by Simone Buchholz
Fourth book in the series featuring Chastity Riley based in Hamburg. In this novel she has more of a background role as she part narrates the story of a drug related payback cum hostage situation in which she is one of the hostages. 8/10
by Mathias Enard
This was a book that is hard to categorise. It starts and ends with David Mazon who is supposedly carrying out fieldwork for his Phd in anthropology in the west of France in a small village that is struggling with all the problems of rural France. His diary entries are very funny. However, not much work on his thesis gets done. The central sections of the book are crazy as we explore the interaction of the wheel of life and its impact on the inhabitants past and future of the village. In the middle of this we have the banquet of the gravediggers which is magnificently described and dotted with stories and speeches by those in attendance.
My biggest gripe with this book which was published by Fitzcarraldo, is the glaring typos throughout the book where words are duplicated or appear in the wrong order. Dreadful.
As for the book itself I enjoyed this madcap trip 9/10
by Colm Toibin
The story of an Irish girl, Eilis who in the 1950's is encouraged to emigrate to New York by her sister.
The story of her preparation for this upheaval and her arrival and setting in New York I really enjoyed. The story of her return visit to Ireland seemed a bit less believable to me and so lost a bit of the edge that occupied the earlier sections. Having said that the ending was interesting. I will read the sequel at some point. 7/10
