pamelad's 1010 #2

Keeping some old categories, and adding some new ones. The goal is to read at least two books in each category.




1. Nobel Prize Winners
2. Endless European Challenge
3. Books off the shelf (on the shelves since last year, at least)
4. Rest of the world (authors from anywhere except Europe and the English-speaking countries
5. Humour
6. Recommended on LT or elsewhere
7. Non-fiction
8. Australia and New Zealand
9. Crime
10.Overflows and books that don't fit into a category.

Previous Challenge

1. Nobel Prize Winners

My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk 4*
The Prodigy by Herman Hesse 4*
The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa 5*

2. Endless European Challenge

Turkey: Dance with Death by Barbara Nadel
Greece: The Athenian Murders by Jose Carlos Somoza
Czech Republic: When Eve Was Naked by Josef Skvorecky 4*
Ireland: The Untouchable by John Banville 4.5*
Netherlands: Just a Corpse at Twilight by Janwillem van de Wetering 3.5*
Netherlands: Outsider in Amsterdam by Janwillem van de Wetering 4*

3. Books off the Shelf

The Levanter by Eric Ambler 3*
The Face on the Cutting Room Floor by Cameron McCabe 4*
The Night-Comers by Eric Ambler 3.5* aka State of Siege
Passage of Arms by Eric Ambler 3.5*

4. Rest of the World

6930::The Guide by R. K. Narayan 4*
2858::Some Prefer Nettles by Junichiro Tanizaki 4*

5. Humour
Very Good, Jeeves by P. G. Wodehouse 4.5*
Mulliner Nights by P. G. Wodehouse 3.5*
Secret Lives by E. F. Benson 4.5*
Nightingale Wood by Stella Gibbons 3.5*
Miss Buncle's Book by D. E. Stevenson 4*

6. Recommended on LT or elsewhere

Touch Not the Cat by Mary Stewart 3*
We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson 4.5*
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield 3.5*
Ordinary Thunderstorms by William Boyd 4*
When Will There Be Good News by Kate Atkinson 3.5*
In a Lonely Place by Dorothy B. Hughes 4*
Room by Emma Donoghue 4*
Typical American by Gish Jen 4*
The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather 3.5*

7. Non-fiction.
Since Yesterday by Frederick Allen 4.5*
Stones into Schools by Greg Mortenson 4*
The Coldest Winter by Paula Fox 4*

8. Australia and New Zealand
Shooting Star by Peter Temple 4*
Truth by Peter Temple 3.5*
Amy's Children by Olga Masters 4*
Follow the Rabbit-proof Fence by Doris Pilkington 4*
Three Cheers for the Paraclete by Thomas Kenealley 4.5*
The Price of an Orphan by Patricia Carlon 4*
Sixty Lights by Gail Jones 4*
The Dragon Man by Garry Disher 4.5*

9. Crime
Deep Waters by Barbara Nadel 3.5*
Limitations by Scott Turow 3.5*
Lonesome Road by Patricia Wentworth 3.5*
The Lights of Skaro by David Dodge 3.5*
The Song is You by Megan Abbott 4.5*
Die a Little by Megan Abbott 4*
All the Colours of Darkness by Peter Robinson 3*
The Suspect by Michael Robotham 3.5*
Fearless Fourteen by Janet Evanovich 3*
T is for Trespass by Sue Grafton 4*
What the Dead Know by Laura Lippman 4*
Pilgrim's Rest by Patricia Wentworth 3*
Lazy Bones by Mark Billingham 4*
Dream Girl by Robert B. Parker 3*
In a Dark House by Deborah Crombie 3.5*
Death of a Unicorn by Peter Dickinson 3.5*
Whisper Town by Judson Phillips 4*
Murder to Go by Emma Lathen 4*
The Saltmarsh Murders by Gladys Mitchell 3*
The State Counsellor by Boris Akunin

10. Overflows and extras
A Pale View of the Hills by Kazuo Ishiguro 4* (1001 Books........)
Talk, Talk by T. C. Boyle 4*
Henrietta's War by Joyce Dennys 3.5*
The Promise by Chaim Potok 4*
Civil to Strangers by Barbara Pym 3.5*

Dance with Death by Barbara Nadel

While Inspector Celik Ikmen investigates the twenty-year old murder of a woman in Cappadocia, his aristocratic off-sider, Sergeant Mehmet Suleyman, searches Istanbul for a peeping Yom who preys on young men.

The Turkish setting was fascinating, the characters were well-drawn, and the plot moved along. Unfortunately the book was let down by a silly ending and some distractingly bad writing. 3*

Nadel won a silver dagger for Deadly Web, so I'll give it a go in case this one was an aberration.

ET sort out touchstones. Waiting......

Deep Waters by Barbara Nadel

Inspector Ikmen is caught up in an Albanian blood feud, which brings back memories of his dead Albanian mother. Apart from this ludicrous plot thread, Deep Waters was a good read, though I could have done without Ikmen's distracting cousin, the giant transexual Albanian.

3.5*

Problem with touchstone - there are soooo many books called Deep Waters. The right one won't load, even though I've removed the number at the front.

Limitations by Scott Turow

George Mason is an appeals judge, sitting on a case involving a vicious pack rape. His wife is ill. He is receiving death threats.

