Hm, can one call it a failure if I never actually stated that I would read the entirety of the longlist before the prize was awarded? To be fair, that hasn’t be done yet and only the shortlist is being announced today…

Suffice to say, though, I have only read four of this year’s Man Booker dozen and in the process of reading another; I have only reviewed two, one of which I loved but doubt will make the longlist because it is too “popular” and “readable” (as if they are bad words!)  My lack of motivation had nothing to do with the judges’ choices but more my own craving for older fiction, which has been previously documented on Paperback Reader.

I do intend on reading the shortlist but will not be rushing to do so before the winner is announced on October 12th; in fact, since I own all of this year’s longlist I do plan on reading all of the books at some point but not with any deadline or enforced timetable on my part.  I look forward to reading more about what the judges and my blogging peers think of the choices before committing myself to reading them in any order.

However, I could not resist speculating which books will make the shortlist later today.  Now, as I have only read 1.5 of the books enough this is not at all an informed opinion!  I am simply basing my prospective shortlist on what I have heard/read about the titles and my own instinct.

I would also like to draw attention to two of the titles I think will make the shortlist -The Slap and In a Strange Room- featuring on the inaugural longlist for The Green Carnation Prize.  Please check out this prize if you have not already; the focus on gay literature is one born of a passion for reading and a desire to highlight the work of gay writers, which can only be a good thing.  I have read In a Strange Room and will definitely be reading The Slap as well as exploring some other titles on the longlist.

Please check out the Man Booker shortlist once it has been released and see how my guesses matched up!

Ahem.  I seem to have acquired a good few books over the last month.  A number of these, if not all, have transpired from my recent desire to return to my reading roots and the above reflect my true and yet diverse reading tastes.  Very few of the titles are actually new fiction but those that are follow a pattern of series reading or timeless fiction.

Bought: Verity and I visited the Notting Hill Book Exchange recommended by Simon T, which allowed us to indulge in our favourite activity of book shopping whilst culling some of our collection (I exchanged over twenty books for six others and credit for my next visit).  Anyway, I came away with six books that I have been wanting to read and/or own.

Fireflies by Shiva Naipaul: Shiva is the younger brother of V.S. Naipaul and Fireflies is a family saga novel that has been on my radar for some time but the novel is out-of-print.

Lark and Termite by Jayne Anne Phillips: a review by Jill of Fizzy Thoughts brought this novel to my attention a few months ago; I borrowed the book from the library, read the first fifty pages and realised it was a book that I had to own.  When I saw a perfect copy of this for a £1 in the bookshop I gladly added it to the pile.

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers: I have read and enjoyed McCullers’ novella, The Ballad of the Sad Cafe, and been looking for a (pristine) copy of her critically-acclaimed first novel in the silver Penguin edition.

Hetty Dorval by Ethel Wilson: I read this Persephone book during the first Persephone Reading Week but had borrowed it from Verity.  I can never leave an unowned Persephone in a secondhand bookshop.

Rule Britannia by Daphne Du Maurier: this is not a novel I have come across mention of before but I would like to own (and of course read) all of Daphne Du Maurier’s books one day and picking up good copies secondhand makes a start at least.

Rabbit Redux by John Updike: I have still to review it but I read and adored Couples by Updike last month and good not resist picking up another of his novels (in a matching white Penguin edition); now I need to find Rabbit Run before starting the Rabbit series.

I also separately bought copies of The Lonely Londoners by Sam Selvon and The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen.  The former was mentioned by Kim of Reading Matters at book group last winter and then chosen as this month’s read; the latter is a book I have been very curious to read, one Steph raves about and the buzz surrounding Franzen’s forthcoming novel has reminded me to finally read this one.

Received from publishers: Some of my favourite publishers conveniently publish older books and as I have been craving older books in my reading, I requested some, along with receiving a few newer and forthcoming titles.

After enjoying A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood, Indira of Vintage Books generously sent me Mr Norris Changes Trains and Goodbye to Berlin.

Excitingly Alexandra of Scholastic Books sent me a copy of Mockinjay by Suzanne Collins, the third in the Hunger Games trilogy.  As the book was under international embargo I received it on the day of its UK release and read it immediately; my review is forthcoming.

Sophie, Judith and Zoё each sent me a Virago title.  Zoё sent me the paperback edition of Margaret Atwood’s The Year of the Flood; I have been seeking more Atwood in my life but I’m undecided still which novel to read next.  Sophie and Judith, respectively, sent me the latest Virago Modern Classic titles: Desert of the Heart by Jane Rule, a reputed lesbian classic, and When Rain Clouds Gather & Maru by Bessie Head, a double-header from the prominent Botswanan writer.

The lovely Kirsty of Oxford World Classics sent me a number of classics to fuel my current craving, especially for Dickens.  I am already rereading Great Expectations, one of my favourite Victorian novels, and looking full of anticipation for The Pickwick Papers and The Old Curiosity Shop.  I also shamelessly requested a copy of The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas after a real hankering to read it (it should last me a while on its own…) and Kirsty sent me Tarr by Wyndham Lewis, a modernist novel that I am intrigued to read as my Master’s degree covered the modernist period.

Hand Me Down World by Lloyd Jones is his latest novel.  I loved Mister Pip when I read (and recently reread) and look forward to reading his new novel.  John Murray amazingly invited me along to a dinner with Lloyd Jones, who is visiting from New Zealand to promote the book, and other book bloggers, publishers and book industry people.  It was an exceedingly enjoyable evening with fascinating bookish chat and Lloyd kindly signed my proof copy of the book.

Lastly we have a proof copy of Mary Ann in Autumn by Armistead Maupin sent to me my Alison of Transworld Books.  This is by far the most exciting book I have yet received as a book blogger; I am a huge fan of Maupin’s Tales of the City series and this, the eight book in the series, is not released until November, and I read it immediately.

Many thanks to the publicists who contributed to my most recent acquisitions.

Have you read any of the books from this extensive installment of recent acquisitions?

When I read Little Boy Lost by Marghanita Laski a year ago, I felt as if my heart had been ripped out in the heightened emotion of the closing pages; with Still Missing by Beth Gutcheon, the emotional intensity was present from the opening page and sustained throughout; my heart when not in my mouth leapt, contracted and plummeted for the duration of the novel.

From the arresting first pages (which can be read almost in entirety on the Persephone webpage) we know that this is a novel about loss, the unbearable loss of losing a child.

Alex Selky, going on seven, so eager to grow up, kissed his mother goodbye on their front steps on the hot bright morning of May 15 1980, and marched himself down the street on his way to the New Boston School of Back Bay, two blocks from his corner. He never arrived at school, and from the moment he turned the corner, he apparently disappeared from the face of the earth.

We are shown and given insight into the impact of Alex’s disappearance on those who loved him, especially his mother, and Al Menetti, the detective assigned to his case.  Still Missing is raw and emotive but never sentimentalises; it provides an inside -albeit fictitious- look at the trauma of a missing child; of the public and media attention; of the overwhelming support and judgment of strangers; of the unrelenting hunt for clues and scanning of children’s faces on the street and in the park; of unrelinquished hope.  Susan Selky, mother to Alex, Harvard English professor, recently separated from her husband, refuses to give up hope that Alex will be found; it is Susan’s faith and tenacity that carries -or rather propels- the reader through the novel ’s thrilling pages.  Structured loosely as a thriller complete with a leading detective who first comes off as a Columbo-type, Still Missing has exceptional emotional depth and vivid characterisation.

Gutcheon explores the dramatic behind-the-scenes investigations in a missing child case where nobody is above suspicion and every secret is unearthed and revealed; in the public eye and being under investigation by the police, everyone’s motives and actions are held up to scrutiny and nothing is private, even grief.  What Gutcheon does remarkably well is tackle the stereotypes and the judgments that come with a high-profile missing child case; everyone has an opinion and Still Missing does not shy away from showing how the public often react to what they deem to be the parents’ irresponsibility in losing their child or how the parents conduct themselves in the aftermath, which prompts the reader to examine their own prejudices.  The stereotypes are infuriating but fitting for the 1980 setting and Gutcheon never endorses them but presents them in the historical framework of the early years of the Gay Rights movement.

