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The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino

Earlier, Fiction, Reviews No Responses »

May 152012

“The Devotion of Suspect X,” the cult Japanese thriller by Keigo Higashino has at long last been translated into English.

This story of murder and its consequences, set in modern-day suburban Tokyo, is (in the words of all good book reviews) a gripping page-turner. Seriously, however clichéd that description might sound, this novel really and truly is a page-turner.

The story is – without spoiling anything for you – about a murder, about the attempt to cover it up, and the ensuing police investigation that sets out to find the murderer.

Couldn’t be simpler, right ?

And there you are so wrong. Nothing could be less simple, for this is a novel full of twists and turns, and shadows and secrets, and ever more twists and turns, and the ending…but I cannot, and will not reveal the ending to you, as that would be nothing less than criminal. The ending is a killer.

(Apologies for the puns)

Keigo Higashino sets the story against the backdrop of ordinary, regular, day-to-day routine life in Tokyo.

This is a world of school, university, and buying take-away lunches. A world of homeless people camping quietly on waste land alongside a muddy river. A world where neighbours in apartment blocks hardly know each other, yet nod politely whenever their paths cross. A world where old university friends, now middle-aged, get together for a chat about work over excruciatingly awful cups of instant coffee. Commuting to the suburban train station, going for a movie, playing badminton – all completely mundane, unremarkable events – until you put a murder into the equation.

I use the word “equation” deliberately, because one of the main characters in the novel, Ishigami, is a brilliant mathematician, a legend to his university peers. Ishigami, fat and balding and a lifelong bachelor, is now a high school maths teacher, struggling to install a passion for mathematics in his students, but failing even to arouse a flicker of interest. In a book that is quite dark, the moments when we see Ishigami with his failing maths students provide some of the lighter moments. And when Ishigami abruptly cancels the re-re-take exam of the students who have failed even his deliberately easy re-take exam - well, your reviewer for one, wished she had had such a sympathetic maths teacher in school. We all share the relief of the poor struggling students who are saved from relegation.

The central characters of the book are very much “there” for us the reader, but we are never told too much about their innermost thoughts, despite the dramatic events in which they are all caught up. One stays at a certain remove from them, although hoping all along that events will turn out in a certain way (which I can’t explain here, obviously) but there isn’t too much emotional involvement with them as people.

Rather, the mathematical imagery that is so fundamental to the plot takes over and drives the narrative.

Actions and their consequences.

The probabilities of x result if z happens – the plot is almost like a maths formula (but don’t let that put you off, really and truly) working through to its natural and logical conclusion.

Except that it isn’t.

Read this page-turner for its cleverness, its twists and turns and its unexpected and dramatic ending.

A truly great read.

The paperback is published in India by Hachette and costs Rs 350.

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BRAVE DRAGONS by JIM YARDLEY

Reviews 1 Response »

Apr 202012

Before I even start writing the review – disclosure time.

I am in book club in Delhi with the author’s wife, Theo. So I am not totally impartial, especially since we were all privy to some of the labour pains involved in the final stages of this fascinating book. I cyber-followed Jim’s book tour earlier this year with great interest, and we ladies of book club were all happy that Theo could join him for part of it.

Secondly, I am not in the least a sports fan, know absolutely nothing about basketball, and have never even watched a single match, not even on TV.

So, I approached this book from a different perspective, to be honest, much more intent on the culture clashing promised on the title page than the ins and outs of basketball.

Right.

Review time.

First things first – loved the look and the feel of the book – a nice hardback, and those slightly uneven, rough-cut pages were reassuringly solid and real, if that makes any sense.

Mr. Yardley – oh what the heck, may I call you Jim ? - so Jim Yardley, clearly a basketball fan of serious note, used to live in China, where he was the foreign correspondent for the New York Times.

His book chronicles the ups and downs and oftentimes downright bizarreness of a not very good Chinese basketball team that employs an American coach.

Culture clash doesn’t even begin to describe it.

The author spends lots of time with the team and the looser entourage of translators, coaches, and trainers in the unattractive, gritty, highly polluted industrial city of Taiyuan. He stays in Taiyuan, he travels with the team throughout China, and is clearly both a sounding board and a listening post for both the Chinese and the handful of Americans caught up in the world of the “Shanxi Brave Dragons.”

Jim Yardley’s approach to the story of the Brave Dragons, the sometimes hapless team whose fortunes form the core story of the book, is to chat around and about the subject of basketball and the games, and then through this prism, introduce us to background sporting history, his thoughts on Chinese politics, and his wry, often hilarious observations of Chinese society.

It was the latter that made the book for me.

Sure, I was happy that the Brave Dragons ended the season ranked 10th (surely not a plot spoiler ?) but the whole sporty aspect of the book didn’t enthuse me as much as the author’s often beautiful writing about China.

You see, the trouble for me with the basketball bits was, to be perfectly honest, I didn’t really follow the nuances.

