a household name. Quebert is the only suspect.

Marcus Goldman - Quebert's most gifted protégé - throws off his writer's block to clear his mentor's name. Solving the case and penning a new bestseller soon merge into one. As his book begins to take on a life of its own, the nation is gripped by the mystery of 'The Girl Who Touched the Heart of America'. But with Nola, in death as in life, nothing is ever as it seems.

I can't decide how I feel about this book. Starting it, I was disappointed. The characters were, in my opinion, unsubtle and some of the scenarios unrealistic and verging on farcical. My biggest objection, as you might expect, was to some of the decisions made and conversations had in the novel's publishing industry. That's not to say you don't get diabolical editors and money-craving publicity stunts but the whole thing felt a little OTT.

I also (and I realise this is subjective) struggled with the character of Nola herself - there seemed to be so many contradictions. Some, of course, are deliberate, but it seems to me strange, for instance, that a child so overtly young and naive in the way she talks, the way she generally operates, would be sexually engaged? It's not the fact Quebert is in love with a fifteen year old - terrifyingly, it happens - it's that this fifteen year old somehow doesn't make sense to me. It would probably all have been fine if I could distract myself from these niggly points with an intelligent and fast-paced plot but two hundred pages in and I'm struggling a bit.

That said, I don't want to take away the credits Joel Dicker deserves. The concept is strong and the writing was good and appropriately unintrusive; Dicker doesn't shove hyperbolic imagery down the reader's throat or indulge in too many metaphors or flowery sentences. While the plot continued to be a little uninspiring, it did pick up and by the end I was engaged and found myself turning the pages much more rapidly.

Overall I wouldn't say this book goes down as the most original crime novel I've ever read... But it does pick up pace and there are some fun twists and turns along the way so I'd say, if you're going to pick it up, do persevere, it gets better. But am I going to stock up on copies to send to all my friends at Christmas? Sorry Joel Dicker, I feel I've been overly harsh, but no.

5/10

The London Short Story Festival

Where better to hold a literary festival than in Waterstones' flagship store on London's Piccadilly? Award-winning writers nestled in amongst the endless shelves of books and a sea of book-loving streaming in through the doors every hour. Solid effort from Spread the Word teaming up with Waterstones for the first ever London Short Story Festival.

With the sun blazing outside, though, some anxious cynicism seeped into my brain - was the lineup, fantastic as it is, likely to win against the blue skies and 25 degrees outside? Thanks to Spread the Word and the festival's Guest Director, writer and blogger, Paul McVeigh, lined up such a fantastic series of talks and workshops across the weekend that the turnout was not something we needed to be concerned about.

The festival kicked off on Friday evening with the launch of Salt Publishing's Best of British Short Stories 2014 followed by an evening with the winner of the Guardian's Fiction Prize, the impressive Jackie Kay who had the audience in the palm of her hand as she read, discussed and answered questions on her work.

Amidst the science-fiction novels and Manga on Waterstones' first floor was the festival's main space, which played host to an eclectic range of talks all weekend. The first of which got everything off to a weird and wonderful start with "The Weird and Wonderful World of Short Stories" with readings from Adam Marek, Dan Powell and Robert Shearman. Marek's first line made sure there wasn't any hanging around in the 'weird and wonderful' department: "I met a man with a 40 litre monkey..."

You can see just what went on by looking at the Festival Programme online HERE, which featured writer and journalist Anita Sethi, writer and editor Jacob Ross, writers Colin Barrett, Stuart Evers, MJ Hyland, Alex Preston, Radio4's Di Spears, Booker-shortlisted Alison Moore, the list goes on...

A big draw for the writers in the audience was the range of workshops on offer over the weekend, hosted by huge talents such as MJ Hyland, Vanessa Gebbie and Claire Keegan, whose book Foster was, from my experience, the talk of the festival!

Meanwhile, downstairs Spread the Word had set up a series of hands-on sessions in the Writers' Space.

If you didn't have tickets, you needn't have left the store's main atrium to have listened to some stunning examples of short stories at Speaker's Corner. I was very lucky in being able to introduce Davy Byrnes-shortlisted Irish writer, Danielle McLaughlin, Crossword Book Award Winner and author of Boat on Land, Janie Pariat, Edge Hill-shortlisted writer Jaki McCarrick and journalist and writer, Anita Sethi. All of which were fantastically evocative and entertaining. And I mustn't forget the powerful English Pen session which saw Femi Martin read some extraordinary extracts from creative writing written by prisoners - quite amazing.

I feel there is so much more to say as it was such a fun-packed event. Fingers crossed for round two next year so you can all come along for yourselves!

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry - Rachel Joyce

When Harold Fry nips out one morning to post a letter, leaving his wife hoovering upstairs, he has no idea that he is about to walk from one end of the country to the other. He has no hiking boots or map, let alone a compass, waterproof or mobile phone. All he knows is that he must keep walking. To save someone else's life.

'The odyssey of a simple man, original, subtle and touching'. - Claire Tomalin

'From the moment I met Harold Fry, I didn't want to leave him. Impossible to put down.' - Erica Wagner, The Times

As a reader, great quotes from respected sources are much appreciated. As a reviewer, they make things difficult. Ultimately, I'm struggling here to describe this book in a better way than Claire Tomalin. She even stole my name. Or arguably she had it first, but whatever.

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce is one of those books that has sat on my proverbial shelf for a long time but, as so often happens with me, everyone keeps saying 'you must read this' and so I don't read it for fear of it not living up my consequently heightened expectations. Foolish, it turns out in this case, as it was honestly brilliant.

It's really rare that I find a book deeply touching but there's something about old people isn't there? About lives lived (or not, as the case may be)? I don't mean that in a patronising way, I'm always oddly envious of people who have experienced life, whatever route it took, and have something to talk about rather than having to hype up for themselves what they might do.

The Frys, though, aren't talking. Rachel Joyce gets across the rural and domestic silence so well. Somehow she combines the lonely sadness of it all with the enlightening, refreshing feeling when you read about people whose lives are not over-complicated. With that said, though, (and I realise I keep making one point then backtracking and saying the book did something else entirely...), this book reminded me of how everyone's lives are more complicated than they seem. A classic 'what goes on behind closed doors' tale, and not just in the case of the Frys, but also all the people who Harold meets along the way. The little secrets and lies we tell ourselves that we think will make everything that bit easier.

Underpinning the whole narrative, of course, though, is the main premise. The is something wonderfully bizarre about the whole concept of a man who goes out to post a letter one day and just keeps on walking, and that light, quirky, humorous side is something that carries on throughout the novel and brings it all together - a classic British read where subtle humour and sadness come hand in hand.

If you have any heart at all, you will love this book, and you'll probably feel a little weepy...

9/10

Animals - Emma Jane Unsworth

Laura and Tyler are best friends who live together, angrily philosophising and leading each other astray in the pubs and flats of Manchester. But things are set to change. Laura is engaged to teetotal Jim, the wedding is just months away, and Tyler becomes hell-bent on sabotaging her friend's plans for a different life.

Animals is a hilarious, moving and refreshingly honest tale of how a friendship can become the ultimate love story.

Don't ask me why, but this isn't the kind of book I would normally read. But as with so many novels that I've loved over the years, I originally approached them tentatively with a sprinkling of cynicism.

The book description sums it up as "A filthy, funny story of friendship, love and the morning after the night before". That strapline puts it so brilliantly that really there is no point in my giving you this review but I'm going to anyway, obvs.

So yeah, I really loved this book! I'm sure a lot of women who pick this up will think 'oh my god, this is me' as Emma Jane Unsworth recounts the drunken escapades of Laura and Tyler. But for me it wasn't like that. Sure I've had eventful nights out, but I'm quite frankly a wuss and like to be in bed at a reasonable hour on as many nights of the week as I can manage. Saying that, I got completely absorbed in this. It's hilarious for starters, had be genuinely laughing out loud which is rare for me when I'm reading. Hate to think what my reading face is... perhaps a little dull an experiment for series 2 of Gogglebox...

Anyway, I digress again. The book's funny, really funny. There's the occasional moment where the comedy is a tiny bit self-conscious but who cares.

The story is also very real. Who hasn't had a time in their lives when you feel like you're being pulled in two different directions and you're desperately trying to stay loyal to both but ultimately jeopardise both? Laura is exactly in that play, stranded between wanting the security of growing up and getting married to a sensible man and still wanting to have irresponsible drunken nights on the town with her addictively crazy sister from another mister, Tyler. Both simultaneously so very appealing, and so very grim.

Consequently, you kind of want to give Laura a slap and a hug at the same time but whatever you choose, Unsworth's created a character that you just kind of 'get' and can't help but feel sorry for when things start crumbling around her.

8/10

Book Slam: Emma Jane Unsworth, Ned Beauman, Elvis McGonnagall

Tonight was Book Slam night. For those of you unacquainted with the brilliance that is Book Slam, it basically involves a group of reasonably like-minded liberal book-loving intellectuals gathering for one night in the delightful and oh-so-classy Clapham Grand (on this occasion) for “London’s Best Literary Club Night”.

The evening started off well. Very well. You all know me well enough by now to know that that means there was food on offer. Flame-grilled barbecue steak or ribs, only without the flame-grill part because, you know, it was inside... so each steak was served with a portion of ‘this would normally taste better if they’d let us use our blowtorch’. Unflamed but still delicious. And what is better than food? FREE food. And what’s better than free food? Free DOUGHNUTS.

Anyway, books. Great line-up tonight and for the first time I’ve actually read one of the books. Emma Jane Unsworth read from her new novel, Animals. As kindly summed up on the front, it’s basically Withnail and I but with women. It’s an hilarious read, but also very touching and, at times, hugely frustrating. Unsworth’s protagonist is desperately trying to navigate her way through her late twenties, on the one hand trying to settle down with her very sensible and stable tee-total fiancé, while still being drawn in by the addictive madness of best friend, Tyler, who is still very much into all-night benders and one night stands. Loved. It. Will review shortly.

Generally I’m not in to poetry. Occasionally I like to romanticise about sitting down by a peaceful canal on a sunny day with a pretentiously named ale in hand and reading TS Eliot, but mostly poetry just makes me recall studying poetry at school and how rubbish I was at it. However, if you want to bring in a tartan-wearing Scot reciting his hilarious satirical verses, then I’m all ears. We got to meet Nigel Fromage and hear what the queen really wants to say in her Christmas speech. Good fun. Thanks Elvis McGonnagall.

The finale was Ned Beauman reading from his new novel, Glow. He began by explaining how he had become aware of his portrayal in the media as being very pretentious and that a journalist had recently contributed by wrongly declaring he had been wearing all black (classic sign of pretentiousness apparently) during the interview, when he hadn’t and the accompanying photo of him proved said fact. Sadly, rather than making me warm to him, it just sort of made me a little more certain that he probably is a little pretentious, judging (perhaps unfairly) by his attire and fashionable beard (which I still don’t get, by the way). I don’t mind him being pretentious, hell we’ve all paid to go listen to authors read from their literary novels while we gorge on pop-up bbq deliciousness. I’d just rather he’d embraced it all, rather than slam dunk the journo. Yeah, wasn’t keen. Sorry Ned.

All of this was brilliantly brought together in the middle by music from the brilliantly weird, Benin City. Downloading their stuff legally right now.

Thanks Bookslam. Top evening, great doughnuts.

The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt

Aged thirteen, Theo Decker, son of a devoted mother and a reckless, largely absent father, survives an accident that otherwise tears his life apart. Alone and rudderless in New York, he is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. He is tormented by an unbearable longing for his mother, and down the years clings to the thing that most reminds him of her: a small, strangely captivating painting that ultimately draws him into the criminal underworld. As he grows up, Theo learns to glide between the drawing rooms of the rich and the dusty antiques store where he works. He is alienated and in love - and his talisman, the painting, places him at the centre of a narrowing, ever more dangerous circle.

The Goldfinch is a haunted odyssey through present-day America and a drama of enthralling power. Combining unforgettably vivid characters and thrilling suspense, it is a beautiful, addictive triumph - a sweeping story of loss and obsession, of survival and self-invention, of the deepest mysteries of love, identity and fate.

If there's ever a good time to read a 900+ page novel, it's when you're on a beach on Fiji with literally nothing else to do. I don't mean to brag, sorry. The sea is all pretty and blue. Oops. Sorry. And there are palm tr.. ok. That was both mean and an awful awful joke. I will continue with the book review now.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt is one of my favourite books, as it is for many people. So it's always going to be tough when she brings out a new novel - you can't help but compare. Well it's certainly longer. An 'odyssey' is about right. And really that's my main problem with it. It sounds like a pathetic focal point for such a brilliant writer but it was just too endulgent; it didn't need to be that long.

