Category: Fiction

The Rain Before It Falls by Jonathan Coe: Book Review

Published on by Margaret2 Comments

These days I seem to be choosing books by their titles as well as by their authors. And  it was a combination of both that drew me to The Rain Before It Falls by Jonathan Coe. I knew of the author, although this is the first book of his that I’ve read and I couldn’t imagine what the title means, which seemed a good enough reason at the time to borrow the book from the library.

I wasn’t disappointed. The Rain Before It Falls is full of description, which for me is a good thing; descriptions of people, places and events. It is a story within a story as Gill discovers family secrets she never knew before, after her aunt Rosamond died. Rosamond left half her property to her cousin’s granddaughter Imogen and half to Gill, but no one knows very much about Imogen or her whereabouts. Rosamond has recorded tapes for Imogen telling her about her mother and grandmother through describing a number of photographs (Imogen is blind) and asked Gill to find her.

It’s a story of tragedy as Rosamond describes the relationship she had with her cousin, Beatrix, who had abandoned her own daughter, Thea and the effects this had on all three of them and subsequently on Imogen. The predominant theme is of the inevitability of impending tragedy, although there are moments when happiness seems within reach. At one point the child Thea states she likes the rain before it falls, even though Rosamond points out to her that there is no such thing. Thea responds that, that is why she likes it, saying,

Something can make you happy can’t it, even if it isn’t real? (page 162)

Gill looks in vain for a pattern that makes sense of their lives but realises that it never existed – it was like the rain before it falls , a ‘figment, a dream, an impossible thing.’ (page 278)

There is much that appealed to me in this book, not least the little philosophical thoughts, such as the reflection on watching children squabble over simple things like where to sit at the dinner table or in the back of the car (so true to life):

Endless, small-minded territorial disputes. You could understand the whole, sorry history of human warfare just by observing their behaviour for half an hour. (page 182)

I also like the references to the novel Gone to Earth. Rosamond and Beatrix were extras when the book was filmed in Much Wenlock near to their family home in 1950. Rosamond describes the book as

… an overheated rustic melodrama …  the story of an ignorant country girl who marries the village chaplain but meanwhile gets caught up in a torrid affair with the local squire, while quite sensibly preferring her pet fox to either of them. … at the time I loved it, for being rooted in the Shropshire landscape, saturated with the colours and contours of its hills and the author’s feeling for nature is still what I remember best. (page 102)

I too, had read and loved Gone to Earth by Mary Webb, many times as a young teenager, completely absorbed in the story and loving its descriptions of the countryside. I’ll read it again one day.

Booking Through Thursday – Foreign

Published on by Margaret14 Comments

Today’s Booking Through Thursday’s question is:

Name a book (or books) that you love from a country other than your own (in my case the UK).

Where to start? There are so many! My choices are books that came to mind today – another day I could choose many other books and other countries.

I think the first one is a book from Switzerland – one  from my childhood. It’s Heidi by Johanna Spyri. I loved this book and the sequels, Heidi Grows Up and Heidi’s Children both written by Charles Tritten. It was first published in 1880. Johanna Spyri was born and lived in Switzterland. In the story Heidi goes to live in the Swiss Alps with her grandfather who lives on his own isolated from the other villagers. At first he doesn’t want Heidi there at all but she gradually softens his heart. I haven’t read it for years and would probably find it terribly dated and sentimental, but it lives in my mind as a beautiful book.

Next, a book from the USA – Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner. This book won the Pullitzer Prize for fiction in 1972. It is the story of Lyman Ward, a wheelchair bound retired historian who is writing his grandparents’ life history and also gradually reveals his own story. It’s the story set in the wilderness of the American West – of Oliver Ward’s struggles with various mining and engineering construction jobs, contrasted with Susan Ward’s efforts to support him against great difficulties. This is made more difficult when she compares her life with that of her New York society friend, Augusta.

One of the reasons I chose this book is my fascination with the Wild West.

