This is my review of Train Dreams by Denis Johnson.

This novella which contrives to pack more into 115 pages than many a rambling, self-indulgent saga, captures the lives of Americans living on the harsh yet beautiful frontier of the north-western states in the first half of the twentieth century. The main character is Robert Grainier, a simple, semi-literate casual labourer who repairs railroad bridges and hauls forest timber. A brief period of personal happiness with an acre of land in the Moyea Valley, a wife and baby daughter, is destroyed by a ferocious forest fire. Yet, Grainger finds the dignity and resilience to rebuild a life which may seem insignificant, but forms part of the great wave of human effort to settle a continent. This is what gives an ostensibly sad book a note of optimism.

Although he spends most of his life in mourning, there are frequent touches of humour – comic scenes arise unexpectedly, as when he agrees to help a disreputable friend, who wants to assist a widow in moving house so he can lay hands on her money – , lurking superstitions about "wolf-girls" and touches of the surreal fed by the scale of the surrounding wilderness, contact with the local Kootenai Indians, and the nocturnal howling of wolves and coyotes, which Grainger begins to copy to gain a sense of release. There is a keen sense of nature, as when Grainger notices " it was full-on spring, sunny and beautiful. and the Moyea Valley showed a lot of green against the dark of the burn. The ground was healing….A mustard-tinged fog of pine pollen drifted through the valley when the wind came up".

The strength of the book lies in the quality of the clear and vivid prose, which struck me as poetical before I knew that the author has won prizes for his verse.

Here is a description of the aftermath of the fire, which you may appreciate if you have visited areas like the Yellowstone National Park:

“The world was gray, white, black and acrid, without a single live animal or plant, no longer burning yet still full of the warmth and life of the fire….he felt his heart’s sorrow blackened and purified, as if it were an actual lump of matter from which all of the hopeful, crazy thinking was burning away. He drove through a layer of ash deep enough, in some places, that he couldn’t make out the roadbed any better than if he’d driven through winter snows”.

I would place Denis Johnson on a par with Cormac McCarthy, but without the brutality.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5 Stars

This is my review of The Man Whose Teeth Were All Exactly Alike by Philip K. Dick.

Energetic, pushy and prickly, realtor Leo Runcible has great ideas for property development in rural California, but he will probably never gain acceptance in 1960s Marin County, being not only an outsider but Jewish. An exaggerated grievance against his neighbour Walt Dombrosio sets off the quirky chain of events which form the theme of this novel.

As he continually switches his viewpoint between four of the main characters, so that Walt and his classy wife Sherry are as central to the tale as Leo and blurrily drunken Janet, I became engrossed in his capture of how they perceive each other and of the continuous small shifts in emotions – the observation of psychology and social life. This is a match for Philip Roth, I found myself thinking. Then, the narrative slips more into black farce and although I accept that the early 60s was a period of male chauvinism, of the sense that a man was emasculated if his wife worked, of unabashed racism and callous dismissal of the disabled, I began to have a nagging concern as to exactly how misogynist and non-PC Philip Dick may have been himself – or perhaps this is a mark of his skill as a writer.

It seems that this was one of the mainstream novels which remained unpublished in his lifetime, since his cult status was achieved only through his sci-fi, which does not interest me personally. Although I agree with a reviewer who found the end of this book somewhat rushed – he sets up an interesting final twist but fails to develop it adequately – he has clearly been underestimated as a writer with a keen eye, sharp insights into how mismatched people may tear themselves apart in relationships, “hell is other people” leavened with wry humour and a laconic style. I shall read another, but perhaps that will then be enough.

⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4 Stars

This is my review of All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque.

Having read and seen so many books and films about war, I made the mistake of expecting this to have little to add apart from the different perspective of a First World War soldier on the German front. Written in the 1920s by a young journalist who fictionalises his own experiences of the futile lunacy of war, it soon proved to me its status as a classic.