In this short novel, Trurow raises the issue of judgement: who has the right to judge?

3.5*

Good to see another 2nd challenge. I've nearly finished my first one and have been toying with the idea of starting a second (but smaller) one too, so having seen yours I think I will give it a go.

Welcome back! I'm glad to see that you're still going to be in here.

Thank you Cindy and sanddancer.

Couldn't bear to leave, and I like reading in categories because it's good to read books other than crime fiction from time to time.

Shooting Star by Peter Temple

Frank Calder ex-police man, ex-soldier, is scratching a living as a mediator, when Pat Carson, head of a hugely successful building company, hires him to deliver a ransom to the kidnappers of his grand daughter. Frank realises that the kidnapping is more than extortion; it has its roots in the past of the Carson family.

With his offsider Orlovsky, anothr Afghanistan survivor, Frank searches for the kidnappers as he desperately tries to save the Carson girl.

The book is set in Melbourne, always a plus for me. The rich people are greedy, corrupt and evil, another plus.

Recommended 4* It won a Ned Kelly Award for the best Australian crime novel of 2000.

Trying to fix the touchstone, but it's not loading.

Congratulations on finishing your first challenge. I'm enjoying following your diverse reading.

I've had The Broken Shore on my watch-list a while, so I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed it.

The Athenian Murders by Jose Carlos Somoza

The body of a young man is found in ancient Athens. His heart has been torn out, his torso is covered in cuts, but his arms are untouched. The boys' distressed tutor, a philosopher at Plato's academy, begs Heracles Pontor, the Decipherer of Enigmas, to investigate.

Meanwhile, somewhere in the modern world, a slim, bearded man is translating the Greek text. The images in the text lead the translator to believe that there is a hidden message, and he searches for it with increasing frenzy.

Nothing is what it seems.

Recommended 4*

Welcome Aruba. The Broken Shore is definitely worth a read. If you like Australian crime novels, Garry Disher is worth a look as well.

The Levanter by Eric Ambler

This is a lateish Ambler, 1972. I prefer his early books.

Michael Howell, Cypriot, Armenian and British, is the Levanter, a businessman based in Syria. His company is infiltrated by Palestinian terrorists.

According to Ambler, Howell's best qualitites are the result of his English heritage, but he has the slippery insincerity of his Cypriot and Armenian ancestors, and their unfortunate lack of phlegm. I gritted my teeth and read on.

3*

Books off the shelf.

Touch Not the Cat by Mary Stewart

I'd forgotten reading this, or perhaps I'm embarrassed to admit it. It was recommended on LT, and I've read others by Stewart: nice, cosy undemanding romantic suspense for a cold, rainy day. Her books remind me of M. M. Kaye's Death in Zanzibar, Berlin, Cyprus.....

In Touch Not the Cat though, there's a supernatural element. Our heroine has, from her earliest youth, communicated soul to soul with an unknown relative. Erk.

3*

Does it seem to you that some of the books written today are trying to recapture the old-fashioned romantic suspense genre? Like The Thirteenth Tale?

Good to see Peter Temple's other books are also well worth reading. And I second the Gary Disher recommendation.

RidgewayGirl, I haven't read The Thirteenth Tale. Do you recommend it, and very importantly, is is free of supernatural phenomena?

Mary Higgins Clark writes old-fashioned "had I but knowns", with orphan heroines and two male characters, a goodie and a baddie. Which is which, and will our heroine choose the right one? They're not as cosy as Mary Stewart's.

Just read Since Yesterday, which started with the 1929 Crash and ended with the British declaration of war on Germany. It's a fascinating look at the thirties. FDR, and the New Deal, the obstructiveness of the Supreme Court, the ten million unemployed, the radio programs people listened to, the books they read. In the thirties under FDR the US was a country where no group of people was superfluous and the government saw its role as eliminating the desperate poverty of one-third of its citizens.

Highly recommended.

Also read Right Ho, Jeeves. Wodehouse is brilliant.
No I didn't. It was Very Good, Jeeves.

Also read Right Ho, Jeeves. Wodehouse is brilliant.
No I didn't. It was Very Good, Jeeves.

This made me laugh. I've done this too - Wodehouse is brilliant and I love him, but he does only have one plot, so I can never remember which is which.

But that's good, isn't it? I can reread any Bertie and Jeeves and know that it's just as good as the others.

The Thirteenth Tale is free of the paranormal, as far as I can remember. Since I dislike the "ghosts did it" type of plot, usually, I'm pretty sure I'd remember if it did.

Stones into Schools by Greg Mortenson

With the donations resulting from Three Cups of Tea, Mortenson's Central Asia Institute has built many more schools in remote parts of Afghanistan. The theme is uplifting, the writing a little pedestrian. Overall, highly recommended. 4*

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

A creepy little classic, which I greatly enjoyed.
4.5*

Truth by Peter Temple

As a loyal Melbournian, I am disappointed in Temple's latest book, the first crime novel to win the Miles Franklin award.

Reviewed here

Touchstone is not loading.

Mulliner Nights by P. G. Wodehouse

Mr Mulliner holds court in the bar-parlour of the Angler's Rest, telling tall tales about the exploits of his numerous and eccentric relatives.

