I read eight books in October.
Lucy Barton’s estrangement
from her family and her dysfunctional relationship with her mother was the
subject of My Name is Lucy Barton. In
this follow-up Lucy, an acclaimed writer living in New York, goes back for a
brief visit to where she was brought up in small-town Illinois. But, as this is
an Elizabeth Strout novel, Lucy herself hardly comes on stage. Instead, we see
her in passing from the viewpoints of her siblings, her niece and her former
friends and neighbours and in doing so we piece her history – and theirs –
together. Loved it. Loved it.
Read on Kindle. The paths of
event planner Jane and archaeologist Theo cross when she organises a conference
in his university building. Both have got ‘baggage’ – Jane from her time as a
young woman with a predatory employer and Theo with an abusive ex-girlfriend.
It’s pretty much dislike at first sight for both of them but soon they find
themselves trying to uncover an archaeological mystery – partly inspired by the
author’s family connection with the famous Mildenhall Treasure. Recommended.
‘Rose Janko has been missing for seven
years. Her family has made no attempt to find her.’ Until now. Well, if that’s
not an intriguing premise I don’t know what is. What adds so much to this
brilliant story is that Rose is from a gypsy family as is Ray Lovell, the private
investigator hired by Rose’s father. I’d love to see him get another outing.
Stef Penny’s first novel was the
Costa-winning The Tenderness of Wolves.
At a writing event I was at in the summer, the first sentence of that book was
deemed by the panel of publishers and agents to be one of the very best they’d
ever read. The bad news, it transpires, is that publishers and agents, when
reading manuscripts, sometimes barely read any further than that first
sentence.
Read on Kindle. Miss M got
her first outing in Miss Moonshine’s
Emporium of Happy Endings, a collection of stories by nine romantic
novelists from Yorkshire and Lancashire, all set in the town of Haven Bridge
and involving the ageless and magically empowered emporium owner. This new collection
of contemporary and historical stories is even better I think.
A few weeks ago I was in the
Peak District of Derbyshire and came across a shop selling new books at low
prices – publishers’ overstocks/remainders. What a treasure trove. I picked up
this YA book because I liked the title. It’s a sweet romance
between a newly motherless American girl, Sass, coming to live with her uncle
in Cornwall, and a local boy … The identity of that ‘local boy’ was
a surprise and took the story in a different direction. Can’t make
up my mind if I liked that aspect of it or not. If you want to know what I’m
blathering on about see the footnote*. Or if you’d rather read the book and
find out for yourself then don’t.
Robert Galbraith (aka JK
Rowling) needs no accolades from me to enhance her popularity but here are some
anyway: Lethal White is brilliant –
the best in the Cormoran Strike series so far! I didn’t speak to anyone at the
weekend because I was so engrossed in it! Thank you very much! Now, please get
on and write the next one.
Read on Kindle. Partly set in the cosy village of Willowbrook, this
is the story of Evie and Jake. Evie has family difficulties and a controlling
ex-boyfriend and Jake is still very much in love with his late wife. When
circumstances dictate that they spend Christmas together in sunny Provence, the
understanding is that no strings are attached … but with a woman gathering more
confidence in herself and a man with the ice in his heart beginning to thaw,
well, that wasn’t going to last, was it?
Read for book group, on
Kindle. The first English translation of a book by ‘Norway’s Anne Tyler’. I
would not agree with that description for various reasons. Anne T is terrific,
for example, on sense of place. There’s little of that here, despite the fact
that family homes and summer cabins are important to the characters; plus it
would have been interesting to have more of a sense of their wider
surroundings. But I did enjoy this story of grown-up sibling relationships and
rivalries, told in turn from the sisters’ and brother’s viewpoints, following
the shock announcement that their 70-something parents are getting divorced.
*In an alternative version of the British Royal Family
Sass’s boyfriend is Alex who is third in line to the throne, after his
grandmother and his father. Cue the paparazzi, intrusive journalists etc.
