Victory City

By Salman Rushdie

A story about a mythical figure who like the novelist creates a city and empire and all its inhabitants from nothing. Rushdie's imagination is amazing and this is a great tale. 7/10

Birnam Wood

By Eleanor Catton

A mystery/thriller set in New Zealand where a billionaire crosses paths with an ecological action group. It was a quick read but it never quite worked for me. The characters were all a bit too stiff and playing to stereotypes. 

Having said that I didn't see the end coming in quite the way it did. 6/10

Shalimar the Clown

By Salman Rushdie

A story spread across the globe but centred in Kashmir and the tensions of that region since partition. 

I found it a slow start but it gathered pace as the novel unfolds. The characters are large and engaging and as ever the plot comes from a fascinatingly creative mind. 8/10

Mirror of our Sorrows

By Pierre LeMaitre

The third in the interwar trilogy which sees some previous characters return as the German invasion of France in June 1940 is taking place.

After a strange encounter between a doctor and a waitress followed by a suicide we learn the history that led to this moment. 

A good read but lacked some of the punch of the earlier books. 6/10

My Friend Maigret

By George Simenon

Maigret has an English detective from Scotland Yard shadowing him and he is not too happy about it. They end up in the South of France investigating a murder of someone who claimed Maigret was a friend. Good yarn 8/10

Demon Copperhead

By Barbara Kingsolver

An ambitious book mirroring David Copperfield in a modern American setting. Damon is brought up on a trailer park and then in foster care. The story follows his life with Damon as narrator.

The writing is good but I found the constant referencing of the Dickens work a distraction. 6/10

The Dead Secret

By Wilkie Collins

Set around a house by the sea in Cornwall this is a mystery about a housekeeper and her mistress and a secret they held between them. The melodrama is a tad too high and the secret is easily guessed, but it was a fun read nonetheless 7/10

The Dynamite Club

 by John Merriman

A book about late nineteenth century France and the anarchist movement told by following the story of Emile Henry who exploded two bombs in central Paris. It is a fascinating story and told in a very engaging way.
Merriman concludes that there was no Dynamite Club as such but it is easy to draw parallels between the motivations of nineteenth century anarchists and modern day terrorists. Surely, it behoves society to look at the reasons for such actions 8/10

The Candy House

 by Jennifer Egan

A book looking just a short way into the future and where social media and technology might take us, when a social media guru invents a technology that can retrieve memories and download them, and also upload them to the collective conscience. Scary stuff. It has a huge cast of characters who interlink over time and place. Some of these characters appeared in A visit from the Goon Squad. Keeping track of them all required a fair bit of mental gymnastics. I enjoyed the first two thirds of this book but for me it lost its way toward the end and as such lost me as well 7/10

Review of the Year 2022

 A bit less crime this year-only 5 Maigret's, all enjoyable, and a smattering of others, including The Secret Life of Writers

The Booker list was ok but not a classic. My favourite by far was The trees by Percival Everett, a truly different book. I enjoyed the winning novel, The seven moons but a number of the other novels were pretty ordinary imho.

The year was dominated by a couple of Trollopes from the Palliser series, The Forsyte Saga trilogy-which I thoroughly enjoyed, and to celebrate it's centenary, Ulysses. This book was like climbing a mountain but was in equal measure entertaining and so opaque that it became a slog to get through. 

Pierene continue to produce good books in translation with my favourite this year being Marzahn, mon amour.

Companion Piece

By Ali Smith

A really enjoyable book about modern life told through an encounter with a wacky family and a story within the story about a young female blacksmith who may or may not have made the lock which features in the first part of the story.

All good fun with a serious poke at the inept government currently in power. 8/10

To Let

By John Galsworthy 

The last part of the Forsyte trilogy and its weakest.

The story revolves around Fleur and Jon the daughter of Soames and son of Irene. It verges on melodrama but the writing is such as to walk a narrow line that keeps it real.  As a picture of Britain leaving the victorian age this is a brilliant series with wonderfully drawn characters 8/10

The Politics of Imperial Memory in France, 1850-1900

By Christina B. Carroll

This is an interesting book charting the portrayal of Empire in France from Napoleon 111 to the early 20th century.  I particularly liked the way it differentiated Empire at home to Empire overseas and also the way reaction to the second empire was such a problem for republicans.

Having said this the writing style I found difficult and not very engaging 5/10

Maigret's first case

 by George Simenon

We go back in time to Maigret's beginnings in the police force and a case which ends unhappily for Maigret but where his methods shine through all the same. A murder in the house of a wealthy coffee merchant gets covered up by the elite-including Maigret's boss. Interesting back story for the other novels 8/10

In Chancery

 by John Galsworthy

The second Forsyte novel takes us into the 20th century and the pain of Soames and Irene's divorce set against the background of the Boer war and the end of the Victorian age. Soames continues to be a bastard but is such a great character. 8/10

Ulysses Unbound

 by Terence Killeen

The guide referred to in the previous post. This book was invaluable in guiding a layman like me through the maze that is ulysses, giving a guide to the style, to the references to Homer's epic and to the many real characters and places referenced in the text. Great reference book 9/10

Ulysses

 by James Joyce

Well, well. I have finally finished this book in the year celebrating the centenary of its publication. What can I say. This was a hard read but at times incredibly engaging, as we follow Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus through one day in Dublin. Each section is told in a different style and sometimes different styles within a section. I have to say without a guide to help I would have struggled but I am glad I have read it. As a novel I would give it 3/10 but as a work of such significance you have to give it more and it will stay with me for some time. 7/10

The Man of Property

By John Galsworthy

The first novel of the Forsyte saga and the BBC adaptation comes flooding back even though it was 50 years ago and me barely in my teens.  The novel paints Soames exactly as I remember him but with the added touches only a novel can bring. It paints a fantastic picture of life in late nineteenth century Britain for a narrow bunch of the aspiring middle class. Narrow in scope but great in execution  9/10

The Secret Life of Writers

By Guillaume Musso

A very engaging crime mystery set on a French island in the Mediterranean. A woman is found murdered in a remote spot, but all is not what it seems. But more than this the book plays with the reader around areas such as who is writing what and what is real. Great larks 9/10

Shrines of Gaiety

By Kate Atkinson

Set in the 1920's this is the story of a tough woman who ran a string of London nightclubs and of a policeman who tried to bring her down together with a host of other characters.  Not my favourite of her novels but still enjoyable 7/10