Cross Channel

 by Julian Barnes

Great collection of short stories by Julian Barnes dealing with the interaction between the French and the English at various times through history.  Very funny in places and thoughtful in others. I really enjoyed it 9/10

Transcription

 by Ben Lerner

An interesting book which starts with a comical loss of a phone following a drop into a sink, something which many of us can identify with. It goes on to examine how things get remembered and transcribed through memory or electronic devices and raises the question of what is true and how is truth remembered. Not great but thought provoking 7/10 

The Disappearers

 by Marlon James

 Where to begin. This is a long book and at times feels like a relentless flow of violence and gay sex which was just too much at times.

The basic story is about a group of gay men who in 1988 in Kingston, Jamaica are rehearsing a "gay" play when they are brutally attacked by a mob, leaving one dead, one blind and six injured. Two disappear but this is the tale of the months leading up to and the years following the attack and how the individuals dealt with it. The story is told by means of diary entries, interviews and letters and holds your attention to the end but not a story to raise your spirits! 7/10 

The Vivisectors

 by Missouri Williams

Where to begin. This novel was a real struggle to get started with and I only picked up the flow of it from half way through and even then I was struggling.

It is set in an unnamed crumbling city of lofty spires and the university. The city is being overrun by vegetation and the gardeners-who are a powerful faction in the running of the city-are in dispute with the academics.

In the middle of this we find Agathe who is not speaking to her father and whose mother has been seriously injured in a suicide attempt. Having abandoned her own studies she is living with her uncle and working for an academic from another city.

The university is in uproar over a student who has come into conflict with a professor called Jacob and this throws Agathe and the student together in very weird circumstances.

The book has some beautifully written snippets but as a book it left me cold. Not for me 4/10

All Them Dogs

 by Djamel White

Think the Sopranos set in present day Dublin and you just about have the plot for this novel! The main character is even called Tony! The pace is relentless and the outpouring of anger is written with real intensity. 

Surprised to see it on the Booker longlist and it wouldn't make my shortlist, but stranger things have happened. 6/10

The End of Everything

 by M. John Harrison

A weird book set in a dystopian near future where the economy is collapsed and law and order has broken down. Europe has disappeared although people leave London in boats to try and find it. None seem to come back. Meanwhile, the country seems to have been invaded by some alien life force, or maybe it hasn't. It's a disjointed, shocking and yet strangely compelling book. 7/10 

May we Feed the King

 by Rebecca Perry

 An interesting book where a nameless curator discovers through a nameless archivist in a nameless palace a nameless medieval king. She is decorating the rooms for a forthcoming exhibition and through her we catch fragments of her life before being plunged into the life of this reluctant king. It is a history built from fragments and never complete. It was at times frustrating, at others fascinating posing questions about how history is built and stories told and where they cross over and merge. 7/10

John of John

 by Douglas Stuart

A tale of a gay man returning to his family home on the Western Isles and the unravelling of family and community secrets that have been foundational to his life. The story is not only about Cal but about his father John and about the close knit community built around the strict calvinist church. 

I was not sure we needed the story of Cal's friend which dragged out the middle of the book but then again maybe we did.

Sad and despairing but offering hope I really enjoyed this. 8/10

The Renovation

 by Kevin Orhan

This novel, like many it appears on this year's longlist, throws you off kilter when early on our central character Dilara discovers that builders have installed a Turkish prison cell instead of the expected ensuite in her bedroom. Not only that, but the cell leads to an actual Turkish prison even though she lives in Italy!

Crazy as this sounds, this is an absorbing novel about homeland and belonging but also about love and loss and the pain of loss when drawn out and gradual-her father has dementia and is living with them. 8/10

Helen of Nowhere

 by Makenna Goodman

A professor is looking for a new house having been kicked out of his university. This novel is told in the form of six acts featuring four characters. It is a great set up and starts well but it gets weirder as it goes on. Does the professor end up as a dog? and why? He wasn't the most likeable but even so. 5/10

The Shadow of the Object

 by Chloe Aridjis

Starting with a dog bite in Mexico and a friendship formed in hospital with an older German lady called Wilhelmina the narrator is drawn into a world unknown to her. 

On the death of Wilhelmina she returns to London to meet her son, bringing with her a magic lantern and the ashes. This is a gentle tale that is mesmerising and a love story to magic lanterns and illusion where we are always having to fill in the gaps. I really enjoyed this and would read it again. 8/10

Black Bag

By Luke Kennard

A very quirky readable book which has an out of work actor taking a job being a black leather bag in a lecture theatre for one term. Along the way it examines what masculinity is in today's western society and whether an anonymous black bag can offer sexual fulfilment. It has a take on how to make money in digital world and a talking dog! It is very funny in places. I enjoyed it. 8/10

The Palm House

By Gwendoline Riley 

This is a well regarded author but I could not get into this book. The characters I found impossible to find a connection with or anything remotely interesting about them.

I enjoyed the occasional bit of humour but otherwise left me cold 4/10

The Things We Never Say

By Elizabeth Strout

I did not expect to enjoy this novel as much as I did. It follows Artie Dam, a popular and successful teacher who life finally overwhelms as he descends into loneliness and depression. Sad, it is but engaging and touching the nerve endings of people of my age I suspect. It asks the question of whether it is true that no man is an island. It doesn't really answer the question. 9/10

Poulenc a biography

 by Roger Nichols

An interesting biography of one of the key French composers of the first half of the twentieth century. He comes across as a complex figure but whose musical stature grew and endures. The biography has definitely coaxed me into listening to more of his music which has been a good experience 7/10 

A prayer for Owen Meany

 by John Irving

A sprawling novel of over 700 pages that took me a little while to get into but ended up being totally absorbing. It is set mostly in 1960's New Hampshire at the time of the Vietnam war and two boys, the narrator and Owen Meany grow up together and become best friends, even though Owen manages to kill John's mother at the start of the book with a wild, uncharacteristic swing of the bat in a little league baseball game.

It touches on friendship and faith as the narrator looks back from twenty years hence when he is living in Canada. It is sad and moving in places but also has one of the funniest passages I have read as the 1953 christmas pageant unfolds. 9/10

Land

 by Maggie O'Farrell

Set in Ireland this book follows the fortunes of Tomas and his wife and family, together with the land they inhabit. It starts in 1865 when Tomas, working for the british as a cartographer has a quasi religious experience in a wood on the West coast. It will change him and those close to him forever. It is an absorbing book and has some great characters in it from a slimy priest to a faithful irish wolf hound. 8/10

The Alchemist of Paris

 by M. C. Dulac

A gothic page turner which starts in current day Paris but then takes us back by way of a diary to strange happenings in a house in Paris. Can alchemists make gold or extend life, and what happens if they can. All will be revealed. Fun holiday read 7/10

Maigret and the Ghost

 by Georges Simenon

A policeman gets shot and Maigret is pulled into the art world and the lives of the rich Europeans who operate there. 7/10

My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein

 by Deborah Levy

The narrator (called Deborah Levy) goes to Paris to write an essay on Gertrude Stein. She falls in with two women, Fanny and Eva. Eva is Swedish but has a husband in America who she hasn't seen for a couple of years-other than their weekly facetime call. Fanny is in finance and has three lesbian affairs going at any one time. The book quotes a lot from Gertrude Stein but the writing is clever, funny and pulls you along at a cracking pace. A cat also features throughout but I must not give too much away! 9/10