"Prague Spring" by Simon Mawer

An audio book.

It's 1968. Two Oxford students, Mark (1st year science, a Northerner) and Eleanor (2nd year English, more middle class), discuss the long vac in a noisy pub. They only know each other because they're in the cast of a play. She suggests that they hitch-hike around Europe just as friends. On the way to the coast they stay at her parents' in separate rooms. She tells him she still has occasional sex with her ex-fiance Kevin.

In Prague, embassy employee Sam (who's in a cooling relationship with pretty Stephanie, who's returning to London) flirts with Medalina who sleeps with Lenka who, he discovers after, was an East German honeypot spy when she was 15. Prague has experiencied a few months of relative freedom. The embassy staff speculate over what to do if Russia tries to suppress the Dubchek revolution.

Mark and Elli start hitch-hiking. She can speak French - he can't. After smoking pot they have sex, which means more to him than her. She confesses later that she can't let herself go during sex, perhaps because her mother had affairs. She'd hoped it would have been different with Mark - she likes and trusts him - but she still doesn't enjoy sex. They get picked up by a US band, "Ides of March". They meet a cellist who knows about Oxford and is soon to perform in Prague. They decide on a whim to head for Prague. To their surprise they get through the barrier - "a barber's pole, a jousting lance" - at the border with a minimum of fuss.

Sam meets Lenka's mother who tells him stories about the past - she was recently offered a medal and compensation for her rebellious husband's death. Lenka's mother has a partner who belongs to the party. Thanks to him she's a student (but she slept with him?) Sam and Lenka stumble upon a Russian army exercise. They pop to Munich and back, taking advantage of his diplomatic immunity. They pick up Mark and Ellie. Lenka gives them a tour of Prague and sorts out accomodation. The Moody Blues are in town. They see "Ides of March" in action (did Ellie share pot and have sex with them? Mark suspects so. Ellie says that what she does with her body is not his problem) and the cellist's concert. After the concert, 2 russian musicians want to defect. Sam lets them stay overnight in his flat.

The Russians invade. Sam is told to come to the embassy and not bring Lenka. Stephanie desperately tries to contact him. Elli and Mark get caught up in street action - they see Swastikas painted onto the tanks. Mark phones Sam, tells him that Lenka's been shot. A convoy's arranged out of the country - Elli, Mark and the musicians are in the same minibus. Sam rushes to the hospital. It's touch and go. Safe in Germany, Mark feels that he and Elli have recently only been together because of the situation. She says she liked Lienka and wonders if she's a lesbian. They decide where to go with the toss of a coin.

[It works for me, maybe because I'm interested in Prague. It didn't seem over-researched (the researched bits are sneaked in when czechs tell english people about their past). Videos of the Moody Blues from that time are on YouTube! Compromises, chance and fate are abiding themes. I imagine that Sam will marry Stephanie and that Eleanor will look back on the journey as a turning point. There are little glimpses of the future - e.g. at one point we're told that Mark will recall a kiss with a married woman for the rest of his life and she would later die in a New York car accident.]

Other reviews

• Roberta Silman (this consistently interesting novel adds a resonate dimension to an historical event about which we thought we knew all there was to know)
• Lisa Hill

"Honshu Bees" by Dorothy Yamamoto (Templar Poetry, 2018)

A pamphlet of poems from The High Window, The Interpreter's House, Orbis, South etc.

None of the poems tried too hard, and all had something to like. The most common shape (of the more successful poems anyway) is a surrealism/symbolism that gradually takes over from an initial observation.

"Abandoned bike" starts with "I wonder when the abandoned bicycle/ lost its last bit of bikiness.". It's easy to guess how this might continue. It manages to end with some less-easily-guessed ideas - the final loss of "how to be unique - the one/ pulled from a rank of slumped neighbours// to enjoy that special taste/ of spun air, that journey home".

Some make so little use of line-breaks that they might as well be prose - "Hares at Dublin airport" and "Autumn wasps" for example are in short-lined couplets, the lyricism of the final lines fitting easily within the style of Micros.

"Hoovers" and "Exotic" seem too light to me. I much prefer "The sound of paper" (my favourite) and "Honshu bees".

Other reviews

• Wendy Klein (In addition to her marvellous observations of animals and insects, her subjects include poems that explore her Oriental/Anglo-Saxon heritage. Her parents, particularly her father, are portrayed at various stages in their lives. ... Every poem here is so much larger in scope than its words on the page, but none more so than the title poem itself. )
• Matthew Paul ( the poems which chime with me most are those which describe Yamamoto’s English mother and, more often, her Japanese father ... Yamamoto’s depiction of surreal memory is wondrous, particularly in the title poem)

"The girl who got onto the ferry in Citizen Kane" by Sean Martin (Templar poetry, 2018)

A pamphlet of poems, one of which won the Wigtown Poetry Competition. The first poem, "Roger Barrett: Works on Paper" is provocative - short lines, essentially a list. Many of the other pieces - especially "Ballad" - are beyond me.

"Wish You Were Here" by Jodi Picoult

An audio book.

Diana (29) works for Sotherby's in New York, selling art (she used to be an artist). She has a plan for her life. Her partner is Finn, a doctor. Her art-restoration father died 4 years before. Her mother, who left years before that, returned with early onset Altzheimers and is in a care home. Diana and Finn have planned a holiday in the Galápagos Islands - she expects to be proposed to there. At the last moment he has to stay - Covid has broken out. When she arrives at the islands, her hotel is closed - lockdown. At old lady offers her a house. Her son Gabriel isn't friendly to her initially. She befriends his daughter Beatrice (14) who can speak English and (unknown to her father) is a cutter. The mother has left the family. Some messages from Finn get through but she has trouble replying. In the end the messages sound like covid-diary entries.