Right, with that aside, I can go on to more positive stuff. Donna Tartt is an amazing writer. One moment you're introduced to a brand new character and somehow you're a few pages further ahead and you know this person as if they were real, standing in front of you. How does she do that without you noticing?

I was also pleasantly surprised to find myself falling for the world of antiques, something I've always unfairly turned my nose up at. Think I must have subconsciously grown resentful from countless evenings waiting for some woman to find out how much her lavender vase is worth when all I wanted was for whatever was on at 9 o'clock to start...Sorry, I deviate. Basically Hobie is my new favourite person who you get to meet reasonably early on in the book, and through him you get another side of antiques that isn't all old posh people. The kind of guy you want to buy a crumbling old desk from him just to make him feel good.

It's not all old furniture, though; it's a drama, almost a thriller in places. The opening haunted me for days. It's wonderfully powerful and it's so immediate - this is modern day New York, but it could be London or Paris or Hong Kong. It's like you're getting a 'behind the scenes' look at this huge news story, and it kind of put me in a weird state of mind - not dissimilar to what Theo Decker is feeling I guess: shocked and yet sort of weirdly calm, fuzzy and gentle. (I realise I'm pulling out some difficult literary jargon here, I hope you can keep up).

While I stand by my view that this book was too long, Tartt does cover a lot of ground: quite literally, taking us from New York to Arizona to Europe, but also thematically. One moment you're aww-ing at childhood romance, the next minute you're racing through Dutch streets with the art world's criminal underbelly. Tartt keeps you on your toes; the moment everything's lost pace and you're losing interest is when everything gets turned on its head again.

Is it better than The Secret History? No. Is it worth reading? Definitely. If you have time. And a strong wrist to carry the book. Otherwise, dare I say it, this might be one for Kindle... the ultimate technological advancement for the weak-wristed.

7/10

The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox - Maggie O'Farrell

Edinburgh in the 1930s. The Lennox family is having trouble with its youngest daughter. Esme is outspoken, unconventional, and repeatedly embarrasses them in polite society. Something will have to be done.

Years later, a young woman named Iris Lockhart receives a letter informing her that she has a great-aunt in a psychiatric unit who is about to be released.

Iris has never heard of Esme Lennox and the one person who should know more, her grandmother Kitty, seems unable to answer Iris's questions. What could Esme have done to warrant a lifetime in an institution? And how is it possible for a person to be so completely erased from a family's history?

I find one of benefits of writers that make a name for themselves is that, because you've read a number of titles by them and know you like their style and the kind of subjects they deal with, you can pick up a book by them, not read the blurb, and have a reasonably good chance of enjoying it. The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O'Farrell was one of those books for me.

There's something great about reading a novel when you have no idea what it's about, it's sort of how it should be.

As you know by now, I'm a big fan of Richard Yates. Aside from being in love with his writing, I really like the way he approaches domestic subjects. That's such a stale way of putting it but I have the same thing with Maggie O'Farrell. She's just brilliant at getting into people's homes and writing a whole family. In this novel one of the most important characters has only a handful of pages worth of airtime but O'Farrell makes sure the reader is armed with a perfect understanding of this woman's character, her public face, her lurking motives.

This is not a ghost story, but it almost kind of is. O'Farrell's writing is wonderfully haunting. You can't help but soak up the sinister atmosphere surrounding Esme Lennox and her mysterious life. There's also humour and just the right amount of odd to make this a truly unique read.

For a relatively short read, you really get involved here; ostensibly this is a snapshot of Iris's life, but there's plenty more on offer here.

I really liked this book. It gets 7.5/10 from me.

A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute

Jean Paget is just twenty years old and working in Malaya when the Japanese invasion begins. When she is captured she joins a group of other European women and children whom the Japanese force to march for miles through the jungle - an experience that leads to the deaths of many. Due to her courageous spirit and ability to speak Malay, Jean takes on the role of leader of the sorry gaggle of prisoners and many end up owing their lives to her indomitable spirit. While on the march, the group run into some Australian prisoners, one of whom, Joe Harman, helps them steal some food, and is horrifically punished by the Japanese as a result. After the war, Jean tracks Joe down in Australia and together they begin to dream of surmounting the past and transforming his one-horse outback town into a thriving community like Alice Springs...

Starting in London, then on to the invasion of Malaysia by the Japanese in World War 2 before moving to Alice Springs and then the east coast of Australia - there didn't seem like a more appropriate follow-on from The Glass Palace than A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute.

My edition of the novel actually included a touching introduction from Eric Lomax, the writer of The Railway Man that I read at the end of last year. Having read Lomax's memoir, then The Glass Palace and now this, I feel I'm just starting to really grasp what it was like in South East Asia during and after the war. This is particularly interesting to me as my grandparents lived in Malaysia for decades and my mum was born out there.

If you're a woman and need to feel empowered, you have to read this book. This basically paints a world where one woman shows everyone else how it's done. She's a little annoying in places, and that probably makes me anti-feminist in some definition or other, but ultimately Jean Paget is pretty awesome. I can't imagine what it must have felt like reading this novel if you were Eric Lomax, reading the descriptions of the all too familiar insane heat, the death and disease, the starvation.

Shute's novel definitely paints a convincing scene but its ambition is of course not that of The Railway Man, or even The Glass Palace. To read, the book felt dated but in a good way, like I was reading one of my grandad's books or something - a nice alternative to the more modern reads I normally find myself with. There is a strong romantic thread in this book, which I appreciated - you definitely root for all the characters - but, for me, this is where the dated element of the book didn't quite work. It was all a little too trad for my liking, which is saying something as Jean Pagets life is far from traditional - for now, let alone then! But yeah, I guess it must have been the influence of The Glass Palace, but I surprised myself by wanting a little less romance, and a little more of the history, culture and time. For some reason it just started to feel a bit two-dimensional. I hate saying that as this is a good book, it is. And a great choice for my trip considering the route I took. I just think it's a case of a modern reader being used to a certain amount, or more a certain kind of drama that this book just didn't provide I'm afraid.

Overall, though, this gets a 5/10 - by 5, I mean 5, not 1. I have a tendency to lump any rating from 1 to 5 together as 'not very good', but I enjoyed it on an average level, so it gets a half score. It's a great insight into a particular time, not just in Asia and Australia either, but of the world and the way it got so much smaller after the Second World War, and then better technology and transport, brought so many people together.

The Glass Palace by Amitav Ghosh

Set in Burma during the British invasion of 1885, this masterly novel by Amitav Ghosh tells the story of Rajkumar, a poor boy lifted on the tides of political and social chaos, who goes on to create an empire in the Burmese teak forest. When soldiers force the royal family out of the Glass Palace and into exile, Rajkumar befriends Dolly, a young woman in the court of the Burmese Queen, whose love will shape his life. He cannot forget her, and years later, as a rich man, he goes in search of her. The struggles that have made Burma, India, and Malaya the places they are today are illuminated in this wonderful novel.

The Glass Palace by Amitav Ghosh is probably the best book I could have read at this point in my trip. The novel spans over a century of socio-political history and travels all over South East Asia, from Calcutta to Mandalay, from Rangoon to Malaya.

It's an ambitious project for Ghosh, taking him 5 years writing and researching  all the tiniest details but it's paid off massively. What a feat of writing. Everything comes alive in this novel - who knew I could learn so much, and be genuinely made interested in, teak and rubber plantations?? I often find that Asian writers have a particular, more floral style that I'm not always used to and struggle with but Ghosh doesn't do that. He writes clearly and fluidly, while weaving in the vital historical and cultural detail with subtlety, rather than showing off his wealth of knowledge. 

This book has a story to tell certainly, but in comparison to Burmese Days, I don't think Ghosh's primary intention is to make a political/cultural statement. He does address difficult issues explicitly, but does so admirably fairly and without, I think, losing the facts. Subjects include the treatment of the Indian communities in Malaya and Burma, their relationship with the British army and Gandhi's crusade, the violence inflicted on Asia by the British and the Japanese during World War 2, class climbing, and more domestic issues such as marriage, grief and infidelity across the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

For anyone travelling in South East Asia, this is a must read, but you should read it anyway.

8.5/10

Burmese Days by George Orwell

Based on his experiences as a policeman in Burma, George Orwell's first novel presents a devastating picture of British colonial rule. It describes corruption and imperial bigotry in a society where, 'after all, natives were natives - interesting, no doubt, but finally ... an inferior people'. When Flory, a white timber merchant, befriends Indian Dr Veraswami, he defies this orthodoxy. The doctor is in danger: U Po Kyin, a corrupt magistrate, is plotting his downfall. The only thing that can save him is membership of the all-white Club, and Flory can help. Flory's life is changed further by the arrival of beautiful Elizabeth Lackersteen from Paris, who offers an escape from loneliness and the 'lie' of colonial life.

