Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘Novel’ Category

The Confession: A Novel by John Grisham

Posted in Book club, fiction, Novel, Rating: 4.5 stars, Thriller, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 10, 2012 | Leave a Comment »

When my friend read this book last year she was literally glued to it. I don’t know how about you, but for me, this is the best recommendation for a book, especially when you know that you two have very similar taste in books. So as you can imagine, I was very keen to put this book on my  (ever-expanding) ‘to be read’ pile.  I read one or two of Grisham’s books years ago and I was really glad that this one appeared on my book club list. Well, truth to be told, I helped it to appear… Yep, killing two birds with one stone ;)

So what do I think about the book? Apart from few minor criticisms, I thought that the book was very good, thrilling, fast paced and gripping. I don’t know whether Grisham’s seasoned readers would agree with me as I am not in a position to judge whether this book is better/average/below average than his other books. But as I said before, I don’t read Grisham that often and maybe that is why I totally enjoyed the book.

Without giving you any spoilers here, I would like to say, that all parts of the book have their merits and I didn’t expect to invest as many emotions into reading the book as I did (and I was ready to invest quite a few :) ). I think it is fair to say that the book will leave you with more questions than it gives answers and leaves you thinking about the story long after you finish the book. For me, the description of the Texan death penalty system and it’s ins and outs was eye-opening. I know that the book is fiction, but I can easily see how something similar can happen in real life.

Little snippet from the book:

“… but as he watched the preliminaries unfold, he was struck by the coldness, the ruthless efficiency, the sanitized neatness of it.  It was similar to killing an old dog, a lame horse, or a laboratory rat. Who, exactly, gives us the right to kill? If killing is wrong, then why are we allowed to kill? As X* stared at Y*, he knew the image would never go away. And he knew that he would never be the same.”

(* I deliberately left out the names as not to give you any spoilers.)

Now the criticisms. Well, for once, I just thought that all the characters were too neatly cut – good guys on one side, bad guys on the other. Everything seemed black and white (literally) not only in the characteristics of the people involved in the story, but also the society was clearly divided by colour. I think that this also had impact on the fact that for me the characters felt bit two-dimensional. We are given a bit of background information about some of the characters, but we could have been given a little bit more. That still didn’t stop me to ponder what would I do and how would I feel if I was in the shoes of each of the mums, the priest and the defence lawyer.

So, if you fancy a decent read that would challenge your perceptions and opinions then go ahead, you will enjoy this one!

Read Full Post »

The Slap: A Novel by Christos Tsiolkas

Posted in Book club, fiction, Life story, Novel, Rating: 1 star, tagged , , , , , on June 6, 2012 | 13 Comments »

I finally finished this book! You might not believe me, but this has been a long battle and the fact that I managed to finish it should earn me a pat on the back. My book club choose this book for our monthly read almost a year ago and right from the first page I knew that this is not going to be a pleasant read. Don’t get me wrong, I am not prude and I don’t mind a bit of bad language if it serves a good purpose in the story, but this book went completely off rails. Right from first paragraph you are bombarded with swearwords left, right and centre, no matter whether it is male or female character, old or young. It is almost as if no one can express themselves unless they swear. I am not sure to which extend is this a portrait of current australian society (I really hope it isn’t) and to which extend it is the author’s poor observational skills or/and influence of the people surrounding him. Or maybe the author is just trying too hard and the result is just appalling.

Apart the foul language, the book is filled with constant sex, abrupt bursts of unbelievable violence (nope, not talking about the slap itself) and a bit of a story line. Before I started to read this book I was hoping that it would offer a moral discussion about the slap itself, how different generations see it, how different cultures see it etc. but I couldn’t be more wrong! The book offers a precious little on this and the slap itself is just a minor event in the whole book. I really wonder why the author choose it as a title! Maybe it would be harder to market and sell so many copies if he had chosen a random swear word for the title – which would be much more appropriate if you ask me, because at least you would know that you are willingly buying a garbage.

In regards to the characters, well, neither of them is pleasant enough for the reader to care for them. They are a random bunch of greedy, angry, drunken, lecherous, lying, self-obsessed, woman-hating, homophobic and unbelievably racist people. I don’t think there is anything more to add to this.

As I said before, I started this book almost a year ago and managed to read seven out of the eight chapters and had to give up. I couldn’t take the abuse from the book anymore and it is not like me not to finish a book. But this one was particularly bad. Well, the book was looking at me from my bedside table for so long, that it was about a time to bite the bullet and finish it. And actually the last chapter wasn’t half as bad, definitely the best out of the book.