Entertaining as always, but not a top-notch Wodehouse effort.
3.5*

When Eve Was Naked by Josef Skvorecky

This collection of short stories spans fifty years of Skvorecky's life, from his childhood in Nachod to a university in Toronto. Many are related by Skvorecky's fictional counterpart, Danny Smiricky.

Danny traces the destruction of Jewish life in Koslovo, the fictional Nachod. He sees his primary school teacher taken to the camps; a once-respected doctor is unable to practise medicine of even to speak to his former patients;people return from the camps to find that their neighbours deny all knowledge of the valuables left with them for safe keeping; Czech children abuse the Jewish schoolmates who were once their closest friends. Through the years, Danny remembers the Jewish people he once knew.

In "Spectator on a February Night," written in 1948, Danny witnesses the Communist coup. Life under Communism is bleak: intellectuals and liberals like Danny are exiled to remote cities; jazz is banned; Czech patriots are executed; people live sad lives without hope. This is a different Danny Smiricky from the ebullient, sardonic narrator of The Cowards.

Highly recommended 4*. (I took of half a star because there are a couple of so-so stories, but don't let them put you off.)

A Pale View of the Hills by Kazuo Ishiguro

Etsuko's English husband has died, and her older daughter, Keiko, has recently committed suicide. She remembers a time early in her first, marriage, when she was pregnant with her first child and married to her Japanese husband, Jiri. Etsuko's life then was spent in a small, new flat, across a stretch of waste land from a ramshackle cottage inhabited by a woman, Sachiko, and her daughter, Mariko.

Like many of the inhabitants of Nagasaki, Sachiko is adrift. The men have been killed in the war and families have been wiped out by the bomb. Sachiko has no family, except for an elerly cousin of her husband's. She has no control over Mariko, who refuses to go to school, and wanders unsupervised day and night as Sachiko searches for Frank, a man who might take them to America.

Etsuko, too, has lost her family. She becomes more and more involved in the lives of Sachiko and Mariko. Looking back, Sachiko's and Etsuko's lives seem to parallel each other, and Etsuko's memories become confused. The ending is eerie.

Like An Artist of the Floating World and The Remains of the Day, A Pale View of the Hills is permeated by regret for the old order. Jiri's father, Ogata, a retired teacher, is the link to the past. A friend of Jiri's has attacked the old man in print, but Ogata sees himself as an honourable man who taught his students to respect his country and culture.

Recommended 4*

Category 5. Best Book Lists. 1001 Books You Must Read...........

The Untouchable by John Banville

Victor Maskell is an art historian, a curator of the royal pictures, and one of the Cambridge spies. In Banville's portrait, Victor is a shallow man without convictions: he becomes a spy for the thrill of it. He's a gay man with a wife and children he rarely sees; a communist who seeks wordly rewards.

The book begins with Victor's betrayal. He has lost his knighthood and his position at the palace because a recently published book links him to the defection of "Ballantine and MacLeish." The Untouchable is his memoir.

Banville's book has wonderful characters, good writing, humour and energy. Highly recommended: 4.5*.

That one sounds interesting. I have Banville's The Sea on the shelf and haven't gotten to it yet.

The Guide by R. K. Narayan

Raju was once a tourist guide, an expert on Malgudi. Travellers from all over India asked for him by name and paid him well, but Raj became greedy and cheated too many people. The book starts with Raju's release from jail.

Raju can't face returning to Malgudi, so he stops by a river, near an abandoned temple. A local man stops to talk about his problems, which Raju indavertently solves. The villagers hang on Raju's words and adopt him as a swami, their holy guide.

Narayan's Malgudi novels are philosophical, yet gently comical.

Recommended. 4*

Just a Corpse at Twilight by Janwillem van de Wetering

Gripstra and de Grier have retired from the Amsterdam police force. Gripstra is running a detective agency, while de Gier is travelling the world, trying to find himself. Gripstra receives a frantic phone call from de Grier, who thinks he may have just killed a woman in Maine.

While Gripstra and de Grier search for the truth in Maine, their old boss, the commisioner, directs the investigation from Amsterdam.

The eccentric characters and ironic tone make this an entertaining mystery. It's a series, so I'll keep an eye out for others. 3.5*

->30 pamelad:

I've never heard of this series, but I've lived in Amsterdam, so reading books set there is always interesting. Thanks for the heads-up!!

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

Read the whole book, 400+ pages, yesterday. An entertaining and undemanding read. Just what I felt like.

3.5*

Adjusted the stars down by a half. Not as good as My Name is Red.

My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk

In sixteenth century Istanbul a painter is murdered. With three other master miniaturists he has been illustrating a book for the sultan. One of these colleagues may well be the murderer.

Pamuk's book has many narrators, each with a different perspective. In fact, perspective is central to the story. It is a painter's role to paint the world as Allah sees it; to represent the world through the eye of the painter, rather than in the traditions of the old masters, is forbidden by the Koran. Allah must be the centre of every painting, so the use of perspective, which could make a profane object bigger than Allah, is also forbidden.

The story builds in layers, with painting and religion at its core.

A bit too long, but recommended 4*

I am very pleased to have finished a book for the Nobel category.

