I’m sure I’m not the only reader who was excited to receive P. D. James’ new novel, Death Comes to Pemberly for Christmas this year. The novel, a sequel of sorts to Pride and Prejudice, follows Elizabeth Darcy to her new home, Pemberly, in Derbyshire. Set six years after Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth is now settled and happily married to Mr. Darcy. Continue reading
For a long time I thought fantasy fiction was the sort of thing I should avoid. I didn’t like Lord of the Rings that much and I found The Hobbit a bit, well, childish. I preferred grittier or loftier things to read. Or so I thought. This week I picked up – metaphorically that is: I actually downloaded – George R. R. Martin’s A Game Of Thrones and it’s proved me wrong. It is packed with the sort of fantasy tropes I thought I’d hate – dragon eggs, dwarves, a mysterious group of creatures called The Others – but I could hardly put it down and have gone out and bought the next in the series.
Why was I so struck? Because of it’s grandeur and ambition I think. The books are about war and fantasy but they are also about politics and ambition. Modern literary fiction and crime fiction don’t really deal with the scope of politics and leadership very well and, all to often, they pay lip service to matters of state so that they fall short and feel false. In part because they are necessarily short these days: big books are harder to sell. George R. R. Martin doesn’t do this. A Game of Thrones is a fascinating examination of why men and women in positions of power act as they do and it shows the consequences of these actions in vivid detail. I can’t wait to keep reading the series and it’s great to be proven wrong too.
Right now every publisher wants to get themselves a C. J. Samson. It’s easy to see why. His books, set in the during the latter period of Henry VIII’s rule featuring lawyer-cum-sleuth Matthew Shardlake, are entertaining, fast paced and are rich with historical details. Continue reading
According to Red Magazine, The Hypnotist is ‘One of the best – if not the best – Scandinavian crime thrillers I’ve read…’, or at least that’s what the back cover of the book says. That’s a pretty strong recommendation, which ever way you cut it, but it’s also the Larsson siren call that we’re going to hear a lot of for the next few years. Any crime writer with a name that looks like there’s too many consonants in it or that has an Ø in it – ideally both – is going to be similarly beatified. At least until after David Fincher’s films come out. Continue reading
This review, by Adam Mars-Jones, has been published on the Guardian website. I’ve not read Gordon Bowker’s book yet but I have it and am looking forward to it. One of the things that struck me though about this review was Adam Mars-Jones comment: