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[caption id="attachment_117" align="alignleft" width="115"] Don't Make Me Laugh[/caption]A quirky short story - just 80 pages or so - which starts off rooted in the earthy reality of football, adultery and jealousy but becomes increasingly bizarre as the narrative progresses. Leo and Trevor are twins. Separated shortly after birth, they were unaware of each other’s existence until a chance encounter leads to their reunion. Augustus relates in direct and dramatic style how that reunion affects their lives and ultimately comes full circle, accounting for manipulation and human weakness which led to their separation. This is gritty humanity written with emotion; its family dynamics interlaced with spirituality; it’s the south London immigrant community meets psycho. Patrick's style is forthright, choppy, and very funny in places, which keeps the narrative moving along at a cracking pace. In the end though, although I thoroughly enjoyed Don’t' Make Me Laugh, I found it a little unsatisfying. I wanted to know more of the brothers, more of their mother who abandoned them, and more of their father and more of how the pain and betrayal that each has inflicted on the others affects their lives. But that is perhaps the point of ‘Quick Reads’. Read and reviewed in 2006. Postscript added August 2014 Sharing the joys of reading Patrick Augustus’ Don’t Make Me Laugh was produced for the 2006 Quick Reads campaign. Quick Reads is a brilliant initiative, supported by the Reading Agency among others, which encourages and helps those not comfortable with reading to discover how pleasurable it can be and to build their confidence. One in 6 adults in the UK struggle to read and may never pick up a book. Half a dozen or so easy to read books are specifically commissioned from established authors each year and each costs just a £1. You can read more about this fantastic campaign on the Quick Reads website – who knows, perhaps you can become one of their reading champions! © Jessica Mulley 2006, 2014

Rich, vibrant and colourful, Karen Maitland’s latest outing is a closely woven tapestry of medieval superstition infused with a strong sense of place and time and ultra-modern thriller. Welcome to Lincoln, 1380s style. (Those who know the city will recognise the steep climbs around the cathedral and the little imp inside.) Here you will find Caitlin, the scheming widow-cum-wicked step-mother, Robert of Bassingham, the well-to-do, aspirational and pretentiously bourgeois merchant; hardworking Gunter who is blessed with the a that only poverty and tragedy can bestow; and the down-trodden, pock-marked and abused but loyal servant Beata. But if the characters are shallowly-drawn and a little archetypal, it is only so that nuances of character do not inhibit Maitland’s transfixing story-telling.

Told through a range of voices and perspectives, the Vanishing Witch is by turn grisly, touching, horrific and bewildering. The ‘action’ takes a little time to get going, as Maitland sets her scenes and draws together, step by step, the seemingly disparate lives of Gunter, Robert and Caitlin and their households, but when it does, this becomes a riveting and rewarding read, right down to the twist in the tale at the end. The writing is close up and intimate, creating fully realised images of both people and places – particularly Lincoln itself, the once-might centre of the English wool trade, with its busy, smelly, ruthless trading harbour and achingly beautiful cathedral spires – as a patchwork of vignettes, splashes of colour, rather than a blended vista.

[caption id="attachment_109" align="alignleft" width="224"] The Vanishing Witch by Karen Maitland[/caption]

I particularly enjoyed witnessing first through the eyes of Hankin, a young boy and then through those of his father, the Peasants’ Revolt in London. Gunter sees the Thames, sprawled with rich merchants’ barges, laden with worldly goods and frightened, fleeing families navigating around broken bodies and the debris of revolt. But where Gunter sees the tragedy of violence, Hankin is awed and uplifted by the prospect of the people taking power and carries himself with a verve born of the promise of liberation.
The historical setting is drawn in detail, with a series of vignettes which shed light on medieval morality and beliefs, commerce and, if you can it that, healthcare. The horrifically cruel images of the misused and forgotten Beate restrained from the neck down for hours in ice-cold water by those who are supposed to be ‘caring’ for her, and her inability to take charge of her own circumstances, will stay with me.

I struggle, usually, to give credence to supernatural powers but, although witchcraft and the ways of wise women are a running theme, and plot device, through the novel, the reader does not have to believe in them to enjoy.

The one part of the novel that worked less well for me was the attempt to build suspense about the identity of Caitlin’s lover: by the time the revelation comes his identity has been obvious for quite some time.
In short, this is a cracking novel – a good story, well told, with haunting scenes finely woven into an illuminating historical background.

The Vanishing Witch was first published by Headline Review in 2014. Use the #vanishingwitch to chat about it on Twitter.

Read and reviewed in 2014
© Jessica Mulley 2014

[caption id="attachment_106" align="alignleft" width="198"] Richard Zimler's Guardian of the Dawn[/caption]I don't read historical fiction. It just doesn't hit the right buttons for me. That is, until I read Richard Zimler's latest novel, The Guardian of the Dawn. As soon as I'd finished reading The Guardian of the Dawn, I read it again. The next thing I did was buy a copy of each of Zimler's previous novels. The third instalment of his 'Sephardic cycle', following the bestselling The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon and Hunting Midnight, which loosely traces Jewish experiences of persecution through the lives of different branches and generations of the same family. Set in early 17th century Goa, at the time a Portuguese colony, The Guardian of the Dawn is a provocative tale of vindictiveness and revenge. It is also a thumping-good mystery. Living just outside the boundaries of the Portuguese colony, the Zarco family cautiously adhere to their Jewish traditions and beliefs, avoiding the attention of the Portuguese authorities and the cruel Inquisition. Retold through the voice of Tiago, he and his sister Sofia enjoy a gentle childhood under the care of their loving but troubled father, at times secretly dipping their toes into the Hindu celebrations honoured by their beloved cook, Nupi. The family is torn apart as first their father, and then Ti, are arrested, imprisoned and tortured by the Inquisition. Resisting conversion to New Christianity, Ti serves many years exiled in the prisons of Lisbon. He returns to India to pursue an ingenious, dangerous plan for revenge against those responsible for his exile but his plans, and convictions, disintegrate as it become apparent that the source of betrayal is much closer to home. Moody, atmospheric and at times ink-black with pain, Zimler's writing conjures vivid pictures of Portuguese Goa, of imprisonment and of personal devastation, which combine to produce a mystical, exotic mystery with a deeply-rooted sense of place and purpose and one which rewards on many levels. It is a real treat. The historical mystery genre is littered with derivative, second-rate plots and caustic prose - so much so that it seems misleading to place The Guardian of the Dawn on the same shelf. Guardian of the Dawn has none of these faults: it is historical fiction at its dazzling best. Guardian of the Dawn was first published by Random House in 2005. Postscript, 2014. Zimler’s Sephardic cycle books completely changed my views on what historical fiction can be and I have regularly read other books in the genre over the last ten years. Some good, some bad, but had quite reached me like Guardian of the Dawn until I read Karen Maitland’s The Vanishing Witch earlier this year. Read and reviewed in 2006 © Jessica Mulley 2006, 2014

[caption id="attachment_99" align="alignleft" width="186"] The Lemon Grove - Paperback Cover[/caption]Transport yourself to the calming, cultured and idyllically picturesque western coastline of Mallorca. Take calf-stingingly steep, rocky paths towards expansive, tranquil marine vistas. Stroll through the pretty, arty, village of Deia, once the chosen retreat of Robert Graves where now playboy millionaires and coach-tour day trippers rub along among the panoply of artisans and latter-day hippies, all savouring the bitter-sweet experience of destroying the very way of life they strive to taste. Peel open the pages of The Lemon Grove and plunge into Deia, the setting of Helen Walsh’s fable of small betrayals and secrets as hidden as the caves around the cove. But don’t relax too much. This is a tense and perturbing read. Just as Deia is fully realised, so are most of the small cast of Walsh’s characters. Jenn Harding is just another middle-class, middle Englander struggling to reconcile the reality of her aging body and fading dreams with her aspirations and desires. She’d married to the seemingly dependable, rather large, Greg, an English professor at a polytechnic-turned-university with an unpublished novel, and two of them have been holidaying at the same villa in Deia for years, living out their dreams for two weeks before returning to humdrum suburbia. And then there’s Em, the pouting, bolshie teenage step-daughter whose chrysalis to butterfly transformation into womanhood pointedly juxapositions Jenn’s gentle drift into the softness of middle age. Into this typically atypical family is thrown Em’s boyfriend, Nathan: working-class confident, just tipped from adolescence to manhood, seductive and elusive, muscular and ready to explore. [caption id="attachment_100" align="alignright" width="240"] Deia by Night, photo credit: Moixet via photopin cc[/caption]Thus the scene is set for at what Stephanie Merritt, rightly called a ‘richly seductive story of forbidden lust as psychologically substantial as it is sexy’ (The Observer, February 2014). But this is not ‘mummy porn’ of the Fifty Shades of Grey sort nor a between-the-sheets romp. It is a sophisticated sexual thriller. There are explicit sex scenes, as there were in Walsh’s debut novel, Brass, a decade ago. But more often than not it is what is suggested rather than exposed that is as powerful, and Walsh guides us through the impact and consequences of giving into temptation, of breaking social boundaries and of destructive lust indulged in way that invites judgement and sympathy and forces, for me at least, some degree of self-recognition. Is Jenn a wicked step-mother of fairy tale proportions? Or a caring mother and wife only able to become herself, under vacation licence and liberated by an exotic location, by shattering glass-brittle relationships? Nathan remains elusive, half-drawn, always seen through the disparaging and desiring eyes of others, a stark contrast to the acutely observed Em and the multi-layered Jenn. This is the real joy of the novel. Like Jenn, like Em, I wanted more of Nathan, to know more, to learn, to see: with Nathan, Walsh draws the reader in with a seduction which parallels the arc of her fable. As Nathan dances on the minds of each of the Harding family, secrets are revealed, foibles exposed and boundaries crossed with devastating consequences. Perhaps not quite the literary masterpiece that some early reviews suggested but is it an enjoyable and rewarding read. The taste of the Lemon Grove will linger on well past the final page. The Lemon Grove was first published (in paperback only I think) in February 2014 by Tinder Press. I was sent this book to review via Amazon.co.uk’s Vine Programme. Views are, of course, entirely my own. Further reading Stephanie Merritt’s review of the Lemon Grove appeared in the Observer in February 2014. Helen Walsh talks about the Lemon Grove on her own website. London’s Metro interviewed Helen Walsh about the Lemon Grove. And of course a number of other great book bloggers have done the Lemon Grove justice. Just a few tasters here: • Dot Scribbles • Girl! Reporter • Rea Book Review • Blog a Book etc Read and reviewed in August 2014 © Jessica Mulley 2014

