4.5 stars

“He looked at the envelope in his hand. ‘For when the child is grown’… Inside the envelope was a photograph of a girl with a half-smile holding a blurred bundle, high and awkwardly, like found treasure. Mahony turned it over and the good solid schoolteacherly hand dealt him a left hook. ‘Your name is Francis Sweeney. Your mammy was Orla Sweeney. You are from Mulderrig, Co. Mayo. This is a picture of yourself and her. For your information she was the curse of the town, so they took her from you. They all lie, so watch yourself, and know that your mammy loved you.’”

That’s a mystery hard to resist, so Mahony doesn’t. On his arrival, the village reserves its judgement, but Mahony’s charm and charisma soon work their magic on many; a few (the guilty ones) do their best to dissuade his inquiries. Somebody definitely knows what happened to Orla Sweeney, and Mahony will learn the truth.

Mulderrig is peopled with quirky characters: the car-mad publican; the laconic guard; the prickly old actress; the reclusive landlord; the elusive hermit; the heartless former nurse; the reluctant housekeeper; and the obligatory priest. Some are harmless, benign, good; in some, the quirkiness conceals a malignant soul. And those are just the live ones. There’s also a chorus of the dead, whose commentary may or may not be helpful to Mahony’s quest.

Himself is the first novel by London-born author, Jess Kidd. It’s a debut that offers a generous helping of humour, a bit of romance and a good dose of magic. Kidd has a way with words: “Bridget exhales and waves her cigarette at him. ‘What you have to understand, Desmond, is that this is Mahony we’re talking about. He’s a Dublin orphan, which means that he could survive on an iceberg in just his socks. You, on the other hand, are as helpless as a fruit fly out there.’” This outstanding debut ensures that readers will look forward to more from this talented author.

“Even the circus freak side of my face – my damaged half – was better than the alternative, which would have meant death by fire. I didn’t burn to ashes. I emerged from the flames like a little phoenix. I ran my fingers over the scar tissue, caressing the contours…. There are scars on my heart, just as thick, as disfiguring as those on my face. I know they’re there. I hope some undamaged tissue remains, a patch through which love can come in and flow out. I hope.”

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine is the first novel by British author, Gail Honeyman. At thirty years of age, and despite her degree in Classics, Eleanor Oliphant has worked a mundane office job in By Design, a graphic design company in Glasgow for nine years. She has no friends and the people she works with find her strange. But her life is well organised: completely fine, in her opinion, needing nothing. Until, that is, she casts eyes on musician Johnnie Lomond.

Eleanor sets out to attract the love of her life, undergoing several preparatory procedures to ready herself for a potential encounter (waxing, hair, nails, make-up), as well as acquiring the electronic means to do some research on the object of her attention. She is distracted from her task by Raymond Gibbons, the firm’s (rather slovenly) IT consultant, who ropes her into helping an old man who has fallen in the street. Eleanor is sure he’s drunk but “…Even alcoholics deserve help, I suppose, although they should get drunk at home, like I do, so that they don’t cause anyone else any trouble. But then, not everyone is as sensible and considerate as me.”

Honeyman gives the reader a moving tale that includes a good dose of humour. Eleanor is a complex character: socially inept but generally unaware of it, often remarking on the lack of manners that others display: “’You don’t look like a social worker,’ I said. She stared at me but said nothing. Not again! In every walk of life, I encounter people with underdeveloped social skills with alarming frequency. Why is it that client-facing jobs hold such allure for misanthropes…”

Yet Eleanor is often insightful, although she can also be naïve: “After all, how hard could it be? … If I could perform scansion on the Aeneid, if I could build a macro in an Excel spreadsheet, if I could spend the last nine birthdays and Christmases and New Year’s Eves alone, then I’m sure I could manage to organize a delightful festive lunch for thirty people on a budget of ten pounds per capita”

Her literal interpretation of what people say often makes for laugh-out-loud moments, and her observations can be shrewd: “She had tried to steer me towards vertiginous heels again – why are these people so incredibly keen on crippling their female customers? I began to wonder if cobblers and chiropractors had established fiendish cartel.”

This brilliant debut novel touches on childhood neglect, physical cruelty and emotional abuse, as well as repressed memories and survivor guilt. It highlights the value of a skilled counsellor and the importance of care and understanding, friendship and love. Recommended!

“One of the most remarkable things about Antonina was her determination to include play, animals, wonder, curiosity, marvel, and a wide blaze of innocence in a household where all dodged the ambient dangers, horrors, and uncertainties. That takes a special stripe of bravery rarely valued in wartime”

The Zookeeper’s Wife is the eleventh book by American author, Diane Ackerman. It is non-fiction, but often reads like a novel, a plain narrative with spurts of lush descriptive prose, for example: “In a country under a death sentence, with seasonal cues like morning light or drifting constellations hidden behind shutters, time changed shape, lost some of its elasticity, and Antonina wrote that her days grew even more ephemeral and ‘brittle, like soap bubbles breaking’”

It tells the story of Antonina Zabinska and her husband, Director of the Warsaw Zoo, Jan Zabinski. When Poland is occupied by the Nazis in 1939, the animals that aren’t killed during bombing raids are stolen by Berlin zookeepers, and Jan and Antonina need something else to keep them busy. As the zoo cycles through different legitimate incarnations (pig farm, fur farm), the one business that is soon a constant, very much behind the scenes, is the concealment of Jews trying to escape the Ghetto and Nazi persecution.