By the way, this book was a winner of the Commonwealth Writers Prize 2009!!! Honestly, how was that possible is beyond me! Did any of the judges read the book?! I purely refuse to believe that the other books (runner ups) were worse than this one, because that would have been a disastrous year for the commonwealth books! I don’t approve any mishandling of books or damaging them on purpose but this one would be my first choice to throw in bonfire. I truly believe that future generations wouldn’t  miss much if this book was never written…

You can only imagine my shock when I read in one magazine that the ABC is making a drama series out of this book! First I dismissed it completely, but then I got curious to see how is the ABC going to tackle this material. And to be honest I quite liked the series! I was pleased to see that ABC more or less stayed true to the original material, they just really mellowed the language (you wouldn’t be able to broadcast the original no matter what time of the night), mellowed the excessive violence and the ever-present sex and made it an interesting series. All the actors played their part very well and I could see that they fit the descriptions from the book to a T.

So if you are still curious about The Slap and want to know the full story, then I would recommend to avoid the book like a plague and rent out the ABC series on a DVD.

Read Full Post »

Dirty Little Angels by Chris Tusa

Posted in Life story, Novel, Rating: 3 stars, Review copy, tagged , , , , , on May 22, 2012 | 1 Comment »

I don’t know why, but I have really mixed feelings about this book. I really can’t say that I am disappointed by the book, because I am not and in the same time I feel like the book was missing something, but I really can’t put my finger on what the ‘something’ is. And of course, it doesn’t help that the more I think about how to write this review the less I know what to actually write…

Let’s take it step by step, first of all, what I liked about the book. I think the book has a great story and although it is a fiction, it can easily be a true story. The book is set in New Orleans in a very run down area. The author doesn’t hold back and portrays the struggle of the 16-year-old with her awakening libido, exposure to violence, drugs and a skewed view of a religion as well as trying to make sense (and find who to blame) why the family is falling apart. But to be honest, the little girl has her darker wicked side too and has ways how to cope in this environment. The book offers very interesting insight into a section of a society that is living sometimes on the right side of the law and sometimes dipping into the other side. It shows that the author clearly took the time to do the research.

What I particularly struggled with, was to build a bond with the characters (apart from Verma who is very sweet and down to earth). I tried over and over and it just didn’t work out for me and as a consequence, I didn’t really care about what is going to happened next. And I kind of feel sorry for that because the book is interesting and I should be able to enjoy it more.

For me, this book had all the right ingredients to be a great book but it is missing a ‘soul’. I don’t know whether I am biased because I have read quite a few exceptional books recently and this one didn’t reach the same high mark, which was slightly unsatisfactory. Said that, this book is still a better than average read so try and give it a go, maybe you will have better luck with it than me.

(review copy)

Read Full Post »

Have a Nice Weekend by Ian Ellis

Posted in Life story, Novel, Rating: 4.5 stars, Review copy, tagged , , , , , , on May 20, 2012 | 1 Comment »

Well, this review is well overdue, so let’s get on with it :)

This book is a little gem that can be easily overlooked if you look at it under a wrong angle. It is undoubtedly an easy read but it’s true quality lies not 100% in what is written and how, but by a great part in what you take out of the book. This book bonds with you at a human level, it resonates within you and it makes you care about the characters.

I think we all met Will at some point in our lives and that makes him ever so real with all his hopes and desires (or the lack of) and his misunderstandings and mistakes. Will’s story beautifully shows that neither of us is perfect as we all are only humans and sometimes we put on a show, and others might see right through it.  Sometimes we are completely out of our depth, but try not to let it show and sometimes we just lose our way for a while. Neither of us lived our lives before so we all make do with what we think is the right thing to do, to want or to say. Combine this with other person’s believes, desires and anticipations and you end up with life as complex and complicated as it gets. But don’t we all have to deal with this? Didn’t we all go through relationships that were bound to end because of the accumulation of misunderstandings, bits of selfishness and half-hearted compromises?

As the saying goes, ‘there are two sides to every story’ and this book portrays both of them beautifully. Every each of us can find a part of us in this book and that’s what makes this book excellent.

I think I should mention one more thing, I came to a conclusion that with this book it really matters how old you are. I can only write from my experience, but I believe that in most cases, if you are in your teens or twenties you will not get the full punch from this book. Once you reached thirty you take the first stock of your life and you change your views slightly and you start to think about things you never thought before and even see relationships in different light. And once you reach this certain maturity, that’s when I think you will enjoy the book the most. I say this without any prejudice and if you are so lucky to be young and have a great insight into life, then good for you, go ahead and enjoy the book.

