Title: Varjak Paw
Author: SF Said
Nationality: British
Year: 2003
Publisher: David Fickling Books
Length: 200+ pages
Rating: 9/10
Summary: If only grown-up books were this good
The outline
Pedigree cat Varjak Paw is the only one of his family who dreams of the great outdoors but the Mesopotamian Blues have never left the safety of the Contessa’s house. You can probably guess what happens next.
Sample
Varjak could see for miles and miles. There were no walls or trees to block his view any more. Just open space, rippling out ahead of him, beneath him, above him. He was standing in space, and it was a long way to fall.
He peered down the inside of the wall. He could see nothing through the trees. The Gentleman's cats and the Elder Paw were hidden by the tangled net of branches. There was no way back. He was truly on his own.
The verdict
I certainly wasn’t expecting this fairly obscure and underrated children’s book to be anywhere near as good as it is. Ignore the clichéd and pedestrian opening chapters – from there onwards the narrative opens up into a breathtaking and powerful coming-of-age story, by turns charming, sinister and exhilarating.
Said knows how to keep a narrative moving effortlessly and it’s a shame that few adult novels manage to be so frightening or uplifting. There are strong female characters, dastardly villains and glorious set pieces and it’s no insult to say that parts of this novel reminded me of both Watership Down and Kafka on the Shore. An added bonus were the atmospheric illustrations by Dave McKean, who really understands how cats move.
Personally, it impressed me far more than Harry Potter or His Dark Materials and would be my personal pick for best children’s story of recent years.
Friday 25 March 2011
Saturday 19 March 2011
Review: The Dresskeeper
Title: The Dresskeeper
Author: Mary Naylus
Nationality: British
Year: 2009
Publisher: Prospera Publishing
Length: 200+ pages
Rating: 7/10
Summary: Wickedly funny
The outline
Thoroughly modern teenager, Picky, is transported back in time to Restoration London when she tries on a old dress in her Gran’s attic. No, seriously.
Sample
'Get ya bets. Make a packet. Which hefty is heftier?'
There are three of us in the running but the odds on Edwina the wheelchair kid are so bad no one places a bet, so it is between me and this girl in Year 11, who brings a roast chicken, complete with chips and gravy, to school. Everyday.
The verdict
I loved the opening to The Dresskeeper so much that I bought the book before I’d even finished the first page of the Kindle sample. Despite its title and cover, which imply a fairly straight-laced historical romance, The Dresskeeper is for a large part a darkly comic look at such modern perils as dementia, body image and absent fathers. In fact, the scenes that are central to the plot where 21st century teenager, Picky, travels through time to the London of the 1600s rarely live up to the sheer wit and exuberance of the sections set in the modern day.
That’s not to say that the past sections don’t have their strong points. Naylus succeeds where many better-known authors have failed and makes the past a living and vibrant place. The past is also where the most moving and poignant sections of the novel take place.
However, despite being the funniest thing I’ve read in years, I wasn’t able to award The Dresskeeper top marks. The novel is littered with plot holes, anachronisms and implausibilities. Some leeway can be given because this is a comedy and a young-adult novel, but they were so numerous they did intrude on my enjoyment of the book. It’s easy to criticise Naylus for this, but her publishers should take some of the blame as they really should have pointed these out.
Author: Mary Naylus
Nationality: British
Year: 2009
Publisher: Prospera Publishing
Length: 200+ pages
Rating: 7/10
Summary: Wickedly funny
The outline
Thoroughly modern teenager, Picky, is transported back in time to Restoration London when she tries on a old dress in her Gran’s attic. No, seriously.
Sample
'Get ya bets. Make a packet. Which hefty is heftier?'
There are three of us in the running but the odds on Edwina the wheelchair kid are so bad no one places a bet, so it is between me and this girl in Year 11, who brings a roast chicken, complete with chips and gravy, to school. Everyday.
The verdict
I loved the opening to The Dresskeeper so much that I bought the book before I’d even finished the first page of the Kindle sample. Despite its title and cover, which imply a fairly straight-laced historical romance, The Dresskeeper is for a large part a darkly comic look at such modern perils as dementia, body image and absent fathers. In fact, the scenes that are central to the plot where 21st century teenager, Picky, travels through time to the London of the 1600s rarely live up to the sheer wit and exuberance of the sections set in the modern day.
That’s not to say that the past sections don’t have their strong points. Naylus succeeds where many better-known authors have failed and makes the past a living and vibrant place. The past is also where the most moving and poignant sections of the novel take place.
However, despite being the funniest thing I’ve read in years, I wasn’t able to award The Dresskeeper top marks. The novel is littered with plot holes, anachronisms and implausibilities. Some leeway can be given because this is a comedy and a young-adult novel, but they were so numerous they did intrude on my enjoyment of the book. It’s easy to criticise Naylus for this, but her publishers should take some of the blame as they really should have pointed these out.
Thursday 17 March 2011
Review: The Girl on the Swing
Title: The Girl on the Swing
Author: Ali Cooper
Nationality: British
Year: 2010
Publisher: Standing Stone Press
Rating: 9/10
Summary: Beautiful and emotive
The outline
A middle-aged doctor who has lost her son and lost her job is caught up in visions of what she believes are her past lives. But are they true or is there a more rational explanation?
Sample
I am standing on the seafront, on the southwest corner where the road meets the sea, where the steep ramshackle streets meet the crumbly cliff. A cold, brisk, sea breeze burns my skin, stings my cheeks with salt. The sunlight is piercing, icy blue, glaring on the water; it lacks the yellow fullness of summer. The salty fishy smell of the harbour penetrates my nostrils. I wrinkle my nose. I am counting. One. Two. Four. Six. It is a game. I count some more as I stare out towards the streak of purple which lines the horizon. Ten. Twelve. Fifteen. Seventeen. Do I not know my numbers or am I deliberately cheating? Mostly the latter, I think. Suddenly and unexpectedly I reach one hundred. I call out. 'Coming! Ready or not!' My voice has a lilt, an accent that surprises me, as though it is not my own.
