by Richard Flanagan
This book won the Man Booker Prize this year and the award is certainly deserved, unlike the title they chose last year.
The book is an amazing work of literature but it is brutal and devastating. I had to put it away several times because I couldn't deal will the brutality and cruelty in it.
It is the story of an Australian doctor who ends up serving in a Japanese POW camp in Burma. The man has a girl friend whom he proposes to, prior to leaving for the war. However, he also has a passionate affair with his uncle's wife.
The largest part of the story is about the hardships and cruelty the prisoners in the POW camp face as they are tasked with building a railway through the jungle. The book is graphic in details of the starvation, illness, cruelty of the Japanese officers and prison guards. It also shows kindness that the prisoners showed to each other. It also shows how the prisoners escape from the reality by remembering or daydreaming about life at home. The doctor does his best to look after and fight for the soldiers. He spends a lot of time thinking of his lover, Amy.
We learn that the man's uncle knew of the affair and tells his wife that Dorrigo, the Dr, has been killed in the war. The Doctor's fiancee likewise writes him a letter telling him that his lover died in a fire at the hotel/bar his uncle and she ran. Both things are untrue.
We then see the lives of some of the prisoners, guards and soldiers after the war. The Japanese and guards think that they did nothing wrong, they were acting on behalf the the Emperor and they look upon the soldiers who surrendered as weak and thus deserving of everything they suffered. Some of the prison camp staff are put on trial for war crimes and are sentenced to death but the major figures escape unscathed. Dorrigo meets the wife of one of the soldiers who died in the camp, she tells him how lonely she is without her husband, they were deeply in love.
Dorrigo returns to Australia and marries his fiancee. Despite acclaim he feels empty and the marriage is loveless. He has numerous affairs trying to fill the emptiness he fells. Dorrigo does rush through a barrier to save his wife and three children from a wildfire but it seems that he does this more as an automatic reaction, in an emergency, much like his work as a doctor in the POW camp, than an act of love.
One day he does see his lover and she sees him. He is surprised that she is still alive and does not approach her. He assumes that the two little girls she is with are hers, they are her nieces. She seems him and knew he was alive because of the news reports about him. She had thought of contacting him but never did. He had told her he would marry her.
The book does a brilliant job or representing the people and the lives, the good the bad and the ugly. However, it was just so hard to read I don't think I would ever reread it.
Wednesday, 17 December 2014
Sunday, 14 December 2014
A Quiet Kill
Janet Brons
This is a book by a woman who worked for the Canadian Foreign Service for part of her career. It is set at the High Commission in London England where one of the staff, a public relations person, has been brutally murdered in the High Commission building. It appears there may be an eco-terrorism connection to the murder as the RCMP officer assigned to the High Commission claims the weapon was a sealing club.
The Brits initiate the investigation of the murder and are soon joined by two RCMP officers from Canada and another Canadian official. As the site is officially Canadian territory there is some sensitivity as to what the role of the Brits is, but the two teams seem to work together fairly well. In the staff interviews we meet a strange little woman, who seems to be OCD and mental. She is obsessed about cleaning the building, patrols the building at the end of the day to clean or check for thefts. She cooks fabulous meals, imagining a handsome man will arrive someday to share the meals, and then throws them out uneaten. We also meet the frustrated chef, the Asst. to the Commissioner, the Commissioner who seems to be a decent man and his very rude and hated wife. We also meet an ecological activist.
Shortly thereafter a man is killed in his fur store. He and his wife are Canadians, making a living in England. His wife shows police threatening letters he has received. The police wonder if both deaths are the act of eco-terrorists and suspect the activist they have interviewed may be responsible. As the investigations continue they learn that the female victim was pregnant and that she had been having an affair with the Commissioner. The Commissioner had told his wife he wanted a divorce to marry the victim once his posting in England was over. Could the wife be the murderer? But what of the furrier?
The murdered woman's father arrives to claim his daughter's body. We learn that he was from Bosnia but moved to Montreal where he ran a successful dry cleaning business. The police then learn that the RCMP officer assigned to the High Commission was stationed in Bosnia and at the time there was suspicion that some of the military people were involved in drug trafficking out of Bosnia to North America.
The police rush to find the RCMP officer but he has been killed by the girl's father. The father is furious that the RCMP officer, who had been involved with the father in drug trafficking to raise money for Bosnia, did not protect his daughter. He doesn't realize that it was actually the officer who killed the man's daughter so she would not reveal his and her father's role in drug trafficking. He murdered the furrier just to confuse the police and try to direct police interest to eco-activists.
This was a small book but very well written. As it ends it seem like there may be future stories involving the Canadian female RCMP officer and the British Inspector... I hope so.
This is a book by a woman who worked for the Canadian Foreign Service for part of her career. It is set at the High Commission in London England where one of the staff, a public relations person, has been brutally murdered in the High Commission building. It appears there may be an eco-terrorism connection to the murder as the RCMP officer assigned to the High Commission claims the weapon was a sealing club.
The Brits initiate the investigation of the murder and are soon joined by two RCMP officers from Canada and another Canadian official. As the site is officially Canadian territory there is some sensitivity as to what the role of the Brits is, but the two teams seem to work together fairly well. In the staff interviews we meet a strange little woman, who seems to be OCD and mental. She is obsessed about cleaning the building, patrols the building at the end of the day to clean or check for thefts. She cooks fabulous meals, imagining a handsome man will arrive someday to share the meals, and then throws them out uneaten. We also meet the frustrated chef, the Asst. to the Commissioner, the Commissioner who seems to be a decent man and his very rude and hated wife. We also meet an ecological activist.
Shortly thereafter a man is killed in his fur store. He and his wife are Canadians, making a living in England. His wife shows police threatening letters he has received. The police wonder if both deaths are the act of eco-terrorists and suspect the activist they have interviewed may be responsible. As the investigations continue they learn that the female victim was pregnant and that she had been having an affair with the Commissioner. The Commissioner had told his wife he wanted a divorce to marry the victim once his posting in England was over. Could the wife be the murderer? But what of the furrier?
The murdered woman's father arrives to claim his daughter's body. We learn that he was from Bosnia but moved to Montreal where he ran a successful dry cleaning business. The police then learn that the RCMP officer assigned to the High Commission was stationed in Bosnia and at the time there was suspicion that some of the military people were involved in drug trafficking out of Bosnia to North America.
The police rush to find the RCMP officer but he has been killed by the girl's father. The father is furious that the RCMP officer, who had been involved with the father in drug trafficking to raise money for Bosnia, did not protect his daughter. He doesn't realize that it was actually the officer who killed the man's daughter so she would not reveal his and her father's role in drug trafficking. He murdered the furrier just to confuse the police and try to direct police interest to eco-activists.
This was a small book but very well written. As it ends it seem like there may be future stories involving the Canadian female RCMP officer and the British Inspector... I hope so.
Come Barbarians
by Todd Babiak,
"Christopher Kruse has moved to the south of France with his wife and daughter to become a better man—to escape his past as a high-priced security agent and his guilt over old wrongs. But after a harrowing accident, he finds himself drawn into a web of political gamesmanship and murder. When his wife disappears, Kruse must draw on his old instincts to find her, ahead of the police and two sinister members of a Corsican crime family. His desperate search leads him closer to his wife, and deeper into the dangerous machinations of the most powerful leaders in the country".
Kruse and his wife have moved to France. His wife is working as a pr person for a very conservative French political party. At a party for a local candidate their daughter is tragically killed by the candidate himself who hits her with his car. His wife is distraught and goes to see the candidate. His wife does not return and shortly after the candidate and his wife are found murdered in their home. Kruse proceeds to try to find his wife and prove her innocent of the murders. He gets some assistance from the local police officer but suddenly the police officer is forced into retirement.
Kruse keeps trying to find his wife and makes contact with other police who seem to want to help him but really want to use him to find his wife. His wife is brutally murdered but he keeps going to find out the truth, that the candidate was drugged by people who wanted to stop him from being elected. The physical training he received from his partner in his security company saves his life on numerous occasions.
