September Reads

Once again, not a very impressive list this month. Just the one to report. I'm not sure why my reading has fallen recently. Maybe I am just not very enthusiastic about some of the books on my TBR list. I haven't been excited about reading something in a while. Sometimes it helps to know that I will review it later, but mostly I am just apathetic to a lot of the books on my shelf.

I have not been reading so much on my commute. I have been very happy to listen to podcasts and try to grab some more sleep than to strain my eyes reading so early in the morning.

But enough with the excuses, there is only one book to review so here it is.

After Me Comes The Flood
Sarah Perry
Serpents Tail 26/6/14 Paperback
7/10
Book Haul (Profile)

After a long drought John decides to close up shop in London and visit his brother in Norfolk. The heat in this book is brilliant, the minds of the characters are literally crackling in it. After some car trouble, he ends up stumbling on a strange house full of an odd collection of people.

He remains in the house as a guest, a somewhat intruder into their lives. They are isolated in the house and while the world waits for the storm to break John spends the summer unraveling the histories of his strange companions.

This is a story of torturous heat in more ways than one. The tension must break. In the weather and in all of their lives, John is not a catalyst but as he becomes further and further tangled in their story, he records it all down. This story telling technique is very old fashioned, but Perry has used it to incredible strength in her debut novel.

The book struggled to get off the ground at first and frustratingly the feeling of impending events does not abate until well into the second half. I think for many readers they would not get very far, but I hope most people will persist past the 50 page rule because Sarah Perry makes big promises of action in this novel - and she delivers.

August Reads

Time for the August round up! Shockingly low numbers here. I have actually read a third, but it is a manuscript under consideration so I can't tell you anything about it. If it ever gets published I'll review it though.

I do hope that I can bring my average up next month. I'd like to keep the average around 3/4. It is really tough to balance around work.

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves
Karen Joy Fowler
Profile 19/06/14 Paperback
8/10
Off The Shelf

Waacbo, as it is affectionately called in the office, was long listed for the Man Booker Prize. Shortlist to be announced (9th Sept). I'm fairly certain it will be shortlisted, and might even win! It is outselling all the other long list books put together.

I was nothing to do with this book, it was all sorted before my time, but I was very glad to have read it. It has a very interesting look at a topic I knew nothing about. The characters are curious, and intriguing. They are not necessarily people I would want to know... But they make for fantastic reading. READ it. BUY it.

I found the book so interesting, (I can't give away the twist!) and it is written so well. A brilliant insight into humanity, how and why we do things and why it is important. Not to mention the bizarre nature of childhood memories.

Behind the Beautiful Forevers
Katherine Boo
Portobello Books 7/06/14 Kindle
8/10
Kindle

I hadn't realised that this was non-fiction until I read the acknowledgements at the end of the book. I discovered that Katherine Boo is a journalist (I didn't know she had won the Pulitzer, or that would have been a giveaway...) who threw herself into the slums of Mumbai and became so much part of the furniture that she could recount the incredible stories and events in this marvelous book.

What I loved about this book was not just the stories of poverty, but that within poverty there are different levels of ambition, pride and ability. That a garbage sorter's lively hood might not be as meager as others might think, despite the taboo of the job. An incredible and inspirational story.

See my review of what I thought of reading on a kindle here.

I may have only read two books this month, and one that I can't tell you about, but they were all 8/10. The highest mark I've given so far. I think 10s pretty much belong to old favourites like Diana Gabledon's Outlander series. By the way, is anyone else watching the Starz series of Outlander?