THE ARSONIST by Chloe Hooper

At this point in time, with parts of Australia burning to pieces, I cannot think of a better book to read to give one an insight into the nature of these types of devastating and ruthless fires, the loss of life and property, the horrific dangers firefighters go through in trying to manage these fires, what happens to the land during such fires, and then for investigators to find that there are people out there who deliberately set these fires, sit back to watch the devastation and horror unfold.

This is that book. The author is an Australian narrative non-fiction writer, and man, can she write. She was in Victoria on her partner's bush block during the time of the Black Saturday February 2009 fires, aware that at any time the wind could change direction and come their way. Luckily for them, it didn't happen, but 173 people died during those few days, millions of domestic and wild animals died, and thousand of hectares of trees and property destroyed.

Arson investigators quickly established that in one area where 11 people died, the fires were deliberately lit. What follows is the story of how the arsonist was tracked down, arrested, brought to trial, found guilty and sentenced. A quick on-line search will show that arsonists in general have a variety of mental health issues, and this was the case with Brendan Sokuluk, the arsonist in this case. Hooper's reach is much more than simply focussing on trying to understand the mind of such a man - it seems no one is really able to come to grips with what type of person he really was. She touches on the causes of a number of the other fires in the region - failures by those in charge of maintaining the power grid to do so and the fall out from this negligence, as well as arson. She also closely examines the communities affected by the fires - small towns and communities whose existence is dependent on the coal mines and power stations in the area  that are being sold off, run down, closed down. I also learnt about fire itself and how it behaves in an eucalyptus plantation, how this tree is built to burn, how the Aborigine people knew how to control such fire and used it for their advantage, how it became a weapon between Europeans and Aborigine, and between feuding Europeans. And how we really are totally useless at controlling it at all.

An exceptional read, with something to learn about on every single page, reading more like a thriller than a non-fiction narrative. Compulsory reading right now.

ASK AGAIN, YES by Mary Beth Keene

West Side Story, Romeo and Juliet,  are just two stories through history and real life of  star crossed lovers whose families are not greatly pleased that their childrens have fallen in love. This novel is another take on this never-fails-to-tug-the-hearstrings story, and very well done it is too, if somewhat too long and drawn out. Luckily for the reader, the lovers don't die a tragic and youthful death, but their relationship being over ridden by the turn of events amongst the parents. The beauty of this of course, is that it is in the hands of the younger generation to find ways to heal the damage, forgive the actions of the parents, find ways to move forward, and be the agents of the healing.

Kate and Peter grow up next door to each other. Their dads Francis and Brian respectively meet as rookie policemen, and although friendly, never really become best mates. Their wives Lena and Anne could not be more different, and this does make for awkward neighbourly relationships. Kate and Peter do everything together, best of friends, kindred spirits. It is clear fairly early on that Anne is not a well woman, deeply affected by the still birth of her first baby, her pregnancy being the only reason she and Brain married in the first place. The grief is enormous grief between these two, and it is never fully dealt with, shaping their marriage and family life, with Peter the pawn in the middle.

Things come to a head one day when Kate and Peter are in their early teens, with an almost fatal outcome, resulting in the two families going their separate ways. It is not until Kate and Peter are both living and studying in New York city in their late teens that they meet up again, falling in love as adults this time rather than than children. Their union is wonderful to watch, but at the root of their relationship is what happened some years before, the repercussions still seriously affecting both families. Unexpectedly it is Anne who is the catalyst for the two families to reunite, the result being this beautifully told and gentle story of rebuilding, commitment, love and the power of family. Out of the ashes of one family breakdown a new and stronger family is built.

DIPLOMATIC BAGGAGE by Brigid Keenan

On GoodReads so many people with so many negative reviews about this book, about the author, about the life she has lived as a 'trailing spouse' - one of that peculiar species of mostly women who accompany their spouses to foreign lands for any length of time up to 5 years. Having been both the person who has been posted to one of  my country's high commissions for 2 years, and been a trailing spouse for 1 year in another country some 27 years later, I can fully relate to this wife's life, and at times completely felt her loneliness, her frustration with the local environment and people, her culture shock, the every-few-years-upheaval as she has to say to good bye to those she has formed deep attachments to knowing she has to start all over again in another brand new and alien place. But like most expats, she constantly picks herself up again and gets on with it - it's a big exciting and interesting world out there and I aint going to see it if I sit at home moping!

The cover will tell you that this is not a serious read, and in many parts it is hilarious - not just for the bizarre, strange, commonplace, curious and silly things that happen to Brigid, but for the whacky and self-deprecating writing style she employs - never taking herself too seriously, putting her emotions on the line for all us strangers to read about. And at all times she absolutely has to put on a brave face, in control, having the best time ever. It certainly helps that Brigid began her career as a journalist with writing and reporting coming so easily to her.

As the wife of an EU diplomat she began her expatriate existence in Nepal way back in the early '70s, and I can guarantee you there is nothing at all remotely easy about this little intrepid journey. She has lived in Trinidad, Barbados, Gambia, Ethiopia, Syria, India, with her narrative bookended by a posting to Kazakhastan, possibly one of the last postings they do. 

I loved all the postings she had, each was very different. The ones that have remained with me are their time in Ethiopa during the 1970s when the famine struck, and their time in Damascus in Syria, a place she and her husband adored, resulting in a book about ancient monuments of Syria, unfortunately now unavailable. During all her postings, her domestic life features heavily - her dealings with the staff at their various homes, her parenting of two strong willed and intelligent daughters, her relationship with her husband, the other expat wives. Her gift is being able to make all this very relatalbe, garnering some sympathy from the reader, as well as the laughs, and best of all she never takes herself too seriously. 100% recommend.  

THE GUEST BOOK by Sarah Blake

It is long, protracted, a little preachy but overall not a bad read. The writing is terrific with well drawn and conflicted characters; descriptive of place and setting, and how well ideas and themes are put together and transmitted to the reader.

This is a very American novel, with old New York money and its deeply ingrained attitudes, embedded for generations.  If you aren't white, brought up in the same narrow circles, Christian, wealthy then please do not apply. Within this tight circle if you are female please don't expect to have an opinion, let alone express it, please know that you are disposable and expected to marry within the same class you are born into.

With this as the backdrop, the story opens in 1935. Kitty and Ogden Milton are living the life in New York. A terrible tragedy occurs, and as a way to help the recovery Ogden buys an island off the coast of Maine with a beautiful rambling house on it. It becomes a retreat for the family and the setting over the years of parties, celebrations, family holidays. But where did the money to purchase it come from?

In the late 1950s the Milton children are now young adults, and bringing their own friends to the island including those who would have been excluded in the near distant past - a very talented young Jewish man called Len Levy who works in Ogden's investment bank, and a talented young black photographer called Reg Pauling. Talk about putting the cat amongst the pigeons - things happen....

Parallel to these stories taking place in the 1930s and 1950s is that of Kitty, granddaughter to Kitty and Ogden. Evie and her cousins are faced with the prospect of having to sell the much loved island. Evie''s husband who happens to be Jewish himself, has uncovered disturbing secrets about the history of the Milton family, bringing to the surface the family secrets that Evie always felt lay just below the surface of her perfect family exterior.

The author is tackling a lot in this large novel, not the least of which is the sense of entitlement and exclusion that those of extreme wealth often have to almost all other elements of the society we all live in. And how easily it is for them to shut down any threat those elements may bring. These were the aspects of the book I liked - how the author tackled the conflict between them and us, the justifications and moral judgements for the way people behave, plus her analysis of her characters.  The only problem is that the story is far too long, with too many threads, not all of which are satisfactorily resolved. 

THE BLUE ROSE by Kate Forsyth

For all fans of historical fiction, get your hands on this. And with a love story to completely hold the interest, this is a great read. The places you will go and the things you will see when you read this. If you want to learn about the French Revolution without wading through history textbooks, or about the early days of European trade and contact with China, then this book is a great place to start. It is not weighty or turgid or heavy going, and with the fictional stories of the main characters closely intertwined with the historical events, it makes for a really good book.