[caption id="attachment_91" align="alignleft" width="148"] The Lives of the Monster Dogs, Kirsten Bakis (UK paperback cover)[/caption]The Lives of the Monster dogs should have been an exceptional novel. It has an intriguing premise and all the elements required for a gripping plot - dastardly scientists, loyal and dependable dogs and of course a crusading, innocent journalist to come to the rescue.

It is a retrospective account of the dying days of a race of dogs, the result of over 100 years of experimentation, genetic manipulation and physical alteration. Fitted with artificial hands and mechanic voice boxes, these dogs were designed to the perfect foot soldiers - tough, intelligence, loyal and deadly - but by the time their race has been perfected the ghoulish man who first conceived of them is long dead and with him has gone any sense of their purpose or any concept of whom they were intended to fight. Frustrated, the monster dogs rise up against the community in which they were bred, massacring their human masters and, after years of wondering around the North American continent, descend on an unsuspecting New York with all the grace and elegance of 19th century Prussian High Society - and fabulous wealth to boot.

Having already been asked to accept that a village in Canada could exist for over a hundred years unnoticed by anyone else and that a troupe of 150 or so man-sized speaking dogs dressed in Victorian costume could, in the early 21st century, roam through Canada and New England for eight years without comment, the reader is now asked to believe that the monster dogs would be accepted by New Yorkers with little more interest or comment than that which would be generated by the arrival of a Hollywood B-star. This is, quite frankly, too much. The author's argument that "hey, all New Yorkers are immigrants anyway and therefore understand and accept diversity" just isn't convincing. And this is the real flaw in the novel: while its language and scenario are rooted in the realism of today, its central premise is incredible and the reader is given no assistance to suspend disbelief.

This doesn't undermine the work entirely. It has a lot of good points. It is a fun and easy read, always thought-provoking and at times variously grotesque and moving. The drawing of the characters of the dogs is masterly, in particular those of Lydia, a tender and intelligent friend of peace, and Ludwig who alone seems to struggle to accept his differences. Yet ultimately, The Lives of the Monster Dogs fails to delivery on the promise of its premise, in part because of its incredible nature and in part because it, tantalisingly, fails to exploit fully the psychological issues it raises. One is left feeling that the author has squandered an opportunity to write something of real merit and lasting significance.

The Lives of the Monster Dogs was first published in 1997 by Farrar, Strauss and Giroux. It was named one of the Best Books of the year by Village Voice and a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times. It was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction and won the Bram Stoker Award for the best first novel.

Read and reviewed 2006

© Jessica Mulley, 2006, 2014

[caption id="attachment_85" align="alignright" width="185"] First Edition Cover, A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian[/caption]At times laugh-out-loud funny, at times touching and at times disturbing, Monica Lewycka's novel is not what you might expect. Nominated for the Booker Prize, it lacks the gravitas of novels more usually associated with literary awards; yet, although looking unmistakably like chick-lit in its binding and promotion, there is more depth to it than you'll find in any Jane Green-ite. The premise is deceptively simple. Pappa, an 84-year-old, recently widowed, Ukrainian immigrant falls in love with a flash, brash and breast-enhanced floozy from his homeland, fifty years his junior. She, for her part, wants the luxurious life of a westerner with the colour co-ordinated kitchen, the private school education for her genius son and the top prize of a British passport. To the chagrin of his two adult daughters, Pappa marries Valentina and takes her and her son, Stanislav into his home. But all is far from rosy in the English idyll. Pappa can't support Valentina in the style to which she wishes to become accustomed and Valentina can't stop her flirty affairs with other men. The two daughters, who haven't been on speaking terms since the death of their mother, are re-united in their efforts to save their father and oust Valentina in his affections. Simple, so far? Well, yes. And no. The portrait of Pappa, with his conflicts between love and loneliness, between lust and old age, between loyalty towards his daughters and his desire for a new and vital existence with the larger than life Valentina is beautifully drawn. And Valentina, with her green satin bras, foul-mouthed pigeon English and apparent obsession with materialism eventually demands as much sympathy as derision. To some degree both are stereo-typical but that only serves to make the understanding of their complex and very human desires all the more poignant. Pappa's fascination with the history of tractors - itself mildly interesting - is wonderfully juxtapositioned against the very practical concerns of sex, money, immigration and divorce and the occasional, short extracts from his book on the topic underline the wastefulness of the war which ravaged Ukraine, and the rest of Europe, in the mid 20th century, so forcefully highlighted as Vera and Nadia, his two daughters, explore together their family history and the reasons for their differences. A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian is a quirky, enjoyable and easy read but in the end one can't escape the conclusion that Lewycka has just tried to do too much, to address too many themes, in the space of 300 odd pages. The overall effect therefore leaves a sense that the humour is inappropriate within such deep issues and the commentary on social conditions is undermined by the humour. It's a shame that the reader is almost made to feel guilty about chortling along with such a range of wonderfully comic characters. It's just too ambitious. It almost works, but not quite. A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian was first published in 2005 by Viking. It won the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize (the UK’s only prize for comic novels) at the Hay Literary Festival in 2005 and the Waverton Good Reading Award in 2005/06. It was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2005. Read and reviewed in 2006 © Jessica Mulley, 2006, 2014

[caption id="attachment_82" align="alignleft" width="195"] Julian Barnes, Before She Met Me (Jonathan Cape, 1982)[/caption]“So why should this jealousy linger on, unwanted, resented, only there to bugger you around? Like a middle ear, only there to make you lose your sense of balance.” There’s no denying that Julian Barnes’s Before She Met Me is an absorbing, even compelling, account of one man’s descent from jealousy into obsession and ultimately to insanity. Graham, at first happily and then unsatisfying married, falls for Ann, for whom he leaves his wife and daughter. Ann, a sometime bit-part actress seems to offer Graham the solace and companionship which he has just discovered he’s been lacking all these years. By then, through the offices of his bitter ex-wife, he happens to see a film featuring, albeit briefly, Ann. He becomes obsessed with her past, convulsively gathering evidence of her former liaisons and boyfriends and even passing acquaintances. But he can’t leave it there: and what he imagines his new wife did before she met him becomes worse than the reality. Sad, funny and disturbing, Barnes’ prose is, as always, well-measured and quite elegant. Yet there is something just a little unsatisfying about this novel. Never quite convinced that Graham’s descent is totally self-driven, the reader is left wondering about the machinations of his friends and his ex-wife. Questions surrounding their role are never quite resolved and yet are too closely drawn to remain provocatively ambiguous. I’ve seen this book described as a ‘dark comedy’. The darkness permeates but for me the comedic element was lacking. Barnes has done a lot better. Julian Barnes' Before She Met Me was first published in 1982 by Jonathan Cape. Read and reviewed in 2006 ©Jessica Mulley 2006, 2014