After initial descriptions of the time before occupation, the bulk of the story tells of the Guests that passed through the Zabinski’s Villa, both human and animal, with all their quirks, traits and oddities. Sometimes the text does get a bit bogged down in details (insect collections, sculpture, extinct species and back breeding), but the ingenuity of these brave people is amazing, and their generosity is truly uplifting. As an officer in the Home Army, and very active in the Resistance, Jan is often absent an it is up to Antonina to keep things running smoothly, and facilitate the passage of some three hundred people to safety.

“In prewar days, the villa had harboured more exotic animals, including a pair of baby otters, but the Zabinksis continued their tradition of people and animals coexisting under one roof, over and over welcoming stray animals into their lives and an already stressed household. Zookeepers by disposition, not fate, even in wartime with food scarce, they needed to remain among animals for life to feel true…”

Ackerman’s extensive research is apparent on every page, as well as in the 21 pages of notes on the chapters, the 7-page bibliography and the comprehensive index. She portrays Jan as cool under pressure, demanding and critical, while Antonina comes across as clever and intuitive, but they are hard to connect with, perhaps because Ackerman had to base her tale on diaries and notes. It will be interesting to see what Hollywood does with this tale. A fascinating true story.

The End of the Day is the fourth novel by British author, Claire North. After his interview for a new job as the Harbinger of Death, Charlie was pretty sure he wouldn’t get the job, but apparently, the previous Harbinger thoughts he was suited to it, so he did. Charlie is just an ordinary human. Or perhaps not quite so ordinary: it does take someone a bit special to do this job.

There’s a lot of travel involved, often at very short notice, but the staff in the Office at Milton Keynes make all the arrangements and keep his calendar up to date. And it should be no surprise that Death has an Office: it’s a very busy job and someone needs to keep on top of the schedule. Although it’s murder on relationships, one of the perks of Charlie’s job is getting to hear local music and adding to his collection of losing team football T shirts.

Death comes to everyone and everything eventually, but quite often Charlie comes before. He explains to those he visits that he comes sometimes as a courtesy, sometimes as a warning. He often brings a gift, although he is usually unaware of its significance. He considers it a privilege to honour the living before the end comes. Many he visits are unsurprised; some are angry and try to refuse, but he explains that whether or not Charlie does his job, Death will come.

Now and then, Charlie runs into the other Harbingers (Pestilence, Famine, War), but mostly it’s a fairly solitary job. People often ask him about Death, but his answers usually fail to satisfy, and occasionally provoke a more violent reaction. And just sometimes, Charlie can’t help getting involved, whether or not that is wise.

Once again, North has come up with an original and very imaginative tale that often takes quite unexpected turns and naturally features, given the subject matter, some moments of rather dark humour. North easily captures the feel of the many locations to which Death sends the Harbinger. Some of Charlie’s encounters are bound to uplift, while other interactions, and the undercurrent represented by snippets of conversation and opinion, are definitely thought-provoking. It’s clever and interesting and there’s certainly a Terry Pratchett feel to it all. Another brilliant read that will have fans eager for more from this talented author.

“Maybe I pretend that my family is normal when I know it’s not normal to have a runaway brother. Maybe my whole life I’ve been living inside of an imaginary painting. I can’t figure out how I feel about this. But I know I feel uncomfortable. All the time”

Still Life with Tornado is the eighth novel by American author, A.S. King. Sixteen-year-old Sarah has always loved art, and she’s good at it. But something happened at school, and now she can’t draw at all. And nothing ever happens there anyway, everything is always the same, nothing new or original, so she begins to skip classes. It eventually becomes apparent than an act of theft and wilful vandalism has set in motion an existential crisis.

As a truant Sarah wanders the streets of Philadelphia, she encounters other versions of herself: aged ten, then aged twenty-three and later, forty. Conversations with her other selves lead her to recall the events of the family’s Mexican vacation six years earlier, the vacation that triggered her brother Bruce’s disappearance. Sarah benefits from the clear, innocent perspective of her 10 year old self, the cynicism of her 23 year old self and the wisdom of her 40 year old self.

King employs three distinct narratives: sixteen year old Sarah relates present-day events, while ten year old Sarah’s account of the Mexican vacation slowly reveals the cause of Bruce’s exile. Helen’s view of her marriage to Chet completes the picture of a family destined for crisis. There’s a bit of magical reality going on (the four Sarahs) but it’s deftly done and not so weird as to be completely bizarre. Watching her ten year old self in the gallery: “I see her looking around for the security guard. I remember being her and thinking ‘just one touch’ as if touching the same thing Picasso touched would give her the talent to become him”.


What at first seems to be a book about teen angst goes much deeper: psychological abuse, domestic violence, sexual predators, bullying, homelessness, friendship and loyalty also feature. King skilfully builds her tale, gradually revealing the true situation as her protagonist’s appreciation of the facts develops. Eventually Sarah sees how it really is between her parents: “’Good,’ they say in unison. And then they look annoyed that they said something in unison. Then they fake smile at each other, but I’m starting to understand that smiling is really just another way of baring one’s teeth”.

This is a novel that is original and different: it’s clever and thought-provoking, and is bound to have wider appeal than the Young Adult genre in which it sits. Recommended.

The Devil and Miss Prym is the third book in the On the Seventh Day series by Brazilian author, Paulo Coelho. It is translated into English by Amanda Hopkinson and Nick Caistor. As old Berta sits on her verandah watching, a stranger arrives in the town of Viscos, a man who comes to stay a week, and brings the devil. Chantal Prym, barmaid at the only hotel in town, is intrigued when the stranger wants to show her something in the woods.

The gold bar buried near the Y shaped stone would let Chantal leave town and get on with a decent life. The other ten bars, hidden elsewhere, would ease the pressures on the town. All she has to do to have that gold bar is to tell the town they need to commit a murder by the end of the week. If they do it, they get to keep the ten bars. But Viscos is a town of good people: surely, they would not?

There you have it: a totally unrealistic premise used as a vehicle for debate on Good and Evil. Viscos is a conveniently small, isolated town full of older people, no children. The oldest resident, widow Berta has, conveniently, no family or friends, and is visited only by the ghost of her late husband. The youngest, Chantal is, conveniently, an orphan, completely unattached. The stranger is, conveniently, rich, powerful, tortured and believes himself to be a good man.

The story is filled with anecdotes: parables heavy on message, moralistic lessons lacking subtlety, hypotheticals built on an artificial situation. Good and Evil feature frequently, angels and devils play important roles. The characters are stereotypes. The whole thing is tedious and a bit clumsy.

The End is the thirteenth and final book in A Series of Unfortunate Events by American author, Lemony Snicket (aka Daniel Handler). As we once again join the unlucky Baudelaire orphans, they find themselves, much to their dismay, in a boat with Count Olaf.

Having narrowly escaped a burning hospital and already suffered the loss of their parents, the threat of marriage, slave labour, hypnosis, a terrible boarding school, being thrown down a lift shaft, being thrown in jail, acting in a freak show, being thrown off a mountain, almost dying from a lethal fungus, fleeing from a burning hotel and the murder of their Uncle Monty and Aunt Josephine at the hands of the evil Count Olaf and his nefarious assistants, the siblings are ever-vigilant of his reappearance. Luckily these well-mannered and uncomplaining children are also very resourceful: Violet invents, Klaus researches and Sunny cooks.

Snicket’s tone throughout is apologetic, sincere and matter-of-fact as he relates the unfortunate events in the children’s lives; his imaginative and even surreptitiously educational style will hold much appeal for younger readers, as will the persistent silliness of adults. Snicket’s word and phrase definitions are often hilarious. As always, the alliterative titles are delightful and Brett Helquist provides some wonderfully evocative illustrations.

This instalment sees the Baudelaires shipwrecked on a coastal shelf, shown kindness, offered a safe place, not forced into anything, and yet… The orphans live amongst a group of castaways but end up having to take sides in a schism. They learn about moral compasses, and that dreaded Medusoid Mycelium reappears. They assist with a birth and are witness to two deaths. Readers hoping for the answers to all unexplained issues will be sorely disappointed. Readers who have not yet exhausted their appetite for Snicket/Handler’s writing may like to avail themselves of an associated work, The Beatrice Letters. Ends not with a bang…

Dead Lions is the second novel in the Slough House series by British author, Mick Herron. Slough House is where the spook screw-ups from MI5 who, for some reason or other, can’t be sacked, are sent. There they are set such tedious, mind-numbing tasks it’s hoped they will be fed-up enough to quit. Slough House doesn’t have a big staff, currently just seven under the control of Jackson Lamb. They had a bit of unexpected action a few months ago, so there are empty desks and a few new faces.

Ordinarily, there are no ops from Slough House: the Slow Horses can’t be trusted with anything that matters. But the recent death, on a bus, of Cold War spy, Dickie Bow has Jackson Lamb looking closer, and soon his smartest young spy, River Cartwright is in place in a sleepy Cotswolds village trying to track down a Russian agent. Meanwhile, two of Lamb’s slow horses are seconded by River’s nemesis at Regent’s Park, James (Spider) Webb, for “babysitting” duty in Russian oil talks. Is there a connection?

Once again, Herron gives the reader a fast-paced spy novel of a very different sort. The premise is original, and the execution is inspired. The characters are all credibly flawed, their dialogue is full of dry wit, and there is plenty of humour, most of it very black and very British, with an abundance of laugh out loud moments. There are twists and red herrings and the reader will find it hard not to cheer these misfits on as they do their best. Readers will be pleased to learn there are two and a half further volumes of this series for their entertainment and enjoyment. Another brilliant read!