The story opens in a chateau on an estate in Brittany where young aristocratic Viviane lives with her awful aunt and occasional visits from her tyrannical father, who lives at the court of Louis VI in Paris or Versailles. Her father engages a young English botanist, David, to create a garden along the lines of the gardens at Versailles. Naturally these two fall in love, a forbidden love as Viviane is destined for an arranged marriage with a fellow aristocrat. Naturally disaster follows, the two are separated and Viviane is despatched to the French court. Viviane is a smart girl, easily able to move between the aristocracy and the revolutionaries but even so she finds herself getting ever closer to Madame Guillotine.

Meanwhile David, thinking he has been betrayed by Viviane, decides to restart his life by following in the footsteps of his hero Sir Joseph Banks, going on a voyage to China to search for new plants to take back to Europe, in particular camellia sinensus - the tea plant - which the English are desperate to obtain so they can start growing their own instead of importing from China. David is also on the search for the rarest of roses - the blue rose - which he had promised Viviane he would try to locate for her.

Naturally there's a happy ending, but what adventures these two have in the years before they finally find each other. David and Viviane are great characters, a true case of opposites attracting which makes them more real. The writer obviously loves her history, bringing the horror of the French Revolution and Reign of Terror truly alive. Her writing about those exploratory sea voyages, and what China was like in the early days of contact with Europe/England is fascinating. Despite all the history there is nothing high brow or text book  about this novel, being a great balance between fact and fiction.

1947: WHERE NOW BEGINS by Elizabeth Asbrink

I started reading this thinking it was going to be a potted history of the year 1947 - the big ticket items of  the year that defined the age and contributed to how events unfolded in the years ahead, how people were affected and behaved, and how these events are still reverberating in our present history.

Yes, it is all that, but the author also manages to weave some of her own story and that of her family. The author is both Swedish and Jewish, this book being a translation. So there is a personal flavour to this book, but without it being a memoir. It follows then that some of the events and happenings hold greater importance to the writer than others, but she has been very even handed in her choices of important events and people of the year.

It is only 2 years after WWII officially finished, but for many the war and its terrible aftermath are still happening all around. So many people are homeless, jobless, and for the surviving Jews also stateless with nowhere to call home. This is the driving issue of the whole book - the result being the creation of the the state of Israel by some unholy land grabbing, orchestrated by the British, that 70+ years later the world is still feeling the repercussions of.  It was either that or have the Jewish population of Europe boating around the ports of the Mediterranean, not wanted anywhere. Quite an appalling state of affairs.

The British continue to create mayhem with their hasty decision to partition India before Gandhi and his supporters forced their hand. The lazy, irrational and ignorant way this momentous and disastrous policy was enacted will forever be a scar on the relations between Sikhs, Muslims and Hindus in this most diverse of countries.

Also in 1947 the Kalashnikov was created, the CIA is set up, Simone de Beauvoir writes The Second Sex - seen as the starting point for the rise of feminism. Christian Dior takes his creations to America, the Nuremberg trials get underway, the first single standardised programming language is created by a woman no less, Billie Holliday and other black performers/artists struggle in America for recognition despite their talent and popularity.

Why did the author choose this particular year? Because really every year has momentous events, significant people, terrible tragedies and monumental mistakes. I suspect the creation of the state of Israel which has gone onto have tidal wave effects rather than ripple effects ever since throughout the entire Middle East, and so onto the rest of the world, was the catalyst for her choice of this year.

I learnt a lot from this condensed biography of one year. And felt vaguely downhearted that nothing has changed - the same issues are still going on - Middle East, the continuing displacement of black Americans, #MeToo movement, the return of facism and nationalistic politics, religious conflicts in India, and so on. I doubt anything really has been learnt since 1947.

THE BOOKISH LIFE OF NINA HILL by Abbi Waxman

An utter delight to read, helped enormously by the endearing, smart, slightly anxious Nina Hill, employee of an independent bookstore, whose favourite activity is, without a doubt, reading. Oh, that is when she is not agonising over the minutiae of her daily life, ensuring that her daily wall planner is exact in its detail, or when she is engaging with her character-filled cat Phil. But don't get the idea that only child Nina is some sort of bookish, nerdy, introvert who cannot connect with others. Not at all. Nina has a wide group of friends, is a trivia pub quiz queen, and sounds absolutely adorable.

She seems to come across as a slightly unusual person, a little bit quirky and whacky, but I loved her, because I could see parts of myself in her, as I am sure most readers will also. Of course we love characters we can relate to. And for how many people would their dream job be to work in a bookshop, even if you do have to be nice to everyone all the time. Hardly surprising you would need the solitude.

Anyway, the main thing is that Nina is happy, she loves her life, she sees no reason for it to change, for her to do other things with her life, to travel, to have a boyfriend, to have huge adventures. Another reason to love her - she is happy and content with her life. Adorable.

Then one day she receives a letter from a solicitor. It turns out she is not an only child after all. Her absent and unknown father (her mother's choice) had always known about her. Nina is required to be at the will reading following his recent death. Who wouldn't be thrown into a tail spin by this alarming and completely unexpected piece of news? So now Nina finds she is having some chaos in her life - her new and surprising family, the contents of the will,  and to top it off the difficult-to-avoid attentions of a rival trivia expert. How is Nina going to cope and manage with all this conflict and unresolved issues going on. Will she find a wall planner clever enough to cope with all these new people, new events, new decisions? For once, Nina is being challenged - how will she deal with this?

The author is a fabulous writer - funny, witty, combines words in a most charming and hilarious way, adores her character creation, all together just too cute for words.  

THE WIFE AND THE WIDOW by Christian White

Here is a murder mystery that will rock your socks, and keep you glued to your soft comfy chair. What a cracker of a story we have here!

Not giving anything away by saying that the basis for this novel is the death of John, wife of Kate who is now a widow. He isn't in London as Kate was led to believe by her husband, but turns up dead on the island of Belport, some 45 minutes ferry ride from the city of Melbourne. The island hums in summer as the city dwellers relocate to their flash holiday homes, with their flash cars and flash city ways. In the off season nothing happens, the locals living off the incomes they made in the summer, and the maintenance work they do for the absent owners of the houses. Abby's husband is a maintenance man, her world rocked when she finds evidence in the garage of some foul play. The lives of the two women gradually intersect as Kate come to Belport to find out what happened to John, and Abby has to deal with what she is learning about her husband.

So impossible to say more without giving it all away. The goldfish bowl of the island and its small permanent  community is its own character, as is the bleak wintery landscape. The characters of the two women are really good. Kate has to come out of her 'wife' shell, taking charge for perhaps the first time in her life as she does her own detective work, asks lots of questions in her quest to find out what happened to John. Abby is a taxidermist, something she loves and is very good at; she also works at the local superette so always knows what is going on in the community. And what lengths will she go to protect her family, her son and her husband? Riveting. 

A SHARP LEFT TURN by Mike Chunn

When I was a gawky nerdy teen way back in the 1970s, the only poster I had on my bedroom wall was Split Enz, ripped from some magazine. Why? No idea because when I listen to their songs from that time I don't recognise a single one. Maybe it was how they reinvented themselves with mad makeup, hair and colour everywhere. Who knows. But they have always been and continue to be one of my favourite bands.

So a book comes out, written by one of those weirdos in that poster! Get my hands on this. So enjoyable, so readable, so interesting and a bit of a walk down memory lane with a potted history of how NZ music went from nothing to something, Mike Chunn being one of those who made it happen.

His parents must have been marvellous people - allowing their two sons to develop and hone their musical talents, always approving, giving support and guidance without it seems being pushy or overbearing. The boys' time at Sacred Heart College brought them into close contact with other musically inclined boys, who also went onto make names for themselves in music. The bonds these boys formed at school carried them through the next few years as they tried to become a world famous rock band.

Be careful what you wish for. Fame and relentless exposure does not suit everybody. Many tough times too, not just for the band as a whole, but for the players. I knew nothing about agoraphobia, which Mike suffered from starting at this time. His life only surviving due to all the pills he was taking, it was many years before he realised what the cause was, and then how he went about dealing with it, learning to live with it.

He has gone onto great things in NZ music, his love for playing with others resulting in the formation of Citizen Band.  After flanneling his way through the excesses of the 1980s, I loved reading about his relentless campaigning to get more NZ music on the radio, encouraging young people in song writing, and possibly his greatest legacy the Play It Strange music trust. What a gift this man and his brother have been to the business of making music in NZ. 

THE LIGHT BETWEEN OCEANS by M.L. Steadman

A baby is washed up on a remote island, inhabited only by the war damaged lighthouse keeper Tom and his wife Isabel. Two miscarriages and a still born baby have deeply damaged Isabel, and the appearance of a tiny baby is a gift from God. The dead man in the boat is buried by the increasingly uneasy Tom, who also makes the fatal mistake of not entering the arrivals in the log book, or letting the authorities half a day's boat ride know what has happened. The pleas and joy of his wife override what his head is telling him he should do. Naturally it all comes undone when the little family makes one of its infrequent journeys to the mainland, and the real mother appears.

Reading this book reminded me of the biblical story of King Solomon, renowned for his wisdom and fairness. Two women come to him, both claiming to be the mother of a child. Solomon's decision is to cut the baby in two, his theory being that the real mother, or the one most deserving of the child would be the one to renounce her claim and thus save the child's life.

There is a certain point in this novel where that particular decision is made by one woman, and I was holding my breath as to what the outcome would be. As there were still quite a few pages to go I knew it was not going to go according to King Solomon's decree. The writing is so good, the character development so beautifully done, that the reader feels sympathy and compassion for all the people in this story, despite the mistakes many of them make.  We don't know the reasons for the beaching of the boat on the island until well over half way through the novel, and the over arching sadness of this one event really does colour in its many shades of grey the actions and behaviours of those left behind. In the middle of it all is a little girl, only four, who is told she has two mummies, but only wants one. This will tug at your heart as you too wrestle with what is the right thing to do, what would you do in a similar circumstance. It is desperately sad, which puts me off wanting to watch the film, but when friends say it is very true to the book, then maybe I will sit down with a pack of tissues. No wine - will only make it worse. 

EIGHT LIVES by Susan Hurley

Now this was a page turner, I really could not put this down, and on waking in the middle of the night, just had to keep reading. I had no idea where it was going, what the outcome was going to be, and it was all a great big surprise.

We begin with a woman and child washing up in Hong Kong, refugees fleeing Vietnam in the mid 1970s. Mother and son find a new life in Melbourne, David a brilliant student, who becomes a brilliant medical researcher. The Golden Boy of his med school generation, he creates a drug that will treat and cure auto immune illnesses, but without medical trials on humans it does not have a show of getting approval. Or of making its investors rich and famous. Imagine discovering a cure for multiple sclerosis, rheumatism, lupus and many other sicknesses.  So the long tortuous process of finding funding, 8 guinea pigs, a facility to do the testing begins. And then David dies - was it by his own hand or was he murdered?

This meticulously plotted, twisting and turning story is told from the view points of a number of different characters  - his half sister, his best friend, his girlfriend, a PR/fixer mastermind, and his research assistant. Each of these characters has their own distinctive voice, their own self-interests,  motivations which could all in some way contribute to the mysterious death of David. As well as being a medical mystery, this novel is also a study human behaviour, the deep set secrets we hold within ourselves, and really how little we do know those we are closest to. 

THESE TWO HANDS by Renee

Way back in the early 1980s, when in our early 20s, my brother had his first job at Playmarket NZ which managed/nurtured/supported/assessed playwrights and their works in NZ. I remember him talking one day about a new playwright, an elderly lesbian lady with only one name - Renee. It helps to remember when you are not yet 25, everyone over 30 is old, so Renee who would have been early 50s, older even than our parents, was pretty old. What an intrigue!

Naturally I was intrigued when she published her memoir a couple of years ago, and bought it. Intriguing it certainly is, written in 87 patchwork quilt pieces, 1 for every year lived so far:  an allegory of course for the enormous variety, layers and events of a life of what is now 90 years.

What a delicious treat this has been to read. It broadly follows a chronological line, beginning with her birth in Napier in 1929. Her father disappears when she is 4, she later finds out he killed himself a long way from home. She had to leave school at 12, being the oldest child, wondering at the time if she would ever get to learn everything she wanted. Such a great spirit this woman has, her zest for life and living shining through - beginning to write when her children were young, involving herself in local repertory theatre, getting her degree, becoming a teacher then a playwright, discovering herself. Her 'patches' are not all memoirs: interspersed with examples from her plays, her poetry and her musings on life. I really liked this, more than I thought I would. The woman is a treasure and at 90 is still out there giving life her all. 

CROSSINGS by Alex Landragin

There are two types of readers in the world: those who like their stories told page by page, so that you always know where you are up to, or those who like the idea of taking a risk and reading a book in a quite different way -  you get to the end of a chapter, and told to go either forwards or backwards to read the next piece of the story. Of course you never then know where exactly you are up to! Once you start, it is probably difficult to go back to reading the book in the conventional way - so quite a risk.... Like most on-line reviewers of this,  I chose to read the jumping around version, and once I got used to it, enjoyed it very much. What a story too!

In the present day,  a Parisian bookbinder is given a manuscript containing three stories, each quite different and unusual. The first is a letter written by the poet Charles Baudelaire to a young girl; the second is a romance set in Paris in 1940 as the Germans are stamping at the gates of Paris, and the third is really quite strange - the story of a woman from a Pacific Island community in pre-European times. Together these three quite separate stories tell the tale of two lost souls through 150 years and 7 lifetimes.

It really is quite strange, but also compelling, rich, descriptive and lovely to read. It could be a gimmick this moving backwards and forwards following the tale, but it never really feels like that mainly due to the uniqueness of the story, the characters, and the magic - you need to suspend disbelief somewhat. It is made more intriguing with real historical figures  featuring as characters - Charles Baudelaire, Walter Benjamin, Coco Chanel, Jeanne Duval, and they don't have minor roles either.  Give this a go, your patience will be rewarded.

THE BODY LIES by Jo Baker

Here is yet another novel about a woman making her way in the world on her own terms as much as she can, but still falling victim to a nutter who wants to claim her for his own. Oh, and then murder her. Nice. Why, oh why are women still portrayed and written about as victims, through no fault at all of their own, subject to the most ghastly fates. Over it really.

Nevertheless, this is very well written, the tension and unease slowly brewing. There are no red herrings, or twists in the tale; the reader finds out fairly early on who the trouble is going to be. What makes this novel stand out is how the woman, whose name we never know, uses her wits and her intuition to try and  beat him at his own game. You might not necessarily approve of her methods, but she is giving it a go, and doing all she can to not be a victim.

Our chief character lives in London with her teacher husband, and 3 year old son. The book opens with her being sexually assaulted while pregnant. There is definitely some post trauma here, and despite her best efforts it continues to haunt her. In an attempt to move on, she is successful in applying for a professor ship in creative writing at a university a few hours from London, which she accepts, much to the puzzlement and annoyance of her husband. But this is something she needs to do. Her creative writing students are an odd bunch, including Nick, who is a quite damaged young man, producing some very uneasy and alarming writing. Nick is also a clever and manipulative young man, and it doesn't take long before our professor has fallen into his web.

This is a psychological thriller, a game of minds and keeping one step ahead of your enemy. There is sexual assault in the book, quite graphic in one place, but not gratuitous. I liked this, but didn't love it, mainly due to the subject matter, which in some ways is more of the same. Although deftly done. 

THE DUTCH HOUSE by Ann Patchett

Sublime, beautiful writing - how does a writer do this? And tell a good story at the same time. This is a bit of a modern day fairy tale, complete with orphaned children, a step mother, step sisters, kind older women, and a huge rambling landmark of a house at the centre of it all.

The story is told through the eyes of Danny Conroy, firstly as a child living in the Dutch house with his parents and older sister Maeve. The Dutch house is a thing of beauty, originally built for a wealthy Dutch family, then purchased by Danny's dad Cyril sometime after WWII. Mother Elna never settles in the house, and then one day she is gone. Danny is only 4 so has little memory of his mother. It is Maeve who suffers the worst with the absence of her mother, especially when Cyril brings home Andrea. Danny narrates this time in his family's life without truly understanding what is going on, as one would expect. Things worsen after Cyril dies, the brother and sister effectively on their own. Danny is now in late teens, and Maeve mid-late twenties.