What marks it out is the combination of a whole gamut of reactions, from the MASH-like scenes of cynical survival to moving scenes portraying the psychology of survival at the front. In the opening chapter, the eighty men out of a company of a hundred and fifty who have returned alive and uninjured from the front are delighted to find that the quartermaster has not been informed in time to reduce their supplies so they have double rations for a day. A young man is dying from his wounds in a field hospital, and a friend is mainly preoccupied with laying claim to his rather fine pair of boots.

Using the present tense to give events more immediacy, the narrator Paul describes the sinister nature of the front in apparently calm periods which may be shattered with no warning by shells and gas – how to survive he must throw himself instinctively to the earth, which may protect, bury alive or claim him for ever. He must kill or be killed without emotion to stay alive, feeling his most conscious hatred for the teachers who abused their authority by urging him to enlist, or the sadistic ex-postman, now Corporal who provided his training, none of them with any realistic first-hand experience of the front. The prospect of leave seems like heaven, until Paul realises that he can no longer relate to family and acquaintances, or any aspect of his past life. He can no longer read the books he used to treasure, and his academic education now seems useless.

The narrative makes very early on the telling point which recurs at the end: the fact that young men plucked from school to the battlefield have no clear framework of work, wife or children to which to return, should they survive. They are a generation cast in limbo: “if we go back…. we shall be weary, broken-down, burnt-out, rootless and devoid of hope. No one will understand us – we are superfluous even to ourselves.”

This well-translated novel is saved from unendurable sadness by the range and frequent black humour of incidents. It is one of the most powerful pieces of anti-war writing I have ever read. The saddest aspect is that, when he wrote it, Lemarque might still hope there would be no future struggles of this sort on such a scale.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5 Stars

This is my review of Lila by Marilynne Robinson.

Marilynne Robinson's writing fascinates me. For a celebrated professional creative writer she has produced relatively few novels, of which three produced over a decade examine and rework the lives of two families in the quiet Iowan town of Gilead, each book focussing on the inner thoughts of a different character. Lila, a newcomer who has married the Reverend John Ames in his old age and borne him a son, is a minor figure in "Home" and "Gilead", but comes to the fore in this latest novel. Best read in turn with Lila last, to understand all the references, they can be treated as standalone novels.

Carried on a stream of consciousness which catches Lila's distinctive voice, we learn how she was abducted as a young child from a neglectful and possibly violent household by Doll, an itinerant casual worker. On the run for years from some real or imagined pursuer, they attach themselves to a small group who find jobs where they can in what sounds like the dustbowl America of the `30s, although the author is vague as to time and place. Despite having been barely tolerated by everyone apart from the protective Doll, Lila retains a nostalgic longing for her childhood, lived mostly out in the open, with a keen sense of nature and the seasons, and what little they all had shared in common.

By comparison, in the reverend's comfortable old house, with his kind and patient attention, she often feels lonely and reluctant to confess details of her past for fear this may turn him against her. It appears he has married her out of his own loneliness and a sense of her reflective nature, drawn to the same spiritual questions which perplex him. Perhaps he feels a desire to give practical support to a woman in need who has endured hardship through no fault of her own, outside the safe shell of his own life troubled only by self-concocted theological dilemmas. We can never be any surer about his motives than Lila, for everything is seen through her eyes. The book is full of irony: the old man never grasps that she likes to read Exekiel because its fire and brimstone images capture a sense of her own past life. He is amused by her announcement that she never wants to have a credenza in the house, not realising that this was the piece of furniture in which a whorehouse madam kept locked up the few possessions of the young women she exploited.

Since every phrase appears crafted with care, the book needs to be read slowly, rereading some sentences aloud to capture the full meaning by stressing the right word. Although it has been described as one of the saddest books imaginable, the beauty, expressiveness and wry humour of the style make the bleak aspects tolerable. Lila's pregnancy also strikes a continual optimistic beat. The mistrust of John Ames' old friend the Reverend Boughton, and likely bewildered disapproval of parishioners, held in check by respect for the old clergyman, are only hinted at in this subtlest of novels.