Some of it was almost impenetrable :

I have no idea what an alley oop dunk is, but it does sounds amazing, I have to say :

Where Jim Yardley is unsurpassed is when he describes the China in which he lives, a country evolving every day, eager for change yet sometimes afraid of it. Anxious to understand American culture and oftentimes failing totally - which is more than can be said for most of the American players who appear disinterested by China and the Chinese, intent only on money and winning the game their way, and with no interest whatsoever in trying to learn any of the language of their host country.

The author’s descriptions of the smoky, dirty, noisy city of Yaiyuan bring the place to life, warts and all :

He has a fine eye for people, both their appearance and their conversation. Garrison Guo - a translator - is one of the nicest people in this cast of amazing characters and from the first moment he walks into the pages of the book, I was hooked :

A soufflé of 1970s hair - now how gorgeous a description is that ?

Guo’s English is good, and this is – amazingly - why :

We presume Garrison didn’t learn English the “Crazy Emglish” way :

There is a certain amount - no, correction – lots of linguistic tangles, but these are so well handled by Jim Yardley that you laugh along with the Chinese players, never laugh at them. The author writes with a sensitive helping hand. The hilarious “groove” moment is a case in point :

Jim Yardley is equally perceptive when it comes to his fellow ex-pats, closel guarding their hard-earned China expertise :

During a noisy taxi ride along shockingly awful roads with Garrison, the latter asks Jim Yardley a question. The author’s answer is, in essence, the explanation of why he wrote the book :

These cultural tangles, the author’s attempts to understand them himself and then explain them to us are the backbone of this funny, informative look at politics, economy, history - and, of course, his beloved basketball - alley oop dunks included.

The hardback edition of “Brave Dragons” was published by Knopf in 2012 and sells for US$ 26.95

JEFF IN VENICE, DEATH IN VARANASI by GEOFF DYER

2009, Fiction, Reviews 2 Responses »

Apr 092012

Reading this funny, clever book about Venice and Varanasi, the two ultimate water-based dramatic, atmospheric, crumbling cities, sitting in Varanasi made the whole experience that much more fun. If not a little bizarre.

Well, to be honest, I read the Venice section in Varanasi, and the Varanasi section once I was back home in Delhi, and by then able to say “Ah yes, the Ganges View Hotel” and ” Of course, Assi Ghat,” having just visited them.

Adding to the deliciousness of it all, having literally just read the incident in the Venice section about real life African sellers of knock-off Prada handbags actually being part of an art installation, we arrived at Assi ghat on our first morning to find a Bollywood shoot in full flow.

So the question remains – were the completely OTT, utterly fabulous, wildly photogenic saddhus and holy men for real, or were they from casting central ? Whatever the outcome, it was a suitable metaphor for this hilarious, entertaining book.

“Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi” is clever, screamingly funny in parts, with the Venice part definitely funnier than the Varanasi part.

There are two definite stories, one taking place in a dramatic, picturesque, crumbling waterside town, and the other taking place in a dramatic, picturesque, crumbling waterside town.

But are the two stories connected ? Ah, that is for you, dear reader, to determine.

The Venice story is certainly funnier and more obviously dazzling, writing-wise. I laughed out loud several times reading the Venice part in Varanasi (oh dear, is this getting too interwoven ?)

In the Venice story we meet Jeff, a middle aged jaded, freelance writer going on what is basically a junket to the Biennale in Venice. There, he meets the gorgeous Laura who is young and beautiful and irreverent and mysterious, and they embark on a 3 day fling. Copious amounts of booze, lines of coke and mammoth - nay epic – sex sessions are the order of the day, and then she leaves Venice, and the novella ends with Jeff alone and downcast.

Cut to the Varanasi section.

Here we see the town through the eyes of an un-named middle-aged, world weary, freelance journalist. Who may or may not be Jeff. We are never told. But there are enough clever links and references to nudge you into thinking it may well be.

But if you don’t feel that it is Jeff, it doesn’t alter the story in the slightest.

Our narrator goes to Varanasi to write a story for a British newspaper, and just stays on. He doesn’t make a conscious decision to stay on, just sort of drifts into it, and drifts through his life there, and towards what is possibly his death.

To my delight, when reading this second half of the book, having just watched a Bollywood movie being shot on the ghats, we see that our narrator….yes, you’ve guessed….he also watched a Bollywood movie being shot on the ghats.

So many delicious worlds within worlds.

There are lots of clever little references linking the two halves of the book, be it a dream or bananas (you’ll see why) or a lovely woman whose name begins with L.

As a fellow Brit, I loved Mr.Dyer’s acerbic observations on our country and countrymen.

Here he is describing a sour-tempered Indian shopkeeper in London :

Or Jeff”s hilarious reaction to his own somewhat unexpected use of the clipped word “Quite” :

His power of language is so sublime that a waiter, whom we meet for one fleeting second and never again, has an over-powering personality :

And as for this description of Venice - well, after all that possible film within a film feeling in Varansi, with possible saddhus posing for the Bollywood cameras, this seemed to sum up perfectly the deliciously clever mood of this fun, entertaining, clever but ultimately sad book :

Published by Random House India, the Indian hardback costs Rs 395. (I have no idea how much the Venice edition sells for…)

BEHIND THE BEAUTIFUL FOREVERS by KATHERINE BOO

2012, Indian Authors, Non Fiction, Reviews 2 Responses »

Mar 282012

There have been few books that have moved me as much as this extraordinary book by the Pulitzer prize winning journalist Katherine Boo.

It is a stunning read, and one that every thinking Indian should read - well, not just Indians, everyone who has a heart and a conscience should read it, but to Indians it will have a special resonance. And it should be mandatory for everyone in Mumbai.

Ms Boo chronicles the lives of some of the dwellers of Annawadi, a Mumbai slum, close by the airport but a lifetime apart from the world of travel and hotels and leisure as it is possible to imagine.

As a respected, award-winning journalist, Ms Boo invested years in this book, visiting the slum so frequently that the inhabitants soon ceased really noticing her as an outsider. They all had their tragically difficult lives to get on with, scraping together every paise they could find to try and keep body and soul together, so there was little time for sitting and staring at a foreigner.

And so, for years, Ms Boo visited, talked, watched, observed, interviewed, recorded, filmed, checked, cross-checked - and then some.

And the result is this amazing expose of life at the bottom of the pile. Literally, since we meet scavengers, children who collect rubbish for a living. We meet people who have a just-about home – rickety huts next to mounds of sewage. Life doesn’t get much worse than in Annawadi.

Ms. Boo’s narrative is quite simply extraordinary, when you realise (and this is not a plot spoiler, by the way) that her book is not a work of fiction, but 100% pure fact. Everyone of those slum dwellers, corrupt officials, bribe-taking policemen, venal nursing staff - every man jack of the exists. And is named.

This book pushes reporting about poverty and corruption in India to a whole new level.

And throughout this compelling, albeit oftentimes heart-breaking chronicle, you never for a moment glimpse the presence of the writer, Ms Boo. She does not insert herself into the narrative for even a fleeting moment. She sits, listens, observes and lets the children and adults of Annawadi do the talking.

And how they talk. Here is the ambitious Asha, who sees politics as the way out of the desperate poverty of the slum :

Her dutiful daughter Manju, the girl hoping to be the first female graduate from the slum, studies hard, though often not really undertsanding everything she is being supposedly taught. So she “by-hearts” everything :

Asha is the ultimate pragmatist, banking everything on the success of her daughter, for who she has words of advice :

The inhabitants of this appalling slum lead equally appalling lives of deprivation and degradation, tempered by a weary awareness that there may well be a better world out there. It’s just not for them. They see the airport and the airport hotels and the flashy cars, but always through the prism of what rubbish and garbage this brave new glittering world may leave behind for them, the bottom of the social pile. The rag-pickers and scavengers.

I have to say that after reading this sensational book, I look at the filth and rubbish that lies all around my Delhi nighbourhood with a slightly different view. I loathe the rubbish. But then again, I would, wouldn’t I ? It is a blight for me, not a business opportunity.

I found the criticism of the Cooper Hospital amazing, because 20 years ago, when I lived in what was then Bombay, I had to take the illiterate, non-Hindi-speaking wife of one of my Nepalese staff there for some unidentified stomach complaint, which our local GP couldn’t identify.

When I went to admit her, I nearly died.

A waiting room full to busting with hundreds of poor Indians, row after row after row, all waiting patiently. One tiny hole behind a thick grille into which you had to contort yourself to speak.

Everyone told me “They are closed for lunch”.

But, I hate to admit it, I played the foreign card. My woman was writing in agony, as were many other people in the waiting room, by the way. People were bleeding too.

I marched right to the head of the queue, to the quiet, weary smiles of everyone else waiting - why are Indians so consistently polite to foreigners ? - and when the person behind the thickly grilled window said, in Hindi, “Closed,” I played my second card. That’s the one where I pretend I can’t speak any Hindi, and act appallingly stupid to boot, not understanding basic hand gestures and facial expressions.

I’m not proud.

So I walked behind the counter, pushed open his cubicle door, and insisted my poor Nepalese lady got admitted.

Eventually they did admit her, mainly to get rid of me, I suspect, because I just stood there talking louder and louder, until she was taken off to the ward.

I remember we had to provide all medicines and food, and I also remember throwing a scene at the state of the bed-sheets, making them strip the filthy many-times-used ones and put clean ones on for her.

So clearly some things haven’t changed in 20 years.

I’ve told this Cooper Hospital story many times over the years, but never has it resonated the way it did when reading this book.

