Category: Wenvoe Page Turners

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

This book follows a single day in 1923 in the life of Clarissa Dalloway, an upper class London society hostess, preparing for a party. The day interweaves her thoughts, reflections on the past, life choices and actions, with several other characters, including Septimus Smith (a war veteran, suffering from post traumatic stress) and Peter Walsh (an early admirer). The day ends with the suicide of Septimus and Clarissa’s party.

The book published in 1925, is considered a classic, an example of ‘stream of consciousness’ storytelling. It touches on suggestions of a Lesbian relationship, mental illness and lost love.

However, the majority of our group did not enjoy it. People found it repetitious, with overlong sentences, the characters hard to visualise, lacking in story and boring. Several members did not finish the book.

Those in favour rated it as a favourite read and beautifully written. The reader gets to know the characters really well and they are cleverly connected at the end.

 

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This month we all read a book of our own choice.

Coming ‘Highly Recommended’ were a variety of novels:

‘The Dry’ by Jane Harper.

‘And the Mountains Echoed’ by Khaled Husseini.

‘Nutshell’ by Ian Mcewan

‘Such a Long Journey’ by Rohinton Mistry

‘The Devil in the Marshalsea’ by Antonia Hodgson

Also, ‘Eggs and Anarchy’ by William Sitwell, a bio-graphical story of Winston Churchill’s cabinet in World War Two, was recommended, as was Barack Obama’s autobiography.

Finally Penelope Lively’s non fiction ‘In the Garden’ comes recommended for those gardeners who also love literature.

Virginia Wolf next month. Quite a change!

 

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‘The Quality of Silence’
by Rosamund Lupton

Yasmin who is an Astrologist, and her daughter Ruby, who is deaf from birth, have flown to Fairbanks to meet up with her husband Matt, who makes documentary wildlife films. They were met by a policeman who explained that Matt had been staying in Anaktue, a village north of the Artic Circle where a fire had claimed the lives of everyone living there.

Yasmin felt strongly that Matt would have survived and set out with ten year old Ruby, who is a bright little girl and internet savvy, in a hired giant ice-road truck across the Alaskan tundra in search of Matt. Within hours they were faced with biting piercing coldness, raging storm conditions and a bleak and unforgiving landscape.

The majority of us accepted the implausibility of the idea of mother and daughter taking on the ice road and an Arctic monster storm and concluded that they were either very brave or delusional. The adventure, events and descriptions of the wilderness compensated for the far-fetched storyline. Most of us were of this opinion, some thinking that credibility was a bit of a stretch and in fact quite ridiculous, the idea that a mother would subject her 10 year old daughter to such danger.

In spite of the reservations concerning the credibility of the storyline, the majority felt that they would recommend the book and that it would appeal to adults and early teens alike. The average score out of 10, was 6.

Tea and cake were served and being November the evening concluded with a brief but spectacular firework display

 

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The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins

This is a classic novel, written in 1868 and declared to be the first detective story. It is number 19 in the 100 best books on the Guardian list.

To quote Carolyn G Heilbrun from Goodreads. “The Moonstone unfolds its amazing story through the recounting of several narrators, all of them enticing and singular. Wilkie Collin’s spellbinding tale of romance, theft, and murder inspired a hugely popular genre – the detective mystery. Hanging on the theft of an enormous diamond originally stolen from an Indian shrine, the novel features the innovative Sgt Cuff, the hilarious house steward Gabriel Betteridge, a lovesick housemaid and a mysterious band of Indian jugglers.”

The majority of us thoroughly enjoyed it. Our descriptions were:- Each character really well drawn; intricate, fascinating with its old use of language; style of different narrators interesting. At times it felt too wordy and simplistic but the humour was good and the weaving of detail was excellent. There is a happy ending, always heartening. It has all the ingredients for a good read: wit, romance, theft, murder, a bit fanciful and lovely language.

There were 2 dissenters who felt their heart wasn’t in it, it was slow, verbose and difficult to get through to the end.

Our scores were mainly good, we had one 9, the overall score came out as 7. That is definitely a recommended read. The Moonstone was made into a film in 1934 and a BBC TV film was made in 1997 starring Greg Wise and Keeley Hawes so good reading or good viewing ahead!.

 

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The Year of the Runaways
by Sanjeev Sahota

This Booker-short listed novel traces the lives of three Indian immigrants over a year.

The three young men, Tarlochan Kumar (Tochi), Avtar Nijjar and Randeep Sanghera, move into a house in Sheffield which is shared by numerous migrant workers. The fourth character in this story, Narinder Kaur, is a young British-raised devout Sikh girl, the visa-wife of Randeep, who moves separately into a flat in Sheffield. The author tells the story of each character’s past in India, the events that bring them to this country as immigrants and the struggle they then face in the daily fight for work, money and survival in England, as their lives become entwined.

The majority of the group agreed that the book is superbly written, simply expressed and a real page turner. It is thought provoking with clearly drawn characters and incidences. We are given good insights to Indian culture and the Sikh religion. Although the story-lines were tragic and moving at time, harsh details were not unduly dwelled upon. Unusually, the view was expressed that this is a book people need to read as it opens our eyes to a greater understanding of why people want to come to our country as immigrants.

One member of our group listened to this novel on Audio and expressed her delight at the way in which the background sounds really enriched the story and helped bring the culture alive.

However not all opinions were positive and a view that the book was depressing with continual hardships was also expressed. Additionally, it was agreed that a Glossary would be useful as the author has included many foreign words and phrases which were a bit daunting a times.

After a lively discussion the overall score was a positive 8 out of 10 and therefore a highly recommend.

The evening was pleasantly rounded off as we enjoyed tea, coffee and delicious snacks and cakes courtesy of Val.

 

 

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The Silk Merchant's Daughter by Dinah Jefferies.

We met on 8th August to discuss it, and for once our stars aligned and all ten of us were present!

We agreed that it was an amazing and captivating story, historical fiction maybe but we all learned a lot about French Indo-China in the early 1950s. Our average score for the book was 8 out of 10.

The book is set in Hanoi, Vietnam, in the early 50s and focuses on Nicole and her struggles with identity and belonging. With a French father and a (late) Vietnamese mother, Nicole has inherited her mother's looks so she is often called "métisse", something that makes her feel uncomfortable and out of place. Her older sister though has their father's looks and seems to be the preferred daughter. Nicole's self doubts only increase as the story unfolds and Vietnam becomes a very dangerous place. The French government is loosing its power as the nationalist Vietminh gain power and support. And soon, Nicole finds herself having to decide which side she is going to support.

Between all this turmoil, there's also space for romance. Early in the story, Nicole meets a dashing American that makes her heart flutter. But he seems to have many secrets and a special connection with her sister. So when an enthusiastic and persuasive young Vietnamese enters her life, she must decide, once more, which life she is going to choose.

The Silk Merchant's Daughter is a story with many layers. There's war but also love, betrayal but also forgiveness, doubts but also certainties. It captures perfectly what it means being part of two completely different cultures but not belonging to either. It's something that has made me think a lot and I'm sure this story will stay with us for a long tim

 

 

 

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We had no set book this month, so we all chose a good read, some very successfully, others not quite so.

The one 10/10 was by Rohinton Mistry “A Fine Balance” – an exceptional novel about India during The Emergency. (We as a group had read this author’s “Family Matters” and had loved it)

Several highly recommended 9/10s:

 “Four Seasons in Rome, On Twins, Insomnia and the Biggest Funeral in the History of the World” – a delightfully funny memoir by Anthony Duerr (chosen because of the group’s recent unanimous admiration of Duerr’s novel “All the Light we Cannot See”).

 “The Golden Hill” by Francis Spufford – rich in language and history. Compulsively readable.

 “Exposure” by Helen Dunmore – a spy come love story. Thoroughly enjoyable.

 “Human Croquet” by Kate Atkinson – a gripping surreal mystery. Wonderfully written.