“The photos were mainly black-and-white, some brown or yellowish sepia. Several of the images looked very old; these were wedding groups in stiff clothing with something Eastern about it, young people staring transfixed into futures now long past”

The Shadow Land is the third novel by American author, Elizabeth Kostova. In May, 2008, Alexandra Boyd leaves her North Carolina home and her job as a librarian to take up a teaching position at the Central English Institute in Sofia, Bulgaria. But on her very first day in the country, through a mix-up, she ends up with a bag not her own, one that contains an urn of ashes. Alexandra is distraught at the thought that Stoyan Lazarov’s family are heading to the Velin Monastery in Rila without his remains.

Her taxi driver, Asparuh Iliev (just call me Bobby) obligingly returns her to the spot where the unfortunate mishap took place, to no avail. A visit to the Police Station sets them on a path that becomes almost a quest: a quest to see the urn returned to the family. In the process of this far-from-straightforward mission, they learn a great deal about the life of the man whose remains they are carrying with them.

As well as the third person narrative of present day events from Alexandra’s perspective, there are some chapters describing her motivation for travelling to Bulgaria. Stoyan Lazarov’s story is told to Alexandra and Bobby, both by others, in anecdotes often second- or third-hand, (usually translated by Bobby) and by Stoyan’s own account, written as a confession, that details the important milestones in his life from 1940 onwards.

Kostova gives the reader a tale that has it all: mystery, romance, history, politics and corruption, a secret compartment, labour camps, violins and a faithful, heroic dog. All this rendered is gorgeous descriptive prose. The protagonist’s quest takes the reader on a tour of Bulgaria while subtly informing about a shocking history not commonly known. Kostova’s original plot has several twists that even the most astute reader is unlikely to anticipate. Tension-filled pages build up to a very exciting climax, and several of the multi-faceted characters are not what they at first seem to be.

Kostova’s extensive research and her familiarity with Bulgaria, her politics, her history and her customs, are apparent on every page, as is her love for the Bulgarian people and the landscape: “On every horizon Alexandra saw mountains, some of which were blue and very distant, beyond a great plain. Others were closer and rubbed with darkness, like long smudges of soot”. This inspirational story demonstrates what one will do to endure. The Shadow Land is intriguing and informative, but also moving and very uplifting. A superlative read.

The Keeper of Lost Causes (also titled Mercy) is the first book in the Department Q series by Danish author Jussi Adler Olsen. It’s early 2007, and Homicide Detective Carl Morck has returned to duty. Some weeks earlier, a shooting at a murder scene at Amager left one of his colleagues dead, the other paralysed with spinal injuries. Carl may be an outstanding detective, but his lack of people skills is wearing thin on the Homicide Department of the Copenhagen Police Force. The solution comes in the form of his appointment as head of the newly formed (politically instigated) Department Q, which will handle nationwide “cases deserving special scrutiny”.

It looks like Carl will be doing all the work. Not that he cares: the shooting of his colleagues, still unsolved, has left him riddled with a deep-seated guilt and beset by an apathy he has never before known. A number of case files is delivered to his basement office, and after a cursory sorting of the folders, Carl settles back to examine the insides of his eyelids. But the assistant he has been assigned, a Syrian refugee who is meant to do cleaning and filing, seems to have other ideas. Assad’s enthusiasm isn’t exactly contagious, but soon enough, Carl finds himself intrigued by the case Assad has selected.

In early 2002, politician Merete Lynggaard disappeared from a ferry on her way to Berlin with her psychologically disabled (mute) younger brother, Uffe. While most believed she had drowned, no remains were ever found. Uffe was unable to shed light on her fate. Carl and Assad believe they are looking for a murder victim, but an alternate narrative that starts in 2002 and is intermittently inserted between chapters from Morck’s 2007 perspective lets the reader know otherwise.

Adler-Olsen gives the reader a riveting tale with an intricately woven plot and an exciting climax. His characters are multi-dimensional, and their dialogue is often a source of humour. The way Carl drops the occasional remark to point the Homicide crew in the right direction on their current cases is also fun. The mystery of the Amager shooting is not resolved and is one of several strands that provide potential material for further books (of which there are currently six). Assad is a delightful surprise whose inner workings will, no doubt, also be explored further. This is a brilliant start to the series and an excellent example of Danish Crime Fiction.

“I was deciding whether to call Henk when the phone rang and it was him. That sort of thing happens a lot, you know. I think about something, and then there it is. It makes me wonder if my life is neatly woven, instead of the tangle it looks like. If I could just follow all the threads, maybe I’d see a nice pattern”.

The Satanic Mechanic is the second book in the Tannie Maria Mystery series by South African author, Sally Andrew. Slimkat Kabbo is the face of the Kuruman Bushman’s successful land claim case. With his peace-loving attitude (“Fighting can make you bitter. But sometimes it must be done. If you have to fight, then you must do so with soft hands and a heart full of forgiveness”), he is no boastful victor. So when he is poisoned right there in front Tannie Maria and the Klein Karoo Gazette’s intrepid investigative reporter, Jessie Mostert, and under the noses of the Oudtshoorn and Ladismith police, they are puzzled.