The book was an interesting thriller but I found the graphic violence very unpleasant, especially since the last few books I have read have all had elements of imprisonment and torture in them. I would have enjoyed the book better if there had not been such graphic violence.
"Christopher Kruse has moved to the south of France with his wife and daughter to become a better man—to escape his past as a high-priced security agent and his guilt over old wrongs. But after a harrowing accident, he finds himself drawn into a web of political gamesmanship and murder. When his wife disappears, Kruse must draw on his old instincts to find her, ahead of the police and two sinister members of a Corsican crime family. His desperate search leads him closer to his wife, and deeper into the dangerous machinations of the most powerful leaders in the country".
Kruse and his wife have moved to France. His wife is working as a pr person for a very conservative French political party. At a party for a local candidate their daughter is tragically killed by the candidate himself who hits her with his car. His wife is distraught and goes to see the candidate. His wife does not return and shortly after the candidate and his wife are found murdered in their home. Kruse proceeds to try to find his wife and prove her innocent of the murders. He gets some assistance from the local police officer but suddenly the police officer is forced into retirement.
Kruse keeps trying to find his wife and makes contact with other police who seem to want to help him but really want to use him to find his wife. His wife is brutally murdered but he keeps going to find out the truth, that the candidate was drugged by people who wanted to stop him from being elected. The physical training he received from his partner in his security company saves his life on numerous occasions.
The book was an interesting thriller but I found the graphic violence very unpleasant, especially since the last few books I have read have all had elements of imprisonment and torture in them. I would have enjoyed the book better if there had not been such graphic violence.
The World Before Us
by Aislinn Hunter
This book is written by a Canadian but takes place in England. It is the story of a young woman, Jane, who is carrying around a big burden of guilt. As a young girl, 15, she was accompanying a widower and his daughter on a trip into the countryside. The man was doing some research about plants, the girl was supposed to be minding the little girl and she is playing a game with the girl but gets momentarily distracted and the girl disappears and is never found.
The young woman feels guilty because the girl disappeared, she also feels guilty because she had a juvenile crush on the man, and daydreamed about him.
When the story opens the young woman is working as an archivist in a small museum in London. The museum is being closed down because of lack of funding and she is helping to log and disperse items that have been sold. She will be losing her job and is understandably upset at this prospect. She is even more upset about the fact that William, the father of the girl who went missing, will be coming to speak at the museum about a book he has just written. She longs to see him again but also fears it.
The museum is actually the result of the research and collecting of one British man. The museum is located in his home, which has been converted to a museum with all sorts of biological specimens and other curiosities including a whale skeleton hanging from the ceiling.
Aside from her work at the museum, the girl has been working on research about an asylum near where the man's daughter disappeared. In the late 1800's two patients walked away from the asylum and wandered over to a local estate where they were invited to come in and have tea before being returned to the asylum. She learns that both men returned but is puzzled by another note saying that "N" is missing. She is curious as to who N is and what happened to her.
While she is wrapped up with wrapping items, thinking about the disappearance and William she is also puzzling about the Asylum incident. While she is working/thinking we find out that she is surrounded by a number of spirits/ghosts. They seem to follow her around. We don't learn their names, they don't see each other but know who is there by doing role calls, referring to each other by nicknames, boy, girl, poet, theologian, etc. The spirits enjoy looking at the exhibits, hoping that they or the girl will help them to figure out who they were in life. Some items seem to resonate with them. They seem to hope that if they find out who they were they will then no longer be in this suspended state.
The day of William's speech arrives and Jane listens to it. She is surprised by some of the things he says about the life of the museum creator and his acquaintances, he seems to give some things very short shrift. She is surprised to learn that he has remarried and has a little girl. It seems that he has gotten on with his life, something she has been unable to do. When she encounters him he doesn't recognize her. She slaps him on the face and runs from the building.