 

A 7/10, and recommended.

 “The Reader on the 6.27” by Jean Paul Didierlaurent- a very enjoyable quirky read.

 “Murder at the Vicarage” by Agatha Christie – part of a mammoth task to read all Christie works. Enjoying so far…

 

Not quite such successful choices were:

 “The Power” by Naomi Alderman – (science fiction) not particularly enjoyed, nor recommended .

 “Death of an Avid Reader” by Francis Brodie – not enjoyed.

 

We return to concentrating on one book next month.

 

 

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No Time for Goodbye is a "thriller" novel written by Canadian author Linwood Barclay.

Married and with a daughter of her own, it has been twenty five years since her family vanished without a trace but Cynthia Archer has never given up hope that they might one day all return and, as a result, has not been able to bring herself to move out of the town that she grew up in. Just in case. When a reality television show offers to go over the events of that fateful night, taking Cynthia back to her childhood home, she jumps at the chance. What if a television special jogs somebody's memory? What if her parents and brother are still alive and see it?

When the show airs and nothing more than a few cranks and side-show freaks come out of the woodwork, Cynthia begins to give in to despair. Then the 'messages' begin to appear, followed by strange phone calls and the feeling that she is very definitely being followed. Is this just a strange coincidence or could someone know something about that night? Is there someone shadowing Cynthia and her family or is she just so desperate to discover the truth, that her mind is playing tricks on her?

Points made by the group were:-

 This book does have some page turning quality, but any hint of excitement at the mystery unfolding was completely overshadowed by the terribly poorly executed and unbelievable narrative.

 There was no connection to the characters or their stories.

 The story is told by the husband, Terry and he is quite possibly the most uninteresting character. Dry, drab and monotone in his dialogue where any hint of feeling is executed in a cliche and considered fashion. There were points where it was exasperating because of the terrible writing, considering he was an English language teacher.

 What lies at the heart of the mystery is totally ridiculous and unbelievable.

 The tone slips. When Vince comes on stage, we move from creepiness to slapstick

 The reason the ending is surprising is because it's improbable not because it's surprising.

 

The storyline did, I suppose, have some merit as the book was finished by all members of the group despite the painful narrative. However nothing about it was actually believable. I understand thrillers often are not of the truthful nature, but I feel that no character was developed enough for the reader to understand motive or action. We only gave the book a 3 out of a possible10.

As usual we spent the remainder of the evening enjoying tea, coffee and cake provided by Helen.

 

 

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All The Light We Cannot see” by Anthony Doerr 

"This is a magnificent, deeply moving novel from a writer whose sentences never fail to thrall" The Guardian.

Remarkably our whole group concurred with this quotation and during our discussion we ran out of superlatives to describe this brilliantly written book. The story is set in Nazi Germany where we follow the story of Werner Pfenning during his years in an orphanage with his sister Jutta and subsequently, having displayed exceptional talent for wiring electronics Werner wins a place at an elite but brutal academy for the training of The Hitler Youth. It is at the academy that he befriends Frederick who as a gentle character is bullied and finally brutalised.

Doerr cleverly intertwines Werner’s life with the story of a blind girl, Marie — Laure and her father, who live originally in Paris from where during the Nazi Occupation they flee to her uncle’s home in Saint Malo. Her father is deported to a work camp in Germany and she is left behind during the intense bombing of Saint Malo following the D Day landings. Doerr’s commitment to detail to the travails of a blind youngster surviving the difficulties of relocating to a new area is quite remarkable and the group felt that her character gave us an insight into life for so many people in Europe in the later stages of the Second World War. It is in Saint Malo that the paths of the two main characters collide as they both struggle to survive the devastation of the war.

The only detrimental part of the story was Doerr’s over use of Americanisms and perhaps owing to an overuse of adjectives the book may be over long. Ten years in the writing this book deserved to win The Pulitzer Prize and having awarded the book ten out of ten we would recommend it as a real page turner.

As usual we concluded our meeting with great hospitality and superb ginger cake!