Books read in October

I know this is all a bit behind the times, but I am trying to catch up! Just because I stop posting the book reviews it doesn't mean I have stopped reading, and someday I may catch up again. In the meantime, the following are short reviews of the books that I read in October. The marks I have given them in the brackets are out of five.

The City of Falling Angels – John Berendt (4.2)

John Berendt tells the story of the rebuilding of La Fenice (and the court case over its destruction) which gives his Venice saga a point of difference, but he keeps going off on tangents, telling other stories and, when he returns to the main narrative, repeating himself. He generally uses other people’s words so he can’t be blamed or criticised for an opinion. He seems to have a grudging admiration for the city and this inspires some beautiful passages of prose.

Venice is an anomaly of a city; filled with strangers trying to preserve it, and locals who resent their intrusion. People, particularly Americans, are prepared to raise large sums of money to ‘save’ Venice and restore its buildings and treasures. Many of these funds are raised during Carnivale, a festival which traditionally mixed the creeds of Apollonian restraint and Dionysian abandon. As with most things Venetian, the interlopers have hijacked Carnivale. Mask shops have taken over the town, begun a new industry and squeezed out the old.

The message of Berendt’s book seems to be that Venice, like a proud cantankerous old lady wants to survive by herself. She has her own laws and customs and does not appreciate interference. She will take the money and the help that is offered, but do not expect her to be grateful. As with women everywhere, she has been assigned Madonna/whore schizophrenia. You decide which is her true personality.

Crime Brûlée – Nancy Fairbanks (3.4)

This style of mixing crime with recipes is a fast-growing and apparently very popular genre. Nancy Fairbanks sets the serving of murder and mystery in New Orleans (pre- Hurricane Katrina) where she can mix the ingredients of swamps, jazz, voodoo, alligators, Mardi Gras, and all the usual clichés that come with the Louisiana city.

Carolyn Blue goes to New Orleans with her husband Jason who is attending an academic convention; he is a chemist who draws molecular compound modules on serviettes. She has got a publishing contract to write a book about the local food and takes the opportunity to catch up with old university chums. Her best friend, Julienne, argues with her husband, Nils, on their first group meal and subsequently goes missing. Carolyn’s suspicions cause her to attempt to find Julienne with perilous consequences. A succession of unfortunate events befalls her, such as being mugged, cursed, run off the road and pushed into a swamp.

Carolyn is a little bit scatty, like a younger (forty-something) Miss Marple. Is she naïve or simply stupid, and how did this woman ever win a publishing contract? The vague and flighty conversational tone can be amusing and works in places, but at other times the novel seems rushed, with loose ends and inconsistencies.

She is fairly shallow and self-obsessed, as are the rest of the friends, who are also pretty bitchy. Carolyn has matching outfits, shoes and handbags, and her wardrobe is all planned out daily. Although Carolyn is supposedly distraught by her friend’s absence (none of the others take it seriously – her husband suspects she is having an affair and the police can’t investigate foul play until she has been missing for at least 48hours), she still repeatedly goes out to eat and then details the contents of the meals. It is hard to care when the characters clearly don’t, and the denouement involves a blatant deus ex machina, as if the author doesn’t really know or care how to solve the mystery. None of the characters are likeable, which isn’t exactly a crime, but their superficial and one-dimensionality is.

Crime Brûlée is less about the crime and more about the brûlée. Despite the pedestrian style and the constant rhetorical questions asked by the narrator, the book is interesting for its information about the food and the history of the city. The murder seems tacked on as an afterthought or as a framework to be filled in with edible details. It is similar in concept, if not style, to Sophie’s Choice but with cooking replacing philosophy. Crime Brûlée is quick and easy to read, and the lasting impression is of the flavours of the South rather than the mysteries of the mind.

Loving Frank – Nancy Horan (3.9)

Strangely, it is not necessary to know much about Frank Lloyd Wright or architecture itself to enjoy this novel. It is about him and his visionary organic style, but it is more about the relationship he had with Mamah, a married woman who left her husband, children and her entire family to be with him, invoking the wrath of society. With no letters to work from, the author has surmised her feelings, and her bravery at following her heart and risking everything without guarantees is particularly well imagined.

Like the novels of Kate Chopin, Henry James, or Willa Cather, Loving Frank examines the consequences of a society that constricts women. Stifled by suburbia, Mamah worries that she is being punished for her dissatisfaction with what other women have. She attempts to balance personal fulfilment with a fertile and loving connection to the lives around her. She has to work if her husband cannot support her, and should she remain in a loveless marriage or risk alienating her children? Although this is set at the turn of the twentieth century, there are no answers to these questions, and they remain quite contemporary.

Escaping the confines of Puritan America, the couple flee to the hedonism of the Old World where Europe offers treasures and beauty with colour and passion. But beauty cannot be indulged purely for its own sake, and, just as architecture must be functional as well as aesthetic, so Mamah and Frank have to return to America.

Mamah believes whole-heartedly in Frank’s vision and is attracted to his passion which ignites his movements. When she begins to worry that he is a hypocrite, it is a crushing blow. Mamah wonders if it is his insecurities that make him believe he is the only one with refined sensibilities. He justifies spending money they haven’t got, and he doesn’t really live in the real world. He is interesting, but interesting is not safe, so which do we choose? This is an eternal novel, quite splendid but gentle, which explores that dichotomy. I imagine there are very different reactions to Mamah’s choices, but there will be no definitive solution to her problem.

The Raw Shark Texts – Steven Hall (4.1)

This book is certainly different and a little bit odd, but it also manages to be intriguing so all is forgiven. In 2007, debut novelist Steven Hall was hailed in The Guardian as the next big thing. This is indeed, a novel for the intellectual, or at least the person who likes to think of himself as such. It is part love story; part philosophic construct; and part fast paced thriller.

Eric Sanderson wakes up with amnesia. He has vague memories of his girlfriend, Clio, and he knows something awful has happened to her but isn’t sure what, so he begins a search for her, his own identity and the meaning of life itself. He follows the instructions he has left himself (as ‘the first Eric Sanderson’) into the underworld, both literally and figuratively.

Meanwhile he is hunted by a thing – a big shark-type monster. This leviathan preys on words and thoughts, invading his mind, threatening to engulf him, and introducing the terrifying concept of madness. While we will Eric to keep one step ahead of the predator, and there’s no denying it’s clever, we also question is any of this actually real?

In an almost nerdish manner, Hall indulges in literary gymnastics including a flipbook shark, drawn with letters, enlarging over fifty pages to devour the reader. He also connects with his sensitive side, however, and his pain and feelings of loss are achingly credible. How much do we invent because we simply don’t want to let go? And what happens when we know we have to?