She leaves town in a hurry, leaving her cell phone behind, borrowing the family car, but not telling anyone what she is doing or where she is going. She leaves for the little village near where the little girl and woman N disappeared. She signs in at the hotel under a pseudonym. She then proceeds to the local archives to try to find out more about the truth about N. She examines asylum records and also letters and diaries of the family that own the estate. She visits the estate which is under restoration to be a museum and meets a young gardener who shows her around. She tells him she is a trust researcher and tells him her false name. The young man is a much younger than her but seems to really fall for her and they have sex.
She finds out that one of the two escapees died a short time after his escape. She later learns that he was killed at the estate he had visited previously by one of the men of the estate. She figures out that N was an employee at the asylum and then went to work on the estate. She also learns that there was an affair between one of the men of the estate and the wife of another man. As she is doing her research some of the spirits seem to figure out a bit more about themselves, for example the theologian determines that he was a school teacher who had an affair with the other man of the estate. We suspect that the "quiet one" might be N and I think the little girl may have been Jane's charge.
Eventually Jane tells the young man her true name. He is shocked that he lied to her but still loves her. The police arrive at her hotel room while she is out, not because she is in trouble, but because she has been reported as a missing person. As the story ends Jane has given the young man her number in London, the spirits are still around thinking they are there to help Jane, not the other way around. We never learn what really happened to the young girl, if she drowned or was killed.
I enjoyed the idea of the story and of the spirits hovering around but had expected some sort of resolution for Jane but that didn't seem to happen. She did of course learn that William had chosen to live in the present, something she hadn't been doing. An unusual and engaging, if somewhat unresolved story.
This book is written by a Canadian but takes place in England. It is the story of a young woman, Jane, who is carrying around a big burden of guilt. As a young girl, 15, she was accompanying a widower and his daughter on a trip into the countryside. The man was doing some research about plants, the girl was supposed to be minding the little girl and she is playing a game with the girl but gets momentarily distracted and the girl disappears and is never found.
The young woman feels guilty because the girl disappeared, she also feels guilty because she had a juvenile crush on the man, and daydreamed about him.
When the story opens the young woman is working as an archivist in a small museum in London. The museum is being closed down because of lack of funding and she is helping to log and disperse items that have been sold. She will be losing her job and is understandably upset at this prospect. She is even more upset about the fact that William, the father of the girl who went missing, will be coming to speak at the museum about a book he has just written. She longs to see him again but also fears it.
The museum is actually the result of the research and collecting of one British man. The museum is located in his home, which has been converted to a museum with all sorts of biological specimens and other curiosities including a whale skeleton hanging from the ceiling.
Aside from her work at the museum, the girl has been working on research about an asylum near where the man's daughter disappeared. In the late 1800's two patients walked away from the asylum and wandered over to a local estate where they were invited to come in and have tea before being returned to the asylum. She learns that both men returned but is puzzled by another note saying that "N" is missing. She is curious as to who N is and what happened to her.
While she is wrapped up with wrapping items, thinking about the disappearance and William she is also puzzling about the Asylum incident. While she is working/thinking we find out that she is surrounded by a number of spirits/ghosts. They seem to follow her around. We don't learn their names, they don't see each other but know who is there by doing role calls, referring to each other by nicknames, boy, girl, poet, theologian, etc. The spirits enjoy looking at the exhibits, hoping that they or the girl will help them to figure out who they were in life. Some items seem to resonate with them. They seem to hope that if they find out who they were they will then no longer be in this suspended state.
The day of William's speech arrives and Jane listens to it. She is surprised by some of the things he says about the life of the museum creator and his acquaintances, he seems to give some things very short shrift. She is surprised to learn that he has remarried and has a little girl. It seems that he has gotten on with his life, something she has been unable to do. When she encounters him he doesn't recognize her. She slaps him on the face and runs from the building.
She leaves town in a hurry, leaving her cell phone behind, borrowing the family car, but not telling anyone what she is doing or where she is going. She leaves for the little village near where the little girl and woman N disappeared. She signs in at the hotel under a pseudonym. She then proceeds to the local archives to try to find out more about the truth about N. She examines asylum records and also letters and diaries of the family that own the estate. She visits the estate which is under restoration to be a museum and meets a young gardener who shows her around. She tells him she is a trust researcher and tells him her false name. The young man is a much younger than her but seems to really fall for her and they have sex.
