The Bell Jar - discomforting

The Bell Jar is Sylvia Plath's only novel and is partially based on her own life. Set in 1953, Esther Greenwood wins an internship on a New York fashion magazine. She thinks that this is the break she has been waiting for and will be her passport to becoming a writer. She endeavours to throw herself into the lifestyle of her colleagues, which revolves around cocktail parties and fashion shows, but she never seems to be fully present wherever she is. She writes furiously, but nobody takes her work seriously. Esther struggles to find meaningful relationships and seems to veer between wanting to be like the people she mixes with, and in the next breath, loathing them. She slowly becomes more detached from reality and sinks into depression, for which the treatment she eventually receives is brutal - ECT (Electroconvulsive Therapy). This book is a study of someone living with a mental illness. While you feel a certain empathy for Esther, she is a tough character to like. I found the novel disjointed and bitty and hard to get to grips with - which added to the feeling of disconnect with the world that the lead character is experiencing. Not a novel that can be enjoyed, but one that can be admired as an attempt to show something of the experience of someone living with depression.

My STAR rating: THREE.

Length: 240 print pages.
Formats: print, audio CD, audio download, ebook.
Price I paid: free, borrowed from library.

The Tenth Circle - not as hellish as it should have been!

It's quite a while since I read a Jodi Picoult story and, having enjoyed them in the past, I was looking forward to diving back in. Daniel is a comic book artist who seems to have it all - a job he loves, a beautiful wife who teaches Dante's Inferno at college, and a daughter, Trixie, who is the apple of his eye. But Daniel has a past, and it's not particularly pretty. Raised in Alaska, he was the only white kid in a native Eskimo village ,where to be different meant merciless teasing. He fought back, becoming to baddest kid around, until he finally escaped. Life was pretty wild until his girlfriend became pregnant and Daniel made a monumental effort to change his ways and become a responsible adult, taking on the role of devoted husband and father. Fast forward 15 years. One evening, Trixie is date raped. On top of this, Daniel discovers that his wife is having an affair. The rage that Daniel has so successfully suppressed comes boiling to the surface once again, and Trixie discovers a side to her father that she has never seen before. When her rapist turns up dead, suspicion falls on both father and daughter, especially when Trixie runs away. Daniel sets out to find her and calls on all his childhood experiences to bring her home. The Tenth Circle didn't quite flow for me in terms of story arc, plus the characters weren't totally believable, or indeed, sympathetic. Usually Jodi Picoult can tap effortlessly into my emotions, but for some reason, this book left me cold. I can't quite put my finger on it, but the inclusion of some of Daniel's comic book work felt, to me, intrusive and unnecessary. Not one of her finest, but it won't stop me reading more Jodi Picoult in the future.

My STAR rating: THREE.

Length: 400 print pages.
Price I paid: free, borrowed from my Mum.
Formats available: print; audio CD; audio download; ebook.

A Grown-Up Guide to Dinosaurs - Fascinating!

A Grown-Up Guide to Dinosaurs, by Ellie Sans and Clare Chadburn is a fascinating podcast series for anyone who has a passing interest in dinosaurs. Much of what we know about these almost mythical beasts will have been gained from our childhood, but over the last 20 years, paleontologists have made amazing discoveries using cutting edge research that might just blow your mind! New types of dinosaurs have been discovered, from small cat-sized ones to enormous ones covered in feathers - yes, I said feathers! Filled with interviews from a range of experts, the narrative is woven together by Professor Ben Garrod, whose enthusiasm and wonder about this subject is truly infectious. As the series progresses, we learn more about how these creatures looked, lived and evolved, and we seem to be learning together. He even debunks some misconceptions ... if you thought Jurassic Park gave you the lo-down on the fearsome velociraptor, think again! And if you thought dinosaurs were long-gone, then, my friend, you are in for a big surprise ... you remember when I said some had feathers ... yes, those things tweeting outside your window - dinosaurs are still among us! I heartily recommend this to everyone, and the only reason it didn't get 5 stars was that I wanted more!

My STAR rating: FOUR.

Length: 2 hours 50 minutes.
Price I paid: FREE.
Formats available: audio download, audio CD, ebook.

The Beekeeper of Aleppo - Moving

The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Leferti is the incredibly moving story of a man and his wife escaping from war-torn Syria to seek asylum in the United Kingdom. Told in a series of flashbacks, it has an almost dreamlike quality as we find out how Nuri (the beekeeper) and his wife Afra (an artist) lived a life full of joy and happiness in Aleppo, before the war tore their family apart. When a bomb kills their son and leaves Afra blind, they finally heed the call from Nuri's cousin, Mustafa, to leave the city and follow him to the UK. The journey they make is a hazardous one and full of horrific scenes as they cross the sea, reach a refugee camp, end up in an unsafe park where people are treated like cattle waiting for market, and deal with a people smuggler who is only out for what he can get. They are journeying both in the physical and mental sense - bottling up their grief and anger, and you can sense the madness that seems to be coming for them both, but especially Nuri. There is very little beauty in this tale and it is sometimes a challenge to keep on reading as it brings the life of a refugee into sharp focus - one minute everything is ticking along in your life as usual, the next, your world is completely turned upside down. The full gamut of human traits are on display - from kindness, cruelty and everything in-between. I did find the switching between different times and countries a little confusing initially, but once I realised what was going on, I found it an impelling read. Personally, I would have liked to have heard more from Afra, who was quietly stoical most of the time, but perhaps that's what the fragile Nuri needed - someone to anchor him back to reality. Maybe the current Covid-19 crisis across the world will help us all to appreciate the plight of asylum seekers and refugees striving to find a light in the darkness that has, through no fault of their own, overtaken their once tranquil lives. I read the audio edition, narrated by the wonderful Art Malik.

