I managed to finish two books before the end of the month, both quite good.
Just Finished
"American Gods is the 2nd book by Neil Gaiman that I've read and enjoyed. I wanted to read this especially because I wanted to start watching the TV series based on the book.
I have to say that this was so very interesting. I can see similar themes between American Gods and the other book I've read, Neverwhere, but on a bigger scale. You have this blending of the 'real' world with the world of gods and demons, the breaking down of barriers between the two and you have these supernatural beings that wander between both worlds.
American Gods is basically about Shadow, who has just been released from prison and discovers that not only was his wife, Laura, unfaithful to him, but was also killed. Shadow meets Mr. Wednesday who hires him as a chauffeur, and since he has nothing to go home to, he agrees. Wednesday is an 'old' god who is trying to unite the varied old gods who live in the US to battle against the new gods; god of internet, god of airwaves, etc. who are out to destroy them. That is the story on its most basic level, but there are so many questions to be answered as the story develops.
Who is Shadow really? Who is Wednesday? Which is the good side? Why is his dead wife following him around? It's a fascinating, interesting concept and a well-developed story that gets more and more interesting as the story moves along. I loved it, found it to be a page-turner and most enjoyable story. I will continue to check out Gaiman's stories; Stardust awaits me on my bookshelf. (4 stars)"
"The Cruellest Month is the third book in the Chief Inspector Gamache mystery series by Canadian writer, Louise Penny and like the first two, I enjoyed it very much. Once again we find Gamache assigned to investigate a murder in the small town of Three Pines in Quebec. He brings along his team; 2nd in command Beauvoir, trouble - making Investigator Nicholl, new man Lemieux and Lacoste.
They are investigating the death of a woman who seems to have died of fright during a seance at the Hadley Estate, the place that played such an integral role in the first book in the series. The usual cast appear, Peter and Clara, Olivier and Gabri, Myrna, Ruth, etc to add colour and keep the story moving.
Was it murder? That's to be determined. Complicating the matters is the continuing troubles being caused by Gamache's old enemy, Arnot another Sureté commander who Gamache brought charges of murder against many years ago. People are now rehashing this case, making life dangerous for Gamache and his family. Does he have spies in his team?
It's a wonderfully rich story, with many subplots, many suspects and a fascinating resolution. I like Gamache, he's a class guy and I like his team for the most part. I kind of wish that Clara would divorce Peter, but that's just a personal wish; he's holding her back! Great story and I look forward to moving on to the fourth book, The Murder Stone. (4 stars)"
I've started the following books in their place.
Currently Reading
The synopsis is below.
"The story of the Phantom of he Opera, a half-crazed musician hiding in the labyrinth of the famous Paris Opera House and creating a number of strange and mysterious events to further the career of a beautiful young singer, is today regarded as one of the most famous of all horror stories: widely mentioned in the same breath as Frankenstein and Dracula. Yet the fame of this novel, first written by the French journalist turned novelist Gaston Leroux, in 1911, ,is based almost entirely on the various film versions which have been made over the years. Remarkable performances by two actors, Lon Chaney and Claude Rains, helped to make the Phantom an immortal figure"
"Playboy Thompson C. Briephs has just been found strangled in his bed. The police believe the Newcastle Herald crossword editor, a scion of a blue-blooded New England family, died from kinky sex gone wrong. But cop-turned–private investigator Rosco Polycrates thinks there’s a six-letter word for what happened. Enlisting the help of Annabelle Graham, the crossword editor for a rival paper, Rosco unearths a crazy quilt of suspects who had it in for the victim - and one of them was blackmailing him. Belle is certain the answers lie in Briephs’ twisty puzzlers. Now she and Rosco will have to employ some dazzling wordplay of their own to stop a cunning killer from crossing paths with another victim."
September 2017 Reading Summary
General Info
September 2017 Total
Books Read 9 89
Pages Read 3,300 24,900
Pages Breakdown
< 250 3 42
250 - 350 3 28
351 - 450 0 12
> 450 3 7
Ratings
5 - star 3 10
4 - star 3 45
3 - star 3 31
2 - star 3
Author Gender
Female 3 23
Male 6 66
Genre
Fiction 4 21
Mystery 3 42
SciFi 1 23
Non-Fic 1
Classics 1 2
2017 Reading Challenges
12 + 4 Challenge (1900 - 1950) (completed)
1. C.S. Forester - The African Queen (5 stars)
Canadian Literature (3 of 5)
Technically I've read 4 as The Cruellest Month was by Canadian author Louise Penny but I've included it in the Mystery genre. None read in September.
The Classics (pre-1900) (2 of 4)
2. Charles Dickens - Nicholas Nickleby (5 stars)
Mysteries (Cops) (17 of 25)
3. Louise Penny - The Cruellest Month (4 stars)
Mysteries (Sleuths) (16 of 25)
4. Jacqueline Winspear - Birds of a Feather (4 stars)
Fantasy (4 of 5)
5. Neil Gaiman - American Gods (4 stars)
Horror (3 of 5)
(None finished in September)
Fiction (Post 1900) (5 of 10)
6. Mai Zetterling - Night Games (3 stars)
7. Nevil Shute - A Town Like Alice (5 stars)
SciFi (2 of 5)
None completed in September.
Spies / Thriller / War (4 of 10)
8. John P. Marquand - Last Laugh, Mr. Moto (3 stars)
9. Sax Rohmer - The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu (3 stars)
Non-Fiction (1 of 5)
None completed in September.
Top Three books of September
"Back during my high school days, and I shudder to think it was 50 years ago, I read The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens and I recall enjoying it very much. However such is my memory I may be wrong. ;0) Anyway, it took me that long to try another book by Dickens. Over the past couple of years I've been exploring the Classics more and in July, decided to try Nicholas Nickleby. I had an old book of this story. Not sure when it was published but the illustrations by W.H.C. Groome lead me to believe it was published in 1907.
Anyway, enough administrative details, what about the story? Simply put, I loved it. Dickens' writing style is so accessible and entertaining. He creates wonderful characters who you find yourself becoming very invested in. The story starts off with Nicholas and his mother and sister, Kate, being placed in dire circumstances. Their father has died recently, leaving the family without income. Uncle Ralph, not a nice man, sends Nicholas off to be a teacher at a boys school in Yorkshire and then provides poor lodgings for Kate and her mother, also getting Kate a job as a dressmaker. In both instances, both Nicholas and Kate are treated horribly. Things look so very grim. Nicholas finds the treatment of the boys at the school to be abominable, especially that of Smike, a boy or more rather a young man, who has been at the school for years and is the special punching bag of Squeers and his wife. Nicholas finally can take it anymore and after thrashing Squeers leaves with Smike to return to London.
This is the barest introduction to Nicholas Nickleby, so much more is to happen. You meet such wonderful characters as Newman Noggs, hard worked clerk for Ralph Nickleby, who does everything in his power to help the family, Vincent Crummles, leader of a roving band of actors, who takes in Nicholas and Smike, the Cheeryble brothers who provide so much generous assistance to the Nickleby family, even Miss La Creevy, the lovely lady who is such a good friend. And then the villains, the Squeers, Ralph Nickleby, Mulberry Hawk, who wants to abuse Kate, etc.
Getting to know these characters as the story develops makes it such fascinating reading. Wanting to find out how everything will resolve makes you turn page after page. It's a very long story but it doesn't seem so. I won't say how everything turns out. There are so many varied possibilities. Ultimately I was so satisfied. Dickens is a great writer and story teller. I will have to now try another of his books, and I'll ensure it doesn't take me 50 years to try another. (5 stars)"
"As Joe says and most Queenslanders say throughout this book, 'Oh my word!'. What a great book A Town Like Alice by English author Nevil Shute is. Shute is one of my favourite authors. I've enjoyed so many of his books and I will keep searching for others of his stories.
A Town Like Alice (which I've always wanted to name A Town Called Alice; I know now why the title as it is) is the story of Jean Paget, a young English woman, whose journey carries her from Malaysia in WWII, back to England and on to Australia. She is a normal girl, who finds herself in unique situations and finds a strength of character common to the heroes and heroines who people Shute's novels. Shute has said this story is based on a true story of a Dutch woman who kept many women prisoners of the Japanese alive with her efforts. In Shute's story, the Japanese invade Malaysia and capture a group of English women and their children. Not wanting to have anything to do with them, the women begin a march around Malaysia, from Japanese camp to camp, suffering privations. Jean, unmarried, becomes a rational, smart leader of the group.
They are helped by an Australian prisoner, Joe, who risks his life to provide food and medicine to the women. After the war, Jean returns to England and discovers she has inherited a fair bit of money. The story teller, her solicitor Noel, helps her sort out this inheritance, which Jean wants to use to help the Malaysian village that kept the women safe.
She also decides to go to Australia to find out more about Joe, where he was from and when she arrives decides to use her money once again to help the town he was from, to make it 'a town like Alice'.
I don't want to discuss the plot much more as it is a book that needs to be enjoyed and savoured. I love the characters, I love the spirit of nation building, the positiveness of the people. There are outstanding events that take place in this story, but they are told in such a gentle, matter of fact way that it makes them even more impressive. There are many highlights for me. I especially enjoyed discovering how the Australian outback radio communication system worked and how much of a key it was to saving a lost man. The story reminds me of The Far Country, another story that features Australia. Shute is a great author that should be explored. (5 stars)"
"The African Queen by C.S. Forester might be better known for the movie based on this excellent book. I've seen this movie, starring Kate Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart many times and I'm glad to finally have finally sat down to enjoy the book.
The book was originally published in 1935 and is set during the First World War in Central Africa. I've read a fair bit about WWI but generally it's been focused on the European theater. It was interesting to read a book set in this location. Rose Sayer and her brother Samuel have been many years in Tanzania, her brother a missionary and she his assistant and house keeper. The war has come to home as they are located in German South Africa and their workers and their goods have been taken by the German Army. This has broken her brother and Kate is now on her own. She joins Charlie Allnutt, a Cockney sailor who plies the Ulanga river for a Belgian mine. Allnutt is also on his own and he allows Kate to take control and agrees to head downriver to try and sink a German cruiser that plies the Lake, hindering British efforts to push the Germans out of Africa.
There are many excellent features to this story; the journey and all its trials and tribulations, the growing of Kate as a person, one who had been under the thumb of her family and brother for the first 30+ years of her life; the budding relationship between Allnutt and Kate, etc. It's a fascinating story, made more interesting because it basically features two people in close quarters. The adventure is tense, their ingenuity at solving their issues as the sail downriver.
There are key differences to the movie, especially the ending, but the book is every bit as interesting and entertaining. The development of the characters and the challenges they face and work together to resolve make it all the more interesting. I've enjoyed so many of Forester's books; he writes such varied stories, the Hornblower tales, interesting mysteries, excellent war stories and of course, this. (5 stars)"
So there you go. Three months to go now. I'll continue with my future reading threads in the next couple of days and then get back to my other ideas that have been neglected a bit in the past couple of weeks. Have a great week!
No comments:
Post a Comment