CHERTSEY

BOATS, BRIDGES, BOILERS ... IF IT'S GOT RIVETS, I'M RIVETTED
... feminist, atheist, autistic academic and historic narrowboater ...
Likes snooker, beer, tea, rivets and solitude, and is strangely fascinated by the cinema organ.
And there might be something about railways.
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Tuesday 30 March 2010

Books I read in March

Ann Granger Shades of Murder
Another decently crafted village whodunnit. I could read the series.

Penelope Fitzgerald Offshore
Wonderfully economical and evocative, more a poem than a story.

Sarah Waters The Little Stranger
A wonderful treat which I've been saving since the paperback came out to immerse myself in it. I managed to resolve it in my own mind without recourse to belief in the supernatural, but there's no glib tidy explanation at the end - you have to decide for yourself.

Alastair Campbell All in the Mind
Disappointing, rather pedestrian and heavy handed; too many characters, none of them really fully formed. I'd like to see him try a political thriller though.

Reginald Hill Midnight Fugue
A bit far fetched, as I've come to expect, but pretty gripping and unexpectedly moving.

Stephen Booth Blood on the Tongue
Lots of Peak District atmosphere and a police team you could get to know and like. And a good strong plot. I'd read more of these.

Simon Kernick A Good Day to Die
A rather old fashioned sort of thriller (and none the worse for that) that started well, but became rather far fetched towards the denouement.

P.D. James The Private Patient
Cardboard cut-out characters, wooden dialogue, preposterous plot, with moralising and political polemicising thrown in randomly, and old fashioned in all the wrong ways - just why is P.D. James so highly rated?

John Harvey Lonely Hearts
And the first shall be last... Now this is more like it - instantly engaging, really human, characters; credible plot and an outcome you can care about. Wish there were more where this came from (there are ten, and now I've read them all). And at last I know where the bloodstain came from.

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