The Day of the Triffids

Synopsis: When a freak cosmic event renders most of the Earth's population blind, Bill Masen is one of the lucky few to retain his sight. The London he walks is crammed with groups of men and women needing help, some ready to prey on those who can still see. But another menace stalks blind and sighted alike. With nobody to stop their spread the Triffids, mobile plants with lethal stingers and carnivorous appetites, seem set to take control. "The Day of the Triffids" is perhaps the most famous catastrophe novel of the twentieth century and its startling imagery of desolate streets and lurching, lethal plant life retains its power to haunt today.

Review: I'm not one for science fiction, anything written in code gives me the horrors, but I am liking the classic sci-fi books very much and this one was no exception. The plotline was familiar, I think it's probably given birth to hundreds of disaster movies/TV dramas since, but this is the original and one of the best.
The concept of reducing the (almost) entire human race to little more than helpless, sightless, babies, staggering around and falling prey to a legion of carrion eating plants is a terrifying one, the real stuff of nightmares. Also terrifying was how quickly the people left acquired a 'dog eat dog' mentality, you can imagine that happening.

My mind did have little niggling doubts (it's amazing how the mind can find the notion of walking plants perfectly rational but have trouble with the details.) I thought, for a start, the likelihood was that there would have been a lot more sighted people - more children for instance, unconscious people, rock stars who always manage to lose a week every month and the inhabitants of Swindon sleeping off a three day bender - also I didn't think that people would have become suicidal so quickly .. is it likely that a doctor would throw himself out of a window just because he had gone blind? Human nature fights for survival usually and it's not as if he didn't know that there were still sighted people left .. and why would they ever allow the triffids to establish?, ok at first they were a curiosity and in typical greedy style we found a way to profit by them but to let them start walking around ... that's unwise .. get the DDT out (I'm not advocating this in general .. I've very much with Joni on this point but desperate times calls for desperate measures.) plus wouldn't they have been tripping over dead bodies eventually, there was only ever a handful of people outside but then, science fiction always calls for a huge amount of suspended disbelief, and I can do that when the story is as good as this one.

I liked the love story, it seemed convincing and natural in the circumstances. Though feisty, Josella wasn't the sort of of kick ass, kung fu type of heroine that sets my teeth on edge (the sort of woman.. not to be too indelicate .. that does cartwheels and climbs ladders in white trousers when Auntie Flo is visiting .. and doesn't sit in a corner hunched in a ball of misery with a knife clenched between her teeth like normal people.) She was a nice mix of capable and vulnerable.

The ending was a surprise because it was ambiguous. I was expecting a clear cut ending and actually had something in mind which I thought was going to sort the little wretches out, possibly I got this from a film version or something. It didn't spoil it for me though, if anything I preferred it, I liked the uncertainty of it all.

Of course it does make you eye everything in your garden with suspicion, and I'm definitely more wary of going out into it (bother .. why do I have to have hedges .. perfect camouflage for the blighters) ... the crash helmet is probably unnecessary but I can't afford to take chances.

Highly enjoyable in a shivery, hide behind your pillow, sort of way (I must just add here that I am quite capable of being scared by my own shadow .. allowances have to be made for me being a bit of a custard .. I have never ever watched any of the 'Nightmare on Elm Street'/'Scream' sort of films .... If I did sleep would be a thing of the past.)
The Midwich Cuckoos and The Chrysalids are also on my TBR's and if there anything like as good as this I'm in for a treat.

The Sea, The Sea

Synopsis: When Charles Arrowby retires from his glittering career in the London theatre, he buys a remote house on the rocks by the sea. He hopes to escape from his tumultuous love affairs but unexpectedly bumps into his childhood sweetheart and sets his heart on destroying her marriage. His equilibrium is further disturbed when his friends all decide to come and keep him company and Charles finds his seaside idyll severely threatened by his obsessions.

Review: I really enjoyed this book, it's beautifully atmospheric and lyrical. I think it's probably going to set me off on an Iris Murdoch obsession .. in fact it already has ... whilst reading it I also managed to fit in Iris's only short story Something Special and am currently reading her husband John Bayley's beautiful Iris memoirs, I've also recently bought The Black Prince so she's becoming a bit of a project. The central character of The Sea, The Sea is Charles Arrowby, an ageing theatrical celebrity, and it has to be said he's completely unlikeable, although my opinion of him shifted quite a bit during the story I never found myself liking him at any point. At the start of the story you find yourself fairly in tune with him .. you can understand why anyone would want to take themselves off to a remote location by the sea to commune with nature and get away from it all .. Charles's wish is to find himself somewhere where he has nothing else to do but 'learn to be good' and this seems admirable, perhaps he is tired of the adulation and fame and yearns for the simple life. He has plans to write a diary/journal/autobiography .. perhaps novel .. he can never quite pin it down and changes his mind constantly. Perhaps it's just as well that I started the novel by being fairly well disposed towards him because he soon tests that to the limit.

The house that Charles buys is called 'Shruff End', it perches on a small promontory and is exposed, isolated, damp and possibly haunted. The locals are fairly hostile, they seem less than impressed with their new celebrity neighbour and the sea (very much a central character in the book) and it's environs also turn out to be unpredictable and unaccommodating. Charles is spooked by all sorts of imaginary faces at windows and bumps in the night and things come to a bit of a head when whilst sitting with his notebook staring out to see he momentarily see's a monster rising from the waves. Are these things just hallucinations or are they portents of things to come?

'I can describe this in no other way. Out of a perfectly calm empty sea, at a distance of perhaos a quarter of a mile (or less), I saw an immense creature break the surface and arch itself upward. At first it looked like a black snake, then a long thickening body with a ridgy spiny back followed the elongated neck. There was something which might have been a flipper or perhaps a fin. I could not see the whole of the creature, but the remainder of it's body, or perhaps a long tail, disturbed the foaming water round the base of what had now risen from the sea to a height of (as it seemed) twenty or thirty feet. The creature then coiled itself so that the long neck circled twice, bringing the now conspicuous head low down above the surface of the sea. I could see the sky through the coils. I could also see the head with remarkable clarity, a kind of crested snake's head, green eyed, the mouth opening to show teeth and a pink interior. The head and neck glistened with a blue sheen. Then in a moment the whole thing collapsed, the coils fell, the undulating back still broke the water, and then there was nothing but a great foaming swirling pool where the creature had vanished.'

He find himself and his cottage besieged by many of the people he has sought to leave behind, old love rivals, relations, friends and enemies turn up at his door, these people seem to both love and loathe him at the same time and it's through them that we start to see Charles's true character emerge and instead of 'learning to be good' he carries on being bad. This is a man who is far more used to manipulating and exploiting people than we were at first led to believe. His staggering conceit and lack of regard for the feelings of others really comes to a head when he bumps into Hartley, an old flame who he was once engaged to marry. Hartley was the one true love of his life and he has never really came to terms with losing her. They were very young when first together and seemingly devoted to each other when Hartley was suddenly whisked away by her family never to be seen again by Charles ... until now. It turns out that Hartley lives just a short way from 'Shruff End', she's an ordinary, rather unattractive and elderly housewife now but that doesn't matter to Charles. He see's her very much as she once was and is convinced that she needs rescuing from her rather brutish husband, Ben. This sets him on a course of actions which can only be described as bizarre, obsessive and self deluded. He thinks his intentions are honourable and finds constant excuses for his selfish behaviour. It is at times extremely uncomfortable to read about Charles's treatment of poor Hartley even though you do find yourself thinking frequently 'get a grip woman for goodness sake' but it's also fairly farcical too (you're constantly cringing and hoping that something happens to thwart his plans and scheme.) It's only in the aftermath of these disastrous encounters with Hartley that Charles really begins to assess his own true character.

Perhaps one of the most interesting secondary characters is James, Charles's cousin and rival. Charles has never liked or understood him, there's a fair amount of jealousy and suspicion going right back to childhood. Though his character is perhaps only lightly touched upon I found myself drawn to him and wanting to know more and much of the mystery and magic which weaves it's way through the tale is wrapped up in his story.I also really liked the descriptions of the bizarre meals that Charles enjoyed concocting, it added an amusing and quirky touch .. I've since found out that they mostly came from the suggestions of Iris's husband John.

The book is perhaps overlong, I felt at times I had got to the end when I hadn't quite and occasionally the story wandered too far and I found my interest lagging but on the whole I found it mesmerising, strange and quite unlike anything I'd read before. It's a story that's open to many interpretations and probably nearly every reader will take something different from it.

Agnes Grey

Synopsis: 'How delightful it would be to be a governess!' When the young Agnes Grey takes up her first post as governess she is full of hope; she believes she only has to remember 'myself at their age' to win her pupils' love and trust. Instead she finds the young children she has to deal with completely unmanageable. They are, as she observes to her mother, 'unimpressible, incomprehensible creatures'. In writing her first novel, Anne Bronte drew on her own experiences, and one can trace in the work many of the trials of the Victorian governess, often stranded far from home, and treated with little respect by her employers, yet expected to control and educate her young charges. Agnes Grey looks at childhood from nursery to adolescence, and it also charts the frustrations of romantic love, as Agnes starts to nurse warmer feelings towards the local curate, Mr Weston. The novel combines astute dissection of middle-class social behaviour and class attitudes with a wonderful study of Victorian responses to young children which has parallels with debates about education that continue to this day.

Review: My first Anne Brontë book. The tale is a fairly simple one, much less complex than either 'Wuthering Heights' or 'Jane Eyre', in some ways it's more reminiscent of Jane Austen's work than either of her sisters. Agnes is a likeable girl, her family are a bit strapped for cash and her father is in poor health. Determined to earn her own way in life and not overly enthusiastic about her parents choice of work (to draw and sell her own artwork) Agnes decides that she would like to be a governess.

Her first posting is to Mr and Mrs Bloomfield. Mrs Bloomfield informs Agnes that .... Master Tom (seven) is 'the flower of the flock' - a generous noble-spirited boy who always speaks the truth. Mary Ann (almost six) is 'a very good girl on the whole and Fanny (almost four) is a 'remarkably gentle child.' This all sounds promising but alas Agnes finds that Mrs Bloomfield's opinions of her children cannot wholly be relied upon. In truth the two eldest children are a nightmare to teach, rude, egotistical, boisterous and aggressive. Tom in particular is an absolute horror, intent on setting traps for birds and depatching them in different ways .. 'sometimes I give them to the cat, sometimes I cut them in pieces with my penknife, but the next I mean to roast alive.' He's determined not to be taught anything and Mary Ann is just as bad, Agnes occasionally has to forcibly drag them to the table and hold them there until the lesson is completed. Fanny is found to be a mischievous, intractable creature given up to deception and falsehood and employing her favourite tactics of spitting and bellowing whenever thwarted (this is said to be somewhat auto-biographical, with Anne drawing on her early experiences as a governess.) Although she tries hard, Agnes is unable to teach the children anything and she is constantly being undermined by the parents (who naturally regard their children's lack of improvement as solely the fault of the governess.)

'I observed, on the grass about his garden, certain apparatus of sticks and cord, and asked what they were for.
"Traps for birds."
"Why do you catch them?"
"Papa says they do harm."
"And what do you do with them, when you catch them?"
"Different things. Sometimes I give them to the cat; sometimes I cut them in pieces with my penknife; but the next, I mean to roast alive."
"And why do you mean to do such a horrible thing?"
"For two reasons; first to see how long it will live - and then, to see what it will taste like."
"But don't you know it is extremely wicked to do such things? Remember the birds can feel as well as you, and think, how would you like it yourself?"
"Oh, that's nothing! I'm not a bird, and I can't feel what I do to them."

"But you will have to feel it sometime Tom - you have heard where wicked people go to when they die; and if you don't leave off torturing innocent birds, remember, you will have to go there, and suffer just what you have made them suffer."

"Oh pooh! I shan't, Papa knows how I treat them and he never blames me for it; he says it's just what he used to do when he was a boy. Last summer he gave me a nest full of young sparrows, and he saw me pulling off their legs and wings and heads, and never said anything, except that they were nasty things, and I must not let them soil my trousers; and uncle Robson was there too, and he laughed, and said I was a fine boy."
"But what would your mama say?"

"Oh! she doesn't care - she says it's a pity to kill the pretty singing birds, but the naughty sparrows, and mice and rats, I may do what I like with. So now, Miss Grey, you see it is not wicked."
"I still think it is, Tom; and perhaps your papa and mama would think so too, if they thought much about it. However," I internally added, "they may say what they please, but I am determined you shall do nothing of the kind, as long as I have power to prevent it."

Eventually, in less than a year, Agnes is dismissed and sent home, much to her consternation and embarrassment. She's a little downcast but after spending a few weeks at home she decides to try again and this time secures employment with the Murray family. Although the daughters are vain, self centred and thoughtless they are more tractable that the Bloomfields and Agnes becomes more settled. It's here that she meets the curate Edward Weston, a very earnest and worthy young clergyman. Agnes is very taken with him, he's her ideal, but Rosalie, the eldest of the Murray girls (seventeen) is now in want of an admirer and with time on her hands, before she is advantageously betrothed, she fixes on Edward on which to bestow some of her well rehearsed coquetry. Poor Agnes is mortified, and when she is suddenly called back home she fears that she will never set eyes on Edward again.

Agnes is likeable enough but apart from the fact that she's obviously very conscientious and kind you don't really learn anything much about her. Despite her pledge at the beginning of the book to be candid, she's too guarded. The story is a pleasant one but it does lack a little bit of oomph .. obviously you can't always have a lunatic in the attic or a deranged lover digging up his dead soul mate but the story perhaps could have done with a tad more excitement. You have the feeling a long way before the end that it's only a matter of time before she's saying .. click here to continue review - possible spoilers

reader, I married him

.. or something very like it.

The God of Small Things

Synopsis: The Asian literary phenomenon of the 90s. More magical than Mistry, more of a rollicking good read than Rushdie, more nerve-tinglingly imagined than Naipaul, here, perhaps, is the greatest Indian novel by a woman. Arundhati Roy has written an astonishingly rich, fertile novel, teeming with life, colour, heart-stopping language, wry comedy and a hint of magical realism. Set against a background of political turbulence in Kerala, Southern India, The God of Small Things tells the story of twins Esthappen and Rahel. Amongst the vats of banana jam and heaps of peppercorns in their grandmother's factory, they try to craft a childhood for themselves amidst what constitutes their family -- their lonely, lovely mother, their beloved Uncle Chacko (pickle baron, radical Marxist and bottom-pincher) and their avowed enemy Baby Kochamma (ex-nun and incumbent grand-aunt).

Review: I really liked this one, it's full of incredibly dreamy, evocative prose and beautifully crafted. Told mostly from the viewpoint of the 'two egg' twins Esthappen (or Estha as he is mostly called) and Rahel, it tells the tale of the death of their cousin Sophie Mol who is visiting from England .. with her yellow bell bottoms and go-go bag. The narrative jumps back and forward in time a lot, one minute we are with the adult twins in the present and the next they are children again. There are a lot of characters to try and place and remember, it took me a couple of chapters to familiarise myself with them but I was hooked really from page one. Very descriptive and poetic, the author is brilliant at capturing the sights and smells of Kerala. Witty and funny in parts especially the bits about Mammachi's pickle factory and Kochu Maria, the family's 'vinegar-hearted, short-tempered, midget cook,' who is letting the housework go to blazes as she indulges in her addiction to TV. Lots of sadness too, overall the book does have a melancholy feel. Poor little Estha who, after what should have been a lovely trip out to the Abhilash talkies, is sent outside for singing too loudly during 'The Sound of Music' and falls foul of the 'Orangedrink Lemondrink' man, the fear of this man finding him again haunts Estha during his childhood and the incredibly moving tale of Velutha an 'Untouchable' who is suspected of killing Sophie Mol.

Kafka on the Shore

Synopsis: Kafka on the Shore follows the fortunes of two remarkable characters. Kafka Tamura runs away from home at fifteen, under the shadow of his father's dark prophesy. The aging Nakata, tracker of lost cats, who never recovered from a bizarre childhood affliction, finds his pleasantly simplified life suddenly turned upside down. Their parallel odysseys are enriched throughout by vivid accomplices and mesmerising dramas. Cats converse with people; fish tumble from the sky; a ghostlike pimp deploys a Hegel-spouting girl of the night; a forest harbours soldiers apparently un-aged since WWII. There is a savage killing, but the identity of both victim and killer is a riddle. Murakami's novel is at once a classic quest, but it is also a bold exploration of mythic and contemporary taboos, of patricide, of mother-love, of sister-love. Above all it is an entertainment of a very high order.

Review: This is the first book that I've read of Haruki Murakami's and I'm not really sure what to make of it. There's a lot about it that I liked, the way the author mingles the ordinary with the mystical. It reminded me of Neil Gaiman's writing although I thought that the storyline was far more vague and there was less humour. It was very lyrical and poetic and had some great characters and strong imagery. On the downside I did feel like I was in the middle of a fog trying to find my way out to the exit.

Out of the two main storylines I was most drawn to the one about the elderly and simple minded Nakata. Nakata had been quite a clever child until a strange and bizarre incident caused him to lose all of his memory and most of his mental capacity. He has lost the ability to communicate easily with other people but has developed instead a unique talent for conversing with cats and it's a chance meeting with one particular lost cat that sets him off on a road trip of extraordinary adventure. I felt very emotionally attached to Nakata, he was like a very honest and disarming child who just says whatever it is they're thinking without feeling the need to complicate or be evasive.

'Nakata let his body relax, switched off his mind, allowing things to flow through him. This was natural for him, something he'd done ever since he was a child, without a second thought. Before long the borders of his consciousness fluttered around, just like the butterflies. Beyond these borders lay a dark abyss. Occasionally his consciousness would fly over the border and hover over that dizzying black crevasse. But Nakata wasn't afraid of the darkness or how deep it was. And why should he be? That bottomless world of darkness, that weighty silence and chaos, was an old friend, a part of him already. Nakata understood this well. In that world there was no writing, no days of the week, no scary Governor, no opera, no BMWs. No scissors, no tall hats. On the other hand, there was also no delicious eel, no tasty bean-jam buns. Everything is there, but there are no parts. Since there are no parts, there's no need to replace one thing with another. No need to remove anything, or add anything. You don't have to think about difficult things, just let yourself soak it all in. For Nakata, nothing could be better.'

The other storyline about fifteen year old runaway Kafka I was less keen on, I couldn't really warm to him and didn't ever feel I knew him at all. Kafka is running away from his past, in particular his father who has cursed him with some sort of Oedipal prophecy. He would like to find his mother and sister who he has never known. He has an alter ego -'the boy named Crow' - who more often than not provides Kafka with encouragement and words of wisdom.

The writing is very sensual although at times I thought it veered over into the gratuitous and the sex began to sound like the wishful thinking of every teenage boy - maybe it was. It's packed full of metaphor, weird time loops, people that may or may not be what or whom they seem, lots of magical realism with talking cats and skies full of raining mackerel and random philosophical quotations.

The book is full of gorgeous ingredients but when mixed together I'm not sure that they fulfilled their potential. I just didn't get it, that was all. I've had dreams similar to this and they're the type that you wake up sweating and bewildered about. I can still appreciate that it's an incredible piece of surreal writing. I was intrigued by it but ultimately confused. I realise that I probably need to have more ends tied up than this sort of writing is willing to provide which is a bit disappointing.

The Virgin Suicides (Audiobook)

Synopsis: The shocking thing about the girls was how nearly normal they seemed when their mother let them out for the one and only date of their lives. Twenty years on, their enigmatic personalities are embalmed in the memories of the boys who worshipped them and who now recall their shared adolescence: the brassiere draped over a crucifix belonging to the promiscuous Lux; the sisters' breathtaking appearance on the night of the dance; and the sultry, sleepy street across which they watched a family disintegrate and fragile lives disappear.

Review: A very melancholy and haunting tale told from the viewpoint of the boys who are infatuated with the five Lisbon sisters who had all committed suicide. The boys are all grown men now, but they are still mulling over the facts of the case, still interviewing the people connected, still wondering and coming to terms and trying to find reasons why these idolised girls would take their own lives.

It all began when the youngest Lisbon girl, Cecilia, then only thirteen, plunged to her death, at a party given in her honour at the family home. The boys were attending the party and therefore bore witness to the tragedy. The girls were already objects of interest to the boys and to the neighbourhood at large but after Cecilia's suicide, the Lisbon house and family become the target of neighbourhood gossip and speculation. The boys especially are fascinated, they collect snippets of information and any pieces of Lisbon flotsam and jetsam they can find or acquire. It's such an accurate portrayal of teenage infatuation and the often ridiculous lengths that the lovestruck will go to to glean any small detail about the object/s of their desire.

The Lisbon house gradually falls into a state of complete disrepair and decay. The grief stricken parents who were never exactly liberal in their parenting endeavour to keep a tighter rein on the girls, supressing and suffocating them in their attempts to keep them safe. After Mr Lisbon loses his job as a local schoolteacher, they become reclusive and are rarely seen. A smell begins to emanate from the house as it and the family slowly deteriorates. The boys remain captivated, they study the girls, stalking them almost, spying on the house and fingering their Lisbon treasures. Although their fascination is both creepy and macabre, Jeffrey Eugenides wonderful prose prevents it from becoming too sinister and the boys hapless and hopeless adoration is often scattered with humour.

From the outset you are aware that the remaining girls Therese (17), Mary (16), Bonnie (15) and Lux (14) will eventually follow in their sister's fatal footsteps and so the novel has that slow build of tension where you're expecting to lose another of the girls with every turn of the page, the author exploits this to the maximum. Though the girls were never exactly what you might call gregarious, they were, despite all their quirks and traits, fairly normal vibrant girls, with hopes and dreams and favourite lipstick colours and it's heart-rending to watch them diminish into mere ghosts of girls.

The boys realising that things are perhaps spiralling out of control try to reach out to the girls, they attempt to telephone the house and are successful in reaching them. They play each other records down the phone which they hope will provide comfort and inspiration (though to be honest the records which included Janis Ian's 'At Seventeen' and Carole Kings's 'So Far Away' would make anybody's list of top ten most melancholy songs ever) .. the most touching song of all beloved by the Lisbon girls is (another candidate for the list) Gilbert O' Sullivans 'Alone Again (Naturally)' and this touched me more than anything because it seemed to sum up perfectly their quiet, resigned despair.

One night, at the girls request, the boys creep into the Lisbon house to help them escape. They have obtained keys to a car and they intend to drive the girls to wherever they want to go whilst listening to their favourite soundtrack on cassette. The Lisbon girls have other plans though and the boys dreams come crashing down.

'So much has been said about the girls over the years. But we have never found an answer. It didn't matter in the end how old they had been, or that they were girls... but only that we had loved them... and that they hadn't heard us calling... still do not hear us calling them from out of those rooms... where they went to be alone for all time... and where we will never find the pieces to put them back together'.

Quite a depressing read (or listen), I didn't love it as much as 'Middlesex' though it is exquisitely written and is a totally compelling and unforgettable read. I thought the narration by Nick Landrum was excellent.