southeast thank you for the new thread.
My last three reads (numbers 47-49):
Music in the Dark Sally Magnusson
I haven't read The Ninth Child but bought this on the strength of having enjoyed The Sealwoman's Gift despite finding it a bit uneven in tone occasionally.
SM has really come into her own as a writer with this book. Once again she takes an episode from history and weaves a personal story around it. In this instance, the brutality and heartlessness of the Highland Clearances are well explored; a time when rich landowners drove crofters off the land to make way for sheep farming. Families who had farmed the same small patch of land for generations were forced to move south or, in many cases, emigrate, and with little or no support to begin a new life.
Jamesina Ross grew up in a highland glen; she loved the freedom of the wild countryside around her and wrote poems about it. The local minister encouraged her studies and life seemed exciting and full of promise, until the brutal evictions began. We meet Jamesina in later life, still bearing the mental and physical scars of what happened, as well as later sadnesses, and when a new lodger with links to her past moves into her flat, the experiences she cannot bear to think about resurface and have to be faced.
It's a sensitive exploration of love later in life, and of a mind struggling to cope with trauma. SM's own experience of her mother's dementia may have informed this theme in the novel I suspect. The two main characters and their prickly relationship, on Jamesina's side at least, are so well portrayed. There's humour in the dialogue too.
And the evocation of the beauty of the Highlands is heartfelt.
For me, an excellent book.
Paris Echo Sebastian Faulkes.
I don't have a lot to say about this. Very disappointing, especially following Music in the Dark. The contrast was painful. I haven't read his latest novel yet, but is he relying on his reputation and just phoning them in now?
I should have loved this: set in Paris; themes of German occupation, the Algerian war; questions of identity and belonging .. however the dialogue was clunky, the plot didn't make sense and I didn't feel convinced by the two main characters. I finished it as it was a bookclub read, otherwise I wouldn't have bothered. Disappointing.
The World According to Bertie Alexander McCall Smith
Easy and cheerful! I love Edinburgh, and AMS's fondness for the city shines through this amusing book; the fourth in his Scotland Street series. Rather like the James Herriot vet books - although with only one dog - it would be perfect for anyone who wants to escape from harsh reality for a bit.