Secret Lives by E. F. Benson

Mrs Mantrip rules Durham Square. She owns the freeeholds on most of the residences and likes to rent her houses to the right type of person. The new tenant, with her cocked little finger, tasteless hats and shaky vocabulary, is a puzzle. Why does she play the gramophone so loudly, and how can she afford the magnificent French chef, stately butler and opulent decor?

Like the Lucia books, Secret Lives revolves around snobbery, gossip, and the nutty enthusiasms of the leisured class. I loved it.

4.5*

I've reorganised the categories and inserted a humour category. P. G. Wodehouse and E. F. Benson now have a place to belong.

My Name is Red sounds very interesting -- I'm adding it to the TBR list!

That sounds like a good one from Benson. His Freaks of Mayfair is a collection of essays about wealthy people who have more money than sense. Hilarious!

Welcome pammab.

mstrust, I enjoyed Freaks of Mayfair, and remember a Georgie prototype. Mrs Ames is also very entertaining, and more sympathetic than Benson's later books.

Have been away on holdiay for a week and have read:
Talk, Talk by T.C. Boyle
Follow the Rabbit-proof Fence by Doris Pilkington
Amy's Children by Olga Masters
The Lights of Skaro by David Dodge
Die a Little by Megan Abbott
The Song is You by Megan Abbott

Follow the Rabbit-proof Fence is the story of three half-caste aboriginal girls, stolen from their families by paternalistic officials and sent south to be trained as domestic servants. Their story started in the thirties, but the practice of removing aboriginal children from their families continued for decades. Phil Noyce's film of the book was frustrating in that it gave so little practical information about how the girls survived in the bush. I particularly wanted to know what they ate.

Doris Pilkington's book describes the girls' bushcraft, and the way they managed to live off the land. She's the daughter of Molly, who led her two younger cousins away from a school cum jail near Fremantle to their home station hundreds of miles north west . The journey took the girls nine weeks, walking all the way, finding directions by the sun and stars, avoiding aboriginal trackers and interfering white people.

The book's not brilliant, but the story is.

I enjoyed the film, even without the practical details, mostly because I was unaware of the practice. It was eye-opening and their journey and perseverance were inspiring.

>38 pamelad: & 39: What Laura said!

Bonnie and Laura, their journey was even more inspiring with a few more details: digging burrows to sleep at night, catching rabbits barehanded, knowing which water holes it was safe to drink from. They travelled over 1000 miles, often walking forty or more miles per day.

The vast open spaces of Western Australia are frightening to a city-dweller. To us it seems dry and barren, with no food or water. Every so often there are stories of tourists who get lost in the outback and die of thirst.

Just read Three Cheers for the Paraclete by Thomas Keneally and was surprised that I liked it so much. It won the Miles Franklin in 1968.

James Maitland is a young priest, living in a seminary where he teaches history to trainee priests. He is constantly at odds with his superiors becuase he is a humanist, and questions Catholic orthodoxy. Keneally paints a shocking picture of the self-satisfied, callous Dr Costelloe, to whom ordinary people unimportant because the laws of the Church are paramount. The rape and subsequent pregnancy of a young girl, for example, are undeniably tragic, but there is nothing to be done, so she can embrace the opportunity to live a life of sanctity! Keneally studied for the priesthood, but did not take his final vows, so he knows the people he is writing about.

Although it doesn't sound like it, this is a very funny book. Keneally has drawn some wonderful characters: the devout businessman, Des Boyle, one of the Knights of St. Patrick, the Catholic church's answer to the Masons; the mad seminarian who is obsessed with knives and is advised by Dr Costello to avoid psychiatrists and trust in God; the harridan, Celia, who blames her failed marriage on the Church; and little Egan, the speicalist in canon law, who falls in love with a petitioner.

Highly recommended 4.5*

I'm interested to see what you thought of Die a Little.

I assume that's the same Thomas Keneally who wrote Schindler's Ark. Looks like it would be worth discovering a very different type of work by this author! Great review, Pam.

Ordinary Thunderstorms by William Boyd

Adam Kindred, a climatologist in London for a job interview, meets a man in a restaurant. The consequences of this chance meeting are dire; Adam ends up in hiding, in fear of his life. With neither money nor identification, he has to find ways to survive.

Recommended 4*.

Talk, Talk by T. C. Boyle

A young woman's identity is stolen by a con-man. Dana is jailed for crimes she didn't commit, and is pursued by debt collectors. Even when the legal system accepts that she is the inoccent victim, the onus is still on her to manage the debts and summonses set in train by the thief. When the police don't help, Dana and her boyfriend set off to trace the conman and get her life back.

Boyle's book is frighteningly realistic. Recommended 4*

Die a Little by Megan Abbott

Lora and her brother Bill have always been close. Their parents died early, and the two siblings were brought up by relatives. Bill is a policeman, a brilliant young investigator, and Lora is a school teacher. Into their respectable lives steps Alice Steele, a femme fatale with a shady past. Unaware of Alice's history, Bill marries her within weeks of their first meeting.

Lora gradually becomes suspicious of Alice, and sets out to investigate her past. Her search leads her into the seamy side of fifties Hollywood, a world of drugs, prostitutiion and death.

This is a remarkably sordid story, but Abbott told it so well that I couldn't put the book down.