Would the vanquished in the land case, the Hardcore diamond miners and the Agribeest cattle company really take revenge in this manner? Or was someone else behind the harassment and death threats the Bushmen had received? Tannie Maria’s boyfriend, Detective Lieutenant Henk Kannemeyer doesn’t want Maria getting involved; after her recent kidnapping and near murder, he doesn’t want to risk losing her again. Tannie Maria dislikes being told what to do, but she has another problem with Henk, one of a more intimate nature, one that stems from her former husband’s abuse and needs a counsellor’s help.

The first one she sees puts her on a diet. Readers familiar with Tannie Maria know that food plays a big role in her life: “I took a mouthful of tart, and I closed my eyes and let the sweet warm brandy and cream sing down my throat to my belly”. A visit to the doctor has a different outcome, as well as some dietary advice: “’If you apply common sense you should be fine. Obvious stuff: exercise, eat healthy food, only eat when you're hungry.’ The problem is, I thought as I left his office, I am always hungry”. Eventually, she consults the Satanic Mechanic.

Sally Andrew gives the reader a murder mystery with an original plot, a twist or two and quite a few red herrings. She touches on some topical issues: PTSD, the plight of wildlife crossing roads, and the status of gays and lesbians certain African nations. She laces it with plenty of humour, fills it with wonderful food, and wraps the whole thing in some gorgeous descriptive prose: “The phone rang. It was Henk. His voice was warm and sweet like hot chocolate, and it made a smile run through my whole body” and “...they started on a beautiful Xhosa song. Some sang high, others low, with choruses answering each other. They moved in time to the music. The voices wove a hammock of sound that held me and rocked me” are examples.

Also: “Hattie’s fingers were running around her keypad like mice…” and “He was a small man who walked lightly on the ground. But he seemed very tall, as if his head was being pulled up to the stars” and “I picked up another letter on the pile, one that looked impatient to be opened”. Sentences like: “In the Karoo sky, there are so many stars it is hard to see the darkness” are sure to make readers want to visit the Klein Karoo.

Andrew’s characters are appealing, much more than one-dimensional, and occasionally quirky; their dialogue is natural and evokes the South African accent. If there is a flaw in this book, it’s that all those mouth-watering descriptions of food are bound to make the reader hungry. But what’s this? Twenty pages of recipes at the end! Mmmmm.

Sally Andrew’s second Tannie Maria Mystery is even better than the first. Readers who are unfamiliar with Tannie Maria would do well to read Recipes for Love and Murder before this book for two good reasons: firstly, many of the characters from Recipes appear in this book, and there is not a great deal of recap; secondly, the reader will be treated to double the reading pleasure. A brilliant sequel!

“There was around him an exhausted emptiness, an impenetrable void cloaked this most famously collegial man, as if he already lived in another place – forever unravelling and refurling a limitless dream or an unceasing nightmare, it was hard to know – from which he would never escape. He was a lighthouse whose light could not be relit”

The Narrow Road to The Deep North is the sixth novel by award-winning Australian author, Richard Flanagan. Despite his humble beginnings in a remote Tasmanian village filled with “verandah-browed wooden cottages”, Dorrigo Evans is clever enough to get scholarships for high school and university. He leaves the locale where he used to “smell the damp bark and drying leaves and watch clans of green and red musk lorikeets chortling far above. He would drink in the birdsong of the wrens and the honeyeaters, the whipcrack call of the jo-wittys…”

By 1940, he is a promising young surgeon, engaged to Ella Lansbury, a girl from the right sort of family, when he joins the army. Stationed near Adelaide while awaiting dispatch overseas, Dorrigo’s chance encounter with his Uncle Keith’s young second wife, Any Mulvaney, results in a liaison he could neither have anticipated nor resisted.

A few years on, Dorrigo Evans is a Prisoner of War, in command of a thousand men charged with building the Burma Railway, where cruelty and death were unwelcome, but commonplace: “They had smoked to keep the dead out of their nostrils, they had joked to keep the dead from preying on their minds, they had eaten to remind themselves they were alive…”

Dorrigo is constantly wracked with feelings of inadequacy, but “He could do this, he told himself… He had no belief he could do it, but others believed he could do it. And if he believed in them believing in him, maybe he could hold onto himself”

The survivors return home to a life that feels alien: “He didn’t fit with his own life anymore, his own life was breaking down, and all that did fit – his job, his family – seemed to be coming apart”. Dorrigo goes through the motions, marries, has three children and “Occasionally, he felt something within him angry and defiant, but he was weary in a way he had never known, and it seemed far easier to allow his life to be arranged by a much broader general will than by his own individual, irrational and no doubt misplaced terrors”

A celebrated surgeon and a war hero, Dorrigo despises the society of which he is part: “He did not believe in virtue. Virtue was vanity dressed up and waiting for applause”. From those who have been there, he sometimes hears words of wisdom: “Adversity brings out the best in us, the podgy War Graves Commission officer sitting next to him had said… It’s the everyday living that does us in”

Using multiple narrators, Flanagan examines the well-known cruelty of the Japanese captors from both sides. He also exposes the staggeringly selfish attitudes of POW officers, the sometimes secretive, sometimes selfish and sometimes extraordinarily generous behaviour of enlisted men, and also the postwar politics of punishment. With descriptive prose that is exquisite, it is no wonder that this novel is a winner of several awards and a nominee for many more. Profoundly moving.

Heartless is the first stand-alone fantasy novel by American author, Marissa Meyer. Lady Catherine Pinkerton, daughter of the Marquess of Rock Turtle Cove, has one fervent desire: to open her own bakery in the Main Street of the Kingdom of Hearts. But her ambitious mother has other ideas. Determined that her daughter will draw the King’s attention, the Marchioness ensures that Cath is the only one dressed in red at the King’s Black and White Ball. And this is where Cath meets the man of her dreams (literally), but it’s not the King.

Every good story needs a character to despise, but did you ever wonder how the Queen of Hearts in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland got to be so imperious, so cranky, so very despicable? Marissa Meyer has given us her story. And what a tale it is! This prequel has all the essential Alice elements: the Cheshire Cat, the Mad Hatter, the White Rabbit, the March Hare, the King of Hearts, the Mock Turtle, the dreaded Jabberwock, as well as borrowing from other fiction and introducing brand new characters.

Meyer gives the reader an ingenious plot with a few twists and an exciting climax. There is plenty of humour which takes the form of witty dialogue, a good dose of irony, a generous helping of puns and lots of other word play, including clever rhymes. There’s magic and an abundance of echoes of the original Alice. And there are moments that will cause a lump in the throat and maybe even a tear or two. This is a brilliant read and readers will wonder to what Meyer will turn her considerable talents next. Recommended.

“There was nothing remarkable about the Whitshanks. None of them was famous. None of them could claim exceptional intelligence. And in looks, they were no more than average…. But like most families, they imagined they were special. They took great pride, for instance, in their fix-it skills… all of them were convinced that they had better taste than the rest of the world…disappointments seemed to escape the family’s notice, though. That was another of their quirks: they had a talent for pretending that everything was fine”

A Spool of Blue Thread is the twentieth adult novel by award-winning American author, Anne Tyler. The Whitshank House on Bouton Rd, lovingly, carefully and painstakingly built by Junior Whitshank for Mr. Ernest Brill, was eventually home to Junior, Linnie Mae and their children, Merrick and Redcliffe. Later, Red and Abby brought up their four, Amanda, Jeannie, Denny and Stem, within its walls. It was built for a family and stood the test of time. And here is where the family gathers when Red and Abby begin to cope less well than they always did.

The issue of how to manage ageing parents is something common to most families; after their first solution fails, another is decided upon, but frictions arise between siblings when the (sort of) black sheep turns up to help. Old jealousies and frustrations surface, and in the course of events, certain secrets are revealed. Tyler has a singular talent for taking ordinary people doing ordinary things and keeping the reader enthralled and endeared. Her pace is sedate, her descriptive prose, gorgeous, her dialogue, realistic.

The narrative is split into four parts: the first tells, from multiple perspectives, of present day events in the Whitshank family, with plenty of references to the immediate (and less immediate) past; the second is from Abby’s viewpoint, and details the day she fell in love with Red; the third gives Junior’s point of view of events surrounding his early encounters with Linnie Mae and the start of their family life; the last, again from several perspectives, describes the present-day leave-taking from the Bouton Rd house.

Another novel that is characteristically Anne Tyler: funny, moving, thought-provoking and, again, quite brilliant.

The Nany Diaries is the first book in the Nanny series by American authors and ex-nannies, Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus. We start with a nanny called Nanny. Then we have parents Mr X and Mrs X, and their four-year-old son, Grayer. And a potential boyfriend who never gets beyond HH (=Harvard Hottie). So, ignore the silly names, and wade through the interview experiences, the ridiculous demands of these ultra-rich socialites and their first-world problems, and the brand name soup, and there’s actually a reasonable story. Which is that the nanny often has a much better relationship with the children than either of the parents do. And that all that money doesn’t ensure a stable marriage or a happy childhood.

Nanny lacks backbone (but not self-pity) and makes quite a few unwise decisions. Nonetheless, her dedication to her four-year-old charge is genuine. The Xes are, no doubt, an amalgamation of the worst parents the authors have encountered: pretentious, shallow and selfish. This tale gives the reader some laughs, some head-shaking and some gasps at the behaviour of the rich. Is it entertaining enough that readers will want to read the sequel? Doubtful.

Into The Darkest Corner is the first novel by British author, Elizabeth Haynes. In 2003, personnel manager Catherine Bailey is confident and carefree, with a full but somewhat risky social life that involves copious drinking and sexual promiscuity. In 2007, Cathy Bailey is frightened and withdrawn, crippled by the OCD rituals she follows to keep her emotions under control, to keep the fear and panic at bay.

In October 2003, Cathy meets a somewhat mysterious but totally gorgeous man named Lee. He’s closed-mouthed about his job, but charms her friends, and as she gets involved with this enigmatic figure, a man who can be loving and vulnerable, but also rough and controlling, her life changes in major ways.

The gripping tale is told in an alternating narrative that switches between the two timeframes: dates are clearly marked so that it is easy to distinguish the “when” of events. There are also two court transcripts that explain certain incidents. Haynes gives the reader a riveting plot with a twist or two, several nail-biting climaxes and some bombshell revelations that will have them gasping.

The story touches on stalking, PTSD, sexual assault, domestic violence, and the devastating effects of those skilled in manipulation and psychological terror. OCD is very realistically described. It is impossible not to feel empathy with the main character, despite her occasional unwise choices, and impossible not to cheer her on as she gains control of her life. This brilliant debut novel is a page-turner with a chilling ending.

The Husband’s Secret is the fifth adult novel by Australian author, Liane Moriarty. It is early evening on the Monday before Easter, 2012. In Sydney, widowed secretary of St Angela’s Catholic Primary School, Rachel Crowley, still grieving the daughter she lost nearly thirty years ago, is dismayed to learn that her son Rob, his wife Lauren and her dear little grandson, Jacob will be moving to New York.

Cecilia Fitzpatrick, Tupperware agent and busy school mum with three daughters at St Angela’s, accidentally comes across a letter, addressed to her, from her husband, John-Paul (currently in Chicago for work), in a sealed envelope, intriguingly labelled “to be opened only in the event of my death”. In Melbourne, happily married Tess O’Leary, mother of Liam, is stunned when her husband, Will and her cousin and best friend, Felicity tell her that they have fallen in love with each other.

Over the next six days, there will be unimaginable changes in each of their lives, lives that will intersect to culminate in a dramatic climax. As Cecilia tries to resist the temptation to open the letter (“She considered tearing it open right that second, before she had time to think about it, like the way she sometimes (not very often) shoved the last biscuit or chocolate in her mouth, before her conscience had time to catch up with her greed”), Moriarty tantalises the reader with several possibilities before the contents are eventually revealed.

Cecilia had lately been wishing for a bit of excitement in her ordinary life: the admonition: “be careful what you wish for…” was once again upheld. Moriarty once again gives the reader characters that are easy to identify with, leading their fairly ordinary lives in a setting that is reassuringly familiar. None, however, is quite what they first appear; each has their faults and imperfections, and everyone has a secret (or two): some are mundane, some are funny, some will leave the reader gasping.

Moriarty is not afraid to tackle a dark subject and puts her characters into situations that will have the reader pondering, long after the last page is turned, on how they themselves would react when faced with such a dilemma. Events and circumstances in her characters’ lives emphasise that, in life, nothing is black and white. Shame, pride, vanity, grief, fear, guilt and revenge all variously dictate the behaviour of the characters; tragedy, irony, coincidence and circumstance also play a part.

Moriarty gives the reader some marvellously descriptive prose: “She didn’t feel angry yet. Not really. But she could feel the possibility of a fury worse than anything she’d ever experienced, a simmering vat of anger that could explode like a fireball, destroying everything in its vicinity”, also “A steady stream of suggestions ran silently through her head like those snippets of news that run along the bottom of the TV on CNN” and “It was like fishing. It took silence and patience. (Or so she’d heard. Cecilia would rather hammer nails into her forehead than go fishing.)”.

Each book by Liane Moriarty seems to surpass the last and this one is no exception. This is a brilliant read: as well as being intriguing and thought-provoking, it is also humorous (often blackly so) and quite moving. Readers will look forward to Moriarty’s next title, Big Little Lies.

“The Blonde Bobs rule the school. If you want to be on the P&C you have to have a blonde bob…..They’re like Mum Prefects, they feel very strongly about their roles as school mums. It’s like their religion. They’re fundamentalist mothers”

Big Little Lies is the sixth novel by Australian author, Liane Moriarty. The Pirriwee Peninsula on Sydney’s Northern Beaches is home to a diverse range of people, many of whom have children at the Pirriwee Public School and so are present at the Annual Trivia Night Fundraiser. But this year, one of those parents ends up dead. This one, intriguing fact is presented in the first chapter, after which the narrative jumps back six months to trace the sequence of events that led to the tragedy.

Moriarty uses three narrators, each of whom has children starting in Kindergarten: Madeline, confident, outgoing and never averse to voicing her outrage at the smallest injustice; Jane, a single mum with a dark secret in her past; and Celeste, rich and beautiful, and married to a seemingly perfect man. Other perspectives are presented in the form of quotes (some quite perceptive, some decidedly frivolous) recorded after the event by a journalist, from parents and teachers present on the night.

Moriarty gives the reader an original plot with a twist that only the most astute reader will predict. The setting is commonplace and easily recognisable and Moriarty captures the feel of the school situation perfectly. The dialogue is familiar from any café or school playground and the characters are real and flawed; none is wholly good or completely evil. Several characters will surprise at the climax, and the reader may even feel some sympathy for the abuser. Readers are likely to find themselves hoping none of the narrators is the Trivia Night victim.

Moriarty touches on some topical themes as well as some age-old topics: domestic violence; body image; the dangers of a one-night-stand; bullying; victim mentality; erotic asphyxiation; infidelity; and bizarre internet auctions. She manages to include a lost plush toy, a Kindy Mothers race, head lice (of course!), a petition, a twisted ankle, a French nanny, little bullies and big bullies, an ex-husband, a gorgeous barista, a profusion of Elvises and Audrey Hepburns and plenty of laugh-out-loud moments.

Moriarty gives her characters both wise words and amusing observations: “Then, as she hit her late thirties, her body said: OK, you don’t believe in PMT? I’ll show you PMT. Get a load of this, bitch” and “Ex-husbands should live in different suburbs. They should send their children to different schools. There should be legislation …..”. Also “She looked straight ahead at the briskly working windshield wipers. The windscreen was just like never-ending cycles of her mind. Confusion. Clear. Confusion. Clear. Confusion. Clear.” and “Jane saw that Madeline’s feelings about Jane’s baking were similar to Jane’s feelings about Madeline’s accessories: confused admiration for an exotic sort of behaviour”

Fans of The Husband’s Secret will not be disappointed with Big Little Lies. Readers who can ignore the misspelling of peninsula throughout the text will agree that this is, once again, a brilliant read.

The Red House is the third adult novel by British poet and author, Mark Haddon. A week after burying their mother, Angela’s brother Richard, with whom she has had minimal contact for fifteen years, offers to take both their families on holiday. Five weeks later, Dominic, Angela and their three children are on the train to Hay-on-Wye; from Edinburgh, Richard, his wife of six months and his step-daughter are in his Mercedes headed for the same destination: a week in April in a rented house in Herefordshire.

Neither couple expects this to be a jolly family get-together, but they intend to make the best of it. Four adults, three teens and an eight-year-old are gathered in close quarters, all having issues, worries or problems that are slowly revealed to a greater or lesser audience. In between (or sometimes during) meals, walks, excursions, activities and leisure, there are confessions, confrontations, accusations, revelations, tantrums and tears.

And what a feast of emotions and attitudes Haddon heaps on his characters: resentment at carrying the burden of elder care; confusion over sexual orientation; insecurity about a partner’s true feelings; enduring grief over a stillborn baby; worry over possible professional misconduct charges; teenage lust; and guilt, lots of guilt, over an extra-marital affair, over previous promiscuity, over bullying, over poor parenting.

While the adults and teens all have their very human flaws, and their words and actions are often easy to comprehend, if not always excuse, it is eight-year-old Benjy, earnest, thoughtful and wholly good, who cannot fail to both tug at the heartstrings and to delight in equal measure.

Even though nothing terribly dramatic happens over the week, and the pace of the story is quite sedate, by Friday, everyone’s lives have been changed to some extent. There are rejected kisses, a sprained ankle, hypothermia from exposure, a ghost, a stuffed owl, canoeing, bookshops, makeshift swords, desperate texts, and unreliable memories.

Haddon establishes the era with occasional, almost haphazard passages of current events, movies, music, crazes and world affairs; he treats his readers to some gorgeous descriptive prose: “A great see-saw of light balanced on the fulcrum of Black Hill, the sun rising on one end, the other end sweeping down the flank of Offa’s Dyke and switching the colours on as it went”. This is a novel somewhat reminiscent of those by David Nicholls, enjoyable and thought-provoking.

3.5 stars
The Heart of Henry Quantum is the first book by an American author who writes under the pseudonym, Pepper Harding. Four years ago, Henry Quantum’s brief but intense extra-marital affair with (wife and mother of two) Daisy Hillman, ended. Now, two days before Christmas, Henry sets out to buy a Christmas gift for Margaret, his wife of almost fourteen years, something that has become imperative as the proximity of the holiday dawns on him.

As Henry walks down San Francisco’s city streets in the direction of Macy’s with plans to purchase a bottle of Chanel No 5, he is regularly distracted. Then he runs into Daisy. It’s a meeting that turns his day upside down, especially when she reveals what has happened since they last met. Meanwhile, Margaret has set off to meet her lover out at Marin….

This novel is beautifully written and should have been a delightful read. Unfortunately, rather than being instantly endearing, Henry comes across as flakey and rather frustrating. It soon becomes apparent how and why his marriage with Margaret has stalled and staled. There is plenty of philosophising from Henry, to be expected given his philosophy/creative writing double major in college, as well as a good deal of rationalisation from Margaret.

The travelogue of San Francisco, the mention of streets and landmarks, which will certainly appeal to readers familiar with the city, is likely to fall flat with readers who have never been there. That, and the sweet ending fail to redeem what could have been a great novel.