She finds out that one of the two escapees died a short time after his escape. She later learns that he was killed at the estate he had visited previously by one of the men of the estate. She figures out that N was an employee at the asylum and then went to work on the estate. She also learns that there was an affair between one of the men of the estate and the wife of another man. As she is doing her research some of the spirits seem to figure out a bit more about themselves, for example the theologian determines that he was a school teacher who had an affair with the other man of the estate. We suspect that the "quiet one" might be N and I think the little girl may have been Jane's charge.
Eventually Jane tells the young man her true name. He is shocked that he lied to her but still loves her. The police arrive at her hotel room while she is out, not because she is in trouble, but because she has been reported as a missing person. As the story ends Jane has given the young man her number in London, the spirits are still around thinking they are there to help Jane, not the other way around. We never learn what really happened to the young girl, if she drowned or was killed.
I enjoyed the idea of the story and of the spirits hovering around but had expected some sort of resolution for Jane but that didn't seem to happen. She did of course learn that William had chosen to live in the present, something she hadn't been doing. An unusual and engaging, if somewhat unresolved story.
Us Conductors
by Seanid Michaels
This book just won the Giller Prize. It is the story of the life of Leon Termin, the inventor of the strange musical instrument called the Theremin. It takes us from his life as a scientist in Leningrad to a glamourous life in the United States where he is 1)trying to sell his invention to a big company. His vision is to have a theremin in every home in America. 2)he is conducting spying activities on behalf of the Soviet Union and has a minder who tells him who to see and what to do.
It was a well researched story. It was interesting to learn more about his life. I know of the theremin but didn't realize that he had actually trained people to play it and had concerts in Europe and the U.S. While he was in the U.S. he mixed with the rich and famous. At some point we learn that he is basically broke. We never find out what happened to his money. Did he not make any or did his minder waste it somehow?
One of his friends becomes his patron and offers him an apartment in his building in return for teaching his wife to play the theremin.
Termin married a woman in Russia and brought her to the U.S. She lived in New Jersey, they didn't really see much of each other and eventually they divorce. He carries on an affair with another woman even before he is divorced.
The good life is suddenly over, Theremin is scooped up and sent back to Russia, locked into a room on a freighter on his way back. He is sentenced as a traitor and tortured in the prisons. He doesn't believe he has done anything wrong but eventually confesses just to get the tortures to stop. He eventually is released and remarries.
He seemed to be a brilliant man, it seemed puzzling that the Russian's would waste his brilliance by locking him up.
This book just won the Giller Prize. It is the story of the life of Leon Termin, the inventor of the strange musical instrument called the Theremin. It takes us from his life as a scientist in Leningrad to a glamourous life in the United States where he is 1)trying to sell his invention to a big company. His vision is to have a theremin in every home in America. 2)he is conducting spying activities on behalf of the Soviet Union and has a minder who tells him who to see and what to do.
It was a well researched story. It was interesting to learn more about his life. I know of the theremin but didn't realize that he had actually trained people to play it and had concerts in Europe and the U.S. While he was in the U.S. he mixed with the rich and famous. At some point we learn that he is basically broke. We never find out what happened to his money. Did he not make any or did his minder waste it somehow?
One of his friends becomes his patron and offers him an apartment in his building in return for teaching his wife to play the theremin.
Termin married a woman in Russia and brought her to the U.S. She lived in New Jersey, they didn't really see much of each other and eventually they divorce. He carries on an affair with another woman even before he is divorced.
The good life is suddenly over, Theremin is scooped up and sent back to Russia, locked into a room on a freighter on his way back. He is sentenced as a traitor and tortured in the prisons. He doesn't believe he has done anything wrong but eventually confesses just to get the tortures to stop. He eventually is released and remarries.
He seemed to be a brilliant man, it seemed puzzling that the Russian's would waste his brilliance by locking him up.
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