The verdict
This is an absolutely wonderful novel and Ali Cooper’s lyrical and elegant writing will stay with you long after you’ve closed the final page. The story expertly mixes modern day tragedy with past life drama which results in a poignant and moving novel. It addresses big themes such as our relationship with the past, relationships across the class divide and the affects of loss and it never fails to hit the mark with them.
Cooper is particularly adept at creating a believable and multi-faceted central character. Every word is written exactly as you would expect it to be by the central character, Julia, a middle-aged doctor who has long self-censored her feelings and ideas in order to conform with her domineering husband and the society that she moves in. I found it extremely refreshing to read a book where a middle-aged woman was the central character.
This is the kind of novel which, if it had been published by one of the big publishers, would have been nominated for a string of awards. That it hasn’t been is undoubtedly the fault of the award-givers and not Ali Cooper.
Author: Ali Cooper
Nationality: British
Year: 2010
Publisher: Standing Stone Press
Rating: 9/10
Summary: Beautiful and emotive
The outline
A middle-aged doctor who has lost her son and lost her job is caught up in visions of what she believes are her past lives. But are they true or is there a more rational explanation?
Sample
I am standing on the seafront, on the southwest corner where the road meets the sea, where the steep ramshackle streets meet the crumbly cliff. A cold, brisk, sea breeze burns my skin, stings my cheeks with salt. The sunlight is piercing, icy blue, glaring on the water; it lacks the yellow fullness of summer. The salty fishy smell of the harbour penetrates my nostrils. I wrinkle my nose. I am counting. One. Two. Four. Six. It is a game. I count some more as I stare out towards the streak of purple which lines the horizon. Ten. Twelve. Fifteen. Seventeen. Do I not know my numbers or am I deliberately cheating? Mostly the latter, I think. Suddenly and unexpectedly I reach one hundred. I call out. 'Coming! Ready or not!' My voice has a lilt, an accent that surprises me, as though it is not my own.
The verdict
This is an absolutely wonderful novel and Ali Cooper’s lyrical and elegant writing will stay with you long after you’ve closed the final page. The story expertly mixes modern day tragedy with past life drama which results in a poignant and moving novel. It addresses big themes such as our relationship with the past, relationships across the class divide and the affects of loss and it never fails to hit the mark with them.
Cooper is particularly adept at creating a believable and multi-faceted central character. Every word is written exactly as you would expect it to be by the central character, Julia, a middle-aged doctor who has long self-censored her feelings and ideas in order to conform with her domineering husband and the society that she moves in. I found it extremely refreshing to read a book where a middle-aged woman was the central character.
This is the kind of novel which, if it had been published by one of the big publishers, would have been nominated for a string of awards. That it hasn’t been is undoubtedly the fault of the award-givers and not Ali Cooper.
James Frey turns to self publishing
A fairly significant story for the publishing industry on The Guardian's website today: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/mar/15/james-frey-new-book-published-art-gallery Best selling author James Frey is self-publishing his latest novel, The Final Testament of the Holy Bible, a story about the Second Coming taking place in the Bronx.
Just 10,000 leather-bound printed editions will be available at a cost of $150 each. Those who can't afford the steep price will be able to download the ebook version for a few quid.
Frey said that we are currently experiencing the "greatest revolution in publishing since the invention of the printing press. Everything about how we make and consume books is changing very dramatically."
Frey is the master of self promotion and it really is a significant turning point that a major author has decided to ditch his publisher. He will certainly not be the last.
Just 10,000 leather-bound printed editions will be available at a cost of $150 each. Those who can't afford the steep price will be able to download the ebook version for a few quid.
Frey said that we are currently experiencing the "greatest revolution in publishing since the invention of the printing press. Everything about how we make and consume books is changing very dramatically."
Frey is the master of self promotion and it really is a significant turning point that a major author has decided to ditch his publisher. He will certainly not be the last.
Wednesday 16 March 2011
Do we need a literary prize for women?
The Orange Prize for Fiction longlist was announced yesterday to the usual fanfare. There are some great novels on the list, such as Emma Donaghue's Booker shortlisted Room and the National Book Critics Circle award winning A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan. However, there are a great deal of good books that are not on the list because they were written by men.
Founded as recently as 1996, the Orange Prize is curiously anachronistic and, in my opinion, misguided. Fiction is one of the few areas where there is no trace of a glass ceiling and women can visibly and consistently compete and better men without the additional burden of having to overcome prejudices. The most successful author in the world is a woman, the world's most famous bookclub is run by a woman and even a casual reader would probably not struggle to name 10 female authors (try naming 10 female artists with the same ease).
Rather than supporting fiction written by women I would argue that by segregating it off like this the Orange Prize is harming it. It makes it look like the Olympic 100m final, implying that women's novels can't easily compete against those by men so need a category of their own. We should be celebrating women's writing by watching women win awards where men are also competing, not awards where only women can compete.
In my opinion, the only argument in favour of the Orange Prize is the curious failure by the Booker reward women as often as it should. Since the Orange Prize was founded in 1996, the Booker has been won by women on only five occasions. It's an issue that really needs addressing, but that should be the job of the Booker judges (who may have already started to address the balance as women have won in three out of the last five years) and not require a second prize.
I think that there is room for a women's fiction prize, but that it should be awarded to books about women not by women. If the Orange Prize was awarded to the novel which made the best contribution towards issues of women's rights and feminism, regardless of the gender of its author, I would feel much more comfortable with it.
Founded as recently as 1996, the Orange Prize is curiously anachronistic and, in my opinion, misguided. Fiction is one of the few areas where there is no trace of a glass ceiling and women can visibly and consistently compete and better men without the additional burden of having to overcome prejudices. The most successful author in the world is a woman, the world's most famous bookclub is run by a woman and even a casual reader would probably not struggle to name 10 female authors (try naming 10 female artists with the same ease).
Rather than supporting fiction written by women I would argue that by segregating it off like this the Orange Prize is harming it. It makes it look like the Olympic 100m final, implying that women's novels can't easily compete against those by men so need a category of their own. We should be celebrating women's writing by watching women win awards where men are also competing, not awards where only women can compete.