Recommended 4*

The Song is You by Megan Abbott

More violent stars and masochistic B-girls in fifties Hollywood. Jean Spangler, a starlet, goes missing after a night with the famous double act, Marv Sutton and Gene Merrell. Marv is suave, and Gene might just be insane. They might not be responsible though: Jean's mixed up with the mob.

The narrator is Gil Hopkins, once a naive reporter from the sticks, now a movie publicist. His job is to cover up the stars' crimes and indiscretions. Gil was there the night Jean Spangler disappeared. He could have protected her but he didn't, and now he wants to find out what has happened to her.

Jean Spangler was a real starlet, who really did disappear. Other real people also pop up in Abbott's book, including the wild, promiscuous starlet Barbara Payton.

Just as sordid as Die a Little and even more unputdownable. 4.5*

ETA Having trouble witht the touchstone for The Song is You

All the Colours of Darkness by Peter Robinson

A man's body is found hanging in a tree, and Chief Inspector Banks is called back from his tryst with the lovely, and much younger, Sophia to investigate the crime.

This police procedural doesn't quite hang together. The plot is a jumble of spies, terrorism, jealousy and Russian mafia, with strong undercurrents of Othello. I didn't much care about Banks, either.

3*

The Suspect by Michael Robotham

We first meet Joseph O'Loughlin on a ledge of a upper floor of a multi-storey hospital building. He's a psychologist, and he's out there trying to dissuade a desperate young man from jumping. It's in these first few pages that Robotham spells out his theme: the harm that is caused by the well-meaning interference of family, friends and, in particular, the members of the helping professions, in the lives of others.

O'Loughlin has made some bad professional jugements, and the mistakes of the past are putting himself and his family in danger.

This was a not-too-bad suspense novel. The big drawback is O'Loughlin himself, who has Parkinson's disease. Call me callous, but I'm sick of his disease already, and this is the first book in a series. At least he's not depressed, well, not in a Wallender way.

3.5*

The Abbott books sound great so they're going on the list. I love noir.

The Face on the Cutting Room Floor by Cameron McCabe

In her first film, Estella Lamarre was one of two women in a love triangle. It was her big chance and she did played her part well, so McCabe, the number two cutter, is shocked when he's told to cut Estella out of the picture. Later Estella ends up dead in the cutting room, and McCabe joins up with Smith, a Scotland Yard detective, to investigate her death.

This book was first published in 1937 and it's an oddity. McCabe is author, narrator, detective, and it's possible that he might be a murderer. At first the story just doesn't make sense, but that's because McCabe has left things out. Smith fills in some of the gaps, then other characters fill in some more. There are diversions into existentialism and politics; characters come and go for reasons that don't become clear until near the end.

The last quarter of the book is a big surprise, unlike anything that came before. Can't say more in case I ruin it.

Recommended. 4*

The Prodigy by Herman Hesse aka Beneath the Wheel

Hans Giebenrath is a talented student, the only boy from his town to be entered for the competitive seminary exams. The last three years of his life have been devoted to cramming; he's had no spare time, and has had to give up all the friends and pastimes that made him happy. Hans embodies the hopes of his father, his teachers and the vicar, who push the frail, headache-ridden child further and further. He tries to please them all.

Hesse's book, published in 1905, is an indictment of the German education system.

Recommended 4*

I'd never read anything by Hesse because his reputation for mysticism put me off, but now I'm interested in reading another and looking for recommendations.

Some Prefer Nettles by Junichiro Tanizaki

Kaname and his wife Misako have been married for ten years and have a son, but Kaname had lost interest in Misako by the second year and hasn't slept with her since. In fact he's encouraged her to take a lover. Apparently the situation mirrors Tanizaki's own life - he handed his wife over to a friend. The book was first published in 1929, soon after Japan had become open to the West, and initially both Misako and Kaname are attracted to a Western way of life. By contrast, Mitsako's father immerses himself in the culture of old Japan, in which Kaname becomes increasingly involved.

Recommended 4*

The Price of an Orphan by Patricia Carlon

Carlon was an Australian writer, whose fourteen psychological suspemnse novels were published in Britain in the sixties. It's only in the last ten or so years that she has been re-discovered in her home country and in the US. She has been compared to Patricia Highsmith and Barbara Vine, and from the books I've read, the coomparisons are justified.

The newly married Stuart and Kathy Heath decide to foster a young boy, but Johnnie, a tough little city kid, doesn't fit into life on the cattle station. He's foul-mouthed, wary of affection and scared of horses. He's also prone to telling tall tales, so when he goes missing for a day and comes home with a story of a murder no-one believes him.

Johnnie caught only a glimpse of the murderer so would not recognise him, or her, again, but the murderer knows who Johnnie is, and wants to get rid of him.

Highly recommended 4*

The Night-Comers by Eric Ambler

Steve Fraser has been building a dam in Sunda, once part of the Dutch East Indies, but now an independent nation. He has finished his contract and is waiting to fly out, when he is caught up in a coup. Fraser and his Eurasian companion, Rosalie, are trapped in the headquarters of the revolutionary army.

Quite a good Ambler. 3.5*

My copy is a 1956 Pan paperback with a highly dramatic cover: an unarmed white man confronts gun-carrying Asian soldiers while a semi-naked girl in a sarong looks on.