When the poor of Annawadi die, there is little reason to pay them any more attention in death than in life :

There isn’t an aspect of the world about them that doesn’t seem to exploit the poverty and lack of status of these slum-dwellers. The police, NGOs, hospitals, social workers, even Sister Paulette - they all abuse or ignore these people. I loved the vignette of the Congress party workers delivering manhole covers, just before the elections - and then promptly taking them back for use in another slum.

Do yourself a favour and read this amazing book. It’s not always an easy read. Beautifully written, incisively observed, but the subject matter is searing and uncomfortable at times.

“Behind the Beautiful Forevers” (the title is delicious, once you understand what it means) is published by Hamish Hamilton and the hardback costs Rs499

CRY HAVOC by SIMON MANN

2011, African authors, Non Fiction, Reviews No Responses »

Mar 232012

If ever a book needed to be a biography rather than an auto-biography, it is Simon Mann’s “Cry Havoc.”

What could have become, in the hands of a writer, a rather exciting derring-do, gung-ho type of book about white mercenaries trying to stage a coup in Africa is, instead, a badly written, profanity-laced, confusing story.

Not that I have any sympathy whatsoever with white mercenaries trying to stage a coup in Africa, you understand.

No sympathy whatsoever.

But I used to live in Africa, and was there all during that rather bizarre time when Simon Mann and his band of merry men were captured and put on trial. Given the South African angle, the fact that the coup-implicated Mark Thatcher was living in Cape Town, the whole drama played out to a slightly bemused African audience, including us. It was even rumoured, gleefully, in South Africa that Mr.Mann’s Equatorial Guinea coup plot was lifted from Frederick Forsyth’s 1974 thriller “The Dogs of War.”

So I was prepared to be open-minded.

Also, since the copy of the book I read was loaned to me by an old and dear friend of Mr. Mann, I was also possibly prepared to be a tad more sympathetic than usual.

But so alienating was the tone and style of the book, so utterly confusing was the narrative, that any flicker of sympathy was extinguished almost as soon as the book started.

This is his opening page acknowledgment, for goodness sake :

Confused ?

Mr. Mann tries, through his staccato, verb-less, effing and blinding style to portray himself as some kind of ethical saviour of the poor oppressed African blacks.

A word of warning, Mr. Mann mentions race and colour and being white a lot.

This saviour of the poor oppressed African blacks etc etc is how he talks up the previous mercenary coups he led in Sierra Leone and Angola. Yet the opening sentence of his prologue actually says it all.

“This about oil. Oil wars. In Africa mostly”

Precisely.

On the dust cover of Mr. Mann’s book is a quotation :

“When I set out to overthrow an African tyrant, I knew I would either make billions or end up getting shot…”

Precisely.

The book goes back and forth between the earlier coups and the preparations for the disastrous coup to Equatorial Guinea. A straight-line narrative would have helped clear the murky waters of politics, confusing acronyms, top-heavy descriptions of weaponry but Mr. Mann prefers to swing back and forth, rapidly losing the reader in the swirl of events and the random introduction of characters without any explanation.

The one constant in the book is his liberal use of the f word.

No-one is a prude these days, but the f word is not a consistent substitute for vocabulary :

I’ll spare you more quotations.

Mr. Mann sneers openly at the people he meets, be they African politicians :

or potential coup-backers and contacts, be they foreign :

or British :

Nor does he spare his former chum and investor, Mark Thatcher :

His dislike of his former friend knows no bounds :

“Loves to play the officer and gentleman” - harsh words from Mr. Mann, who tries to shield Mr. Thatcher later on, when he is being interrogated, because - well, because, Mr. Thatcher has connections :

The book covers in great detail Mr.Mann’s imprisonment in Zimbabwe, where the effing and blinding style gives way – just a little – to a searingly graphic account of the life he leads in prison. Mr. Mann is definitely a more sympathetic character in this section of the book, surviving what is clearly great deprivation, cruelty and terror.

And then the book stops. Just like that.

The Equatorial Guinea part of the book simply doesn’t happen.

One minute he is on a plane on the way there, terrified of facing torture and almost-guaranteed death, and then the next moment he is out, back in England with his beloved Amanda. Of his trial, he tells nothing.

Why ? Legal reasons, one presumes. Must be for the same reason that we never hear about the trial.

I never worked out who the Boss was. I thought it must be Tony Blair for a while, but am not so sure now.

Perhaps, one day, someone else will write the story of this failed coup attempt and fill in the blanks for us.

“Cry Havoc” is published by John Blake and the hardback costs £19.99

NAGA PATH by URSULA GRAHAM BOWER

Biography, Earlier, Non Fiction, Reviews, Travel 3 Responses »

Mar 162012

Before reviewing Ursula Graham Bower’s “Naga Path”, let me put a couple of things in context, so that I don’t seem to be unfairly partial towards this wonderful book.

The author’s daughter, Catriona, is a friend, and indeed we are in book club together in Delhi. So, yes, I knew a little from Catriona about her mother, but since the former is as well mannered as her mother seems to have been, there is no bragging whatsoever, so I only knew a little.

Then, in December, I went to Nagaland for the first time, to the Hornbill Festival with one of my oldest and dearest friends from Oxford, Jane, who had read the book as a teenager, and dreamed of going ever since. In fact, it was “Naga Path” that inspired Jane to go to Nagaland, and I went along for the ride, as it were.

I hadn’t quite joined the book-Jane-read-as-a-teenager and Catriona’s-mother dots, until the three of us all met in Kohima for the Festival.

I have just finished reading “Naga Path”, while holidaying in Assam, appropriately enough, and can quite understand how such a well-written, derring-do story would capture any teenager’s imagination. It captured mine, I can tell you.

Now for the facts.

Ursula Graham Bower arrived in India as a young woman, a pretty debutante who developed a passion and an unflinching love for the Naga people, in what was then Assam.

Ms Graham Bower lived for years in the late 1930s/early 1940s amongst the Zemi tribe, as an anthropologist but also as a mentor, and, for some, a reincarnation of one of their legendary heroines.

And thus the legend of the Naga Queen came into being. Ms Graham Bower seems never to have traded on the adulation and devotion of her beloved Zemi tribe, living with them in harmony, affection, occasional irritation, and much humour.

The author’s descriptive prose is little short of intoxicating, making the reader see the serried ranks of hills going on into the horizon, and smell the fire and dust and smoke. Her love for the land and the people is palpable in her writing, which is almost a love-song to the Nagas.

Ms Graham Bower’s writing makes you fall in love with the Zemis in the way she did. We meet a cast of characters whom she describes succinctly and affectionately, pointing out their foibles, their worries, their problems, with great humour and respect.

She never once patronises the Nagas, who were (for those who may not know it) head-hunters. Far from it, she is quick to point out the intelligence and wicked sense of humour of the Nagas.

One of the most delicious episodes in the book is the account of how her inseparable companion and mentor Namkia (“the old sinner”) gets himself space on the otherwise crowded train to Calcutta. Namkia stands there, resplendent in his red cloak, telling the initially packed compartment about how, during hard times, he and his wife had agonized over which of their children to kill and eat, finally deciding on the baby.

“it really was exceptionally good, most tender – boiled with chillies”

By the end of the story, Namkia is alone on the train bench, and he “spread out his bedding and slept in comfort, at full length, all the way to Calcutta : and every time a fresh entrant approached him with a hint to move over, the rest of the carriage said, as one :”Look out ! Man-eater!” and Namkia turned slowly over and murmured :”Now the last time I tasted human flesh__________”

Ms Graham Bower’s story gets more and more fascinating, since at the outbreak of World War II she becomes part of V Division, gathering information on the Japanese movements on the far north-eastern flank of India. Although the story is fascinating, this is perhaps the least compelling part of the book, since there is an awful lot of technical detail, and far less of the colour and passion of the early days.

Throughout this section of the book, the author down-plays the risks involved in her wartime work, of the dangers and discomforts in which she and her Naga companions lived. Risk of capture, torture, death at the hands of the Japanese is not mentioned, and whatever discomforts she talks about is all done in an almost breezily cheerfully stoic style. No whingeing or complaining for Ms Graham Bower.

Rather, what comes across is the good humour and resilience of this young woman leading her Naga scouts through the countryside, intelligence gathering for the Allies, in difficult terrain, with minimal supplies, and in horrid weather.

Having just read Fergal Keane’s magnificent “Road of Bones” about the siege of Kohima, one can only begin to imagine the real risks the author ran, but which she almost glosses over.

The end of the book, which came far too quickly for my liking, introduces us to her husband, and describes their delightfully impromptu marriage, following what can only be called a super-whirlwind courtship and engagement. Ms Graham Bower’s Nagas approved of her choice, and the descriptions of the ceremony they hold for the newly wed couple, as befits the woman they consider their daughter, is as moving and romantic a piece of writing as you could wish to read.

A wonderful book, which other than a few archaic terms, is as much of a joy to read today, as it was for my then teenaged friend Jane.

The only sad part of this review is the fact that this wonderful book is out of print. But do track it down in a library or from a second-hand book-shop.

It will fire your imagination, I guarantee.

THE STRANGER’S CHILD by ALAN HOLLINGHURST

2011, Fiction, Reviews No Responses »

Jan 012012

The first review of a shiny new year, and it has to begin with a confession.

“The Stranger’s Child” was the first book by Alan Hollinghurst that I have read, which must therefore make me rather a literary lightweight, I imagine. But what a first meeting with someone who will certainly become a favourite author.

This gorgeous, lush, oh-so-beautifully written book was a wonderful read, and one that I really and truly didn’t want to put down - however clichéd that may sound.

At the novel’s centre lie a solidly middle-class home in Stanmore and a poem that is possibly not actually all that good, yet is known to every character in the novel, over several generations.

The book opens in 1913, with the visit to the Sawle’s home “Two Acres” of their son George’s Cambridge friend, Cecil Valance. There is a distinct Edwardian country house party feel to the writing, all shimmering summer heat, simmering sexuality, and awkward class distinctions.

Yet the scenario is a cleverly inverted one.

It is the aristocrat who is visiting his solidly middle-class friend, throwing the comfortable little world of Two Acres into confusion. Cecil is clever, and outrageous, and out to make George fall even more in love with him than he already is.

When Cecil leaves, after a few days’ visit, George’s younger sister Daphne, who is rather taken with Cecil, asks him to sign her autograph book.

Instead, he writes her a poem, “Two Acres.”

The action then moves forward to 1926.

As we read, pieces of this clever literary jigsaw puzzle fall into place, after Alan Hollinghurst has made us wait awhile – perhaps in case we figure it out for ourselves. As we realise who makes up this new generation of characters, we discover that Cecil was shot in 1916, and that his poem has entered public consciousness, rather like the writings of Rupert Brooke. Not quite Rupert Brooke, but every bit as romantic for having died so young, for having been aristocratic and charming.

And thus the mythology of Cecil and “Two Acres” begins.

The novel moves forward again, through several more generations, right up until 2008.

The story line can be Wikipedia-ed, should you wish, though I wouldn’t want to spoil all the plot for you, which is skilfully woven, with each generational shift cleverly tightening the hold Cecil (or Sizzle as he is later described) and his poem have on everyone.

The book explores many themes. How we remember our history and our own memories of our past. How things enter our consciousness for ever - there isn’t a person in the book who doesn’t know the opening lines of “Two Acres” by heart, indifferent though the poem may well be. There is, of course, love and sexuality, especially homosexuality. Don’t expect graphic writing about sex – just powerfully evocative writing.

There is a wonderful description of growing old, and the dimming of passion, when the now-married George sees the marble effigy of Cecil in Corley Court, the Valance family property that is a parallel universe to George’s Stanmore.

“Had Cecil lived, he would have married, inherited, sired children incessantly. It would have been strange, in some middle-aged drawing-room, to have stood on the hearthrug with Sir Cecil, in blank disavowal of their mad sodomitical past.”

In the late 1970s, when the gauche and rather unlikeable Paul Bryant is writing his biography of Cecil, he is reading around his subject matter.

Alan Hollingurst’s description is perfect :

“…the royal-blue jacket of his huge biography, covered with praise from the leading reviewers, was now among those features that make all second-hand bookshops look inescapably the same.”

Interviewing a man who had known Cecil in his youth, Paul looks at the old man’s file of papers and letters :

“Some brittle and sun-browned newspaper cuttings, words lost at the corners and folds…”

The nature of people’s memories - especially once they have been consigned to the written word – is teasingly queried. Daphne, whose autograph book has become part of literary history, is being interviewed for Paul’s biography. She, too, has written her memoirs.

“Daphne was supposed to have a good memoery, and this reputation sustained her uneasily in face of the thousands of things she couldn’t remember. People had been amazed by what she’d dredged up for her book, but much of it, as she’d nearly admitted to Paul Bryant, was – not fiction, which one really musn’t do about actual people, but a sort of poetical reconstruction. The fact was that all the interesting and decisive things in her adult life had happened when she was more or less tight : she had little recall of anything that occurred after about 6.45, and the blur of the evenings, for the past sixty years and more, had leaked into the days as well.”

Writing and books and diaries and, of course, That Poem are threads linking the generations in the book.

In a rare moment of critical lucidity, towards the end of the book, Daphne’s already old-man of a son is reading the poem “Two Acres” for her. She doesn’t like his rather pedantic style of reading, and tells him so, in one of my favourite lines from this all-round wonderful novel :

“Poetry…you have no idea how to read poetry. It’s not the football results…

The curfew tolls the knell of passing day : one. The plough-man homeward plods his weary way : nil.”

Delicious.

Published by Picador in 2011, the Indian edition of the paperback costs Rs 499.

STARTED EARLY, TOOK MY DOG by KATE ATKINSON

Reviews No Responses »

Dec 202011

One shouldn’t especially like a book because it is based in one’s home town, should one?

Or is that lovely insider feeling of “Yes, of course, I remember that building,” or “Yes, yes, that is exactly the way it used to feel” reason enough to love a book ?

Oh, the latter, I feel.

Already a fan of Kate Atkinson (albeit a new fan), her 2010 novel “Started early, Took my Dog” was a wonderful follow-on read.

Set in her (and your reviewer’s) beloved Yorkshire, the book is funny and moving and exciting and well-written, and Leeds has possibly never had such eloquence prose ever written about it.