If I have any criticism it is over the repetition of some points, although this could be intended to convey how the mind keeps revisiting old ground. In the same way, the very muted ending could reflect the reality of most people's experience. The author's Calvinist background exerts a strong influence, which could deter readers with no biblical knowledge or belief. As an atheist who accepts that Christianity is deeply embedded in mid-west American society, I would say that this book is worth reading if you appreciate skilful writing and have an interest in psychology, how people think and interrelate, often failing to communicate, and how they come to terms with intimations of mortality and the transiency of both pleasure and pain.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5 Stars

This is my review of House of Ashes by Monique Roffey.

Inspired by the abortive 1990 political coup in Trinidad, about which I am now embarrassed to have registered so little, the author creates a similar drama in the fictional Caribbean island of Sans Amen. We are introduced first to the simple yet bookish and spiritual Ashes, haunted by the violent death of his freedom fighter brother in an earlier uprising. Under the influence of “The Leader”, charismatic head of a religious cult, Ashes is sucked into a plan to force concessions from the apparently corrupt and neglectful government, by occupying the main parliament building and taking hostages, including the Prime Minister.

The point of view switches between Ashes and Mrs Aspasia Garland, Minister for the Environment, and one of the more sympathetic of the hostages. In a situation which rapidly deteriorates and clearly cannot end well, the author uses her characters to explore their contrasting attitudes, the different experiences which have shaped them including colonisation, their developing perception of events and the way they handle the psychological trauma of a siege.

This reminds me strongly of another highly praised novel about a hostage-taking in a developing country, “Bel Canto”, yet I think “The House of Ashes” is technically superior in being more realistic and focussed on the complex issues of power, inequality and motivation without getting side-tracked into somewhat sentimental romances. On the other hand, what has the makings of an outstanding novel is undermined for me by the author’s tendency to repeat and over-labour points. It would have been much more powerful to have finished at the end of Part V with at most a brief epilogue, that is, omitting the final section, entitled “V1 L’Anse Verte 23 Years Later”. It is as if Monique Roffey is so absorbed in her characters that she cannot resist continuing to supply and analyse details long after the reader should have been left to reflect and reach his or her own conclusions. A minor irritant for me is the overuse of the West Indian term “steupsing”, the tendency to make a noise by sucking in air to express annoyance and derision. Yet perhaps this, and the patois which I enjoyed, give the story greater authenticity, demonstrating Roffey's genuine deep firsthand knowledge of life in Trinidad. Certainly, she creates vivid images of the dusty rundown city, the lush vegetation and Leatherback turtles dragging themselves up onto remote beaches to lay their myriads of eggs – from which most of the hatchlings are doomed to die in the struggle to survive.

⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4 Stars

This is my review of Waiting for Sunrise by William Boyd.

Actor son of a famous, long-dead thespian, Lysander Rief travels to Freud's Vienna to seek the advice of an English psychoanalyst on a sensitive personal problem. Since it is 1913, we know that the course of his life is about to be transformed for the worse, but before that, fate strikes a very different unexpected blow. With his fertile imagination and gift for spinning words into vivid and original descriptions or moments of farce with no apparent effort, William Boyd creates an entertaining read for the first half. He employs interesting little devices, as in the opening chapter where Lysander is introduced as he might appear to a stranger, although the next scene shows how many of the assumptions based on appearances are false. At other points, the author presents the dialogue in the form of a play, reflecting not only Lysander's employment, but also the way he and those around him are often playing a part in "real" life. The downside of this somewhat flippant, facetious approach is that at times we may not care about the characters' troubles as much as we should.

It is not until halfway through that the novel becomes the spy thriller vaunted on the front cover, and for me it is not improved in the process. At this point, the plot is too close to a Buchanish derring-do of over-complicated implausible events. I began to lose interest, but read on in the hopes of a satisfying dénouement which is in fact less surprising and "clever" than some of the twists on the way. Perhaps the strongest aspect is that Lysander is left a sad and wiser man accepting life's ambiguity, "we try to see clearly but what we see is never clear and is never going to be", one "happier with the dubious comfort of the shadows".

⭐⭐⭐ 3 Stars

This is my review of The Undertaking by Audrey Magee.