Maeve unwittingly takes on the role of protector and carer of Danny, and together the two of them muddle through life. What keeps them bonded for eternity is the house, the centre point of their relationship with each other and with the rest of the world. Their infrequent visits to their home street sees much conversation and processing taking place in the car across the road from the house, still a landmark in the Philadelphia suburbs.

The narrative of the story travels through the years finishing when Danny is in his forties, and I am guessing late 1980s. The only political indicators we have during the course of the story is that Danny is at college during the Vietnam War, and the manages to avoid the draft because he is doing a medical degree, reluctantly as it turns out, but it keeps him alive.

The lives of all the characters are remarkably ordinary, and yet the writing almost lends a magic glow or cast to their lives and who they are. I guess if you are telling a fairy tale or its modern equivalent, a little bit of etherealness is never going to go amiss. I mean, look at that cover! Maeve, all of 10 years old, sitting there having her portrait done so it can take its place with the other portraits in the house. This book was an absolute dream to read, I didn't want it to end, I just wanted to keep enjoying Ann Patchett's beautiful and understated writing.

MYTHOS by Stephen Fry

What was the last book you read that made you laugh out loud? This one will do it for you, the outrageous and gifted wordsmith Stephen Fry seamlessly weaving ancient story telling with modern commentary, a bit of naughtiness and some great word play. I loved it. We all know at least one Greek myth, many of our words derive from Ancient Greek and the stories of the gods,  as do many facets of our lives and how we live them. The collection in this book are only a handful of the thousands of myths and stories that have arisen out of Ancient Greece as a way of explaining the world. All societies and cultures have a creation story - here is the Greek one in all its violence, bizarreness, and strangeness giving us such characters as Zeus, Hera, Apollo, Artemis, Athena, Aphrodite, Poseidon and many others. The fun really starts when the human being is created, and interaction begins between the two. These gods sure knew how to have fun with us mortals! I loved the way the gods moved freely with the mortals, giving new meaning to the word interbreeding, but also producing a race of wonder people. I bet every single Greek person now lays claim to be descended from a god, but which one do you want to be descended from!

The stories are simply wonderful to read. Stephen Fry relates every single story to some facet of our modern day life or recent history. We are all aware of narcissism - read the story of Narcissus; Pandora's box of course is another one we all know about addressing temptation, disobedience.  I loved the story of how wine was made, such an important discovery that Zeus made Dionysus a god, putting a few noses out of joint at Mt Olympus. Fry makes the gods human in their behaviour, their petty jealousies, their desires. And they are so violent - punishment is dished out with horrible frequency for mad misdemeanours, obviously as examples to us mere mortals to behave ourselves otherwise we too could meet a similar fate.

Now I have Heroes on my radar - where he tells the stories of Jason, Oedipus, Theseus, Heracles and many others, again apparently in that easy, modern day relevant way. Maybe these books will lead to a revival of classics in the education system, because they are all such ripping, exciting, and informative rides. 

CONFESSION WITH BLUE HORSES by Sophie Hardach

So hard to believe that it is 30 years ago since the breaking down of the wall that divided the city of Berlin - east vs west, communism vs democracy, freedom vs oppression. It took a while but it is really only in recent years that the stories are beginning to come out. Terrible stories of betrayal, torture, imprisonment, people disappearing, families destroyed, life lived in fear, any individual thought or action subject to intense scrutiny.

It is the 80s, and the Valentin family, living in a small flat on the east side of the wall, are quite fortunate compared to many others.  Parents Regine and Jochen have good jobs as writers, and with their three children Ella, Tobi and baby Heiko live in the shadow of the wall. The time comes though when Regine and Jochen have to leave, plans are made, but in the process of escape things go terribly wrong. Regine is imprisoned, the two older children remain in the care of their grandmother, and no one knows what has happened to Heiko or Jochen. Twenty years later, Ella and Tobi are living in London, now grown up and getting on with life. Ella has never really adjusted to life following the escape attempt and its consequences - too many unanswered questions, including who betrayed them. One day she receives a packet in the mail from the new owner of the flat she and Tobi lived in when they first arrived in London. It contains notebooks from the time their mother was in prison, and it sets Ella on the trail of trying to solve the mysteries of their childhood. And at the centre of it all is a painting of three blue horses.

Her search takes her to a Stasi archive in Berlin, where she meets a young American intern Aaron whose job it is to painstakingly put together all the files that the Stasi shredded, for whatever reason, keeping the shreddings. Together they embark on what would seem to be the impossible and hopeless task of locating the Valentin family files.

Ella is the main narrator of the story - a naive, silly and funny child of ten. As an adult in her early thirties she is alone, tired, lacking in direction or ambition. Too much in her past to resolve for her to be able to focus on a future. Aaron is also a narrator, carefully and diligently trying to put together the appalling life stories he is uncovering, the pointlessness of it when no one is around to read them. Until Ella turns up, giving him that motivation he needs.

This is such a well told story, so sad, heart breaking really. Yet out of all that pain, good things happen. Ella finds out what happened to her family, putting a number of ghosts to rest, in the process finding some peace and giving her the drive to go and make something of her life.

BECOMING by Michelle Obama

Read This. An ordinary woman who is also a most extraordinary woman. Ordinary because she has the same values and morals as most of the rest of us, ordinary because she wants the best for her children and her family, ordinary because she wants to be fulfilled in her relationships and her work. Extraordinary because of the opportunities she found she had and what she did with them and her determination to be the best person she could be, extraordinary because of the unusual and not very ordinary man she married, and most of all extraordinary because of what she has done with those chances, the difference she (and her husband) have made to the face of the US,  to women, children, people of colour and diversity not just in the US, but everywhere. Down to earth, relatable, open and frank about her marriage, her family, the impossible working mother balance; radiating positivity and energy, fighting her own internal demons as well as the public ones. And a great story teller. Truly an immersive and uplifting reading experience. 

THE PARIS DIVERSION by Chris Pavone

A day in Paris - what is not to like about a story set against the Louvre, Champs Elysees, Arc de Triomphe and Notre Dame. Imagine living there and having all this at your disposal on any day? Not so on this day. A Middle Eastern looking man is standing outside the Louvre wearing a bomb vest and a suitcase strapped to his wrist; a multi millionaire investor about to reap the benefits of a huge deal he has orchestrated is missing in action somewhere with his assistant; there is a bomb threat in Mumbai. And what's with the couple in Venice?

Kate Moore was introduced to readers in 'The Expats'. Ex-CIA, but still 'active', she and her  money market investor husband Dexter, are now living in Paris.  By the way, I strongly recommend reading 'The Expats' first, as it provides a lot of background to this story, explaining how and why the Moore family is now in Paris rather than Luxembourg.

Kate now operates an off-the-radar cell in Paris, and once her children are safely in school her spy-self kicks in. Dexter is still involved in money making, and even after everything that went down is Luxembourg, he still has no idea at all what his wife is doing with her time. This is just one of the many implausible details in the story, full of implausible happenings. Despite the intricate craziness of the plot, and the superwoman capabilities of Kate the spy, it is easy to suspend disbelief and enjoy this for the thriller ride that it is. It does become a page turner as the various elements and geographical locations slowly, over the course of the day, do come together. Would love to tell more of the plot, but it is tricky to do so without giving away some of the spider's web that is created. The characters are ok, a little one-dimensional perhaps, but interesting and unusual things happen to them which makes them in turn interesting as they react to the events going on around them.

Some reviewers have panned both this book and 'The Expats'. Neither is a must-read, or is particularly outstanding in the spy/thriller genre, but as I love the spy genre, I did enjoy this. It will hold your attention on a boring day, a long flight or travel journey. And you never know, you may end up in Paris. 

THE CONVENIENCE STORE WOMAN by Sayaka Murata

Keiko Furukura is 36 years old. She has worked in the same convenience store since she was 18 - half her life. She is beginning to feel the pressure from her family that what she is doing is not quite normal, that here she is with no qualifications, working a blue collar job, no man, marriage or babies in sight. What to do? However nothing about Keiko is normal, so it's hardly surprising that although vaguely aware of her family's concerns, she is not terribly concerned or stressed about. Her life revolves around the convenience store: her personality and skills perfectly matched to the heavily prescribed manual and procedures that keep the shop ticking along. Highly valued, very much liked, Keiko is perfectly happy in her life and in her work. None of what bothers her family bothers her.

Nevertheless, with the arrival and subsequent sacking of a quite awful young man, Shiraha, Keiko weirdly sees a way to make herself normal. And so begins a very peculiar relationship which to the reader is a little alarming and not at all satisfactory. Shiraha is a lazy, misogynistic useless bully, gradually eroding away Keiko's uniqueness and self-possession. Until one day she is out shopping and has an epiphany.

Keiko is most intriguing - is she slightly aspergers? Possibly sociopathic? Does she have some sort of intellectual disability? Her need to fit in with the store culture, her strict adherence to the manual and shop routines, to be the best employee she is expected to be, in fact surpassing the expectation would make many of us uncomfortable and want to fight the system. But for Keiko she thrives in this environment - she is happy, content, recognised, acknowledged and rewarded in her job. Is this not what we all want in our working lives - a job we love, in an environment we love, and with people we relate to and like being with. Who are we to say that Keiko, in the eyes of her family and society is not normal?

This small and captivating book, translated from Japanese, is only 160 pages long, but every page is intriguing. The convenience store itself is a major character - the type of shop we do not really have in the West, much more than a corner store or 7-Eleven. For NZers more like a miniature The Warehouse where you can also buy your groceries, fast food and convenience foods. It's a delicious little book, funny, curious, and rewarding to read. 

TALKING TO STRANGERS by Malcolm Gladwell

When we meet people for the first time - a stranger - we are programmed to want a positive interaction with that person. We greet them courteously, as we have been taught; we look for body language cues and cues in what they say or how they say things that we are familiar with, that we can relate to. We want to be liked by this new person, and have a good exchange of whatever it may be - medical advice, shop assistants, the police, our children's friends, potential work colleagues, love interest. When assessing those we aren't quite sure about, we still look for common threads and characteristics, and when some time later we find that we have been had, that that person is not whom we had let ourselves believe they were... well, then we have that massive sense of betrayal, anger, feeling like we have been a fool of. It happens to all of us and for some the consequences of this, despite maybe a nagging doubt or a little intuition antennae flapping way, can be terrible, heart breaking and long lasting.

In this latest from Malcolm Gladwell, he has taken as his starting point an exchange that occurred between a young black woman from Illinois driving in Texas with out of state plates on her car. She had just left a successful job interview at the nearby university and was on her way back to Illinois to pack up her life and start again. She is pulled over by a white traffic officer and immediately the exchange of words gets off to a bad start. The officer's prescribed list of visual cues for trouble is working overtime as he dealtswith the young woman in the car. It did not end well. Two strangers for a whom a routine traffic stop went absolutely off the rails. But why?

In his usual brilliant narrative way, weaving anecdotes, court judgements, research papers, investigations, high profile news stories, the author makes his case as to why again and again in life we fail to read people properly. Bernie Madoff and his Ponzi scheme; how Castro and his spies fooled their American counterparts; the sad story of Amanda Knox found guilty of murder in Italy simply because she didn't behave like a grieving friend should; the issue of sexual consent being given when one or both parties are clearly very intoxicated; the sports coaches and teachers who are also sexual predators and how they get away with it for years. All this and more the author covers in this fascinating insight into how we behave. In a world where we really do need to be kinder to each other, and yet also more aware and wary of those around us, this book is marvellous and easy reading. I love this author's books, I  have read them all, and own most of them, this is another really good one.  

QUEENIE by Candice Carty-Williams

A true delight of a novel - sparkling writing, original and very diverse characters each with their own wonderfully real voice. Yet beneath the funny and tortured surface plot, much deeper issues, worries and problems claw their way out to the surface. This story could be read by anyone and labelled as a Bridget Jones for black women. But by the sheer virtue of being about black women it immediately opens up numerous challenges that Bridget, in her white middle class world, never even had to look at, let alone deal with. There is a much darker side to being a young, single, smart career woman.

So young Queenie has the double whammy really - not only is she 25, highly career minded, looking for love and failing dismally, with the best bunch of girl friends one could ever hope to have. This gorgeous young woman is also dealing with being a black woman and all the challenges that can bring.  How dark she is, how white on the inside she is, how her hair is, how her figure is, how she dresses, how 'involved' her proud Jamaican grandmother and aunt are in her life, and most damaging and appalling really the ghastliness she has to deal with from men - none of whom are black like her.

The novel opens with Queenie undergoing a gynaecological  exam, the outcome of which plus the  recent dumping by her long time boyfriend tips her into a cycle of self-destruction, the root of which would appear to be her troubled mother abandoning her at the age of 11 to the care of her grandmother and aunt. Throughout the story we anxiously follow the self-destruction, her on-line dating, her sabotaging of her job as a writer for a newspaper, her wonderful friends always on the fringes giving her advice and support with delicious wit. Over a number of months Queenie does find her way out of the mire - after all in true Bridget Jones' fashion there is nothing like the optimism and energy of youth to keep one going, and we have to have a happy ending.

The deeper themes however hover over the exuberance and crazy path Queenie finds herself on. #blacklivesmatter makes an appearance, the awful men she encounters, how crucial it is to know and like one's self before finding love with others, and how white the world is that black people have to live and function in. It is humbling to read that the daily struggles of educated and smart young black people can be burdens and experiences that their white co-workers and friends will never have to cope with or overcome. 

THE SILVER ROAD by Stina Jackson

From the title and the cover the reader immediately knows that the landscape is going to feature heavily in this novel in the Scandi-noir genre of story telling. Unlike most Scandi-noir novels, this is not narrated from the police point-of-view, but it has all the bleakness, greyness, long periods of low light with  murder, misogyny, violence and moral corruptness that we have come to associate with novels, films and TV series coming out of the countries of Scandinavia. The setting for this novel is Sweden, in a rural area north of Stockholm. Towns are few and far apart, forest is everywhere, houses/hamlets are scattered, often hidden down narrow windy roads, surrounded by trees, silence, and the long silver road cutting a windy, lonely and endless track through the landscape. There are many secrets, everyone seems to have a dark side to their nature.

Lelle is a father, for the past three years haunted by the sudden disappearance of his only child, 17 year old Lina who went missing at a bus stop. Full of self blame, he has spent these years driving up and down the roads of the area looking for his daughter. Unable to do much over the winter, he spends all summer, day and night, driving, searching, asking questions, stalking Lina's boyfriend of the time. Nothing. He is beyond caring about himself - his diet, his personal hygiene, his wife - he is a mess. The third anniversary of Lina's disappearance is looming, and he is almost at the end of of his tether.

Meanwhile there are two new arrivals in the area. 17 year old Meja and her mother Silje arrive from Stockholm to begin a new life with Torbjorn, a man Silje met on-line. Silje herself is a mess and has been for many years. There is no doubt she loves her daughter but she has very few parenting skills and is almost incapable of looking after herself. Meja's life has been one of upheaval; she is well used to her mother's wild fancies and destructive life style. But being stuck out in the middle of nowhere with her crazy mother and this strange man is almost a step too far for her. Left to her own devices much of the time, she soon gets to know a family in the area who take her in, and treat her as one of their own. Then another local teenage girl goes missing.

There is slow build up to the menace and the danger that the reader knows is going to happen at some stage. Some on-line reviews have not liked this lack of action for much of the book, but I loved it - the ominous dark and dangerous landscape, the numerous men including Lelle himself any of whom could be responsible for these disappearing girls. Meja's curiosity and need for normalcy as well as friends in her life, the compassion of the local detective, the menacing presence of Lina's ex boyfriend. And always that sinister setting - very unsettling and ominous. I loved it. 

YOU WILL BE SAFE HERE by Damian Barr

The author is a British columnist, playwright and writer. He has a NZ connection, last year receiving a University of Otago Scottish Writer's fellowship based at the Pah Homestead in Auckland.  I wonder if this is where he put the finishing touches to this outstanding novel. He says on his website he is a story teller, and oh my goodness, he certainly knows how to tell a story, weaving fact into fiction, creating characters and a story that will stay with you long after reading.