My STAR rating: FOUR.

Length: 384 print pages.
Price I paid: £3.00.
Formats available: print, audio download, audio CD, ebook.

Boy Meets Boy - young romance

In Boy Meets Boy, by David Levithan (a title suggested by the February 2020 list of books featured in my Bibliophile Diary), we meet Paul, a gay teenager who lives in a progressive town where your personal sexual leanings are, on the whole, not an issue. Paul seems destined to be unlucky in love, and spends his time supporting the minefield of his friends love lives instead. But then Noah arrives on the scene and Paul is totally smitten. After a bit of hit and miss, the feeling appears to be mutual, but, as you would expect, the course of love never runs smoothly and when an ex of Paul's appears on the scene to muddy the water, the budding shoots of this new love look likely to be pruned into oblivion. In the meantime, Paul's circle of friends all have their own issues, from Tony who is hiding who he is from his parents, best friend Joni who has hooked up with a controlling thug, and Infinite Darlene, the football hero at school who is also a drag queen! There's a lot going on, but at it's heart it really is a love story. Entertaining, but a little on the sweet side, this is a book for those looking to take a trip exploring the agony and ecstasy of young love.

My STAR rating: FOUR.

Length: 240 print pages.
Price I paid: Free, borrowed from library as an ebook.
Formats available: print, MP3CD, ebook.

Things in Jars - Compelling

Set in Victorian London, Things in Jars tells the tale of Bridie Devine, a brilliant female detective who is on the hunt for a missing child. Bridie is not feeling her confident best in the wake of a previous child abduction case where she (and the police) failed to rescue the victims in time. So it is with some trepidation that she sets her sights on finding Christabel, the daughter of a well-to-do family, who has been kept away from prying eyes her whole life. The evidence starts to point to Christabel being a most unusual child - a merrow (a creature not a million miles away from a mermaid). This leads Bridie to wonder whether she has been taken by those wishing to dissect her for scientific purposes, or perhaps display her for profit in a circus. Over the course of the investigation, we hear about Bridie's own past, which is far from normal, and revel in her relationship with Ruby, who is the ghost of a boxer, recently deceased. Full of vivid descriptions of the murkier side of London and the people who inhabit it, together with a fair dose of folklore and the supernatural make Things In Jars a very entertaining story.  In addition, you cannot help but root for what feels like a burgeoning romance between Bridie and Ruby - then again, with Bridie's individual taste for unusual concoctions to smoke in her pipe, how much of this is real and how much imagined is left to the reader to decide. Like any good detective novel, there are twists, turns, red herrings and some great "baddies".  There's also plenty of humour and fun dialogue. Personally, I feel a couple of sections about the merrow folklore dragged a little, but apart from that, I thoroughly enjoyed it, especially the excellent narration of Jacqueline Miller, who brought vim and vigour to all the characters. This is the second book I have read by Jess Kidd (I read Himself last year), and she is definitely an author I will be seeking out for future tomes.

My STAR rating: FOUR.

Length: 416 print pages.
Price I paid: FREE, as part of 30-day free trial on Audible.
Formats available: print, audio download, audio CD, ebook.

The Secret History of Hollywood: Hunting Witches With Walt Disney - goodbye to glamour!

So, is a podcast a book? Well, in my opinion, if it has a narrative arc over x number of episodes, then I see it as the modern equivalent of what good old Mr Dickens used to do when he wrote and released his books, chapter by chapter. So, this is why The Secret History of Hollywood: Hunting Witches With Walt Disney, by Adam Roche is here on my blog. This short series delves into the paranoia that overtook the USA with regard to the "threat" of Communism. Starting in the mid 1930s, there was a move by a good proportion of people in Hollywood towards a Communist sensibility, fuelled in part by some of the atrocious working conditions within the studio system. Those who stood up for their rights started to be accused of being a Communist by the people who had all the power (yes Mr Walt Disney, I'm looking at you!). Enter the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) who then began a witch hunt to find and deal with anyone displaying Communist leanings. As friends turned on friends, this had a devastating effect on the lives and careers of actors and writers alike and the glamour of the film industry was replaced by fear and retribution. Over the course of some 20 years, this dark chapter of "red" hysteria left its indelible mark on all who were touched by it, and some never recovered. This is an enjoyable and informative work, with a soundscape behind the narration as well as clips of audio from the time which made it a compelling listen. Certainly an entertaining way to spend a few hours if you were on a journey, or maybe gardening!

My STAR rating: THREE.

Length: 2 hours 50 minutes.
Price I paid: Free from Audible.
Formats available: audio only.