I have resolved this year, to post my books each month, even if I don't review them properly (I like reading books, cannot be bothered to review, particularly as I have Book amnesia). In addition, I have resolved to read and clear some books from my bookshelves so they aren't groaning at the seams. I expect this resolution to do monthly reviews will go the way it has the past few years and this will be the only post, but we can but hope!
1. Hamnet Maggie O'Farrell
William Shakespeare, had twin children, one of whom, Hamnet, died aged 15. This account is a fictional account of the life of Shakespeare's children and wife. It is set in 1596, and Judith, is taken ill with a sudden fever. Her twin, Hamnet searches for help but cannot find anyone to help at home. Mother, Agnes is away in a medicinal herb garden and father in London. The book leads up to the death of her son with accounts of young Will (never referred to by name but inferred from the start), his wife Agnes and the children. It is brutal in places- life is very dirty, difficult and unloving for much of the family but what shines through is the love of the extraordinary mother for children. The supposed description of way plague reaches the family is wonderfully clever and evocative and the death is devastating and how it results in a play called Hamlet very intriguing! I've never read any of this author but I really enjoyed this. I give it 4.5 out of 5 just because I find the grit of historical accounts a bit distressing.
2. Escape to the River sea- Emma Carroll (after Eva Ibbotson)
This was a wonderful sequel to Eva Ibbotson's Journey to the River Sea. The setting is WW2 and our main character is a Jewish/English girl, Rosa Sweetman who travelled to England on the Kindertransport, is now, in 1946, waiting for her family back in Austria to call her back home. However, her wait is interrupted by the arrival of Yara Fielding who has come to seek something in the library and soon she finds herself in the Amazon rainforest in search of Jaguars and something else. The writing describing the settings is beautiful and the adventure that Rosa finds, unexpectedly includes danger from unexpected sources. Without spoiling it, this was a worthy successor that kept you guessing. There is a great respect for the indigenous people in here too. I give this 5/5
3. The Case of the Gilded Fly - Edmund Crispin
Robert Warner's theatre company is in Oxford to rehearse for his new play. Yseut Haskell, spoilt and unlikeable actress has enemies at every front and soon faces her demise in a college room close to the room of eccentric, amateur detective and Oxford don, Gervaise Fen's office. Anyone had the motive but who had the means. This story is bonkers in places. I love the vocabulary of it, you can tell E.C (real name Bruce Montgomery) is erudite. Gervaise Fen is highly likeable, but also deeply frustrating through his eccentricity and smug knowing of who things but not really giving you a clue how he knew. There is a lot of red herrings. Entertaining and great setting of Oxford writing but I found myself getting distracted at times. I give it 3.5/5
4. The Moving Toyshop - Edmund Crispin
Another Gervaise Fen mystery, which I have read before, begins with poet, Richard Cadogan arriving in late at night in Oxford for a holiday but as he trudges along the road from the Headington roundabout, he ends up inside a toyshop where he finds a dead woman's body. He is then knocked out and locked in a broomcupboard. When he comes to the next morning and runs to the police station on Ifley road, when they return, there is no longer a toyshop but a grocers instead and certainly no body!!!! Bemused, he turns to friend, Professor Gervaise Fen to solve the missing body and toyshop crime. There is a lot of chaos and capers and wrong turns until we find who murdered who and why! This was more entertaining than the previous book and I enjoyed it! I give it 4/5
5. Orbital - Samantha Harvey
I took a brief break from eccentric whodunnits to read this Christmas present I received which CBC had read before me. He spent the whole time telling me, "NOTHING happens, you will hate it!" This book, shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2024, was a very imaginative and descriptive account of cosmonaults living aboard a space station. Written in the Present Continuous tense, it has a timeless feeling. Not a huge amount happens in it, CBC is right but it is very celestial and beautiful if not the most exciting book to read. You could also say a bit boring. I give it 2.8/5. Lovely, but not my cup of tea.
6. Holy Disorders -Edmund Crispin
In this fen book, we start on the train with organist and composer Geoffrey Vintner who has been attacked and threatened against going to Tolnbridge where he has been asked by his friend, Gervaise Fen, who is on holiday there, to cover the duties at the cathedral of Brooks, the organist in residence who has gone apparently mad after poisoning. The evening they arrive, the organist is then murdered and another member of the church murdered. This complicated and convoluted case involves espionage, witchcraft and a Nazi plot. I found this book harder to stick with again, though as always Fen is irritating and funny and it's quite hard to work out what is going on! I enjoyed the church music references and I liked Geoffrey Vintner as a main character (Fen always has some sidekick who helps him solve the crime, alla Dr Watson.). I give this one 3.5/5