In my opinion, the only argument in favour of the Orange Prize is the curious failure by the Booker reward women as often as it should. Since the Orange Prize was founded in 1996, the Booker has been won by women on only five occasions. It's an issue that really needs addressing, but that should be the job of the Booker judges (who may have already started to address the balance as women have won in three out of the last five years) and not require a second prize.
I think that there is room for a women's fiction prize, but that it should be awarded to books about women not by women. If the Orange Prize was awarded to the novel which made the best contribution towards issues of women's rights and feminism, regardless of the gender of its author, I would feel much more comfortable with it.
Tuesday 15 March 2011
When is a bestseller not a bestseller?
A very interesting post today on the blog of US thriller writer JA Konrath: http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/2011/03/lol-nyt.html He notes that although the famous New York Times Best Sellers list now includes ebooks in its sales calculations, it still excludes self-published writers, regardless of the number of sales. Konrath calculates that he has sold enough books to make the list, as have authors such as Amanda Hocking and John Locke. In fact on Amazon.com, Konrath's The List is currently outselling the Kindle version of the New York Times itself!
I can understand why the New York Times would want to exclude free books from its list of 'sellers' (many of these are self-published) or even why it might be sensible for it to exclude any book priced under a certain amount. But I can see no logical reason for excluding self-published authors. A sale is a sale, regardless of the book's publishing arrangements.
I can understand why the New York Times would want to exclude free books from its list of 'sellers' (many of these are self-published) or even why it might be sensible for it to exclude any book priced under a certain amount. But I can see no logical reason for excluding self-published authors. A sale is a sale, regardless of the book's publishing arrangements.
Sunday 13 March 2011
Review: Never Let Me Go
Title: Never Let Me Go
Author: Kazuo Ishiguro
Nationality: British
Year: 2005
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Rating: 8/10
Summary: Eerie and thought-provoking
The outline
This rare foray into sci-fi territory by an author of literary fiction relates the discomforting tale of three friends growing up in a dystopian alternative to the late twentieth century.
Sample
I can still see it now, the shudder she seemed to be suppressing, the real dread that one of us would accidentally brush against her. And though we just kept on walking, we all felt it; it was like we'd walked from the sun right into chilly shade. Ruth had been right: Madame was afraid of us. But she was afraid of us in the same way someone might be afraid of spiders. We hadn't been ready for that.
The verdict
Never Let Me Go is a haunting novel. Often mistakenly labelled as science-fiction, it keeps discussion of science to a minimum and instead focusses on the moral and philosophical issues that surround its central plot device.
The greatest example of Kazuo Ishiguro’s skill in Never Let Me Go is the way that he expertly crafts the voice of his narrator, Kathy. The language and style he uses is perfect for this young female character, inexpert and naïve but vivid and creative, and there was no occasion when the tone of a middle-aged male literary novelist intruded. Her banal descriptions of situations that the reader will find sinister are what create the eerie atmosphere of the novel and enable it to rise above standard dystopian fare.
Never Let Me go is an enigmatic novel. There’s plenty of sense that it’s an allegory for something much deeper than the mechanics of its plot. It’s up to the reader to puzzle it out. Is it about memory? Parenthood? Growing up? Life itself?
The only real problem with the novel is that it failed to engage me on an emotional as well as an intellectual level. Given its storyline, it should have moved me much more. However, overall this is a very powerful novel and one I would definitely recommend.
Author: Kazuo Ishiguro
Nationality: British
Year: 2005
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Rating: 8/10
Summary: Eerie and thought-provoking
The outline
This rare foray into sci-fi territory by an author of literary fiction relates the discomforting tale of three friends growing up in a dystopian alternative to the late twentieth century.
Sample
I can still see it now, the shudder she seemed to be suppressing, the real dread that one of us would accidentally brush against her. And though we just kept on walking, we all felt it; it was like we'd walked from the sun right into chilly shade. Ruth had been right: Madame was afraid of us. But she was afraid of us in the same way someone might be afraid of spiders. We hadn't been ready for that.
The verdict
Never Let Me Go is a haunting novel. Often mistakenly labelled as science-fiction, it keeps discussion of science to a minimum and instead focusses on the moral and philosophical issues that surround its central plot device.
The greatest example of Kazuo Ishiguro’s skill in Never Let Me Go is the way that he expertly crafts the voice of his narrator, Kathy. The language and style he uses is perfect for this young female character, inexpert and naïve but vivid and creative, and there was no occasion when the tone of a middle-aged male literary novelist intruded. Her banal descriptions of situations that the reader will find sinister are what create the eerie atmosphere of the novel and enable it to rise above standard dystopian fare.
Never Let Me go is an enigmatic novel. There’s plenty of sense that it’s an allegory for something much deeper than the mechanics of its plot. It’s up to the reader to puzzle it out. Is it about memory? Parenthood? Growing up? Life itself?
The only real problem with the novel is that it failed to engage me on an emotional as well as an intellectual level. Given its storyline, it should have moved me much more. However, overall this is a very powerful novel and one I would definitely recommend.
Saturday 12 March 2011
Review: Anna Karenina
Title: Anna Karenina
Author: Leo Tolstoy
Nationality: Russian
Year: 1877, translated by Constance Garnett
Publisher: Project Gutenberg
Rating: 8/10
Summary: A novel of two halves
The outline
Widely proclaimed as one of the greatest novels of all-time, Anna Karenina follows the eponymous heroine’s adulterous affair in the Russian high society of the 1870s.