There are now five Cabana restaurants in London, each offering typical, informal Brasilian food. This book, written by Cabana’s founders, gives recipes from the restaurants’ menus. And cooking recipes from Cabana: the Cookbook is a real adventure in Brasilian smells, flavours and cuisine. It’s colourful and richly illustrated with full page colour photos – a feature I really appreciate in cookbooks – and the recipes are easily followed and don’t call for complicated equipment (although you will need a BBQ to get the best from this book). There must be at least 100 recipes, organised in various sections – breakfasts, bar snacks, BBQ food, sauces and dips, Brasilian classics, sides and salads, desserts and drinks. Scattered throughout the book are also generic tips on cooking and food preparation – such as ‘how to tell when your steak is cooked’ and ‘five Brasilian fruits you’ve probably never heard of’ which makes it ideal for inexperienced cooks. There are also recipes for a few typical Brasilian cocktails at the back of the book, including Cococabanas, made with Malibu, coconut cream, pineapple juice, strawberry puree and few other yummy things, which are fast becoming a firm favourite. I tried a few of the recipes and each has turned out well and been packed with flavour. I found the brief introduction to typical Brasilian ingredients useful, although I would have liked a little more information here on possible substitutes for those which are hard-to-source. Read, recipes test and reviewed, August 2014 ©Jessica Mulley 2014

George Chesney’s startling account of an imagined invasion and conquest of Britain by the Germans in the 1870s was born in the shock reaction to the very real, very swift and unexpected German victories in the War of Surprises of 1870. Filled with regret for a nation destroyed and embittered by the passiveness with which the nation ignored all the warning signs, failing to take what with hindsight seem like obvious measure of self-preservation, a unknown soldier reminisces for history grandchildren upon his experience of the Battle of Dorking. At once level, this short story is just a shocking and gripping account of a fiction overthrow of the country. But Chesney’s tale rewards a deeper reading as well, revealing much about contemporary attitudes to empire and fears for the future. The nameless soldier encapsulates, in his regret, concerns over the squandering of energy and enterprise swallowed in the maintenance and expansion of Empire which so dominated England in the later years of the 19th century. And he exposes a perceived fragility in the security of the nation: that England falls so easily to the Germans is ascribed not only to a lack of preparedness but also to an arrogance born of a belief in the natural superiority of English civilisation and culture and, particularly, to the brittle basis on which British economic prosperity was based. It is in these arguments that the reader cannot fail to miss potential parallels with today’s circumstances: a national prosperity based not on manufacturing or labour but upon trade, credit, services and other business which could so easily be diverted elsewhere. This short story, just short of 50 pages, is therefore not only a sad and foreboding tale of glories lost, but also a telling and disturbing assessment of a nation reaching the end of line of credit in stability and security. It is certainly a quick and easy read but it is at the same time both thought-provoking and memorable. Read and reviewed in 2006 ©Jessica Mulley 2006

Mansfield Park, although certainly regarded as a part of the canon of English literature, is often considered to be the weakest, least dazzling of Austen’s novels. Without the witty sparkle of Pride and Prejudice or the gothic indulgence of Northanger Abbey, it has struggled at time to match the popularity of her other titles. But oh, what a treat those who pass over Mansfield Park are missing. Certainly, it is the most disturbing and perhaps the least superficially pleasing of Austen’s output but it has rewards aplenty for the careful reader.

Mansfield Park, home of the affluent Bertram family, takes in a young poor relation with the overt intention of giving her the advantages of a good education and good connections while preserving her sense of gratitude and subservience. Fanny, the haplessly lucky chosen beneficiary of such benevolence is uprooted from friends, home, family and all that it familiar to take up residence in the grand house with her grand relations.

Austen sets Fanny up as the heroine, designed to evoke the sympathy of the reader: this is a challenge for a modern audience, many of whom will find her weak and too self-deprecating to be genuinely engaging. And similarly, the sins and deficiencies in disposition and feeling with which Austen gifts brother and sister, Mary and Henry Crawford, may seem not so damning today as Austen intended. This however, does little to detract from the overall value of the novel itself. The relationship between the Bertram family and its colonial role (their wealth derives from sugar plantations in Antigua) is only hinted at overtly, but beautifully explored through the metaphorical position of Mansfield as the centre of all that is English. Similarly, contemporary values regarding manners, position, influence and identity are gently rolled out for the reader through the evolving relationship between the Bertrams and their acquaintances and within the family itself. And yet, with all this meat beneath the surface, there is still a gentle and touching domestic love story, which evolves over the course of the novel as the more passionate, less fatalistic engagements and attachments of side characters wax and wane.

Mansfield Park is a masterpiece of English manners, of Englishness and of empire. It is also a pleasure to read from beginning to end. Now, I’m off to start at the beginning again!

Re-read and reviewed in December 2006

©Jessica Mulley 2006

Afterword (2014) I am a little dubious about re-posting these old notes on Mansfield Park. In my view, this is the deepest and darkest of Austen's novels, and has become a real favourite of mine. I'm planning on a more detailed article on the novel which may render these very brief notes entirely useless (if they are not already). But for the sake of completeness, I've decided to include them here in my new blog.