Fearless Fourteen by Janet Evanovich

Light and entertaining, number fourteen follows the usual formula.

3*

T is for Trespass by Sue Grafton

Gus is the neighbourhood grump, ringing the council to complain about his neighbours, shouting at the local kids for making too much noise, just generally acting as though he suspects that everyone is out to get him. His wife his dead, his only niece lives on the other side of the country and he has no friends, so when he has a bad fall and needs someone to take care of him, the experienced, qualified nurse, Solana Rojas, seems like a godsend.

At the request of Gus's niece, Kinsey Millhone undertakes a brief invesigation of Solana's bona fides and finds nothing suspicious, but as Gus becomes increasingly isolated, Kinsey becomes concerned. Kinsy battles an incompetent and disbelieving bureaucracy as she tries to get help for the vulnerable Gus before it's too late.

Highly recommended. 4*

What the Dead Know by Laura Lippmann

Two sisters, 11 and 15 year-old, disappear from a Baltimore mall. Thirty years later, a woman's car slides on greasy road and causes another car to crash. She doesn't stop, and when she's picked up by the police, injured and disoriented, she tells the police she's Heather Bethany, one of the missing girls.

The narration skips between the past and the present as the police try to find the evidence that can prove or disprove the woman's story.

Recommended 4*

Nightingale Wood by Stella Gibbons

Not a patch on Cold Comfort Farm, but a nice, cosy read. Viola's father dies, so she sees no option but to marry the dreary, middle-aged Theodore Wither. When Theodore dies early on, poor twenty-one year old Violet moves in with her in-laws. The penny-pinching, mean-spirited Mr Withers makes the lives of his wife and spinster daughters a misery.

As Viola dreams of escaping into the arms of the local Prince Charming, one sister-in-law flings herself at the chauffer and the other pines for a puppy. This is a tidy little fairy story of a novel, enlivened by Gibbons bird's eye view of the class system in operation, and complicated by the mixed motives of the characters.

3.5*

The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa

This fictionalised account of the last days of Trujillo, the feared and fanatical ruler of the Dominican Republic, is interspersed with the story of Urania, a 49-year-old lawyer who escaped the island when she was fourteen. Urania's father was one of Trujillo's inner circle, a sycophant whose life was destroyed when he fell out of favour. Trujillo is surrounded by sycophants, because Trujillo rewards his friends and kills anyone who criticises him.

This is a real page turner. I wanted to know Urania's story: why does she hate her father, and why has she never returned to Dominica? Will the conspiracy to assassinate Trujillo succeed? Will the conspirators survive? Will Trujillo's insane brothers and son destroy the country?

Highly recommended 5*

I almost picked this one up in a 3 for the price of 2 offer but wasn't quite sure about it. You've convinced me so I hope next time I'm out & about they still have the same books in the promotion.

When Will There Be Good News by Kate Atkinson

A good read, and I stayed up late to finish it. 3.5*

Passage of Arms by Eric Ambler

A middle-aged American engineer, on holiday with his wife in South-east Asia, is conned into becoming the front man of an arms deal. The book was first published in 1959, a time of great upheaval in Indonesia and Malaya, so it's worth reading for its descriptions of the time and place. Lots of local colour, and a Graham Greenish atmosphere of corruption.

A pretty good Ambler. 3.5*

In a Lonely Place by Dorothy B. Hughes

In L.A. women are being strangled. Dix Steele, an aspiring crime novelist, runs into Brub, a friend from the air force who is now a policeman on the strangler case, and tags along on the investigation.

When Dix meets Laurel, his beautiful red-headed neighbour, he falls head over heels, but love makes him act more and more strangely. The more we know of Dix, the more we fear for Laurel.

Original forties noir. Recommended. 4*

In A Lonely Place arrived at my house just last week. I am planning on reading it for next year's challenge, and with your comments I know I can look forward to a great read!

Room by Emma Donoghue

Jack has never been outside the room. His mother has taught him that the world outside the room is a fantasy that exists only on TV. He's the narrator, a precociously literate five-year-old.

Recommended 4*

Sixty Lights by Gail Jones

Sixty Lights tells the story of Lucy Strange, orphan, photographer, fallen woman and free spirit. As befits a book with photography as a theme, there's some brilliant imagery: the night strets of London under gaslight; the brilliant colours of Bombay. Lucy keeps a diary of the things she's seen, the photographs she hasn't taken, as she fits a big life into too few years.

The book is set in the late nineteenth century, so the life expectancy of the characters is authentially low. Death in chilbirth is a tragic and recurring theme.

Recommended 4*

Just catching up on your thread- I read In A Lonely Place earlier this year and really enjoyed it. Glad you did too!

Something ate my post. It was quite a long one, of course. Always tthe way.

mstrust, I'm planning on following up Dorothy Hughes with Helen Nielsen. Have you read any of hers?

For a complete change of pace, I've been reading about he lives of Hasidic and other Orthodox Jews in the New York of the fifties.

The Promise by Chaim Potok

Reuven Malter is studying for his smicha in a well-regarded yeshiva. The young Talmudic scholars have been used to questoning their teachers and arguing with them, but this freedom ceases when a famous scholar from Eastern Europe takes up a position. The holocaust survivors from Eastern Europe cannot accept the tolerant American approach to Orthodoxy, and their arrival in great numbers threatens to change the direction of Orthodox scholarship. This may mean that Reuven will not be granted the smicha, becuase he is unwilling to return to a rigid traditional interpretation of the Talmud.

Talmudic study permeates the book, and it's fascinating. Reuven and his father base their studies on multiple versions of source documents and commentaries and change the text to clarify the meaning; there's a discussion of the oral and the written Talmud, and the medieval scholarship that resulted in two different oral versions. To some scholars emending the text is akin to changing the word of God, so there is bitter disagreement between emenders and the non-emenders.

There's a story as well. It involves a mentally ill boy, the son of a scholar who has been excommunicated; Reuven, who has made a friend of the boy and who wants to help him, despite being forbidden to associate with the boy's father; and Reuven's friend Danny, the Hasid, who was destined to take his father's place as the head of a Hasidic community, but has become a psychogist.

Recommended 4*

The Dragon Man by Garry Disher

This is the first book in the Challis and Destry series.

Hal Challis is detective inspector based on the Mornington Peninsula. He's been called in to help out the local branch, Waterloo, and is working with Waterloo detective Ellen Destry. Two young women have been abducted and murdered, the killer is writing taunting letters to the papers, and the locals are afraid.

I liked this book a lot, perhaps because after the dreary bleakness of Peter Temple's Truth I am in the mood to appreciate an Australian police procedural where the police have lives after work, the sun shines, the minor characters aren't all criminals, and every road doesn't lead to another body. Challis and Destry are honest, hard working police officers, and although some of their colleagues are not quite straight, they're not completely bent, either.

It would be too much to ask that Challis and Destry were actually happy: the police procedural convention doesn't allow that. Challis's absent wife is a sad liability, and Destry's marriage is falling apart, but at least they don't wallow.

I've given this 4.5*, perhaps a bit generous, but that's the Truth factor.

The other books in the series are also worth reading.

Pilgrim's Rest by Patricia Wentworth

Always pleasing to find a Miss Silver mystery I haven't read, but this one, while entertaining enough, wasn't one of Wentworth's best.

There was a gruesomely cute four-year-old who put my teeth on edge, but fortunately she disappeared from the action quite early and lurked harmlessly in the background, waiting until she was needed by the plot.

It was far too easy to predict what was going to happen. Perhaps I've read too many of Miss Silver's cases.

3*

Touchstone problem. Here is a link.

The Coldest Winter: a stringer in liberated Europe by Paula Fox

This is the follow-up to Fox's Borrowed Finery. Not quite as good, but still worth reading. In 1946 Fox travels to England, Poland, France and Spain as a stringer for a British news service. The part I found most interesting was her time in Poland with the middle-aged Mrs Grassner, an American housewife sent by a Midwest Jewish women's organisation to find out about the plight of Jews in Poland. Fox sadly underestimated Mrs Grassner, who showed great nerve and initiative in ferreting out and interviewing hidden Jews.

Recommended 4*

I recall reading The Promise when I was in junior high school and very much enjoying it, but there is a lot in your review that I don't remember and that I can't imagine I was able to understand at the ripe old age of 12. I've been toying with the idea of rereading some Potok, and I'm moving him higher on the list now. Thanks!

Definitely worth a re-read pammab. I read The Chosen this year as well, and thought it was even better.

Just finished Civil to Strangers, a collection of Barbara Pym's writings, most of which were unpublished at her death. There's a novel, some fragments of novels, some short stories and a radio talk on finding a voice as a writer. A good one for Pym fans.
4*

Miss Buncle's Book by D.E. Stevenson

Miss Buncle lives in a small village. Her dividends aren't coming in, so to earn some money she decides to write a book. She hasn't much imagination, so she writes about her neighbours and hardly disguises them at all.

A light, funny and cheerful book.
4*

Typical American by Gish Jen

Yifeng leaves China to study engineering in America. He plans to return at the completion of his studies, but is trapped in America by the Communist takeover, not knowing whether his family is alive, but fearing the worst because his father is a dissident. He becomes Ralph Chung, marries, has two children, and settles into American life.

Ralph, his wife Helen, and his sister Theresa try to live their lives according to the same rules they followed in China. Helen marries Ralph because she believes her parents would have wanted her to marry a man known to her family and Ralph marries Helen for similar reasons. Ralph can't help letting his family down; although he is head of the family and insists on the rights of his position, the women are far more capable than he is.

Jen's book is very funny, but Ralph is a tragic fool, torn between Chinese tradition and American materialism.

Recommended 4*

Lazy Bones by Mark Billingham

Competent police procedural. I enjoyed it and thought the main character, Tom Thorne, was well-drawn and engaging, but the ending was annoying. Exciting, but ludicrous.

3.5*

Dream Girl aka Hundred Dollar Baby by Robert B. Parker

I gave up on Spenser a few years ago because the cute repartee with Susan Silverman made my teeth hurt. Picked up another Parker from the library today because I thought it might be time to give him another chance, but was wrong. Cuter than I remembered and not just with Silverman. At least there were no blow by blow descriptions of what he was cooking for dinner, as there were in the Spenser novels I not so fondly remember.