Sample
With the insight of a man of the world, from one glance at this lady's appearance Vronsky classified her as belonging to the best society. He begged pardon, and was getting into the carriage, but felt he must glance at her once more; not that she was very beautiful, not on account of the elegance and modest grace which were apparent in her whole figure, but because in the expression of her charming face, as she passed close by him, there was something peculiarly caressing and soft. As he looked round, she too turned her head. Her shining gray eyes, that looked dark from the thick lashes, rested with friendly attention on his face, as though she were recognizing him, and then promptly turned away to the passing crowd, as though seeking someone. In that brief look Vronsky had time to notice the suppressed eagerness which played over her face, and flitted between the brilliant eyes and the faint smile that curved her red lips. It was as though her nature were so brimming over with something that against her will it showed itself now in the flash of her eyes, and now in her smile. Deliberately she shrouded the light in her eyes, but it shone against her will in the faintly perceptible smile.
The verdict
Anna Karenina is a wonderful novel. Its tragic tale of adulterous love in 1870s Russia is deservedly a classic the world over. Tolstoy excels at grasping the psychology of his characters and his depiction of Anna and Vronsky’s love affair is moving and captivating as a result. He also wraps into that affair a cutting commentary on the society of his day, which is what separates a great novel from a merely good one.
However, as much as I liked Anna Karenina’s story, the novel as a whole was let down for me by its parallel narrative following the trials and tribulations of countryside landowner, Levin. The sections involving Levin, a proxy for Tolstoy, are preachy and long-winded. Levin can do no wrong in Tolstoy’s eyes and it’s easy to get irritated by his idealistic views of peasant life and his sentimental courtship of saccharine Kitty.
The Levin sections, which take up around half the novel, cause the story to drag in places which is why I felt I couldn’t award it a perfect score. Anna’s story may be a great one, but as a whole novel it failed to live up to other nineteenth-century stories of adultery, Madame Bovary and The Scarlet Letter.
Author: Leo Tolstoy
Nationality: Russian
Year: 1877, translated by Constance Garnett
Publisher: Project Gutenberg
Rating: 8/10
Summary: A novel of two halves
The outline
Widely proclaimed as one of the greatest novels of all-time, Anna Karenina follows the eponymous heroine’s adulterous affair in the Russian high society of the 1870s.
Sample
With the insight of a man of the world, from one glance at this lady's appearance Vronsky classified her as belonging to the best society. He begged pardon, and was getting into the carriage, but felt he must glance at her once more; not that she was very beautiful, not on account of the elegance and modest grace which were apparent in her whole figure, but because in the expression of her charming face, as she passed close by him, there was something peculiarly caressing and soft. As he looked round, she too turned her head. Her shining gray eyes, that looked dark from the thick lashes, rested with friendly attention on his face, as though she were recognizing him, and then promptly turned away to the passing crowd, as though seeking someone. In that brief look Vronsky had time to notice the suppressed eagerness which played over her face, and flitted between the brilliant eyes and the faint smile that curved her red lips. It was as though her nature were so brimming over with something that against her will it showed itself now in the flash of her eyes, and now in her smile. Deliberately she shrouded the light in her eyes, but it shone against her will in the faintly perceptible smile.
The verdict
Anna Karenina is a wonderful novel. Its tragic tale of adulterous love in 1870s Russia is deservedly a classic the world over. Tolstoy excels at grasping the psychology of his characters and his depiction of Anna and Vronsky’s love affair is moving and captivating as a result. He also wraps into that affair a cutting commentary on the society of his day, which is what separates a great novel from a merely good one.
However, as much as I liked Anna Karenina’s story, the novel as a whole was let down for me by its parallel narrative following the trials and tribulations of countryside landowner, Levin. The sections involving Levin, a proxy for Tolstoy, are preachy and long-winded. Levin can do no wrong in Tolstoy’s eyes and it’s easy to get irritated by his idealistic views of peasant life and his sentimental courtship of saccharine Kitty.
The Levin sections, which take up around half the novel, cause the story to drag in places which is why I felt I couldn’t award it a perfect score. Anna’s story may be a great one, but as a whole novel it failed to live up to other nineteenth-century stories of adultery, Madame Bovary and The Scarlet Letter.
Everybody Hates a Tourist, or the Problem with Levin
This post contains minor spoilers for ANNA KARENINA and DOWN AND OUT IN PARIS AND LONDON.
It was the summer of Britpop. The sun was always shining and I had hours to spare lazing on a grassy field, chatting to my friends about life, literature and the musical revolution. The media was fixated with the battle between Blur and Oasis, but we were working class and from Yorkshire so we preferred Pulp.
In our A-level English class we were reading George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London. To fill in the subject matter for those unfamiliar with it, the book recounts the time that Orwell decided to live as a tramp in the two capital cities, in order to experience what life is like on the other side of the tracks. At the end of Down and Out, Orwell grows tired of his life on the streets and casually writes home to ask for the cash he needs to return to his middle class existence.
Orwell’s underworld excursion reminded us strongly of the lyrics of Pulp’s most famous song, Common People. The lyrics relate the story of a rich Greek girl who while studying St Martin’s College asks one of her less well off co-students to show her how the ‘common people’ live and help her pretend to be one of them. “Everybody hates a tourist,” sings Pulp frontman, Jarvis Cocker, adding that “the chip stains and grease will come out in the bath”. He concludes that “you'll never get it right, cos when you're laid in bed at night watching roaches climb the wall, if you call your Dad he could stop it all.”
This all came back to me when I recently read Anna Karenina for the first time. Although I loved the chapters covering the tragic romance of Anna and Vronsky, I was less enthusiastic about the parallel storyline dealing with the enthusiastic countryside landowner, Levin.
Many readers have disliked the Levin chapters of Anna Karenina, largely because they drag by when compared to the Anna storyline. This wasn’t my mine objection to them. With Levin I felt like I was reading Down and Out in Paris and London all over again.
In one famous scene, Levin spends a happy day working in the fields alongside the peasants of his estate. Like Orwell, he is a great friend of the workers and much prefers this day out to spending time among politicians in Moscow. At one level, his views seem refreshing for a Russian aristocrat in the late nineteenth century. Tolstoy relates that “if he had been asked whether he liked or didn't like the peasants, Konstantin Levin would have been absolutely at a loss what to reply. He liked and did not like the peasants, just as he liked and did not like men in general.”
But this ability to see peasants in no different light to other men, does not extend to a wish to see them become anything other than peasants. “The man that can read and write is much inferior as a workman,” Levin says and he believes in a world where everyone knows their place and is happy with it. To him, anyone who wants to educate the peasants and take them away from their work in the fields is doing them a disservice.
Levin never stops to consider that what may be to him an enjoyable day of exercise in the country, is a chore if there is no escape from it. At the end of his day in the fields he can happily go back to his warm safe home and eat a good meal. There are servants to feed him and if his aches grow too painful he can always spend the next day in bed and know that a decent doctor will be there for him if he needs help.
For the peasants there is no escape and no choice. Levin is so wrapped up in his idea of a working class idyll that he never realises that. For him, the grass is greener on the other side and he mistakenly thinks that because he would rather be at work in the fields than behind a desk in Moscow then everyone else feels the same way.
Levin may see himself as the peasants’ friend, but as long as he doesn’t allow them to make their own choices, he’s actually their enemy. Disconcertingly, Levin is held as an extremely positive character in the novel and is widely believed to be a cipher for Tolstoy’s own political views, which are considered liberal for the time. With even the peasants’ supporters looking to deny them a choice, it seems little wonder to me that Russia came to revolution just 28 years after the publication of Anna Karenina.
It was the summer of Britpop. The sun was always shining and I had hours to spare lazing on a grassy field, chatting to my friends about life, literature and the musical revolution. The media was fixated with the battle between Blur and Oasis, but we were working class and from Yorkshire so we preferred Pulp.
In our A-level English class we were reading George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London. To fill in the subject matter for those unfamiliar with it, the book recounts the time that Orwell decided to live as a tramp in the two capital cities, in order to experience what life is like on the other side of the tracks. At the end of Down and Out, Orwell grows tired of his life on the streets and casually writes home to ask for the cash he needs to return to his middle class existence.
Orwell’s underworld excursion reminded us strongly of the lyrics of Pulp’s most famous song, Common People. The lyrics relate the story of a rich Greek girl who while studying St Martin’s College asks one of her less well off co-students to show her how the ‘common people’ live and help her pretend to be one of them. “Everybody hates a tourist,” sings Pulp frontman, Jarvis Cocker, adding that “the chip stains and grease will come out in the bath”. He concludes that “you'll never get it right, cos when you're laid in bed at night watching roaches climb the wall, if you call your Dad he could stop it all.”
This all came back to me when I recently read Anna Karenina for the first time. Although I loved the chapters covering the tragic romance of Anna and Vronsky, I was less enthusiastic about the parallel storyline dealing with the enthusiastic countryside landowner, Levin.
Many readers have disliked the Levin chapters of Anna Karenina, largely because they drag by when compared to the Anna storyline. This wasn’t my mine objection to them. With Levin I felt like I was reading Down and Out in Paris and London all over again.
In one famous scene, Levin spends a happy day working in the fields alongside the peasants of his estate. Like Orwell, he is a great friend of the workers and much prefers this day out to spending time among politicians in Moscow. At one level, his views seem refreshing for a Russian aristocrat in the late nineteenth century. Tolstoy relates that “if he had been asked whether he liked or didn't like the peasants, Konstantin Levin would have been absolutely at a loss what to reply. He liked and did not like the peasants, just as he liked and did not like men in general.”
But this ability to see peasants in no different light to other men, does not extend to a wish to see them become anything other than peasants. “The man that can read and write is much inferior as a workman,” Levin says and he believes in a world where everyone knows their place and is happy with it. To him, anyone who wants to educate the peasants and take them away from their work in the fields is doing them a disservice.
Levin never stops to consider that what may be to him an enjoyable day of exercise in the country, is a chore if there is no escape from it. At the end of his day in the fields he can happily go back to his warm safe home and eat a good meal. There are servants to feed him and if his aches grow too painful he can always spend the next day in bed and know that a decent doctor will be there for him if he needs help.
For the peasants there is no escape and no choice. Levin is so wrapped up in his idea of a working class idyll that he never realises that. For him, the grass is greener on the other side and he mistakenly thinks that because he would rather be at work in the fields than behind a desk in Moscow then everyone else feels the same way.
Levin may see himself as the peasants’ friend, but as long as he doesn’t allow them to make their own choices, he’s actually their enemy. Disconcertingly, Levin is held as an extremely positive character in the novel and is widely believed to be a cipher for Tolstoy’s own political views, which are considered liberal for the time. With even the peasants’ supporters looking to deny them a choice, it seems little wonder to me that Russia came to revolution just 28 years after the publication of Anna Karenina.
Thursday 10 March 2011
Life begins at 40?
I'm currently reading Ali Cooper's The Girl on the Swing and noticed, to my surprise, that it has a middle-aged female protangonist. There shouldn't have been any reason for this to be surprising, but I can't actually remember the last time I read a book with a female lead who was over the age of 40.
Looking back over the last 50 novels and novellas I read, I get the following breakdown of the age and gender of the protagonists:
Girl - 2
Boy - 5
Younger woman - 6
Younger man - 22
Older man - 6
Older woman - 0
Ensemble - 2
Animal - 3
Other - 2
Man, various stages of the character's life - 1
Woman, various stages of the character's life - 1
Older women are almost invisible in the pages of fiction it seems. While this problem has been well-documented in the movies, I don't think it's often pointed out for books and I'd say it's an issue that needs to be addressed. It's certainly not just my own reading habits. A glance at any bestsellers list will confirm that.
So when did I last read a book with a middle-aged female protagonist? I honestly don't know. The Bridge of San Luis Rey, which I read earlier this year has some older female leads, but no single protagonist, and The Poisonwood Bible, which I read around two years ago, has an older woman as one of the five leads. But a whole book about an older woman? I suspect it was around five years ago or more, when I last read one of the Discworld witches book.
Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day is on my to-read list, but I'm keen to hear any recommendations.
Looking back over the last 50 novels and novellas I read, I get the following breakdown of the age and gender of the protagonists:
Girl - 2
Boy - 5
Younger woman - 6
Younger man - 22
Older man - 6
Older woman - 0
Ensemble - 2
Animal - 3
Other - 2
Man, various stages of the character's life - 1
Woman, various stages of the character's life - 1
Older women are almost invisible in the pages of fiction it seems. While this problem has been well-documented in the movies, I don't think it's often pointed out for books and I'd say it's an issue that needs to be addressed. It's certainly not just my own reading habits. A glance at any bestsellers list will confirm that.
So when did I last read a book with a middle-aged female protagonist? I honestly don't know. The Bridge of San Luis Rey, which I read earlier this year has some older female leads, but no single protagonist, and The Poisonwood Bible, which I read around two years ago, has an older woman as one of the five leads. But a whole book about an older woman? I suspect it was around five years ago or more, when I last read one of the Discworld witches book.
Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day is on my to-read list, but I'm keen to hear any recommendations.
Wednesday 9 March 2011
Review: Remix
Title: Remix
Author: Lexi Revellian
Nationality: British
Year: 2010
Publisher: Hoxton Press
Rating: 9/10
Summary: Quirky, old-fashioned and quite unlike anything else on the market
The outline
Rocking-horse restorer Caz Tallis wakes up one morning to find a handsome man and a cute dog asleep on her balcony. The story develops into a good old-fashioned murder mystery with a modern twist.
Sample
I didn't see the man straight away.
The sun was shining, so I'd taken my breakfast toast and coffee out on the terrace. I strolled to the far corner to admire a view I never tire of: a London roofscape, a glimpse of trees in Hoxton Square two streets away, and the distant Gherkin gleaming in the early morning sun. Already the faint hum of traffic competed with the coo of a courting pigeon. My blackbird hopped towards me, bright eye cocked, waiting for his ration of sultanas. I put them in the dish, and stopped dead.
There was a stranger asleep on my outdoor sofa - my new expensive sofa that I can't really afford and shouldn't have bought - a scruffy mongrel curled up beside him.
The verdict
This is a highly addictive novel, a good old-fashioned murder mystery with a dash of 21st century celebrity glamour. It’s a book that is worth far more than the sum of its parts – sometimes cheesy, sometimes predictable, sometimes naïve, but always a rollicking good read. I struggled to put it down. Lexi Revellian is great at crafting a plot that moves at speed but her biggest talent is in creating characters that the reader can really care about, characters that seem like old friends as the novel draws to a close.
Overall, Remix is great fun, extremely entertaining and – dare I say it – would make an excellent transition to the small or big screen.
Author: Lexi Revellian
Nationality: British
Year: 2010
Publisher: Hoxton Press
Rating: 9/10
Summary: Quirky, old-fashioned and quite unlike anything else on the market
The outline
Rocking-horse restorer Caz Tallis wakes up one morning to find a handsome man and a cute dog asleep on her balcony. The story develops into a good old-fashioned murder mystery with a modern twist.
Sample
I didn't see the man straight away.
The sun was shining, so I'd taken my breakfast toast and coffee out on the terrace. I strolled to the far corner to admire a view I never tire of: a London roofscape, a glimpse of trees in Hoxton Square two streets away, and the distant Gherkin gleaming in the early morning sun. Already the faint hum of traffic competed with the coo of a courting pigeon. My blackbird hopped towards me, bright eye cocked, waiting for his ration of sultanas. I put them in the dish, and stopped dead.
There was a stranger asleep on my outdoor sofa - my new expensive sofa that I can't really afford and shouldn't have bought - a scruffy mongrel curled up beside him.
The verdict
This is a highly addictive novel, a good old-fashioned murder mystery with a dash of 21st century celebrity glamour. It’s a book that is worth far more than the sum of its parts – sometimes cheesy, sometimes predictable, sometimes naïve, but always a rollicking good read. I struggled to put it down. Lexi Revellian is great at crafting a plot that moves at speed but her biggest talent is in creating characters that the reader can really care about, characters that seem like old friends as the novel draws to a close.
Overall, Remix is great fun, extremely entertaining and – dare I say it – would make an excellent transition to the small or big screen.
Tuesday 8 March 2011
Are self-published novels any good? Part 4
My experiment to compare samples of self-published and professionally-published novels produced some interesting results, surprising in some respects, while predictable in others.
I expected that some of the self-published books would be good, but I didn’t expect that they would be as good as they were. Although, of the 12 samples I read, the three I liked least were by independent authors, two of the four books that I bought were also self-published. I would struggle to choose a favourite between Booker shortlisted Room and two self-published novels, Remix and The Girl on the Swing. Patsy Whyte’s independently published No Easy Road was also of a high standard, though not something I would normally read.
If this had been a blind test, I’m not sure I would have been able to pick out the six self-published books from the samples. Immortal, Elfhunter and No Cure for the Broken-Hearted would have marked themselves out as self-published due to the quality control issues I mentioned in my previous post, while I think I would have been certain that Parrot & Olivier, C and The Long Song were professionally published as they are written with a confident and sophisticated style that is usually only seen in authors of great experience.
As for the rest, I’m not so sure. I think I would have thought that In a Strange Room was self-published (something in the style and content reminded me of work from a creative writing class), but that No Easy Road was professionally published, due to the current craze for misery memoirs and Patsy Whyte’s assured writing style.
Categorising the remaining four – Room, Remix, The Girl on the Swing and Booker winner The Finkler Question – would have been more complicated. I don’t think any of them would have screamed ‘self-published’. Based on my pre-conceptions, I suspect that the originality of Room and Remix would have suggested to me that they were by relatively new writers and were therefore more likely to be self-published, leaving The Finkler Question and The Girl on the Swing for the professionally published pile. I suspect that it would have been even more difficult to distinguish between them if I’d chosen samples of six random bestsellers, rather than six prize nominees.
In the future, I’m certain that the number of quality self-published books will grow. The Kindle and its rival e-readers have made publishing more accessible than ever before as they have taken away the cost and logistics barriers of traditional print publishing. This has great potential for many types of writers who might otherwise not have made it to the shelves: unfashionable authors, self-conscious authors who can’t face the pile of rejections that have to be surmounted to get published in the traditional way, professionally published authors whose back catalogue is languishing out of print, and authors who have recognised this as a viable alternative business model.
In a post on her blog, The Girl on the Swing author Ali Cooper explains that “I hadn't tried very hard with the agent/publisher route. But what I had done was to keep a careful watch on other authors for the past couple of years. I noted who was signing publishing contracts, in what genres etc, and I decided that in my genre, in UK plus a number of other factors, it wasn't going to happen.” She adds that she is sure that she could have got published by a new or small press but “decided I was better off being indie”.
There’s a similar story from Remix author, Lexi Revellian. “I spent a year submitting Remix,” she told blogger Simon Royle in November. “Four agents requested the full typescript; two of them approached me. I was told I write brilliantly. Two said they would like to see my next book. They said Remix did not fit their list, they did not believe they could sell it to publishers, even that books about rock stars never sold. I decided a year was long enough.”
Remix has since sold 15,000 copies in six months and is a constant feature in Amazon’s Top 100 e-books list. In publishing terms that is a significant impact.
Compare Remix’s sales to those of the 2007 Booker shortlist. According to the Telegraph, in the run-up to the announcement of the winner, Anne Enright’s The Gathering, the entire six-book shortlist had sold only 120,770 copies between them. A staggering 110,615 of the sales were of Ian McEwan’s On Chesil Beach, with the remaining five titles mustering just 10,155 between them. Indra Sinha's Animal’s People managed only 1,189 sales (a mere 231 of these before it got the publicity of making the shortlist). In contrast, Katie Price’s latest novel at the time, Crystal, had sold 159,407 copies – more than the entire Booker shortlist put together.
The statistics may seem galling, but self-published novelists should definitely take heart in the fact that a novel like Remix can manage as much as a tenth of the sales of a novel from the Katie Price marketing operation with its position on supermarket sales stands and promotion through TV and magazines.
Self-publishers who rant about celebrity books damaging their own chances of getting professionally published are way off the mark. I’ve seen a lot of this kind of talk on forums and it completely flies in the face of publishing economics. Publishers who make a fortune from celebrity bestsellers are in a far better position to take risks over new writers than publishers who must play it safe because they are struggling financially. Neither is Katie Price taking thousands of readers away from other books. Most of them I’m sure read Crystal and the rest of her portfolio because they are buying into the Katie Price brand, not because they are desperate for something to read. Very few of those 159,407 readers would ever consider reading Animal’s People.
Given the relatively small sales figures of even some of the most acclaimed novels, does this mean that it’s better for a new author to go it alone? Perhaps. An author who gets a royalty of 20% of the sale price of a £6.99 professionally-published novel will end up with £1.38 per book sold. And that’s quite a good deal. It’s more common for authors to receive 20% after costs are deducted, or even just 10%. Usually it’s necessary for an author to hire an agent to find a publisher for them, meaning that the agent’s cut will reduce that further.
In contrast Amazon’s digital text platform gives authors a royalty of 70% of the sale price. On a £1.99 self-published book that’s £1.39 per sale, 1p more than through the professional publishing route and with no agent to take a fee.
So what advantages are there for an author who gets published professionally? The obvious one is with printed books. A publisher will carry the costs and spend the time necessary to get a printed book to the shelves. But as digital books become the dominant form over the next few years, where will this leave the publishing industry?
Professional publishers will generally still be able to offer authors a better marketing platform than they can create themselves. This is not just in forms of traditional advertising (which is nowhere near as common in book publishing as it is for products such as DVDs or music CDs), but also in the relationships they have with newspaper arts sections and booksellers.
But this offering can vary between publishers. One author who had her first novel published by a small press told me that she was expected to do most of the marketing work herself and had to present the publisher with samples of press coverage before they would agree to a second print run.
However, the bigger publishers will almost always be able to market a novel better than the author can alone. Another advantage of being professionally published is that many book awards won’t accept entries from self-published novelists. This covers a range of awards from small prizes up to and including the Booker itself and to some extent I can see their point. It’s not worth the judges’ time to be deluged by self-published titles whose only qualification may be that the author thinks that they’re in with a chance. Perhaps in future literary prizes should consider approaching an authors association and ask it to put forward two self-published titles in the same way that each publisher is only allowed to submit two titles. This would give the best self-published titles an equal chance.
Another disadvantage that self-publishers face is that the major newspapers rarely, if ever, review or even mention self-published titles. However, this may become less of an issue as we journey deeper into the digital age. “Is the age of the critic over?”, the Observer asked in January, citing the rise of social media as a crucial factor in how consumers make choices. “Every single literary critic in the traditional media seemed to agree that Jonathan Franzen's Freedom, his saga of a dysfunctional American family, was the novel of the epoch,” the article said. “Despite the deafening ballyhoo, the critical consensus didn't seem to make much difference to the larger public.”
So with the fickle and unpredictable public in the driving seat the traditional publishers may find that the e-book revolution wears away their business model in more ways than one. I don’t think it will be long before a self-published author with a great novel and really good self-promotion skills comes along and then there will be no looking back.
I expected that some of the self-published books would be good, but I didn’t expect that they would be as good as they were. Although, of the 12 samples I read, the three I liked least were by independent authors, two of the four books that I bought were also self-published. I would struggle to choose a favourite between Booker shortlisted Room and two self-published novels, Remix and The Girl on the Swing. Patsy Whyte’s independently published No Easy Road was also of a high standard, though not something I would normally read.
If this had been a blind test, I’m not sure I would have been able to pick out the six self-published books from the samples. Immortal, Elfhunter and No Cure for the Broken-Hearted would have marked themselves out as self-published due to the quality control issues I mentioned in my previous post, while I think I would have been certain that Parrot & Olivier, C and The Long Song were professionally published as they are written with a confident and sophisticated style that is usually only seen in authors of great experience.
As for the rest, I’m not so sure. I think I would have thought that In a Strange Room was self-published (something in the style and content reminded me of work from a creative writing class), but that No Easy Road was professionally published, due to the current craze for misery memoirs and Patsy Whyte’s assured writing style.
Categorising the remaining four – Room, Remix, The Girl on the Swing and Booker winner The Finkler Question – would have been more complicated. I don’t think any of them would have screamed ‘self-published’. Based on my pre-conceptions, I suspect that the originality of Room and Remix would have suggested to me that they were by relatively new writers and were therefore more likely to be self-published, leaving The Finkler Question and The Girl on the Swing for the professionally published pile. I suspect that it would have been even more difficult to distinguish between them if I’d chosen samples of six random bestsellers, rather than six prize nominees.
In the future, I’m certain that the number of quality self-published books will grow. The Kindle and its rival e-readers have made publishing more accessible than ever before as they have taken away the cost and logistics barriers of traditional print publishing. This has great potential for many types of writers who might otherwise not have made it to the shelves: unfashionable authors, self-conscious authors who can’t face the pile of rejections that have to be surmounted to get published in the traditional way, professionally published authors whose back catalogue is languishing out of print, and authors who have recognised this as a viable alternative business model.
In a post on her blog, The Girl on the Swing author Ali Cooper explains that “I hadn't tried very hard with the agent/publisher route. But what I had done was to keep a careful watch on other authors for the past couple of years. I noted who was signing publishing contracts, in what genres etc, and I decided that in my genre, in UK plus a number of other factors, it wasn't going to happen.” She adds that she is sure that she could have got published by a new or small press but “decided I was better off being indie”.
There’s a similar story from Remix author, Lexi Revellian. “I spent a year submitting Remix,” she told blogger Simon Royle in November. “Four agents requested the full typescript; two of them approached me. I was told I write brilliantly. Two said they would like to see my next book. They said Remix did not fit their list, they did not believe they could sell it to publishers, even that books about rock stars never sold. I decided a year was long enough.”
Remix has since sold 15,000 copies in six months and is a constant feature in Amazon’s Top 100 e-books list. In publishing terms that is a significant impact.
Compare Remix’s sales to those of the 2007 Booker shortlist. According to the Telegraph, in the run-up to the announcement of the winner, Anne Enright’s The Gathering, the entire six-book shortlist had sold only 120,770 copies between them. A staggering 110,615 of the sales were of Ian McEwan’s On Chesil Beach, with the remaining five titles mustering just 10,155 between them. Indra Sinha's Animal’s People managed only 1,189 sales (a mere 231 of these before it got the publicity of making the shortlist). In contrast, Katie Price’s latest novel at the time, Crystal, had sold 159,407 copies – more than the entire Booker shortlist put together.
The statistics may seem galling, but self-published novelists should definitely take heart in the fact that a novel like Remix can manage as much as a tenth of the sales of a novel from the Katie Price marketing operation with its position on supermarket sales stands and promotion through TV and magazines.
Self-publishers who rant about celebrity books damaging their own chances of getting professionally published are way off the mark. I’ve seen a lot of this kind of talk on forums and it completely flies in the face of publishing economics. Publishers who make a fortune from celebrity bestsellers are in a far better position to take risks over new writers than publishers who must play it safe because they are struggling financially. Neither is Katie Price taking thousands of readers away from other books. Most of them I’m sure read Crystal and the rest of her portfolio because they are buying into the Katie Price brand, not because they are desperate for something to read. Very few of those 159,407 readers would ever consider reading Animal’s People.
Given the relatively small sales figures of even some of the most acclaimed novels, does this mean that it’s better for a new author to go it alone? Perhaps. An author who gets a royalty of 20% of the sale price of a £6.99 professionally-published novel will end up with £1.38 per book sold. And that’s quite a good deal. It’s more common for authors to receive 20% after costs are deducted, or even just 10%. Usually it’s necessary for an author to hire an agent to find a publisher for them, meaning that the agent’s cut will reduce that further.
In contrast Amazon’s digital text platform gives authors a royalty of 70% of the sale price. On a £1.99 self-published book that’s £1.39 per sale, 1p more than through the professional publishing route and with no agent to take a fee.
So what advantages are there for an author who gets published professionally? The obvious one is with printed books. A publisher will carry the costs and spend the time necessary to get a printed book to the shelves. But as digital books become the dominant form over the next few years, where will this leave the publishing industry?
Professional publishers will generally still be able to offer authors a better marketing platform than they can create themselves. This is not just in forms of traditional advertising (which is nowhere near as common in book publishing as it is for products such as DVDs or music CDs), but also in the relationships they have with newspaper arts sections and booksellers.
But this offering can vary between publishers. One author who had her first novel published by a small press told me that she was expected to do most of the marketing work herself and had to present the publisher with samples of press coverage before they would agree to a second print run.
However, the bigger publishers will almost always be able to market a novel better than the author can alone. Another advantage of being professionally published is that many book awards won’t accept entries from self-published novelists. This covers a range of awards from small prizes up to and including the Booker itself and to some extent I can see their point. It’s not worth the judges’ time to be deluged by self-published titles whose only qualification may be that the author thinks that they’re in with a chance. Perhaps in future literary prizes should consider approaching an authors association and ask it to put forward two self-published titles in the same way that each publisher is only allowed to submit two titles. This would give the best self-published titles an equal chance.
Another disadvantage that self-publishers face is that the major newspapers rarely, if ever, review or even mention self-published titles. However, this may become less of an issue as we journey deeper into the digital age. “Is the age of the critic over?”, the Observer asked in January, citing the rise of social media as a crucial factor in how consumers make choices. “Every single literary critic in the traditional media seemed to agree that Jonathan Franzen's Freedom, his saga of a dysfunctional American family, was the novel of the epoch,” the article said. “Despite the deafening ballyhoo, the critical consensus didn't seem to make much difference to the larger public.”
So with the fickle and unpredictable public in the driving seat the traditional publishers may find that the e-book revolution wears away their business model in more ways than one. I don’t think it will be long before a self-published author with a great novel and really good self-promotion skills comes along and then there will be no looking back.
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