In 1996, an Australian rare book conservator travels to Bosnia to inspect the Sarajevo Haggadah, a 500-year-old book with illuminated Hebrew text. The history of the book is presented as historical fiction: creation in Spain in the late 15th century, rebinding in Vienna in 1844, and preservation from Nazis in World War II. Importantly, there are critical roles for Muslims and Catholics in the history of this book. Mysteries are revealed, with a backdrop of contemporary intrigue. Overall, very entertaining.
Category: Book themes
A Table For Two – Amor Towles
Towles is a great writer of novels (A Gentleman in Moscow, The Lincoln Highway). This book features his shorter fiction. First, there are six short stories set in contemporary New York: art in the Metropolitan Museum, dining at Balthazar, music at Carnegie Hall – what’s not to love! These stories feature brief encounters and the delicate mechanics of compromise in a marriage. And second, the book contains a novella set in 1938 Los Angeles featuring Eve from Rules of Civility in a noirish role, in a classic crime caper. Towles writing is stylish and compelling, as always.
In Winter I Get Up At Night – Jane Urquhart
Ms. Urquhart is a Canadian literary treasure and this book is one of her best. In the 1920s, the McConnell family travels from Ontario to the Northern Great Plains (aka Saskatchewan). Emer is a young girl whose life is transformed by a catastrophic injury and slow hospital convalescence separated from her family. What follows are transcendent images and memories revealed in a looping non-linear narrative, in other words, the mind of a child with confused imaginations and an adult’s poignant nostalgia. Emer has a profound and moving life – a must read book in my opinion.
The Blue Hour – Paula Hawkins
By the acclaimed author of The Girl On The Train, this new psychological thriller about art has complex and often toxic relationships with a shifting female friendship confronting the power and entitlement of the patriarchy (aka the art establishment), with a web of lies and secrets and yes, infidelities. Key events occur on a Scottish island isolated from the mainland by the tide and severe weather. Suffice it to say that there is missing art and a missing person and much more. Can neediness by pathological? Surprises persist right to the end of the book which makes for a very entertaining read.
Last Chance To See – Mark Cawardine
In the original Last Chance To See (1990), zoologist Cawardine described travel with the late Douglas Adams, to visit exotic locations with endangered species (sad note, the Yangtze river dolphin has now been declared extinct). Now twenty years later, this book is subtitled “In the footsteps of Douglas Adams”; now Cawardine is travelling with the comic genius Stephen Fry, to view rare and peculiar animals (African white rhinos, Kakapo birds in New Zealand, lemurs in Madagascar …). Six chapters outline their travels to 8 countries in 5 continents.
This book has a unique view of a disappearing world: always informative, often hilarious, but mostly thought provoking.
Juiceboxers – Benjamin Hertwig
Simply put, this amazing first novel is one of the best books I have read this year. It is unquestionably a “guy book” because all the major characters are male. In 1999 in Edmonton, four remarkably different “boys” meet as cadets; they are not really friends but have a type of camaraderie. Then there is army training and finally deployment to Afghanistan in 2005. Hertwig describes the Army mood and male behaviour perfectly: boredom, a lack of purpose, too much drinking and pornography, and yes, racism and bloodlust. And then there is the senseless violence of war, the chaos of conflict. Finally, there is the brutal aftermath of war, with PTSD. Hertwig’s writing is evocative with brilliant metaphors. Highly recommended, a must read book.
The Bookbinder – Pip Williams
This is a fine example of historical fiction by the author of The Dictionary Of Lost Words. Once again, the setting is Oxford, but the time is 1914-18. Peggy and Maude are 21-year-old twin sisters working as bookbinders at the Clarendon Press. Peggy is driven by her love of books and a desire to study literature at university; Maude is a special extraordinary woman, vulnerable with an honest simplicity. Their lives are disrupted by the war and an influx of injured Belgian soldiers, and then by the influenza epidemic. This is a story about the love of books, about knowledge that is withheld if you are female, and the formidable barriers experienced by women. Highly recommended.
The God Of The Woods – Liz Moore
This is a superb thriller. In 1975, a teenager (Barbara) disappears from her Adirondack summer camp. Eerily, Barbara’s older brother vanished from the same camp in 1961. This is an extraordinary story of both investigations, and of course complicating secrets abound. The characters are richly described, both well-meaning (but flawed) people and some dastardly villains. Highly recommended – very entertaining.
The Reader – Bernhard Schlink
Some of you may have seen the 2008 film based on this book, starring Kate Winslet. I respectfully submit that this 1995 book is far superior. This is Michael Berg’s book, both reflective and introspective. In 1958, 15-year-old Michael has a short tempestuous affair with an older woman, Hanna. Eight years later, Michael is a law student who learns that Hanna is on trial for being an SS guard responsible for the deaths of many women and children in a World War II concentration camp. The writing raises important questions about how beautiful memories can be shattered in hindsight, along with issues of betrayal, guilt and shame. Overall, the story is a metaphor for the complexity of present-day Germany’s relationship to its Nazi past – highly recommended.
What David Read 