3*

Still on the crime binge.

Water Like a Stone by Deborah Crombie

Duncan Kinkaid,Gemma James and their children spend Chrismas with Duncan's parents in a picturesque village near the Welsh border. This book is all all about families. Too long, not much pace, and a lot of sentimentality, but otherwise quite well-written.

Deborah Crombie is American, but this series is based in Britain. She spends a lot of time there doing research. I wonder why? I prefer to read authentic British mysteries rather than these homages.

3.5*

Death of a Unicorn by Peter Dickinson

Lady Margaret Millett has been brought up as the heir to Cheadle, an enormous stately home that requires large and regular infusions of cash. But for a year in her twenties, the happiest of her life, Margaret writes for a magazine, a rival to Punch, and falls in love with the owner, the mysterious B.

Thirty years later, after a visit from an old colleague, Margaret resolves to make sense of the tragic events that ended her life with B.

Not bad, but the characters are two-dimensional. 3.5*

Whisper Town by Judson Phillips

Three high school students die when their car is forced of the road by a drunk driver, but the town of Rock City blames their deaths on sex education. Far-fetched? Yes, but it makes terrible sense to the hysterical locals who are looking for someone to blame for the tragedy. Their rage focuses on the teacher who introduced the biology course.

Recommended 4*

This is a Green Penguin. I buy them when I see them because many of them are by good but forgotten writers. Judson Phillips also writes as Hugh Pentecost, so I'll keep an eye out for Pentecost's books.

Touch stone isn't working, so here's a link.

Outsider in Amsterdam by Janwillem van de Wetering

This is the first Grijpstra and de Grier mystery, so now I've read the first and the last in the twelve book series.

In contrast to the angry, depressed detectives who feature in so many recent crime novels, Grijpstra and de Grier don't take themselves too seriously, and nor do any of the other police in these entertaining police procedurals. They're just capable cops doing the best they can in an easygoing city that is plagued by heroin, but really isn't all that violent or crime ridden.

Grijpstra and de Grier are called to the Hindist commune, where the leader, Verboom, has been found hanging from a beam. I could be suicide, but Verboom has a bruise on his temple, so perhaps it was murder.

I'm going to read more from this series. Recommended. 4*

Murder to Go by Emma Lathen

John Putnam Thatcher, vice-president of the Sloan, is taken aback to find himself embroiled in the affairs of the franchise company, Chicken Tonight. It's a bit infra dig for the urbane banker, but he has to protect the Sloan's twelve million dollar investment and he's looking for an excuse to avoid participating in interdepartmental war about what to buy Charlie Trinkham for his anniversary.

The ususal suspects are here: the much-divorced Tom Robichaux of Robichaux and Devane; the pessimistic Everett Gabler; the jovial Charlie; and the formidable Miss Corso, Thatcher's secretary.

I was delighted to find an early Lathen I hadn't read.

Recommended 4*

The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather

Thea Kronberg was brought up in a small Colorado town, the daughter of a preacher. She is a talented pianist and singer, but it seems that she will stay in Moonstone teaching piano to local children, never making her mark on the world of music, until a tragedy gives her the opportunity to study in Chicago.

Thea's dedication and passion are rewarded and, despite poverty and hardship, she fulfils her early promise and becomes a great artist.

Thea is not an easy character to like, so I didn't care too much whether she succeeded or failed. I've read five of Cather's books since coming across her for the first time last year, and this is the most trivial and least engaging. My favourite is still Death Comes for the Archbishop.

3.5*

I read The Song of the Lark last year. It was my first Cather. I loved the first part of the book, but didn't much care for the second half after she left Moonstone. It sounds like there's a good chance I'll like some of her other books better. Maybe I can work one into my 11 in 11 challenge.

>82 cbl_tn: I really liked My Antonia when I read it.

My Antonia was the first Cather I read, and I liked it so much I started hunting out the others.

The Saltmarsh Murders by Gladys Mitchell

The eldritch, screeching Mrs Beatrice Lestrange Bradley investigates the deaths of two young women in an English village.

We have romance, smugglers, pornography, repressions, incest, and a Bertie Wooster clone.

Not one of Mitchell's best, but eminently readable. 3*

The State Counsellor by Boris Akunin

This is the first Akunin I've read, but the sixth in the Erast Fandorin series, which is set in csarist Russia just before the revolution. Fandorin is the state counsellor, investigator of special projects for the governor of Moscow. This time he's investigating the assassination of the governor general of Siberia.

Highly entertaining. I'm glad there's a whole series waiting to be read.

3.5*

Crime category has now reached twenty. Will have to think up a few different crime classifications for 2011.

The High Flyer by Susan Howatch

Carter Graham is a tax lawyer with a life plan: she wants to marry and have children by the time she's thirty-five, then return to her career by forty. When she meets and marries Kim Betz, another successful lawyer, it looks as though she's on target. Unfortunately Betz is encumbered by a seemingly neurotic and vindictive ex-wife, who keeps trying to contact Carter.

Howatch's book was, in part, a gripping suspense story, so I kept on reading to find out what happened. It was also an excursion into Anglican mysticism, which I found very odd indeed. Healers and exorcists are just not my cup of tea.

3*