Margaret Atwood is favourite author who is Canadian. Which book to chose? I’ve decided to highlight the first one that I read – The Blind Assassin.

I think it may have been one of the first books I read that contains a story within a story and it’s about writers and readers as well as about the lives of two sisters, one of whom apparently committed suicide.

Another favourite author is the Australian Colleen McCullough. I’ve loved her books – the Rome series – The First Man in Rome and so on. I first came across her books many years ago with the TV series of The Thorn Birds and then read the book, but my favourite has to be Morgan’s Run. This is an historical novel based on the history of Botany Bay centred on the life of Richard Morgan who was transported from Britain to New South Wales. Again it’s my fascination for history that made me enjoy this book so much.

Finally, a book from China. I read A Loyal Character Dancer by Qiu Xiaolong last year and it’s another favourite. Qiu Xiaolong was born in Shanghai and was a member of the Chinese Writers’ Association, publishing poetry, translations and criticism in China. Since 1989 he has lived in the United States, his work being published in many literary magazines and anthologies. His first crime novel, Death of Red Heroine, won the AnthonyAward for Best First Crime Novel. A Loyal Character Dancer is his second book featuring Chief Inspector Chen Cao, of the Shanghai Police Bureau. Apart from the story which is crime fiction there is a lot about China in it – life, the country and the impact of the Cultural Revolution.

Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman: Book Review

Published on by Margaret6 Comments

I finished Practical Magic a few days ago. It’s one that has been on my to-be-read shelves for some time, so it was good to read it. It’s a light easy read, about the Owens sisters, Sally and Gillian. I have to admit that one of my reasons for choosing this book in the first place is that my mother’s maiden name was Owens and her aunt was called Sally. The resemblance ends with the name as my Sally Owens was nothing like this Sally Owens.

Sally and Gillian were orphaned when they were very young and went to live with their eccentric, elderly aunts in New England. Generations of the Owens women have lived in the house for more than two hundred years and have a reputation as witches. Everything that goes wrong in the town is put down to them. Yet women come to their door at night looking for remedies, particularly for love potions. Sally and Gillian grow up and both move away from their aunts to make their own way. Gillian, the younger wayward sister, has lots of love affairs ending up with Jimmy. Sally, the sensible one, meanwhile has two daughters and is a widow. When Gillian lands up on her doorstep with a dead Jimmy in the car, Sally’s life is turned upside down as she tries to cope with the situation. In the end it is the aunts who are called upon for help.

This is the first book by Alice Hoffman that I’ve read and whilst I thought it was OK I shan’t be rushing out to find more of her books. It has the feel of a fairy tale, mixed up with reality which I liked. There was enough suspense to keep me wondering how it would end and I liked how the characters interacted – Sally and Gillian were both well-drawn. I wasn’t that keen on the love stories, which seemed to be of the type of instant attraction with disastrous consequences. Interestingly, for me at any rate, I didn’t mind that it’s written in the present tense, most of the time I didn’t even notice it.

I didn’t identify this as a book for the RIP Challenge, but it fits in well, I think.

Sunday Selection

Published on by Margaret5 Comments

This morning I finished reading A Caribbean Mystery by Agatha Christie. I read it very quickly as it’s easy reading and although sprinkled throughout with lots of red herrings it wasn’t too difficult to guess the outcome. I’ll write about it later, along with three other books I’ve read recently.

I’m wondering which book to read next. I have a pile of library books – new ones I borrowed this week:

I think I’d better get on with reading Salmon Fishing in the Yemen by Paul Torday as that is the next book we’re discussing at the book club at the end of October. It’s a matter of timing it right so that I finish it in time but not too soon so that I’ve forgotten about it before the meeting. It’s actually a book that I’ve ignored in the past as the title doesn’t appeal to me – the idea of  fly fishing is not guaranteed to fill me with desire. I have started it, but chapter one isn’t inspiring me, with its details of migratory salmonids, the evolution of salmon parr and feeding conditions. I shall persevere and hope it improves.

Meanwhile, my mind is wandering towards the library books, even though I have two non-fiction books from LibraryThing that I feel I should read soon – why is it that books that sound so interesting suddenly lose their attraction when I start to feel the slightest bit under pressure to read them by a certain date? A hangover from my working life, maybe when I had to produce reports to deadlines.

Another thing too – why do I borrow so many library books when I have plenty of my own still to read? If I didn’t have to return books then I wouldn’t be tempted to borrow more – maybe D should go on his own to take my books back!

Back to the library books, I think I’ll look at Solar by Ian McEwan. I like his books but having read somewhere that this isn’t as good as others and I wondered if it may contain a bit too much about physics for me I decided not to buy it, but to check it out if I saw it in the library. At least, it starts off well, as Michael Beard’s marriage appears to be disintegrating and he can’t stand it – the shame  and inconvenient longing he has for his wife. It does make me want to read on.

I borrowed the other books because I like the authors – apart from The Autobiography of the Queen by Emma Tennant and Mr Monk goes to the Firehouse by Lee Goldberg. I haven’t read anything by these two authors and they are impulse loans. The Goldberg book caught my eye because of its title, which intrigued me as it didn’t convey anything at all to me. On the cover it’s advertised as being based on the Television Series – an American series, I assume, as I’ve never heard of it. If anyone knows this series I’d love to hear about it. Is it any good?

The Autobiography of the Queen attracted me when I read on the front cover that this is ‘hot on the heels of Alan Bennett’s fictional account of the Queen.’ I’ve read that and thought it was very amusing. I thought I needed something light and amusing to counter-balance the crime fiction and serious books I seem to have been reading lately.

A Change in Altitude

Published on by Margaret6 Comments

I wasn’t sure when I was reading A Change in Altitude which time period it is set in and discovered from Anita Shreve’s website that it is set in the late 1970s, which surprised me because I’d thought it was possibly the 1950s. This is the story of Margaret and Patrick, a young American couple who have recently arrived in Kenya. At the start of the novel they have just arrived. They are living in a small house in the grounds of their new friends, Diana and Arthur because the plumbing has failed in their own house. Diana is a native white Kenyan and Arthur is British.

Seen through Margaret’s eyes, Kenya is a place of appalling poverty, discrimination and heat. She and Patrick  feel obliged to the other couple and agree to go on a climbing expedition up Mount Kenya, despite their inexperience. I felt very much for Margaret as she struggled to keep up with the others as they ascended the mountain. They were led by guides, roped together, crossing scree and then a glacier, when the inevitable accident happened and Margaret is overcome by feelings of guilt.

From that point on I began to lose interest in this book. I don’t know whether it’s my taste in reading that has changed but this book, fell short of Anita Shreve’s earlier books, which I enjoyed so much. Maybe I should re-read one and see if it’s me or her writing that has changed. Despite the drama of the accident there was no sense of suspense or tension. I liked the account of the change in attitude that was stirring in Kenya as the inequalities in living conditions and culture are highlighted, but as for the change in altitude I just didn’t understand the symbolism. At times the writing is disjointed and the characterisation unconvincing. It’s basically a story about marriage and love and how events and their aftermath affect our lives. All in all, although it promised to be good, it was rather disappointing.

Teaser Tuesday – The Rain Before It Falls

Published on by Margaret9 Comments

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Share a couple or more sentences from the book you’re currently reading.

For today’s teaser I’ve chose this from The Rain Before It Falls by Jonathan Coe. I recently borrowed this book from the library and have only read  the opening page just to see if it appealed. It does. It begins with Gill and Stephen, her husband outside raking leaves and shovelling them onto a bonfire when the telephone rang. Gill ran inside to answer it and then went back into the garden:

Stephen turned as he heard her approach. He saw bad news in her eyes, and his thoughts flew, at once, to their daughters: to the imagined dangers of central London, to bombs, to once-routine tube and bus journeys suddenly turned into wagers with life and death. (page 1)

Now, I just have to read more …