I hope that anyone who is going to pick up this book will have such a pleasurable read as I did.

(review copy)

Read Full Post »

The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

Posted in Novel, philosophy, Rating: 5 stars, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 6, 2012 | 1 Comment »

I originally wanted to write a review of a completely different book but all my thoughts kept going back to this one. I finished The Sense of an Ending yesterday and my mind don’t seem to be able to let it go. So, for the sake of my sanity, I shall give in and try to make sense of my thoughts and feelings about this book. This is not going to be easy but I hope that it will make sense in the end.

The Sense of an Ending is a tiny book – merely 150 pages – and I think most of the people will regard it as a quick read, but that is where they are wrong. I don’t think that this book is meant to be read in one go or over few days. It is more of a book that is better to be read in bite sizes to get the most of it. It feels like this book is offering a mirror to each reader and it is up to every one of us whether we decide to reflect upon our lives when reading the book or just take it at a face value and read just the story as it is.

The story itself is a reminiscence of a childhood and adulthood of a retired man, who is forced through some current events to see his past and its consequences in completely different light. For me, the story itself would have been interesting enough to read, but what I found more intriguing was that the book was literally littered by provoking thoughts. When I read a book, I always mark any interesting parts that I would like to either quote or go back to when I finish the book. With this book I marked 39 of them! Some of them are sentences, some are paragraphs. I don’t think I can say that I was reading this book. I think it is more accurate to say that I was working through the book. I read few pages (sometimes just few paragraphs), I paused, I reflected, I let the book work on me and I continued when I was ready to continue. This book took me on an incredible journey and when I finished it, I was lost for words. And believe me, that doesn’t happen very often. And then, out of nowhere, great sadness washed over me because of the though, that we all have great and highly treasured memories, that we are fond off and no one can guarantee us, that what we remember is actually what happened and how it happened. And I got this urging wish to take back time and to be able to re-live the moments again.

Most of the time, especially when we are young, we don’t even think how much our actions impact on other people and how much damage words can do. I think that one of the wisdoms I took away from the book is that we all need to try to make peace with our past because it has much more influence on our future than we can ever imagine. But then as the book says ‘You still don’t get it. You never did, and you never will. So stop even trying.’

I would recommend to have a go at this book as it is beautifully written and there is something essentially human delivered through the story and some more is left to be found when you read in between the lines. Let me know what you think.

Read Full Post »

A Smudge of Gray: A Novel by Jonathan Sturak

Posted in Thriller, Novel, Review copy, Rating: 2 stars on April 2, 2012 | 3 Comments »

I really wanted to like this book as the title and the short synopsis of the book (you can see it on Amazon) were intriguing and promised good read. Unfortunately my enthusiasm for the book started to crumble not long after I started reading the book. Don’t get me wrong, the story is very decent for a thriller but it isn’t one of those that will catch your imagination and keep you glued to the book throughout the night. And by saying that, I think I have exhausted all the remotely positive remarks I have about the book.

Few pages in and I started to question whether this is really the final product or whether I am reading a first draft.  For me, the characters felt flat and unlikeable and there are many actual errors! For example – on one page Trevor Malloy wears his coat open but right on the next one he unbuttons his coat to impress the first victim with his Burberry attire. There is also quite a few spelling mistakes which any decent proofreader could spot from miles away (know x now) and the same characters are described and introduced over and over again. I also was under the impression that the author is mildly obsessed with some words like ‘dapper’ and ‘yuppie’. There is nothing wrong with these words and they can clearly describe certain trade of the character but to use them frequently in space of several pages is just excessive and irritating. Not to mention that they were always linked to the same characters. Why doesn’t the author use the characters’ names instead?! Author also has a certain way of using phrases and metaphors. They are just odd phrases that never properly sit within the situation or scenario. I even caught myself guessing what ridiculous blurb the character is going to say next to further trash any good parts that the book has left. One example for all of them – and don’t worry it is not what it seems! Don’t say I didn’t warn you!

‘He sat down as the woman dropped to the floor, opened the box, and caressed Trevor’s legs removing this oxblood boat shoes. Then, she guided his appendage into the hole. ‘

This passage describes Trevor testing new shoes in a shoe shop…

All in all, this book is in a desperate need of some TLC from a good editor and proofreader. Then it will have the potential to be developed into a decent and readable book.

(review copy)

Read Full Post »

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 29 other followers

%d bloggers like this: