Book review – Page 6 – Cristina Sanders' blog

Norwegian Wood (Murakami) – book review

Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami

Norwegian Wood (1987) is considered a masterpiece, and Murakami the best known/ best selling Japanese author outside of Japan. So what is it about this book that hits the buttons? It is torturously sad, the story of a life defined by suicides – the whole book really a nostalgic subtext for the story that might have been told had Toru Watanabe’s college friend not committed suicide at the start. It’s timeless, sometimes beautiful. Pitch perfect. A masterpiece? Yes, perhaps.

My Friends – book review

My Friends, by Hisham Matar

Any book that offers a description of a face ‘like a landscape liable to bad weather‘ has got my love. This is a writer with poetry in his soul. ‘We shared the city the way honest labourers share tools,’ he says of two young men finding their way around London. He describes a nurse who ‘would gently tuck in my bedsheet like a skilled cook filleting a fish.’ This is classy writing.

The Grimmelings–book review

The Grimmelings, by Rachel King

Undersong: the sounds of a landscape

Chapters in The Grimmelings begin with a curious word or two, just to set the scene. ‘Undersong‘, one of the words to introduce Chapter Four, describes the background noise we live with, all the time. Can you hear it? I’ve got traffic drone at the moment. I’d rather the undersong of the lake, which I’ll call ‘Flitsplish’, as I have a bit of the Scottish in me. Rachel King’s book itself has an undersong: it’s the rhythm and poetry of the best children’s stories. I was mesmerised from the first line.

The same evening Josh Underhill went missing, the black horse appeared on the hill above the house.

Classic.

The Night She Fell–book review

The Night She Fell, by Eileen Merriman

Eileen Merriman is delightful. I shared accommodation with her at a book festival last year and we sat by the fire in the evenings drinking wine and chatting about writing, YA books, families, life. I should have locked my door.

Prophet Song – book review

Prophet Song, by Paul Lynch

When I described the plot of this book to my hubby – about a country turned to anarchy, the tyranny of a government and brutality of the rebels –he said it could never happen in modern Ireland. This surprised me, as we had lived in London during the troubles, had felt the bombings personally. It wasn’t so long ago. And Hitler’s rise to power less than a century ago illustrates how a modern country can turn on itself in a heartbeat of time. Why assume sectarian violence has gone away? And yet Ireland, today, seems such a peaceful place. Paul Lynch’s book imagines how, still, it could turn. Horribly, given the increasingly polarised state of the world, I found his scenario felt entirely possible.

The Fraud – book review

The Fraud, by Zadie Smith

The Fraud is an ambitious book, not one to take lightly. It encompasses the true story of an identity fraud trial in the 1800s, where a man returning from the colonies supposes to be not an East End butcher, but the lost son of a wealthy family. The family say he isn’t. Others, including a loyal black servant and the masses, believe he is.

Absolutely and Forever–book review

Absolutely and Forever, by Rose Tremain

This is a slim book about first love, and Rose Tremain is at her absolute pitch-perfect best. Oh! That aching yearning of waiting for a boy and the need to know everything about him and be with him all the time. Marianne, at fifteen, has fallen in love with Simon. Her mother says: ‘Nobody falls in love at your age, Marianne. What they get are “crushes” on people’. But her mother could not be more wrong. I can’t think of any better description of love than Marianne’s: the narcissism and obsession, the fear and frenzy of it. She’s fizzing with love.

Whatever Love Means – book review

Whatever love means, by David Baddiel

Whatever Love Means is an easy enough read about two couples in London around the turn of the millennium, the boys best mates, one married, the other a bit of a predator, with all the ingredients Baddiel seems to think we want to read about: sex, love, death, twists, secrets. Def a holiday read, there’s nothing much very philosophical here, no bigger picture other than creepy Vic having an affair with his best friend’s wife, and an unpicking of why her car crashed into a wall. “Whatever Love Means”, of course, is the famous line of Prince Charles’s in response to his engagement to Di – a stunningly cold response to love, which sums up the book really. None of these characters seem to have discovered the meaning of love. So why has it made my good books list? Well, I enjoyed the obviousness of it. Also, I think the stilted and stifled emotions of the characters deserve exploring. A good book, perhaps, for students of creative writing to unpick. Discuss: How might different people receive the book; what does the author want us to feel; is he in control of his characters?

Lola in the Mirror – book review

Lola in the Mirror, by Trent Dalton

Trent Dalton has done it again – Lola in the Mirror is Boy Swallows Universe in all its unmitigated glory, but in Lola in the Mirror we have a girl hero who’s on the rocks, fighting to gain a place in the world. This was one of my favourite books of 2023 and I do recommend it for the feisty characters, twisting plot, adversity, love and gorgeous writing all wrapped up in a thrilling read. Yes, it is sentimental and the homelessness described is packaged with optimism. Barbara Kingsolver did this with her brilliant Demon Copperhead; she gave the narration of a deprivation story to a gustsy kid with smarts. Perhaps such optimism doesn’t live in broken cars in junk yards. Or, just perhaps, it does.

Bird Life–book review

Bird Life, by Anna Smaill

This is a book set in Tokyo. The descriptions of the city are detailed and fabulous, from the vending machines to the ritual greetings and the culture of shopping for therapy, the tingling sounds and twinkling sights of Shinjuku, Ikebukuro, Asakura; all totally immersive. The plot (though there isn’t much of a plot, this is more psychological exploration) follows a few months in the lives of two women, Dinah and Yasuko: both of whom have fairly alarming psychosis. The narration alternates between these women, and although we are told they are very different – one is Japanese, middle-aged, charismatic; the other a dowdy kiwi not much older than the other’s son (and hold that thought) – their disconnected mental states and inability to offer any rational opinion do make them feel a bit like they speak with the same voice. They both teach English to Japanese students at the same language school and quickly become intimate friends.

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