Ms Atkinson is a skilled weaver together of different stories. There is Jackson Brodie, the ultimate thinking woman’s thinking man - battle scarred, fragile inside, but on the outside as tough as the Yorkshire moors.

There is Tracy Waterhouse, whose journey of self discovery is funny and moving and fraught with dangers.

There is Tilly, an ageing actress, long since her prime and teetering on the bring of dementia as she tries to stay abreast of her role in a sit-com.

As each of these story lines progresses, you know, deep down inside, that their paths will converge, but you cannot immediately work it all out.

And then there are Courtney and the dog, 2 waifs who end up as part of the literal and emotional baggage of their new parents.

There are lovely moments of written splendour :

“He had the kind of Yorkshire accent that Tracy though of as ‘aspirational’ “(that was one of my “I know exactly how he sounds” moments)

There is a deliciously un-delicious description of a “full Yorkshire breakfast” in a drab B & B where Jackson stays:

“Nothing discernibly Yorkshire about the breakfast at all. Jackson didn’t know what he’d expected - Yorkshire pudding, a symbolic white rose cut into the toast perhaps – but instead there was the usual fry-up consisting of flabby slices of bacon, a pale, glassy egg, mushrooms like slugs and a sausage that inevitably reminded him of a dog turd.”

Kate Atkinson captures the atmosphere of the pretty holiday town of Whitby perfectly, and yet again, there were many “Yes, that is exactly how it is” moments. Puffing up the 199 steps. The slightly tacky souvenir shops. The smell of smoked kippers. The collecting box for the Lifeboats.

The author’s eye for detail is spot-on.

Loved the book.

Loved the plot, which is intriguing and clever and ultimately surprising. Death, humour, love, hate, sadness, loss of identity, loss of memory, fear, murder, the search for who one truly is - there is hardly a human emotion that this skilled writer does not tackle in this clever book.

Loved the description of my home town, and my often harshly beautiful county, and the little seaside town where we, too, like Jackson Brodie used to holiday as children.

You don’t have to be from Yorkshire to enjoy and devour this book, far from it, but those “Yes, that’s exactly how it was” moments are pretty special.

“Started Early, Took my dog” is published by Black Swan, and the paperback costs £7.99

ROAD OF BONES by FERGAL KEANE

2010, History, Non Fiction, Reviews 3 Responses »

Dec 182011

There is something deeply moving, reading an extraordinary book like Fergal Keane’s “Road of Bones” whilst staying in Kohima, the little town that is the centrepiece for the dramatic events of 1944. I was in Nagaland (incidentally the most in-Indian feeling place I have ever been to in 30 years of Indian travels), for the Hornbill Festival, and so it made sense to take this book with me for the long train journeys.

“Road of Bones The Epic Siege of Kohima” documents the events of what is often referred to as the Forgotten War, the battle between the Japanese and the British & Indian troops in the Burmese theatre of war. While the events leading up to the Normandy invasion were unfolding in Europe, thousands of troops in this hot, difficult, mountainous, tropical corner of Asia battled for supremacy, literally. The ultimate field of battle came down to the tennis court of the DC’s Bungalow, where Japanese and Allied troops lobbed grenades at each other across a burned out few yards of tennis court.

The book is a gripping, often horrific, account of this campaign which pitted Japanese and Allied troops in a deathly, deadly campaign, with the tribals of Nagaland caught up in this war of attrition.

The book is often very hard to read.

War and battle and suffering and starvation and fear are not pretty, and Fergal Keane tells the story of this campaign in gritty, realistic terms. More importantly, he tells the stories of men, not anonymous soldiers. He introduces us to the ordinary men on both sides of the battle, ordinary young boys from Kent, apprehensive young Japanese men, who all found themselves fighting inch by inch for terrain in a far corner of India.

There are the big players, of course - Slim and Churchill and Mountbatten and Mutagutchi – but it is the heroic actions and the courage under fire of the individuals rather than the collective, that makes this book so moving. You weep when you learn of deaths. You sigh with relief when an injured young man makes it onto a convoy out of Kohima.

Naturally, I visited the beautiful Commonwealth War Cemetery in Kohima, while I was still reading the book, and to stand in front of the memorials, and recognise names from the book was profoundly moving.

To add to the poignancy around this book, one of my companions in Kohima was Catriona, the daughter of Ursula Graham Bower, who both figure in the book, and so the whole experience took on an extra vividness.

Kohima was all decked out for the Hornbill Festival and in advance for Christmas, and yet the traces of those events remain. The names of the hills and roads are still there. The beautifully maintained cemetery. A parade of World War II vehicles, compete with everyone dressed up in period clothing.

It was all very time-warp-ish.

