by Catherine Hewitt
The rags to riches story of a nineteenth century courtesan. The story was really interesting, Comtesse Valtesse de la Bigne as she ended up calling herself moved in the highest circles of society and became one of the richest people in Paris. She was clearly single minded and ruthless in the operation of her profession. I did at times feel the author was a frustrated fiction writer but that aside had clearly done a lot of research. 7/10
by Georges Simenon
Maigret is thinking about impending retirement and getting grumpy. He has to deal with a young new prosecutor who he does not take to and in the middle of this he has to deal with a murder in a house where nobody wants to talk about what happened. Enjoyable for the grumpy Maigret on show. 8/10
by Maria Reva
A wacky read that I enjoyed immensely. It is set in Ukraine just at the time the Russian invasion is starting in 2022. It involves an endangered snail called Lefty and some young women involved in the mail order bride industry together with some of the would be Western husbands. It does get a little complicated. It made me laugh, it made me sad, it made me question and wonder. It has the most ambivalent of endings. What more do you want from a novel. I hope it makes the Booker shortlist but it may be a bit too off piste for this. 9/10
by Natasha Brown
A disappointing read. It started with a great plot: a man attacked with a gold bar while squatting in an old farmhouse. He turns out to be the leader of an anti-capitalist group and the assailant is not only a member of the group but also the son of a journalist who is/was sleeping with the owner of the gold bar.
A great start but it all rather fizzled out by the end and seemed more of a surrender to the sorry state we are in than anything else. Perhaps even our writers are getting worn down by our current plight 6/10
by Jonathan Buckley
Set almost entirely at a Greek seaside village/town a British women returns to the same place nine years after her last visit when she came to deal with loss of a parent (death) and a husband(divorce). This time she is dealing with loss again.
The story jumps between the two times and the people she met and interacted with on the first visit. They have moved on, she may not have but she has to deal with the changes. It was a very enjoyable read with the story lapping around you like the ocean. My only regret was the ending and her return to the UK where she discusses with her new partner the plan to turn her notes into a book. It didn't see needed to me but a minor quibble. 8/10
by Ledia Xhoga
An Albanian translator/interpreter living in New York runs into problems when working for a Kosovar who has traumas he is trying to work through. She is forced to face some things in her own life as her lack of appropriate boundaries gets her mixed up in some threatening situations. This was a slow moving book at the start but gathered pace and engaged me more and more as it progressed. I liked it 8/10
by Ben Markovits
A road trip of sorts set in America. Tom's daughter is heading off to college and he and his wife have been not getting along since she had an affair of sorts six years previously. This could be the time for a break so after dropping off his daughter he keeps driving West and reflecting on his life,
I found a lot of the basketball and education references difficult, but they probably are fine if you understand American culture. It didn't quite work for me although I did recognise and enjoy some of the references to getting older and the life unfulfilled. 6/10
by David Szalay
The story of a man who starts life with little in a flat in Hungary and ends life with little in a flat in Hungary. A lot happens in between as we move from Hungary to Iraq and to London, and up and down society. As a consequence the story pulls you along as we get close to the central character but never really know him. His mother features at various times through the story but I found her a bit unbelievable. An interesting read 7/10
by Georges Simenon
Very enjoyable, bordering on Simenon's psychological side this story starts with a man coming to tell Maigret that he is going to be killed by his wife. Not long after the wife arrives and Maigret spends the rest of the book trying to unravel what and who he is dealing with. 9/10
