Post-holiday catch-up:
85. Calypso, David Sedaris
Collection of gently humorous autobiographical essays, focusing on his family. I'd never got the point of this author before, but this clicked with me - I was engaged by his account of midlife relationships with siblings and parents.
I then reread the final section of A Time of Gifts, by Patrick Leigh-Fermor. Not trying to one-up Janina, but by chance, it was his description of Prague, and I read on the night train from Brussels to Prague. He was writing from memory about a many-spired dream city he could no longer visit, so it would be hard for any real city to live up to his raptures, but it was a satisfying moment.
86. The Secret Adversary, Agatha Christie
I've previously found Tommy and Tuppence irritating, but I warmed to them a bit more in this, their first outing, perhaps because they're shown as being recently emerged from service in WWI, so their chirpy wittering is more bearable in that context. It's all very Enid Blyton, with kidnappings and gun-waving but little sense of real peril.
87. Poirot Investigates, Agatha Christie
The short stories don't work for me. There's no space to create atmosphere so the formula is very naked. Mystery. Hastings suggests solution, obvious but wrong. Poirot's eyes gleam green and he tells us the solution.
88. Sleeping Beauties, Suzanne O'Sullivan
Neurologist discusses cases of "mass hysteria" - shows how physical symptoms are embedded in a particular social/cultural context. She is sensible and compassionate and I found this very engaging. It also features Erin Brockovich in a rather inglorious role.
89. You Don't Have to Be Mad to Work Here, Benji Waterhouse
Trainee psychiatrist gives an account of life in the NHS. Interesting on how his ambitions of healing get eroded by the system he's working in, and he's open about how difficulties in his own family background led him to this area of work.
90. The Demon in the House, Angela Thirkell
Mid-century capers as a mother and son do their best to get through the school holidays unscathed. Not her best, although she brings back characters from what may be her best book, High Rising. It's mildly amusing - the author had teenage sons herself, and gets some gentle fun out of the mother's constant lurid visions of the accidents that may be befalling her son.
91. The Secret of Chimneys, Agatha Christie
Machinations involving an invented Balkan country. I rather liked the hero of this one and enjoyed the final reveal.
92. X Marks the Spot, Mike Pitts
Non-fiction about archaeological finds. Great fun - the author tells us that sometimes it is a bit like Indiana Jones, battling through hazards to make discoveries, but he is also thoughtful about how we invent the past. What we look for and accept depends on our own cultural moment.
93. The Mark of Dimitrios, Eric Ambler
Another crime fiction story from between the wars, although a bit more realistic than Agatha Christie. The author hears the tale of a murdered criminal and decides to track down his back-story, taking him all over Europe. The fact that we start with the main villain as a dead body takes some of the tension and momentum out of the story, but it's an interesting glimpse of 1939 Europe.
94. The Backpacker Lifecycle, Brendyn Zachary
As the title indicates, it's an account of the author's backpacking days, but it's also an account of how his attitude to travel shifted over the years, from youthful enthusiasm to wanting to engage with another country (Japan) more deeply. Not great literature, but readable.
95. Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell
I knew I was behind the curve in reading this one, but was still surprised that the book was published 20 years ago. He tells six stories and splices them together, so they're nested inside each other like Russian dolls. The stories range from seafaring in the 1800s to a dystopian post-civilisation future. I enjoyed his playfulness with a range of genres. It's not the subtlest of themes - humans bring about destruction by their willingness to exploit each other, with a note of hope based on the fact that we sometimes manage to trust and help another person. If it had been published as a book of six short stories told in a linear way, it wouldn't have got as much attention. Does the splicing add much? Not entirely sure it does. Interesting experiment but I'm not convinced that it adds up to more than the sum of its parts.