For Your Eyes Only - unexpected!

For Your Eyes Only, by Ian Fleming took me completely by surprise. I was totally unaware that this book was a collection of 5 short stories: From A View To A Kill, For Your Eyes Only, Quantum of Solace, Risico and The Hildebrand Rarity. None of the stories whose names you may recognise from the films of the same title bore any resemblance to those films, and some stories didn't even feel like spy stories at all (one was pretty much Bond having after dinner drinks with someone who was relaying a story to him). However, this didn't present me with any problems in terms of enjoying them. In fact, by the end of the book, I felt that Bond had been given a little more humanity than we had seen in his previous outings. Concise and to the point, it might be argued that Fleming was experimenting a little with his hero to see where he might take him, or indeed, trying out a story that worked in short form but couldn't be expanded into a full blow novel. All the usual Bond tropes are there - the violence, the women, the weapons and the food - and a couple of the stories gripped the attention, but others felt a little flat. Short and enjoyable for anyone wanting a quick hit of their favourite "Double O", I can recommend the audio edition narrated by Samuel West, who provided great company!

My STAR rating: THREE.

Length: 272 print pages.

Price I paid: £2.98

Formats available: print, unabridged audiobook, audio CD, ebook.

The Mirror and the Light - the final chapter

Apologies for the quiet time on my blog for the last month, but the world has been a crazy place and some things had to slip! But I'm back with a bang to tell you about The Mirror and the Light, by Hilary Mantel. This is the final part of the Thomas Cromwell trilogy which began with Wolf Hall. The action picks up from where we left off - it's spring 1536 and pretty much as soon as Ann Boleyn is relieved of her head, Henry VIII settles into a happy state with his new wife, Jane Seymour. Thomas still seems to be at the top of his game, and his power keeps on building with his influence over Henry seeming to know no bounds. But nothing ever stays the same for long, and a rebellion in the north of the country, together with a range of traitorous plots abroad and a new threat of invasion start to impose pressure on the one man who is supposed to keep Henry's reign glorious and trouble free. Thomas uses all his guile, but receives little support from men of power in Henry's court, who have always resented this lowborn, son of a blacksmith, his position as Henry's right hand man. When Jane Seymour dies just after giving Henry his long awaited son and heir, things start to sour - first with the unsuccessful contract with Ann of Cleves as Henry's fifth wife, for which Thomas is blamed, and then the failure of completely snuffing out the many plots against Henry. Sniffing blood, the blue blooded vultures start to gather and Thomas tries to protect his family and those close to him as he can see where this is going - well, he's been on the other side of it so often in the past! Thomas Cromwell isn't supposed to be a likeable person, but you can't help but admire him. Hilary Mantel presents us with a man who has ambitions for himself and his country, but who is also deeply loyal and generous to those close to him. He achieved so much from such humble beginnings and managed to survive and thrive despite standing so close to a king whose ever changing whims and temper could mean death for anyone, at anytime. The end was inevitable, and although we all know the outcome, you cannot help but hope that, somehow, Thomas will manage to wangle his way out of his final destiny. But history is history! I have thoroughly enjoyed this trilogy and, despite the huge length of this last book, I was saddened when I reached the last page. I will definitely miss spending time in the company of Thomas Cromwell! I have read all three parts as audio books and each is a tour de force of narration - go on, immerse yourself in Tudor England!

My STAR rating: FIVE.

Length: 912 print pages.

Price I paid: £5.84.

Formats available: print, unabridged audio download, audio CD, ebook

Pax - in the mind of a fox!

Pax by Sara Pennypacker is an interesting concept where there are joint narrators - a boy and a fox. Peter, the boy, saved Pax, the fox, when he was a kit and they have grown up together. But war is coming, and motherless Peter is persuaded by his unsympathetic father to release Pax into the wild, as the father has enlisted and Peter is to be sent to live with his grandfather. Pax doesn't understand why he has been abandoned and hangs around for days waiting for Peter to return, not eating (as he doesn't know how to hunt) and barely drinking. Peter immediately regrets what he has done especially as he realises that Pax will be in the path of the oncoming hostilities. He runs away, determined to rescue Pax and be reunited with his best friend. Both Pax and Peter have difficult and dangerous journeys ahead of them - Pax must learn how to survive in the wild and tap into his innate "foxness"and Peter must overcome injury and distance to find redemption. Beautifully illustrated by the glorious Jon Klassen, this is an emotional book, with two very distinct voices (I especially liked the fox), but with a common purpose. The backdrop of war and its consequences provide a threatening undercurrent of violence and futility, but we never lose hope that the love the two main characters have for each other will win out. This may be aimed at the younger reader, but there is more than enough here for everyone to enjoy - especially if you have ever wondered what it might be like to think like a fox!

My STAR rating: FOUR.

Length: 288 print pages.
Price I paid: free, borrowed from library as an ebook.

Formats available: print, audio CD, audio download, ebook.

To Kill A Mockingbird - Definitely a classic!

I can't quite believe that I hadn't read this book before now, but at long last, Harper Lee's classic novel about race and class in the Deep South of 1930's America has been ticked off my TO DO list. To Kill A Mockingbird is told through the eyes of Scout and Jem, the daughter and son of the local lawyer, Atticus Finch. He is raising his children without their mother, who died when Scout was very young (she's only 6 at the start of the book), and their upbringing is more than ably supported by Calpurnia, their cook/housekeeper who is pretty much the only black person that the children encounter at this point. Brother and sister are clever and curious and wander the neighbourhood with freedom, especially during the summer holidays when their cousin Dill joins them. They are fascinated by the Radley house, where, it is rumoured, one of the family (known by the local children as "Boo") never leaves the home. Despite their fears, they really want to be the first in town to see the infamous Boo. However, when their father takes on the defence of Tom Robinson, a black man charged with the rape of a white woman, the children start to see a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy. Atticus is accused by many of favouring black people over white people, which, at that time and in that place, was not acceptable. He is bad mouthed to Scout and Jem, and they struggle to follow his instructions to not react (be prepared for the N word). Of course, despite the evidence Atticus presents to demonstrate that the accusers are lying, Tom Robinson is convicted - there was no chance of a fair trial. The aftermath of Atticus's attempts to save Tom are ugly and the children find themselves embroiled in it. I can totally understand why this book has become a classic. The main characters are engaging, and the reader is caught up in the events alongside them. Scout is a great narrator - she has the wide-eyed innocence of a child, and acts on our behalf in asking those awkward questions about why does this or that happen. Many of the issues highlighted are, depressingly, still relevant today. However, despite the incredibly heavy subject matter, there is humour and lightness to be found. I urge you to read this book, remembering that the language used is reflecting the time it was written, which I found hard to take at times, but push through that and you will be rewarded with a story that will remain with you for a long time.

My STAR rating: FIVE

Length: 309 print pages.

Price I paid: Free, picked up from a neighbour during lockdown.

Formats available: print, audio download, ebook.

Adrift - not the book I was supposed to read!

While searching my local e-library for books featured in the August selection of my Literary Diary, the only one available was one called Adrift. So I downloaded it and started to read. This is the real life story of Tami Oldham who, with her fiancé Richard Sharp, set sail from Tahiti on a journey to deliver a boat to San Diego. However, two weeks into the voyage, they encounter Hurricane Raymond, a devastating storm which leaves Tami unconscious. When she wakes up, she sees that the tether keeping Richard on board had snapped. She was injured, in a crippled boat and all alone. We now follow Tami as she goes through forty one days on board - at first wishing she had been swept into the storm with her beloved Richard and slowly making the decision to survive and find land. We see her relationship with Richard told in flashback, from when they first met, to the day he disappears. Adrift, by Tami Oldham Ashcraft is a story of love, loss and determination and it reads very much like a thriller. The first half of the book worked exceedingly well, but as it progressed I started to find it a little repetitive. Nevertheless, it is an amazing story and worth the read ... though why anyone would head out on a journey of that nature during hurricane season totally mystifies me - but then me and boats don't really mix! It was only after I'd read the book that I realised there was another book titled Adrift, which is actually the one that I should have read. Hey ho! One adventure on the high seas is enough for me in one year!

My STAR rating: 3 STARS.

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

Heart Berries - grim

Heart Berries: A Memoir, by Terese Marie Mailhot was from the July selection of suggested books in my literary diary. Again, it was the only one I could get hold of in electronic form from my library. I hadn't heard of it before, but I was looking forward to reading a memoir from a Native American woman - a voice I'd not really heard before. The origins of the book are that following the hospitalization of the author and her subsequent diagnosis of post traumatic stress disorder and bipolar II disorder, she was given a notebook to write down whatever she wanted, as part of her therapy. Heart Berries is the result. I did not find this an easy read. The story of her dysfunctional upbringing to her random relationships with men, self abuse with alcohol and drugs and the removal of one child and the fear of losing another are heart breaking. But also, the way the memoir is written - which felt like a repetitive circular nightmare, where you never were quite sure what was a true memory or something a bit more hazy, I found tough to navigate. Other reviewers found this poetic and powerful. Yes, it is powerful, with some elements hitting you really hard, but poetic, I'm not so sure. It is a book I can admire for its bravery - the author really "puts it all out there, warts and all", and it definitely gives an insight into the struggle of coping with mental illness. However, I found it incredibly depressing and confusing and hard to get to grips with - maybe that's the point! It is, perhaps, one of the most disturbing books I have read and I was grateful for its brevity as I wasn't sure I could take much more. I know many people rave about this book, but it's just not for me!

My STAR rating: TWO.

Length: 160 print pages.
Price I paid: free, borrowed from the library.
Formats available: print, audio CD, ebook.

A Brief History of Time - Mind boggled!

I hadn't meant to read A Brief History of Time, by Stephen Hawking, but it was the only book listed in my literary diary for June that I could get electronically from my library, so I thought, what the heck! Purported to be an introduction written for the "man on the street" to the BIG questions ... Was there a beginning of time ... is the universe infinite ... can you travel back in time? ... this book is definitely not for the faint-hearted. It starts with a review of some of the more well known theories about the world in which we live that have been put forward by the titans of the scientific world, such as Sir Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein. Then we move onto how those theories have been picked up and developed or modified or even contradicted by others, in an effort to help explain the observations man has made that are not explained by the originals. And so we touch on black holes, spiral galaxies, string theory and dark matter. The first couple of chapters I could kind of get my head around, but then things get tougher and tougher. You (or maybe it's just me!) find yourself rereading a passage over and over to try to work out what's going on, but more often than not, it's almost impossible to do so. These are big concepts that are hard to grasp, especially when they introduce aspects that have been put there just to make a theory work ... and then the effort is put into either making observations that will prove or disprove that theory. But that, I suppose is science. Some books are meant to make you think, and this one certainly does, but I wouldn't say I enjoyed it. In fact, I can sum up much of my time when reading this book as follows ...




... yes Goofy, nobody says it better ... Ahurrrh!

My STAR rating: THREE stars (for making my brain work harder than it has for ages!)

Length: 272 print pages.
Price I paid: free, borrowed from library as an ebook.
Formats available: print, audio download, ebook.