MAILBOX MONDAY/IT'S MONDAY! WHAT ARE YOU READING?

Monday morning here and this week there are no new books coming in. This week too it is hosted   by Bermudaonion. Time to play catch up.

Tomorrow we celebrate Deepavali - known as the festival of lights.

I will be away from the blog for two days as I have to go to Rozella as the workers there will be celebrating the festival. We have two enormous dogs who will need looking after so no internet at all.



However this meme will get lots of attention because with so much of travelling and being away from office, reading will get done (hopefully).

The meme is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.

 

I've just started a Tana French book which is proving to be very, very good. I've also got Dear Fatty which got put aside and Mercy awaiting me. William Dalrymple and the Michael Ondaatjie have just got to wait.

 

SLEEP PALE SISTER by JOANNE HARRIS

 

 

Described as Victorian gothic, this was definitely a creepy one!

 

Set in the 19th century Henry Chester is a painter and he seems to specialize in paintings of very young girls.  This also seems to be a secret obsession of his. He takes in Effie as a young model at a very early age and uses her as his muse. He eventually marries her at 18 but though married to her would like to keep her in his eyes and heart as a young girl of not even teenage years.

 

Effie who looks at him as a father figure at first is repelled by him as time goes on specially after she loses her first baby. Ripe for any form of excitment, Effie falls in love with Mose an unsavoury character himself and finds herself lined to a world of prostitution and deceit in the form of the very friendly Fanny Miller.

 

Effie stands alone in this gothic story - yet a link and a pawn with all other characters who want a piece of her and who will cling to her in whatever circumstances they find themselves in.  Victorian society was harsh - the excessive restrictions of women by their husbands, the control that men had over women (even to the point of getting a wife locked up in an asylum on a false charge of insanity was possible as a doctor would faithfully follow a husband's wishes on this matter), the excessive use of drugs laudanum and choral were some of the features of the society at the time.

 

The story was harsh, the ending harsher and it was not a comfortable read. Certainly different, just not comfortable.

PAYMENT IN BLOOD by ELIZABETH GEORGE

 

Elizabeth George never disappoints me. This time around it was particularly good. A practical reason as well. The book was one of 300 odd pages compared to her normal 800 page tomes and sometimes when the story becomes so long, I tend to lose track of characters, plots and sub plots. Especially since I am reading on the go as it were and not in one place (if that is understandable!).

 

This one set in the bleak winter of a Scot landscape was brilliant. I loved the descriptiveness first of the landscape. Maybe it appeals to me because it is the exact opposite of where I live (hot, tropical, humid). The feeling of isolation, the absolute silence of the entire setting is something that can never be found in a populous island like mine.

 

A theatre group including director, playwright and actors meet for a reading in this remote Scottish manor and the playwright ends up dead with a dirk through her neck. Inspector Lynley and his partner Havers are sent out to investigate the crime. At the onset itself it seems rather strange and out of place because Scotland Yard has no jurisdiction in this territory and Lynley should have smelt a rat. It is not till the very end that Lynley finds how he has been used - being a peer it was decided by the higher ups that he would be the ideal sucker to be taken in by another peer Lord Stinhurst whose actions in the case are so suspicious and that Lynley will be taken in by the word of a "gentleman", accept everything he says as gospel and the case will die a graceful death.

 

Unfortunately, they did not think of Havers - who cannot stand the toffs, disregards everything they say and is suspicious to the last of the "gentlemen". A second murder of an innocent bystander, the discovery of suicide of a young woman twenty five years ago, now not a suicide but a murder and the unravelling of that story linked to this play makes for a marvellous mystery murder. Add to this several adulterous relationships, family secrets, government cover ups, a Soviet mole and you definitely have not just a good crime fiction read but a wonderful read.

 

One of the best by Elizabeth George.

 

HEAD OVER HEELS by JILL MANSELL

Yesterday was a busy day and I did need something light to read. I had plenty of waiting time in between doctors appointments and was on the road the whole day. This was an ideal read for me.