It may seem a little unnecessary for a mere reviewer to compliment Fergal Keane on his research for “Road of Bones,” but I must. The wealth of material is truly astounding, and Mr. Keane has woven it all together into a minutely detailed canvas, telling the story of the campaign and the siege in brilliant detail. Often the account reads almost minute by minute, with the threads of many different lives caught up together. He is even handed in his portrayal of both sides in this desperate conflict. No one is lionised, no one is demonised. What we are presented with is a superbly well-written book about ordinary men fighting to the death, thousands of miles from home, in circumstances of great privation.

Published by Harper Press, the paperback costs £9.99

DELHI DURBAR by SUNIL RAMAN & ROHIT AGARWAL

2011, History, Indian Authors, Non Fiction, Reviews 2 Responses »

Dec 172011

This week, New Delhi officially turned 100 years old.

On 12 December 1911, at the Delhi Durbar, in front of maharajahs, rajahs, princes, and thousands of British and Indian citizens, King George V made an announcement that would have major repercussions for India.

The capital city was going to be moved from Calcutta to Delhi.

And thus New Delhi would come into existence as an imperial city.

Fast forward 100 years, and New Delhi 2011 chose virtually to ignore the centenary.

Mutterings about the rights and wrongs of celebrating imperialism masked the plain fact that the venue for the 1911 Durbar, Coronation Park, is a shambles, renovation work incomplete, deadlines missed. This is not the place to discuss how a city can be years behind on deadlines, with no outcry and no accountability – but just remember that some projects for the 2010 Commonwealth Games are still languishing unfinished.

So, Delhi, thank goodness for Sunil Raman and Rohit Agarwal.

They have written a lavishly illustrated book about the 1911 Durbar, which as a stand alone event - with or without the moral issues of colonialism – deserves to be commemorated. The Durbar happened. It is a fact of history. It brought New Delhi into being. It was an event of long-lasting historical importance.

And more than anything else, it was an utterly fabulous, glorious expression of all that was best in royal and imperial India - ceremony, pageantry, clothes, jewels, titles, fanfares – and this lovely book brings out the full flavour of it all.

The authors, both passionate, hands-on historians, do not debate the rights or wrongs of spending a mind-boggling fortune on the Durbar. They do not enter into the politics of Delhi vs Calcutta. They simply recount the amazing, dazzling story of how a dusty area of north India was transformed into a tented city, and became home to one of the most fabulous gatherings ever in India – the first time all the ruling prices came together.

The scale of the Durbar is staggering, even 100 years later :

“A temporary tented city was to be set up, spread over 45 sq miles. It was to last over a week, see around 150 ruling chiefs, feudal lords and zamindars in attendance, along with officials, and witnessed by at least 100,000 ordinary people. The 1911 Durbar was to be the most expensive and the most ambitious Durbar ever organized and, as it happened, over 900,000 pounds sterling were spent on it…

…Spread over 25 sq km, the Durbar Camp was to have 475 separate camps, with a total of 40,000 tents. Each camp was to be a city in itself, with arched entrances, gardens and enclosures. Apart from the King’s Camp, there were provincial camps headed by British Governors or Lt. Governors, camps of the Maharajahs and Princes, and the Government of India Camp.

All the tents were carpeted, furnished, warmed with stoves, and lit with electric bulbs.
Every Indian chief was to have his separate camp, which was like a mini city with all amenities, including a bazaar.

Clear directions were given to officials that nothing be done that was contrary to Indian customs. Cows managed by Brahmans ensured the supply of fresh milk to each camp. separate hospitals, a separate magistrate, and a separate police system ensured the independence of each camp under the overarching control of the British administrators.”

This is the story of a unique event, and the authors tell it with unbridled enthusiasm and love for their subject matter. There are plans and drawings, articles and ads from the newspapers of the day, bills, receipts, and wonderful, absolutely gorgeous photographs to accompany the story of how the Durbar was conceptualised, planned, and carried out.

The ruling Indian princes needed careful handling, so that there would be no clash of egos in their comings and goings and dealings with the King Emperor. There were sensibilities galore to be accommodated. There were logistics on a massive scale to be handled.

And so the days of spectacle and pageantry flowed on smoothly and almost perfectly choreographed.

But there was the occasional headache.

The durbar tent burned down a few days before the event.

Her Majesty the Queen didn’t want the King to ride an elephant in procession – “Elephant Snubbed” was the wonderful newspaper headline.

And then there were problems with the tent for a royal dinner one night :

“The banqueting tent offended against the elements of sanitary science in the matter of ventilation; and it must be added as a warning for future occasions that being very long, very narrow and low, it presented neither a dignified nor an inviting appearance.”

For me, though, the biggest treat in the book is the photography. Wonderful black and white photos - and even a startling, very early colour photo – bring to life the sheer gorgeousness of this extraordinary event.

Delhi, and every lover of history, can thank Sunil Raman and Rohit Agarwal for this well-written, super well-documented book.

Published by Roli Books. Rs 495 for an attractively bound hardback.

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