As some of you will know, I have taken three months out to do some travelling. One of the many luxuries is reading whatever I want! I'm trying, though, to at least read some books that are geographically appropriate. After a brief stop in Kuala Lumpur, I am now in Myanmar, or Burma - hence my first read, Burmese Days by George Orwell.

Burmese Days is, as expected, brilliantly written. It is also incredibly interesting as it provides a genuine insight into what it might have been like in Burma under British rule as Orwell himself had been a police officer out there in the 1920s. For anyone who hadn't read Emma Larkin's intro, or indeed her book on the subject, you might assume the novel would be more sympathetic to the colonisers rather than the native people. I noticed from the copyright page that the novel was first published in the States, not the Uk, which surprised me so I did a brief google (made briefer by the precarious wifi..). The book had apparently caused an uproar in Britain for painting such a negative image of colonialism and so was not published until a year later.

It is extremely clear that Orwell bad become disillusioned by British colonialism in Myanmar but, saying that, the Burmese people do not come across brilliantly either. In fact, there is a distinct lack of likeable people in the whole novel. Flory, Orwells protagonist, is the closest you'll get to rooting for someone but even he is a little too wimpy and pathetic to be truly 'liked'. The women are grim, both the British and the Burmese, and the men are mostly painted as sex and money obsessed, bigoted and supercilious alcoholics.

Orwell focuses a lot on the contradictions, the love hate relationship between Flory and Burma and how he hates it but can't imagine wanting to live anywhere else. Orwells descriptions also ooze heat, the decadent, sweat inducing humidity in the forests and rural villages outside Rangoon. 

Despite it's distinctly negative and depresssing tone, it's been great reading something set where I am - you can really sense what it might have been like, whether it an exaggerated version or not. It reminded me a little of Hemingway's explorations of people and places in his short stories in particular. 

7.5/10

The Bone People by Keri Hulme

Blurb: In a tower on the New Zealand sea lives Kerewin Holmes, part Maori, part European, an artist estranged from her art, a woman in exile from her family. One night her solitude is disrupted by a visitor—a speechless, mercurial boy named Simon, who tries to steal from her and then repays her with his most precious possession. As Kerewin succumbs to Simon's feral charm, she also falls under the spell of his Maori foster father Joe, who rescued the boy from a shipwreck and now treats him with an unsettling mixture of tenderness and brutality. Out of this unorthodox trinity Keri Hulme has created what is at once a mystery, a love story, and an ambitious exploration of the zone where Maori and European New Zealand meet, clash, and sometimes merge. Winner of both a Booker Prize and Pegasus Prize for Literature, The Bone People is a work of unfettered wordplay and mesmerizing emotional complexity.

My bezzie moved to New Zealand this year and for my birthday present she aptly bought me this, The Bone People by Keri Hulme. Hulme was the last New Zealander to win the Man Booker Prize before Eleanor Catton won the esteemed prize this year with her novel, The Luminaries.

I really loved this book. Not necessarily for its literal story or its specific characters, although both were extremely good, but for the tone it set and how I felt reading it, particularly the first half. New Zealand has an extraordinary landscape and has remained, for many, a mystery as Australia normally seems to win the tourists for some reason. This landscape and sense of the unknown comes across in abundance in this novel. With the risk of sounding like the biggest ponce, I'd go as far as saying you could almost feel the waves crashing on the sand - the novel's cover arguably helping me construct this image...

There are three main characters in this novel, all completely different and all adding something to the novel. Kerewin's eccentricity could perhaps have the potential to make her seem caricatured and unbelievable (which fits in with the book itself, which does, in places, touch upon the magically realist...) But despite and because of these slightly odd moments, Hulme has crafted Kerewin (and her world) wonderfully; her grace, her insecurities, her unique mind and her inner-conflicts all come across to create a very full, 'real' person that you can't help feel affection for.

If I had anything negative to say, it would be that I could have done without the author's introduction. As brilliant a writer as she is, she's definitely indulgent. The novel is long, with not much plot - and I liked that - but she's clearly a woman who is difficult to edit. Her preamble felt a little aggressive and a little self-consciously eccentric, which easily winds me up. Saying that, I don't know the woman but I do know her book, and I really loved it.