Jessie has kept the identity of her son's father a secret for 21 years. Of all the coincidences possible the father Toby Gillespie now a very famous actor buys the manor in the small village where she lives and turns her world upside down,  sets in motion a series of events which implausible though they sound actually could happen and in turn make for a wonderful read!

The coincidences were a bit too much but the incidents they set in motion are ones which could really happen and I was always thinking back to something similar that I knew about!!!

Interesting reading.

MAILBOX MONDAY/IT'S MONDAY! WHAT ARE YOU READING

Mailbox Monday being hosted for the month of November by Bermudaonion.

I have been seeing this author on several blogs I follow. I've read one and it was a light hearted read
though definitely very much feet on the ground.

 

A Very English Agent set in 1852 - a period of the nineteenth century very often neglected.

 

 

I am expanding my reading horizons and reading something described as Victorian gothic!

 

A very English crime fiction author and the suave, professional Inspector Lynley along with the haphazard, casual partner Havers. One I am looking so very much to.

 

 

Another author coming up on the blogs.

 

The next meme for Monday is It's Monday! What Are You Reading hosted by Sheila at Bookjourney.

 

 

I have been reading quite a bit but the reviews are getting late and blogger did not work on the scheduling thingie and posted two posts on Sunday! Was a bit disappointed over that.

 

I am reading the memoir of Dawn French. Very humorous and the only problem is that it is such a big book, very difficult to handle in a vehicle!

 

 

 

I still have Anil's Ghost and two books on India. I cannot understand why I don't seem to be able to go further on the William Dalrymple one. I love his writing so very much but this time around its hard going.

 

RESTORING GRACE by KATIE FFORDE

Restoring Grace is a light hearted read. - three very different women. We have Grace very young, recently divorced from a stuffy much older husband, we have single mother Ellie whose own parents shudder at being grand parents and we have Demi whose respective parents have both found new spouses and certainly do not want a teenager in their house.

All three women suffer from self esteem and feel sorry for themselves justifiably. It is not pleasant to be not wanted and Ellie and Demi's parents are particularly harsh. Demi's mother converts her room into a gym as she wants herself toned and fit for a much younger partner. Ellie's parents are too smart, and too modern for the art oriented daughter they have. In Grace's case there is a lot of animosity around as well. Grace inherited a rather old fashioned but valuable house and property from her godmother. The antiques in the house went to her two siblings - Allegra and Nicholas but they are far from being happy or satisfied. Allegra particularly resents bitterly (despite being married to a wealthy man) that Grace inherited this property and after Grace finds a valuable painting panel in the house is livid about the money that Grace will get.

Add to the mix two delicious men - Flynn rugged and handsome and Ran also the same and Grace despite her initial deep distrust of men finds herself drawn to Flynn as if to a magnet. In Ran's case Ellie wants a fling, before her pregnancy begins to show (I found this a bit unbelievable but then again I think I am too conservative for present day stories!!!!)  - she does not want a love affair she just wants some nice sex but the story turns out otherwise.

It was a nice, quiet read for an evening and I liked it.

HUMAN CROQUET - KATE ATKINSON

I did not know anything about this book so went into it totally unaware of how or what it was. We read reviews about books and then we have invariably a pre-conceived idea of the story and the way it works. 

This was going in blind to a story that is part fairy tale, part factual, part fantasy and part pathos.
Told from the point of view of two children, it is very often a sad tale - of how neglect and abandonment by any parent (one is bad enough, two is horrible) can change a child. Not just the personality or character of the child but how they view the whole world and everyone in it. I found the way the children's lives were turned upside down extremely sad.

Having said that about the sadness bit, the book was very interestingly written. Going from past, to present to even future, the fantasy genre is not one I am very familiar with and this was a good start for me to get going with. The future part was plausible and the fantasy part was not too way out for me!!!!

This is a good example of modern story telling.

I am behind on reviews again and even posting as was out of Colombo and just got back. Now its Monday morning and heaps of work!