It’s that time again, where I blitz through a whole bunch of books I’ve read or listened to in the past few months. Think of it like that viral guy on Instagram who rates outfits at awards events in one or two words (too niche a ref?)
The Honjin Murders by Seishi Yokomizo
I listened to this short Japanese detective novel for my book group, and it was fun – about a quarter of the total was the ‘reveal’, which did feel a bit imbalanced, but there was a likeable, unusual ‘detective’ character and a culturally specific spin on the locked room mystery. I particularly enjoyed the references to other classic crime novels, including A.A. Milne’s The Red House Mystery, which seems to be perpetually getting reprinted and never quite making it to mainstream awareness.
On Reading Well by Karen Swallow Prior
A non-fic that somebody here recommended to me, I think? It goes through different virtues and relates them to classic literature – from Persuasion to Huckleberry Finn – as well as a couple of more modern books that I didn’t know about. It’s quite an unfashionable idea, that we can learn to be better people from the books we read – and KSP is writing from a specifically Christian perspective – and I found it fascinating and edifying (which is another unfashionable compliment). She writes very well about literature, and equally well about moral behaviour.
Heap House by Edward Carey
This young adult trilogy is free on Audible at the moment, and my love of Carey made it a no-brainer. It’s a world where everyone connected to an exclusive family have ‘birth objects’ that range from a safety-pin to a huge piece of furniture – and there is one boy who can hear objects endlessly repeating mysterious names. There’s a whole lot more lore that I don’t have time to write, and the chapters alternate between this nervous boy and a charismatic girl – it’s very Carey in its oddness, and perhaps a bit more enveloping in its world creation than some of my favourite books of his.
Weird But Normal by Mia Mercado
I love a book of personal essays, particularly when they link individual experiences to wider cultural phenomena, and do it well. I’ll be honest, this collection was very good and immersive, but I now don’t remember any of the specifics (unlike, say, Emilie Pine’s Notes To Self or Jia Tolentino’s Trick Mirror, which are still with me many months/years later).
The Purgatory Poisoning by Rebecca Rogers
Since there are endless murder mysteries written (all branded to look like Richard Osman’s series), I suppose it was inevitable that one of them would be set in purgatory eventually? In Rogers’ novel, the protagonist has been murdered and has to work out from purgatory who did it. There’s a very likeable angel character, and it’s well written for this sort of thing, but the characters are quite annoying and the solution very obvious (and somehow, simultaneously, nonsensical). It won a prize for humour, but it wasn’t to my taste, humourwise.
Into the Dark by Jacqueline Yallop
I got this from the Big Green Bookshop’s clever idea of giving two strangers the same book, based on some criteria you send in. I loved the idea of Yallop’s book, looking at a cultural and scientific history of darkness, prompted by her father’s dementia. And it is fascinating. Into the Dark is so wide-ranging that often I wish she’d spent a bit more time on certain areas, and I would have liked more memoir/more about her father in it – but it is still a very good, interesting, unusual book and I’m glad the Bookshop chose it.
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
I loved this long novel about the longstanding friendship between a man and woman who are obsessed with video games – turning that obsession into a successful professional life. I’ve never played a video game, but was fascinated by Zevin’s exploration of their creation and development. Above all, this is a novel about friendship, which is an overlooked relationship in the history of literature – which, of course, has always privileged romantic relationships first. The only reason I haven’t written more about Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow on here is because it’s so well-known already that I don’t have anything to add to the wider discussion. But it’s brilliant (and a gift from my dear friend Mel, who proves how important friendship is).
The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
A young girl suddenly discovers that she can taste the feelings of a baker/cooker in the food they have produced. It’s a brilliant conceit that sort of spirals too far from its origin, and I enjoyed the book but not as much as I would have done if Bender had kept more tautly to the initial idea.