The undertaking is Peter Faber's marriage "in absentia" to Katharina Spinell, a Berlin bank clerk whom he has yet to meet. The motives are mercenary on both sides: he wants ten days' leave from the Russian front which makes more sense in the following chapters recounting his ordeals in Kharkov and Stalingrad, whereas she is attracted by the prospect of his war pension if he dies. As loyal followers of the Reich, accepting Nazi propaganda without question, they are happy to fall in with Hitler's half-baked scheme for keeping up population growth at the height of battle. To their surprise, although perhaps partly because of the unreal situation, they develop the mutual love which motivates them to survive many vicissitudes.

Apart from this spark of hope, "The Undertaking" pulls no punches when it comes to the portrayal of war, as the pair begin to realise, in their very different situations, that German soldiers are not invincible against an inferior foe, the Russians are not the useless, cowardly peasants they have been led to expect, and the war will not be a rapidly won victory. It takes a while for the penny to drop with two main characters who are portrayed in a realistic rather than flattering and heroic light. Without any compunction, Katharina joins her callous parents in occupying a luxurious flat from which a Jewish family has been driven; on his "honeymoon", Faber takes part without question in the nocturnal eviction of Jews organised by the sinister fixer Doctor Reinart and he persists in believing a fellow soldier is a communist of doubtful loyalty because he is Russian – unable to grasp the tragedy that, as a Russian born in German territory, the poor man belongs nowhere. Yet the reader knows that Faber and Katharina will be punished more than they deserve, since Faber is on a march to Kharkov and Stalingrad, while Berlin is destined to be looted by drunken Russians who will perpetrate mass rape out of revenge.

The author is quite clever in glossing over historical details which does not matter, as she seems true to the spirit of the times: the moral confusion, the reduction of human beings to a basic animal state under duress, and the inescapable hand of chance. Gripping but bleak, well-constructed with some excellent dramatic moments and insights into the main characters' thinking, the story reaches a well-judged conclusion, which leaves the reader with a good deal to mull over.

"The Undertaking" is in my opinion superior to a number of recent novels which have received much more attention and hype.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5 Stars

This is my review of The Cleaner of Chartres by Salley Vickers.

Although it shares with the bestselling “Miss Garnett’s Angel” the topics of church restoration and the ghostly background presence of a “Gabriel”, this novel has a sufficiently distinct storyline. A little exotic in her colourful skirts, Agnes works as a cleaner at Chartres Cathedral, whether as a means of forgetting the past or in atonement for some past deed is unclear until the end.

Switching between past and present, the novel reveals the sadness of her previous life after being found abandoned in his orchard on St. Agnes Eve by a kindly farmer who thinks she will be better off with the nuns than in a children’s home. Labelled “retarded” owing to her inability to read, she is struck by a chain of misfortunes as a teenager, with inadequate support from both the blinkered nuns and a bungling medical service. The ambiguity as to her guilt or innocence in all this and the tension as to how matters will be resolved in the present make this a page-turner, together with the wrily humorous yet also often poignant portrayal of a variety of characters, the beautiful descriptions of Chartres Cathedral which make you either want to visit it or wish you had paid more attention when you did, and the intriguing details on the history and mythology surrounding it – even if these are too often embedded in a rather clunky fashion into the monologues of the handsome hunk Alain waiting in his conservationist’s scaffolding to carry off the appealing Agnes.

There are a few too many coincidences in the plot, which occasionally teeters on the brink of Mills and Boonland. The greatest flaw for me is the tendency to digress into too much detail at every opportunity: when a character remembers finding her husband kissing the maid, you have to be told exactly which wines she had in mind on her unexpected visit to the kitchen, but some will find this adds charm to the novel. Knowing that the author has worked as a psychotherapist, I sometimes felt that she has been unable to resist the temptation to weave in too much of the welter of experience and analysis stemming from her work. Despite this, the story is in the main saved from mawkishness by her wit and insight. I think I found it more moving than the better known “Miss Garnett’s Angel” and recommend it, although I suspect it will appeal mainly to female readers.

⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4 Stars