image from
New York Times
All the guides are out and everyone has a best-of list, but what
have we actually been reading over the break? When I asked around
the shop this morning, this is what I found:
Ruth raved about The Wasted
Vigil by Nadeem Aslam, a story of intersecting lives lived
in the shadow of the Tora Bora mountains of Afghanistan that is
both beautiful and darkly compelling.
Sharon agreed with the great reviews being received by Colum
McCann for his latest novel,
Let the Great World Spin, that explores the character
and politics of seventies America, through the act of a high-wire
artist crossing the air between New York's newly built Twin Towers.
I remember being fascinated reading one of McCann's lesser-known
earlier novels, Zoli,
based on the life of a real gypsy in Czechoslovakia during the 30s
and in the shadow of Nazi Germany. Dancer,
his novel based on the life of Rudolf Nureyev, was also well
received. McCann's skill at weaving real biography and history with
fictional detail to tell a compelling story is remarkable.
Kathy was utterly fascinated with Sara Maitland's A Book of
Silence in which the author relates her experiences of
searching for silence in our less-than-silent world. She
interweaves her own journeys from the Australian bush to the Sinai
Desert to the Scottish moors, with history of silence through
fairytale and myth, Western and Eastern religion, the Enlightenment
and psychoanalysis, through to contemporary society.
Kevin found Bob Smith's novel
Selfish and Perverse both funny and touching, in which
the protagonist Nelson comes to strongly and bizarrely identify
with the salmon he is fishing for, because they too will overcome
every hurdle in their search for love.
When Kate, our local crime aficionado, was recently in Northern
Europe, she took the recommendation of a local bookseller and read
a copy of Echoes from
the Dead by Johan Theorin, a former winner of The Glass
Key, Nordic Crime Writers Award. Twenty years after his
disappearance, the shoe of Julias' lost son is sent through the
post to her father ...
And from the kids' department, Leanne enjoyed the follow-up book
to Patrick Ness' much-loved
The Knife of Never Letting Go, called
The Ask and the Answer, which has just won the Costa
award for children's books.
And for myself, after having heard several rave reviews from
other staff, I just finished the new novel by Lorrie Moore,
A Gate at the Stairs. Told in the voice of a sassy
first-year uni. student, it explores the cultural tensions in
post-9/11 America, between class, race and the city/country divide.
There are so many layers to this book that, after I finished, I
just wanted to pick it up and start again.
Happy New Year!
The idea of
Australia Day makes me feel vaguely unwell: the thought of yobbos
with Aussie flags and cans of VB clasped tightly in their hands
staggering around the streets. So here I am, hiding out at work,
and hoping it will soon all be over. But despite disturbing reports
coming out of this country about the way we treat aboriginals,
Indian students and refugees, among others, there's gotta be some
good news, right? Well here are some of the best things to come out
of Australia recently -
fiction,
art,
history - take your pick. And while your
waiting for the snags to cook up on the barbie, sit back with your
VB in your hand and enjoy.
You can now wear Naked
Man as a cowboy...
...playing
cricket...
...or at a party.