Susan Selky is a compelling character; Gutcheon has drawn a vivid portrait of a grieving mother whose pain is palpable.  Each of Gutcheon’s characters are very well realised with their flaws on display and private conversations -outwith Susan’s presence- and indiscretions revealed but Susan is particularly memorable.  The disappearance of Alex seems very real and the conversations that take place and reactions of Susan -and her husband, Graham- convincing and also illuminating.

Much has been made of the seeming modernity of this in relation to other Persephone Books but it has an almost timeless quality and universal appeal.  The Persephone titles I respond to strongly are those that focus on relationships and raw emotions; the highly emotive Still Missing easily joins Laski and Whipple and could be said to be quintessentially Persephone.  Preceding its reissue earlier this year I had discussed the book with Lydia at the Lamb’s Conduit Street shop who told me that Nicola Beauman had been wanting to publish it for years, since it inexplicably fell out-of-print in the UK, but that high-profile child abductions had made it inappropriate to reissue earlier.

Still Missing is a powerfully moving novel about the disappearance of a child and the months following (hence the “still”).  As the investigation loses momentum Susan sits at her window every morning facing the corner where she last saw Alex and this scene touchingly shifts through seasons.

As the days grew shorter and the chill in the autumn air deepened, the long uneven panes of glass in the living-room were grey with thin frost when Susan went with her coffee cup in the early mornings to sit looking down at the street.  From the lush gold and blue, deep as an overturned bowl, of the last morning on earth that she saw her son, the light had changed to the flat grey brightness of impending winter.

The quiet poignancy of the above scene and the pain of Susan is a good example of the tone of the novel; the weather has changed but Susan’s undying hope that Alex is still alive and will reappear has not.

Other favourite passages:

Uh-huh, thought Menetti.  Now it starts.  It can’t happen to me.  It happened to her, she lost her kid, but if there’s something funny about her, then there’s a reason it could happen to her but it couldn’t happen to me.  Now starts the drawing away, the pulling aside, the setting the Selkys apart.

To have her house and her heart and her life held open, exposed to the public at this moment, to be robbed of the personal and private in tragedy, was particularly bitter.

Something beneath her ribcage leaped and tore.  These slams of pain were so physically felt, she wondered if it were possible to go on taking them without the inner fibres beginning to actually shiver apart, like the creak and scream of a wooden boat breaking up in a storm.

It is all too seldom that one finds a book to embrace to your heart upon finishing but The Blue Castle by L. M. Montgomery is one such book.  I clasped it with such joy and contentment and poignancy that the experience was over; I fell in love with this book and I am delighted that it will be one that I can revisit often whenever I require to be comforted or cheered.

The Blue Castle is a book I only discovered the existence of through other wonderful bloggers.  Rachel had me coveting a copy when she waxed lyrical about it last last year, swiftly followed by Steph and then Ana; when three of my favourite blogging acquaintances all endorse a book so enthusiastically then it is one I must read.  Besides which, Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne books are close to me heart; Anne Shirley is a “kindred spirit” of mine and previously undiscovered treasures of Montgomery called to me.  Regrettably The Blue Castle (and most of Montgomery’s other work, not of the Anne or Emily series of books) is out-of-print and unavailable in the UK, with secondhand copies rare and extortionate; I was holding off until later this summer to order a copy from Canada to coincide with a relative coming over here to visit but as I was costing the order I serendipitously came across a bargain copy shipped from the US.  Less than two weeks later The Blue Castle was in my eagerly awaiting hands and further timely blog posts along with some gentle but persistent persuasion  from Elaine and Ana conspired and I read it immediately.  The satisfaction and excitement I had reading The Blue Castle on a whim was at the root of my decision yesterday to do such things more frequently; I could not in any conscience deprive myself of future experiences of the same nature.

The Blue Castle is thoroughly enchanting.  I spent last Sunday wrapped up in it as if it was a cosy duvet and felt infused with warmth.  Eva said it best when she wrote that, “it almost felt like something Anne Shirley herself would have written”.  Valancy Stirling is twenty-nine and never been in love; her imagination and heart is free in her daydreams of her blue castle (the locale of romance and happiness) and in reading the “forbidden” nature books of John Foster  but in life she is restricted by her family who call her “Doss”.  Valancy’s mother and Cousin Stickles, whom she lives with, her Uncle Benjamin and other members of the Stirling family treat her disparagingly by relentlessly mocking and bullying her; resigned to being an old maid, she meekly accepts her family’s overbearing and cruel ways.  A visit to Doctor Trent  liberates Valancy and she begins to live life, saying and doing exactly as she wants; Valancy begins to think and behave as if she lived in her blue castle, where she is unconfined by social mores and familial obligation.