The setting for this novel is another sad chapter in British colonial history - the Boer War of 1899-1902. I wonder how many times people are ashamed of the history they have come from, because this is certainly a shameful time, with the forced incarceration of thousands of Boer women and children into what were the first concentration camps, and which were the blueprints for the Nazis in the 1930s. The novel opens with Sarah van der Watt and her 6 year old son Fred being taken from their farm which is burnt to the ground in front of their eyes, to a camp where they are told they will be safe, well looked after and cared for during the course of the war. Like that is going to happen. The reality of course is quite different, awful really. Sarah manages to keep a diary, forbidden by the camp officials, over the months she is there. In reality, there was a woman who did manage to keep a diary during her internment and this part of the novel is based on those writings.

Part II of the novel has moved to the present day - 2010. A teenage boy, Willem, is being sent off to a training camp, to be made into a man. He is a quiet boy, loves his books and his dog. But his mother and her new man are finding him increasingly difficult to get on with, so see this as the only way to fix him. His grandmother is dismayed at what is going on, but has little say in the matter. The camp is an appalling place, run by a pair of sadists. It takes a while for the connections to be made between the present and the past, but it just goes to show one can never run away from the happenings of years previous. Again, much of this part of the novel is based on fact. These training camps did exist, the character of Willem and another boy are based as well as  the camp leaders on real people. You can google all this - names etc are given in the acknowledgements section at the back.

This is an outstanding book, powerful in its story telling, compelling and believable characters, dealing with shocking situations. The characters may all be based on real people, long since dead, but the author has made them so life like and real - such a skill. I loved this book, and despite its subject matter, it is definitely a favourite recent read.

MOONLIGHT SONATA by Eileen Merriman

Successful author of teenage/YA fiction has branched out and written her first novel for adults. I have read two of her YA novels and really liked them in their story line and character development, as well as being very relevant and current in dealing with issues so important to our teenagers. In this novel, designed for adults, she tackles incest - consensual rather than abusive which is a Pandora's box all by itself. I did a bit of googling on the subject and it would appear to be more common, though not at all accepted, than one would think. By the way I am not giving any plot spoilers in revealing that the core of this story is sexual love between family members and the taboo that it is. The last lines of the first chapter are a dead giveaway, as is the setting of a family reunion with a plethora of teenage cousins staying together at the beach over the summer holidays.

Widow Hazel has opened her home on a Northland beach - I visualise somewhere like Coopers Beach or Cable Bay - for New Year holidays to her adult children - Sully, Anthony, twins Molly and Joe, and their families, come together from around NZ, Australia and Middle East. Like all families there is bad history, the most momentous thing that has happened to this one being Hazel leaving her husband and the three sons, moving to Christchurch with Molly when she was only six for a six year period, during which Molly had no contact at all with her father and brothers, the separation from her twin Joe being especially traumatic.

The story is told in alternate chapters by Molly in both the present and in her past; 15 year old Lola who is Anthony's daughter, only very recently diagnosed with type 1 diabetes; and Noah who is Molly's 18 year old  son. The story only covers a few days over the New Year period, but a lot can happen in even just one day. The author has captured that unique NZ phenomenon - the family summer beach holiday where everyone is in close quarters, alcohol is involved, bit of cabin fever, childhood sibling issues resurface, set against the stunning background of the beach, the surf, the sand, running out of supplies, sunburn.

I am not so sure about her characters. Although quite distinct they are fairly one dimensional, with little development. They are all self absorbed which you can appreciate for the teenage characters, but not so much for the adult characters. For example Molly and her mother Hazel I did not like at  all,  both far too stuck in the patterns and behaviours of the past, unable and it would seem unwilling to make peace with each other. Molly is a smart woman - professor at a Melbourne university -  yet she has very little self awareness of how she behaves with her husband, her son and her siblings. So much rage there for a grown woman to be carrying around with her. Brother Sully I found annoying too - his wallowing in self pity, his awful daughter and unpleasant son; then there is Joe who is a bit like Peter Pan - never grown up and blithely unable to take on the responsibilities of being an adult. I did find the ending unsatisfactory.  Aside from being too neat and tidy, I am not sure it is sending out the right message as a way to deal with problems.

It's biggest problem  for me however is that it is neither an adult novel nor a teenage novel. It is not complex and nuanced enough for the former, but with teenagers as lead characters it certainly falls into the teen genre. And yet due to its subject matter with so much of the perspective being from the adult Molly is probably not what I would imagine teenagers would be engaging with.

ALLEGRA IN THREE PARTS by Suzanne Daniel

Allegra is 11 years old, living in suburban Sydney in the 1970s with her dad Rick and grandmother Mathilde at number 23, and grandmother Joy at number 25. Narrated by Allegra, she has little understanding of why this situation is so, only knowing that she constantly feels herself torn into two between her loving but vastly different grandmothers, and the emotionally distant figure of her father. She is a smart wee girl, extraordinarily sensitive to those around her, in the process navigating the classroom ghastliness of 11 year old girls and keeping her grandmothers happy.  Not easy when they can't stand each other.  Her growing friendship of fellow outsider young Aborigine girl Patricia further sets her apart from the rest of her class, but not from her teacher Sister Josepha. 1970s Australia is not an easy place for women, and the growing awareness Allegra is finding of the world around her puts her and those she loves on a collision course. Could leave you with a tear in your eye. This novel is marketed as teen/YA fiction/coming of age fiction. But is equally enjoyable and meaningful for everyone else. I loved this - all about what it means to belong to a family and to be loved.

A SPARK OF LIGHT by Jodi Picoult

The queen of novels with ethical issues at their core, this is classic Jodi Picoult, taking on the abortion debate, possibly the most fraught of them all. And boy, does she cover some ground in this story. She must have brainstormed every single argument, medical fact, scenario where an abortion may be considered, laws,  religion, every everything in putting together a story around this issue. Centred on a clinic in the middle of the US, a tiny weathered island in a huge storm, where women and staff run the gauntlet of protesters, militants, crazies. Even her descriptions of these scenes, before people make the entry point, are raw and passionate. In the clinic on this particular day, a man has taken staff, patients, and supporters hostage, his rage and despair overwhelming him following his own daughter having an abortion. Told from varying viewpoints of those mixed up in the hostage taking - a doctor, a patient, a anti-abortion militant  pretending to be a patient, a nurse, a young girl wanting contraception, her aunt accompanying her, the local police hostage negotiator, a young girl arrested for having an abortion, a woman who became pregnant after being raped - all these many and various scenarios are thrust in front of the reader. To her credit, the author is very good at raising both pro and anti arguments/dilemmas, giving the reader a very comprehensive education in the politics, the social, economic and emotional impacts of pro and anti. It is overwhelming, to the point where the plot gets lost at times, especially seeing it tells the day of the hostage taking in reverse - starting late in the afternoon, working hour by hour back to early in the day. I am and always be pro-choice, but this novel does raise some very good points and with Jodi Picoult's ability to always throw in twists and surprises. The only right answer of course is choice. What you do with that choice must always be respected and encouraged, whether it is to continue with the pregnancy or not.  

THE SEVEN SISTERS by Lucinda Riley

Also on the list of NZ's top 100 reads, this is the first novel in a series about seven sisters, although there are actually only 6 novels. Now young women, they were all adopted by an extremely wealthy philanthropic man, and brought up on an island on Lake Geneva. In this novel, the sisters , now adult and living around the world, are together again on the island, their father having recently died. He has left each woman a letter with the latitude/longitude coordinates of the place in the world they were born in, so they can explore for themselves where they came from. First up is eldest daughter Maia, who finds out she was born in Rio de Janeiro. Off she goes in search of who she is. We immediately jump into 1920s Rio de Janeiro high society, her great grandmother Izabella being a stroppy teenage girl, rejecting her father's arranged marriage plans to cement his place in Rio's social circles. Moving between Paris and Rio, the story of where Maia comes from is told. Wonderfully romantic, lots of history, beautiful people falling in love, it really is quite gorgeous to read, certainly setting the scene for the next novel in the series. The Moon Sister, number 5 in the series, was published in time for Xmas 2018, which is when I first heard of these books. The last one, The Sun Sister, is due for publication 31/10 and it will fly off the shelves, just in time for Xmas and summer holidays.

A MISTAKE by Carl Shuker

NZ novelist Carl Shuker is a former editor of the British Medical Journal. He knows his medical procedures and the opening pages of this novel graphically illustrate the drama, the tension and intimacy of an operating theatre. This is the story of highly respected, hard working, well and truly smashed the glass ceiling surgeon Elizabeth Taylor aka Loco Liz. During an operation on a young woman, a mistake is made, which may or may not have lead to her death some hours later in ICU. In the world however we live in, where blame must always be apportioned, Liz finds herself the target of the cause of the patient's death. At times she is intensely unlikeable, which also raises the question of would we have liked her the same or more if she was a top male surgeon? I doubt you can be 100% nicely-nice to get where Liz has got in her profession, having sacrificed a future of relationships and children along the way, again unlike many of her male co-surgeons. Incredibly competent and confident, she finds herself beginning to unravel as the shock that she may be held accountable for the death begins to hit her. In the world of the operating theatre where there is so much mechanisation and reliance on technology,  the scalpel is still held by a human being, and whether this is the cause of death or not, the human error is the natural scapegoat. Threaded through the novel is the real life disaster of the 1986 Challenger explosion, which in the end was due to the tiniest of human errors. I felt this thread was probably not necessary, it didn't really add to Liz's story, and I found it took away from urgency and immediacy of what was going on in Liz's life. A great read, important too in this society of ours where we are constantly looking for others/anyone to be made accountable for things that go wrong.

HOME FIRES by Kamila Shamsie

Stand out read, the best of my recent reading, so so good.  Such a dreadful cover does nothing for what a great book this is. Long listed for the 2018 Man Booker prize, this is modern day reworking of the Greek myth of Antigone, which I read a summary of on-line before starting this. Just so I knew what I was dealing with! Unlike many other Booker nominees/prize winners, this is not a literary monster, too clever for its own good. Isma, her younger twin siblings Aneeka and Parvaiz are London born of Pakistani descent. Both parents are dead, the shadow of their father who disappeared on his way to Guantanamo Bay always over them. Isma is smart, having won a scholarship to a US university where she meets a young man Eammon, mixed English/Pakistan. Eammon's father is the Home Secretary in the government, barely treading the tenuous path between his Pakistani roots and his Englishness. The disappearance of Parvaiz to the ISIS cause in Syria and Eammon's return to London with a parcel for Aneeka throws these two together, Aneeka seeing a way to bring her brother home. Forces greater than the lovers gradually build, the reader, with the story of Antigone in mind, knowing that this will not be a happy ending. Outstanding story, the tragedy of modern day politics no different from what it was in the days of Ancient Greece.

THE THREE EMPERORS by Miranda Carter

Not everyone's cup of tea, but I have been wading my way through this since the beginning of the year. I love history, and this being the centenary year of the end of WWI - the Great War - it is more than appropriate to find out some of how it all came about. I remember in school learning about the origins of WWI, which focussed on the politics of the times and not much on the monarchies of the countries involved. WWI crushed and destroyed all the monarchies of Europe, not just Germany and Russia,  the king of England being the only one to really survive. These three kings were first cousins, this book focussing on the relationship between the three, how their destinies and the inevitability of war were shaped by their inability to move with the times. Yes it is long, best read in bits and never at night.  Large chunks of the minutiae of politics and machinations I skipped over, enjoying more the lives of King George V, Tsar Nicholas II and Kaiser Wilhelm II, their families, the spider's web of connections, and how it all came crashing down.

THE DOLL FACTORY by Elizabeth MacNeal

Look at that cover - so beautiful. Set in Dickensian London, the East End of all places, where there is very little beauty and daily life is one horrible, grubby, desperate slog. Iris and her twin sister work long hours for a doll maker, hand sewing exquisite clothes for the dolls. Iris dreams of becoming an artist, and in her few spare hours with her meagre savings paints and draws. Noticed by a talented young artist of the Pre-Raphaelite group of artists, she sees a way for her and her sister to escape their dreary hard life. With her unusual looks and beautiful red hair she quickly becomes the artist's muse, then creative collaborator, well timed for the 1851 Great Exhibition. At the same time, she is being stalked by a sinister character called Silas Reed, a taxidermist who makes his living by sourcing and preserving dead animals - birds, cats, dogs, what ever he can find to satisfy the demand from the wealthy for real life decorative ornaments or models for artists. His obsession with Iris is horrific to behold, as are his means to obtain her for himself. This is a wonderful and compelling mixture of love story, and thriller, set against the brilliantly rendered back drop of Victorian London. I can just imagine this as a movie or mini series using all the remarkable talents and resources of the BBC and others - imagine the costuming!

COME BACK FOR ME by Heidi Perks

A thriller! This is an action packed page turning read. Stella and her family live on the island of Evergreen, population approx 100.  She has lived her entire life there, until one stormy night in 1993 when she is 12, the family suddenly up and leaves. No explanation given. Fast forward to the present, Stella is now a counsellor, her older sister Bonnie is an ex-alcoholic married with children, and brother Danny disappeared some 10 years prior. Her mother has died, and her father is suffering from dementia. The news reveals that a body of a young woman has been discovered on the island of Evergreen, buried on the boundary of the property Stella's parents lived at. Iona, was a huge presence in the lives of the family the summer they hurriedly left. Stella is instantly thrown back into the past, especially when the police come calling wanting to know why Iona was wearing a bracelet that Stella had made all those years ago. Moving back and forth between the summer of 1993 and the present, Stella is determined to find out what really happened and why her brother Danny is being sought for the murder of Iona. Surprises galore are revealed, and you are kept guessing right to the very end.

BRIDGE OF CLAY by Markus Zusak

Who didn't love The Book Thief? And how many years have we waited for this writer's next great novel? Too many, but don't for a minute think this is anything like the other! This has made the latest list of top 100 best reads in NZ, which is why I include it here. For me personally it would not make that list. Firstly it is very long, very drawn out, and at times I thought it would never end, never be resolved. I had trouble making all the connections with the author's meanderings and musings at the expense of the story. I just wanted him to get on with it! The writing is amazing, if you love reading for the sake of how words are put together and pictures they make then this is for you. If you have the patience to focus on the story, and the relationships between the characters as well, then you will also enjoy this. Briefly, Clay is a teenage boy, one of the 5 Dunbar brothers, ranging in age from 18 down to 11, living alone in suburban Sydney following the death of their mother and desertion by their father. Oldest boy Matthew is the prime narrator, although the story does move back and forth telling the story of each of the parents and the family in its early days. So much love there, and heart ache and sadness. Clay is the son who is determined to somehow fix everything, the physical bridge he builds with his dad also being symbolic of the bridge being built between the boys themselves and with their father. It is outstanding.

Allegra is 11 years old, living in suburban Sydney in the 1970s with her dad Rick and grandmother Mathilde at number 23, and grandmother Joy at number 25. Narrated by Allegra, she has little understanding of why this situation is so, only knowing that she constantly feels herself torn into two between her loving but vastly different grandmothers, and the emotionally distant figure of her father. She is a smart wee girl, extraordinarily sensitive to those around her, in the process navigating the classroom ghastliness of 11 year old girls and keeping her grandmothers happy.  Not easy when they can't stand each other.  Her growing friendship of fellow outsider young Aborigine girl Patricia further sets her apart from the rest of her class, but not from her teacher Sister Josepha. 1970s Australia is not an easy place for women, and the growing awareness Allegra is finding of the world around her puts her and those she loves on a collision course. Could leave you with a tear in your eye. This novel is marketed as teen/YA fiction/coming of age fiction. But is equally enjoyable and meaningful for everyone else. I loved this - all about what it means to belong to a family and to be loved.

Who didn't love The Book Thief? And how many years have we waited for this writer's next great novel? Too many, but don't for a minute think this is anything like the other! This has made the latest list of top 100 best reads in NZ, which is why I include it here. For me personally it would not make that list. Firstly it is very long, very drawn out, and at times I thought it would never end, never be resolved. I had trouble making all the connections with the author's meanderings and musings at the expense of the story. I just wanted him to get on with it! The writing is amazing, if you love reading for the sake of how words are put together and pictures they make then this is for you. If you have the patience to focus on the story, and the relationships between the characters as well, then you will also enjoy this. Briefly, Clay is a teenage boy, one of the 5 Dunbar brothers, ranging in age from 18 down to 11, living alone in suburban Sydney following the death of their mother and desertion by their father. Oldest boy Matthew is the prime narrator, although the story does move back and forth telling the story of each of the parents and the family in its early days. So much love there, and heart ache and sadness. Clay is the son who is determined to somehow fix everything, the physical bridge he builds with his dad also being symbolic of the bridge being built between the boys themselves and with their father. It is outstanding.

A thriller! This is an action packed page turning read. Stella and her family live on the island of Evergreen, population approx 100.  She has lived her entire life there, until one stormy night in 1993 when she is 12, the family suddenly up and leaves. No explanation given. Fast forward to the present, Stella is now a counsellor, her older sister Bonnie is an ex-alcoholic married with children, and brother Danny disappeared some 10 years prior. Her mother has died, and her father is suffering from dementia. The news reveals that a body of a young woman has been discovered on the island of Evergreen, buried on the boundary of the property Stella's parents lived at. Iona, was a huge presence in the lives of the family the summer they hurriedly left. Stella is instantly thrown back into the past, especially when the police come calling wanting to know why Iona was wearing a bracelet that Stella had made all those years ago. Moving back and forth between the summer of 1993 and the present, Stella is determined to find out what really happened and why her brother Danny is being sought for the murder of Iona. Surprises galore are revealed, and you are kept guessing right to the very end.

Look at that cover - so beautiful. Set in Dickensian London, the East End of all places, where there is very little beauty and daily life is one horrible, grubby, desperate slog. Iris and her twin sister work long hours for a doll maker, hand sewing exquisite clothes for the dolls. Iris dreams of becoming an artist, and in her few spare hours with her meagre savings paints and draws. Noticed by a talented young artist of the Pre-Raphaelite group of artists, she sees a way for her and her sister to escape their dreary hard life. With her unusual looks and beautiful red hair she quickly becomes the artist's muse, then creative collaborator, well timed for the 1851 Great Exhibition. At the same time, she is being stalked by a sinister character called Silas Reed, a taxidermist who makes his living by sourcing and preserving dead animals - birds, cats, dogs, what ever he can find to satisfy the demand from the wealthy for real life decorative ornaments or models for artists. His obsession with Iris is horrific to behold, as are his means to obtain her for himself. This is a wonderful and compelling mixture of love story, and thriller, set against the brilliantly rendered back drop of Victorian London. I can just imagine this as a movie or mini series using all the remarkable talents and resources of the BBC and others - imagine the costuming!

Not everyone's cup of tea, but I have been wading my way through this since the beginning of the year. I love history, and this being the centenary year of the end of WWI - the Great War - it is more than appropriate to find out some of how it all came about. I remember in school learning about the origins of WWI, which focussed on the politics of the times and not much on the monarchies of the countries involved. WWI crushed and destroyed all the monarchies of Europe, not just Germany and Russia,  the king of England being the only one to really survive. These three kings were first cousins, this book focussing on the relationship between the three, how their destinies and the inevitability of war were shaped by their inability to move with the times. Yes it is long, best read in bits and never at night.  Large chunks of the minutiae of politics and machinations I skipped over, enjoying more the lives of King George V, Tsar Nicholas II and Kaiser Wilhelm II, their families, the spider's web of connections, and how it all came crashing down.

Stand out read, the best of my recent reading, so so good.  Such a dreadful cover does nothing for what a great book this is. Long listed for the 2018 Man Booker prize, this is modern day reworking of the Greek myth of Antigone, which I read a summary of on-line before starting this. Just so I knew what I was dealing with! Unlike many other Booker nominees/prize winners, this is not a literary monster, too clever for its own good. Isma, her younger twin siblings Aneeka and Parvaiz are London born of Pakistani descent. Both parents are dead, the shadow of their father who disappeared on his way to Guantanamo Bay always over them. Isma is smart, having won a scholarship to a US university where she meets a young man Eammon, mixed English/Pakistan. Eammon's father is the Home Secretary in the government, barely treading the tenuous path between his Pakistani roots and his Englishness. The disappearance of Parvaiz to the ISIS cause in Syria and Eammon's return to London with a parcel for Aneeka throws these two together, Aneeka seeing a way to bring her brother home. Forces greater than the lovers gradually build, the reader, with the story of Antigone in mind, knowing that this will not be a happy ending. Outstanding story, the tragedy of modern day politics no different from what it was in the days of Ancient Greece.

NZ novelist Carl Shuker is a former editor of the British Medical Journal. He knows his medical procedures and the opening pages of this novel graphically illustrate the drama, the tension and intimacy of an operating theatre. This is the story of highly respected, hard working, well and truly smashed the glass ceiling surgeon Elizabeth Taylor aka Loco Liz. During an operation on a young woman, a mistake is made, which may or may not have lead to her death some hours later in ICU. In the world however we live in, where blame must always be apportioned, Liz finds herself the target of the cause of the patient's death. At times she is intensely unlikeable, which also raises the question of would we have liked her the same or more if she was a top male surgeon? I doubt you can be 100% nicely-nice to get where Liz has got in her profession, having sacrificed a future of relationships and children along the way, again unlike many of her male co-surgeons. Incredibly competent and confident, she finds herself beginning to unravel as the shock that she may be held accountable for the death begins to hit her. In the world of the operating theatre where there is so much mechanisation and reliance on technology,  the scalpel is still held by a human being, and whether this is the cause of death or not, the human error is the natural scapegoat. Threaded through the novel is the real life disaster of the 1986 Challenger explosion, which in the end was due to the tiniest of human errors. I felt this thread was probably not necessary, it didn't really add to Liz's story, and I found it took away from urgency and immediacy of what was going on in Liz's life. A great read, important too in this society of ours where we are constantly looking for others/anyone to be made accountable for things that go wrong.

Also on the list of NZ's top 100 reads, this is the first novel in a series about seven sisters, although there are actually only 6 novels. Now young women, they were all adopted by an extremely wealthy philanthropic man, and brought up on an island on Lake Geneva. In this novel, the sisters , now adult and living around the world, are together again on the island, their father having recently died. He has left each woman a letter with the latitude/longitude coordinates of the place in the world they were born in, so they can explore for themselves where they came from. First up is eldest daughter Maia, who finds out she was born in Rio de Janeiro. Off she goes in search of who she is. We immediately jump into 1920s Rio de Janeiro high society, her great grandmother Izabella being a stroppy teenage girl, rejecting her father's arranged marriage plans to cement his place in Rio's social circles. Moving between Paris and Rio, the story of where Maia comes from is told. Wonderfully romantic, lots of history, beautiful people falling in love, it really is quite gorgeous to read, certainly setting the scene for the next novel in the series. The Moon Sister, number 5 in the series, was published in time for Xmas 2018, which is when I first heard of these books. The last one, The Sun Sister, is due for publication 31/10 and it will fly off the shelves, just in time for Xmas and summer holidays.

The queen of novels with ethical issues at their core, this is classic Jodi Picoult, taking on the abortion debate, possibly the most fraught of them all. And boy, does she cover some ground in this story. She must have brainstormed every single argument, medical fact, scenario where an abortion may be considered, laws,  religion, every everything in putting together a story around this issue. Centred on a clinic in the middle of the US, a tiny weathered island in a huge storm, where women and staff run the gauntlet of protesters, militants, crazies. Even her descriptions of these scenes, before people make the entry point, are raw and passionate. In the clinic on this particular day, a man has taken staff, patients, and supporters hostage, his rage and despair overwhelming him following his own daughter having an abortion. Told from varying viewpoints of those mixed up in the hostage taking - a doctor, a patient, a anti-abortion militant  pretending to be a patient, a nurse, a young girl wanting contraception, her aunt accompanying her, the local police hostage negotiator, a young girl arrested for having an abortion, a woman who became pregnant after being raped - all these many and various scenarios are thrust in front of the reader. To her credit, the author is very good at raising both pro and anti arguments/dilemmas, giving the reader a very comprehensive education in the politics, the social, economic and emotional impacts of pro and anti. It is overwhelming, to the point where the plot gets lost at times, especially seeing it tells the day of the hostage taking in reverse - starting late in the afternoon, working hour by hour back to early in the day. I am and always be pro-choice, but this novel does raise some very good points and with Jodi Picoult's ability to always throw in twists and surprises. The only right answer of course is choice. What you do with that choice must always be respected and encouraged, whether it is to continue with the pregnancy or not.