If it had not rained on a certain May morning Valancy Stirling’s whole life would have been entirely different.  She would have gone, with the rest of her clan, to Aunt Wellington’s engagement picnic and Dr. Trent would have gone to Montreal.  But it did rain and you shall hear what happened to her because of it.

Valancy reviewed her whole life between midnight and the early spring dawn.  It was a very drab existence, but here and there an incident loomed out with a significance out of all proportion to its real importance.  These incidents were all unpleasant in one way or another.  Nothing really pleasant had ever happened to Valancy.

Afraid of her mother’s sulky fits–afraid of offending Uncle Benjamin–afraid of becoming a target for Aunt Wellington’s contempt–afraid of Aunt Isabel’s biting comments–afraid of Uncle James’ disapproval–afraid of offending the whole clan’s opinions and prejudices–afraid of not keeping up appearances–afraid to say what she really thought of anything–afraid of poverty in her old age. Fear–fear–fear–she could never escape from it. It bound her and enmeshed her like a spider’s web of steel. Only in her Blue Castle could she find temporary release. And this morning Valancy could not believe she had a Blue Castle. She would never be able to find it again. Twenty-nine, unmarried, undesired–what had she to do with the fairy-like chatelaine of the Blue Castle? She would cut such childish nonsense out of her life forever and face reality unflinchingly.

I was charmed by The Blue Castle and heart-warmed.  It is a romance with fairy tale elements (including references to one of my favourites, Bluebeard) that reminded me of I Capture the Castle mixed with the magic of Anne of Green Gables and the social satire of Jane Austen.  This is a delightful novel that I would expect to find in the catalogue of Persephone Books, with Valancy a wonderful heroine fitting of the company.  The Blue Castle is predictable but so comforting and satisfying a read that I would happily forego being surprised ever again if it meant being continually delighted by Valancy and her Blue Castle.

You may have noticed that my blogging has been somewhat sporadic of late.  This has been for a myriad of reasons; I have been busier than normal with several projects and a busy calendar, which is going to become even more chaotic over the coming months.  However, I have also been a bit of a malcontent when it comes to blogging.  I doubt that it is anything more sinister than being slightly overwhelmed by a backlog of reviews and a lack of inspiration and motivation to catch up but I have been struggling a little in finding the joy I once did in my book blog.

So, changes are afoot at Paperback Reader. Nothing ominous or shocking, don’t worry.  I love my website and I don’t intend to stop posting but I do need to recapture the passion I use to have for blogging.  To begin with I want to return to my roots, as it were, and read from my own collection more.  I have a strong background in English literature and I have a deep desire to read some classics (inspired, in part, by The Classics Blogger Directory that Amanda of The Zen Leaf has generously implemented).  I will still read modern fiction but I am craving those older books (some no older than earlier this century and others several centuries old) that have been languishing on my shelves whilst I succumbed to the temptation of review copies and recently-published titles.

Becoming caught up in new titles has been an unexpected by-product of book blogging and it is something I have enjoyed; discovering new-to-me authors and following literary prizes and the organic buzz of the blogosphere has been fun but I miss my pre-blogging reading.  I used to have the freedom to pick up books on a whim from my bookshelves and I am desperate for that level of choice once more.  I am fifty pages from the end of my current read (a reread, no less, which I also rarely have time for anymore) and have absolutely no plans after that.  I have freed myself from any thoughts of “Oh, I must read that Booker longlisted title or such-and-such a title for this deadline or that” and succumbing entirely to whim.  I have many, many books on my bookshelves -classics, prize-winners, hyped books, cult classics, off-the-beaten track titles- that have been sidelined for too long and it’s time I return to the stacks.  I intend no disparagement of new titles but there are books I own (some for several years) that are established classics and have stood the test of time; I feel less inclined to run the risk of newer fiction that I do for books that I trust are beloved by fellow bibliophiles for a reason.  That’s not to say that I won’t be rushing to read the new Michael Cunningham/Haruki Murakami/Jeffrey Eugenides novels as I will but they are favourite writers and I know they will be worth the reading time.

Life is too short to not read the books I have been wanting to for years.  Although I have been interspersing those reads with more recent ones, finding a balance on my blog between old and new, it has been more of juggling-act than reading for sheer pleasure.  I’m sure I am not alone in feeling the need to immerse myself in quality literature, good stories and comfort reading without any pressure and the added insurance that it’s a book I am likely to love or escape in.

Creativity and inspiration will, I hope, return to my blog and I have some ideas for new features and the revival of old favourites to regale you with.  I don’t foresee the shift in focus in Paperback Reader being too perceptible really to anyone except me but it’s important to me that you understand why I am going to be reading more for me than any outside influence.  My posting style won’t change -although it will hopefully become regular again- but it should reflect the enthusiasm and enjoyment I have for reading and writing.

It is time to dust off some neglected books on my bookshelves* and blow away the cobwebs.

*a new bookcase has been built this weekend that I will be sure to share with you soon.

Damon Galgut was a writer I had not encountered before  In a Strange Room was longlisted for this year’s Man Booker prize.  He has been previously shortlisted and the blurb on the front of this book alludes to him being “a kindred spirit of the great Coetzee”; as a recent yet ardent fan of Coetzee, I was most intrigued.  I also read that In a Strange Room would be liked this year by those who enjoyed Summertime last year; I was impressed and wowed by the latter novel so was excited by the comparison.  Regrettably, the similarities between Galgut and Coetzee did not really extend for me beyond their shared South African heritage and the similar front covers of In a Strange Room and Summertime; both attempt to do something different with autobiography but Galgut is not in the same league as Coeztee and his In a Strange Room is the poorer writer’s Summertime.

In a Strange Room has a tripartite structure; the book is divided into three separate stories – the Follower, the Lover, the Guardian-  each following the protagonist/narrator in his travels. The protagonist is Damon, a South African and a writer looking back on three memorable travel experiences; like John in Summertime, Damon is Galgut and Galgut approaches writing autobiography in a different form.  The narration shifts between first and third-person, with passages often changing between “he” and “I” pronouns mid-line; these shifts increase in frequency as the book progresses and as Galgut asserts himself as the protagonist.  I found this an incredibly off-putting device and did not entirely see any point to it other than experimentation; I think it was supposed to act as a means to distinguish between older and fresher memories and their strength but it was not effective for me and distanced me from the story, such as it was.

There is not much of an over-arching plot to In a Strange Room and the three sections lacked any cohesion together other than their travel and traveller connection.  In the Follower Damon’s travels take him through Greece where he meets Reiner, a fellow traveller, who he connects and disconnects with; in the Lover Damon travels through Africa in a small group that includes Jerome, who is never in actuality his lover but who he does share an intense attraction with; in the Guardian Damon is in India with his friend Anna who is suffering from mental illness.  The Guardian was the section that had the most emotional resonance for me, was fast-paced and had a plot; I wish Galgut had developed this memory -the one closer to him in time and depth of feeling- into a novel-length work; I would have loved to have discovered more about Anna and Caroline and think the Guardian section would have worked exceptionally well stand-alone.

In a Strange Room ended powerfully but a book should be judged on its overall strengths and this one did not have a beginning, middle and an end but three disconnected stories, one of which I loved and two that bored me.  In a Strange Room is a journey novel, one of those where a journey -or three- act as a metaphor for a journey of self-discovery; the motif itself is old-hat and I don’t think that Galgut said anything more profound on travel than Paul Coelho has in the past.  Each section appeared in The Paris Review as a separate piece and I think they should have remained that way, with the Guardian piece reworked and developed.

This book has garnered much appreciation in less-pedestrian quarters and I think it may very well be shortlisted for the Booker but I did not care for it very much.

You may have noticed that Room by Emma Donoghue is a novel that is receiving a lot of attention across the blogosphere.  Longlisted for this year’s Man Booker prize, there has been an ever-increasing organic buzz surrounding the novel, that is exciting, deserved and nothing like a droning vuvuzela.  Picador in the UK have been fully-behind Room from the beginning, acquiring it for a six figure sum after a hotly-contested multi-publisher auction.  I received a proof copy of the book months ago and am ashamed I did not pick it up sooner, instead seemingly jumping on the bandwagon once everyone else was reading and reviewing it too.  As it was, I opted for Room over any of the remaining Booker dozen because I found its premise appealing and intriguing.

Room is highly original and incomparable; it really is like nothing I have read before.  Much has been made of the novel’s readability and the fact that it can be easily read in one sitting but it is incredibly accessible and thrilling; I found it difficult to put down and in my second -and last- sitting I read it late into the night.  I do wonder, however, how it will stand up to multiple rereads (by the Booker judges) as it relies heavily upon suspense, intensity and revelation.  I also wonder if it is too accessible and popular to take the prize; although I found it immensely readable and outstanding in its originality, I did not think it was particularly literary.

Inspired by the Fritzl case, where Elisabeth Fritzl and her children were found to have been incarcerated in the basement of their captor’s (in this case, Joseph Fritzl, the woman’s father and children’s father/grandfather) house in Austria, Room is about Jack, a five-year-old boy and his Ma, who are being help captive in the room of the title.  Eleven feet by eleven feet, Room is a converted garden shed with a security door and a skylight somewhere in America (a detailed plan of Room can be viewed here).  Narrated by Jack we are given unique insight into their way-of-life beginning on his fifth birthday.  To Jack, Room is the height of his existence with everything Outside make-believe; they watch a limited amount of television together each day but Jack knows -because Ma has told him- that everything in TV is pretend and only he, Ma and the things in Room are real.  Now that he is five, Ma thinks he is old enough to know that there is a world outside and begins the process of “unlying” to him.  Through Jack’s innocent point-of-view we learn that Ma, a nineteen-year-old student, was lured by her captor, “Old Nick”, seven years previously and is visited nightly by him, hiding Jack in the wardrobe where he listens to and counts “Old Nick creaks Bed”.  Like Fritzl Old Nick withholds food and power as punishment and other day-to-day actualities and pertinent plot points directly mirror the real-life case.

Jack’s innocent voice lessens the tragedy of what is being described whilst still poignant; Donoghue has employed a very clever device in her narration because the depiction of events are far less harrowing through the eyes and words of a child.  Ma educates and exercises Jack via games and imagination but some of the games serve an essential purpose, minus Jack’s understanding of it.

After nap we do Scream every day but not Saturdays or Sundays.  We clear our throats and climb up on Table to be nearer Skylight, holding hands not to fall.  We say “On your mark, get set, go,” then we open wide our teeth and shout holler howl yowl shriek screech scream the loudest possible.  Today I’m the most loudest ever because my lungs are stretching from being five.

Then we shush with fingers on lips. I asked Ma once what we’re listening for and she said just in case, you never know.

The quote provides an insight into the style of Room in addition to illustrating the above point.  To begin with the style irritated me as I became used to how Jack looked at Room and life but by the latter half of the book I found Jack exceedingly endearing.  I cannot reveal to you what changed for me without spoiling the book but the narrative voice really grew on me; Jack inspires one to look at things differently.

Some readers will have issues with the subject matter and its topicality (there is a suggestion in the novel that Ma could have chosen to smother Jack upon birth as opposed to raise him in that confined and restricted environment and I was struck by recent news stories not of the kidnapping variety) but Donoghue goes further than striving for shock factor and the sentimental.  The most touching part of Room is the strong bond between mother and child and how Ma teaches Jack and interacts with him using limited means; Room is a testimony of imagination, exhibited by how Ma and Jack use theirs.  The quote below demonstrates how novel and important this interaction is but ***beware of spoilers (in reading the quotes -only the quotes- below you will instantly see where the novel goes)***  So often children are deprived of one-on-one parental attention and imaginative play that is essential to their development.  Jack is articulate (within his perimeters) , intelligent and possesses an extensive vocabulary due to the extended time he spends with his parents; no, Jack and Ma’s situation is not the means of raising a savant child but a happy medium in child rearing is required.  Of course, Jack’s unique situation, his advanced grasp of language and increased childhood innocence is what makes him so believable, useful and cherished as a narrator.  Emma Donoghue interesting discusses her use of Jack’s voice, its intent and her means of creating it in this article; she modeled Jack on her own five-year-old son, Finn, at the time of writing, whilst making necessary adaptations in lieu of Jack’s unique upbringing.

The child-mother bond is the crux of the novel in its extraordinary setting.  Ma breastfeeds Jack, amusingly referred to as “some” by him with references to left and right and the creamier; modern society can be so outraged by breastfeeding beyond a certain age and public feeding and Donoghue tackles the stigma that natural feeding attracts head-on.  The second quote below (again, it is a spoiler) concerns breastfeeding, underlining people’s obsession with it, was one of the funniest in the novel for me.

With its Room setting and framing and its onus on TV being unreal, I believe that Donoghue is playing with the concept of the Fourth Wall and what makes reality.  Ultimately it is a gimmicky book but one that is immensely readable and that I shall be passing on both physically and as a recommendation to everyone I know.

The below quotes contain spoilers.

Also everywhere I’m looking at kids, adults mostly don’t seem to like them, not even the parents do.  They call the kids gorgeous and so cute, they make the kids do the thing all over again so they can take a photo, but they don’t want to actually play with them, they’d rather drink coffee talking to other adults.  Sometimes there’s a small kid crying and the Ma doesn’t even hear.

The woman nods.  “You breastfed him. In fact, this may startle some of our viewers, I understand you still do?”

Ma laughs.

The woman stares at her.

“In this whole story, that’s the shocking detail?”

Strictly speaking this installment of Recent Acquisitions are not that recent but from early last month.  I forgot to post them whilst I was away (despite adding one of them to my summer reading pile) but wanted to share them with you before the latest -and Booker longlist heavy- acquisitions.

Kirsty of Oxford University Press generously sent me a couple more Oxford World Classics.  Candide and Other Stories was one I wanted to read after Amanda of The Zen Leaf told me how surprisingly funny she was finding it (her subsequent review); Voltaire has always intimidated me but I did not realise that Candide was a satire.  Nana by Émile Zola is a novel by another French great that I have been wanting to read since reading this review by Mae of Mad Bibliophile earlier this year.

Looking for Alaska by John Green is the book I have already shared in my summer reads post; after loving Paper Towns I bought both Looking for Alaska and An Abundance of Katherines and excited about reading them (both were loved by Nymeth).

Rosamund of Penguin Books kindly sent me a couple of their newest Viking titles.  I very rarely read memoirs and never any of this kind but After You: Letters of Love, and Loss, to a Husband and a Father by Natascha McElhone caught my eye; the actress continued to write letters to her husband (working in L.A. whilst he was in London, she regularly wrote to him) after his sudden death whilst she was seven months pregnant with their third child.  I’m a fan of McElhone for her role in the TV show Californication and I remember the news of her husband’s death; she has published her letters and diary extracts from a time of unrelenting grief.

Also from Penguin came The Invisible Bridge by Julie Orringer, which sounds like a beautiful love story; a magazine review of the book brought it to my attention.  I have to admit to find the sheer size and weight of it daunting.

Have you read any of these books or looking forward to hearing more about any in particular?

“This is a novel for people with breeding” is the self-proclaiming tag-line for the novel Boxer, Beetle by Ned Beauman, son of Nicola Beauman of Persephone Books.  It is an astonishingly accomplished debut that is highly erudite and original.  Boxer, Beetle is intelligent and witty and one of the best debut novels I have read; I read a proof copy in April of this year and the novel is fresh in my mind, distinctive and memorable.

Published this week (in the UK by Sceptre and available to buy in his mother’s shop) Boxer, Beetle alternates between the present and the 1930s during the rise of Nazism and Fascism. The 1930s is my favourite period to read about but I found myself equally invested in the present-day narrative and enjoyed the voice of first-person narrator, Kevin (or “Fishy”).  Kevin suffers from a rare condition, trimethylaminuria, the inability to break down the chemical trimethylamine, that gives off a strong fishy odour from the body; this is not an arbitrary disorder but one that Beauman watched a documentary about and was inspired to include in this novel.  Kevin is something of a hermit due to his unsavouriness and corrosive attributes to the nasal membranes -trimethylamine in high concentrations smells more like ammonia than fish- and spends his time collecting Nazi memorabilia.  In the 1934-36 narrative strain Seth Roach (or, “Sinner”) is a five-foot tall, nine-toed Jewish boxer who attracts the interest of Philip Erskine, a scientist studying Eugenics and beetles.

Erskine has made a shocking entomological discovery that prompts a letter from Adolf Hitler (which can be read here) and the central mystery of the book; Erskine’s discovery through Lemniscate breeding of a super-strain of beetle is the crux of the novel and the convergence of the present-day and past narratives.

Ned Beauman may not thank me for the comparison but his proficiency at depicting despicable characters reminded me of Martin Amis.  I enjoy characters that I can deplore and there  is much to censure in the cast of Boxer, Beetle although they are so well-drawn that I found myself sympathising with some, Kevin especially. In Boxer, Beetle there is an arresting opening line and clever use of cultural and literary allusion, complete with a dream reversal of Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and inclusion of himself as online forum user nbeauman, in homage to The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster. Beauman also included what he knew of East London and the London Library amongst the bold ideas imaginatively removed from real-life and an impressive amount of historical research.

Boxer, Beetle is not for the faint-hearted with graphic sex scenes, strong language and a lot of beetles. I did not take the warning of “there are lots of beetles” to heart and wish I had when I read the closing pages late one night. Consider yourself warned: beetles aside, this is an intelligent, funny and engaging book.

Lija of Writer’s Pet has interviewed Ned Beauman and is hosting a give-away of a signed copy of Boxer, Beetle on her blog.

Hello, all.  I have officially returned from a holiday at home; I was back in London at the tail-end of last week but we enjoyed a few more days off de-compressing from our time away.  Glasgow was … temperamental weather-wise; one day I was driving along a flooded street in torrential rain, water up to the chassis and such a badly steamed-up windscreen that it was like driving blind in a cloudy bubble (quite possibly the most horrific driving experience I’ve yet had) and the next I spent the day on the patio with a book, strawberry-flavoured beer whilst I left the BBQ in the trusty hands of my boyfriend.  As always I didn’t read nearly as much as I would have liked but a great time was had with loved ones, even if the sun was not always splitting the skies.

I did check in online last week as the pre-Booker anticipation built; I was on tenterhooks awaiting the longlist announcement and quite excited by the result.  I am not going on record by saying that I will read the entire longlist this year but I should have them all in my possession this week and we shall see where my reading then takes me …  At present I am itching to read Room by Emma Donoghue (which I shall begin later today), The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas and The Stars in the Bright Sky by Alan Warner; I was delighted at fellow Scot Warner’s inclusion on the list as The Sopranos (to which The Stars in the Bright Sky is a sequel) is a favourite from when I read it about a decade ago.

I also came across this article in Bitch magazine (online) last week.  Its focus on the importance of positive female role models in young adult literature is a subject I feel strongly about; in a society where Bella Swan passivity is culturally embraced, the need for strong heroines in literature is paramount.  The examples of empowered young females in both the piece and its subsequent comments have me adding to my wishlist and nostalgically reliving my own childhood and young adult reading.

Whilst I was away a new literary prize was established, celebrating the writing of gay men.  So forward-thinking and diverse is this prize that it has already caused controversy and undergone a name-change! More about The Green Carnation Prize can be found here.

Today I  feature in Triple Choice Tuesday, a weekly event hosted by Kim of Reading Matters that highlights three books that mean a lot to the participant.  It was a pleasure to take part in a feature that I greatly enjoy but I found the task of narrowing down beloved books to three far more difficult than I anticipated.  Please have a look at Kim’s site for my final choices.

This week I hope to catch up with some outstanding reviews as well as share with you some of my summer reading and more of the same can be expected over the coming weeks, interspersed -I imagine- with some Booker reading.  In the meantime, did you miss me and what have you been reading and writing about?  Please do alert me to any posts you think I should read as I’m putting off opening my Google Reader and suspect I will mark all posts as read once I do.