There are flashbacks to her career. Her best friend at work is Rodney, flamboyantly gay. In a side-plot, Kitomi had decided not to sell a painting that was on the cover of a Night Jars album, putting Diana's job at risk.

She has private talks with Gabriel and his daughter (who was bullied at school - later we learn that unknown to her father she's a lesbian). Her mother (a photograper, a Pulitzer prizewinner) has covid and soon dies.

Diana wonders why she's reviewing her relationship with Finn. Gabriel tells her that fishermen cut off shark's fins and throw the shark back into the water. She sleeps with Gabriel while feeling guilty that she doesn't mourn her mother's death. Beatrice sees them and runs away. Beatrice has hoarded (instead of posted) the postcards that Diana has written to Finn.

She wakes up and it is all a dream. While she had covid (she nearly died) in Finn's hospital she had vividly experienced months on holiday. She realises that parts of the dream had real-life causes - delirious, she'd told Finn about her doubts regarding their relationship, for example. Her mother isn't dead. but a few other parts of her dream are strangely true. She feels she's been saved for a reason. She tries to contact others who've had vivid "parallel world" experiences.

She tries to make up with her mother (via video link). When her mother contracts covid she breaks into her room, takes off her mask. Her mother recognises her for the first time in years. Diana's heard about "terminal clarity" - covid has given her mother a way to understand things, to remember other places. She soon dies. Because Diana's taken off her mask, she and Finn have to quarentine for 2 weeks. He's initially angry. He proposes. She says "you're perfect. You're just not perfect for me"

There's an epilogue. 3 years later she's an art therapist. She's living cheaply with Rodney. She visits the Galápagos Islands. She seeks correspondences with her dream.

There are many standard situations (especially the covid-related ones). There are some standard plot twists. These are often foregrounded, giving the book a literary feel. I was surprised that Diana didn't analyse her dream - why was Beatrice a lesbian? At times I felt that the author had done Covid and Galápagos research and wanted to find a way to use it. And yet, I remained interested.

Other reviews

• laurasbooksandblogs (I went into this book thinking that Covid was going to just be a small element of the book, the element that just gets Diana to the island by herself and causes this conflict where she is forced to choose between the life she had planned and the life that she fell into. ... Once the twist occurred, I began to try to predict where the story was going next. Surely, Diana had been transported to some limbo state with others who were dead or dying. And she was going to find that her found family on that island were no longer alive once she researched it further. Luckily, the story was a bit less predictable than that as the book makes a U-turn back into a standard romance book. ... we see her break her desire to plan her life out in advance and find a way to make peace with her past and move forward with her future.)
• ivereadthis (Despite these somewhat obvious developments, I found myself swept along by Diana’s life, and Picoult is adept at creating a character with obvious flaws, but much to love as well. The problems in her life plan are obvious as soon as you pick up the book, but she’s not an annoying character you want to see fail.)
• kirkus reviews (Picoult yanks this novel off life-support by resorting to a flagrantly hackneyed plot device. Somehow, though, it works, thanks again to that penchant for grounding every fictional scenario in thoroughly documented fact. Throughout, we are treated to pithy if rather self-evident thematic underscoring, e.g. “You can’t plan your life….Because then you have a plan. Not a life.”)

"Waiting for H5N1" by Jane Routh (Templar Poetry, 2007)

A pamphlet of poems from Rialto, etc

I like the pamphlet more than any particular poem. Several mention the counting of birds. Poems tend to end well (p.4, p.6, p.8 etc). My favourite piece is "Swan".

Other reviews

• Sue Butler (There’s a lot of worry and talk of culls but there’s also a lot of hope. I especially like the poem ‘Egg’)

"The man between" by Charles Cumming

An audio book.

Lara Bartok is interviewed about Resurrection - a group of 7 20-somethings who aimed to punish immoral public figures. Though chronologically this time-line begins when the other nearly ends, sections from the 2 time-lines alternate.

It's 1966. Kit Carradine, a young thriller writer whose father had been a spy, is walking in London when someone pretends to be a fan and wants to meet with him. Intrigued (he thinks the man, Mr Mantis, belongs to MI6), Kit agrees. They've been watching him, and ask him to extend a stay he's taking in Marrakesh to appear at a book festival. He easily succumbs to flattery, seeing himself as a latterday Graham Greene, the role of curious novelist being a good cover. He's close to his father, who had to stop being a spy after a Philby-related smear.

He's supposed to look for Maria, who the secret services lost touch with 2 years before. She likes books and might turn up at the festival. He's supposed to give her a passport and credit card. Seeing her picture, and having read the newspapers, Kit realises she's Lara Bartok, part of Resurrection, ex girlfriend of the dead leader Ivan.

He has some chance encounters on his flight, his train, and elsewhere, some of them suspicious. He feels lost "in a wilderness of mirrors". He uses the skills he learnt while researching for his novels. It's suggested to him that the Russians are trying to kill the Resurrection members and their relatives. He wonders whether MI6 want to save Lara or kill her.

He sees Lara. She says that Mantis works for Russia. Kit has a plan to help her escape before the wrong people get her, involving fans he met who have a yacht. They reach Gibralter then Lara runs off. He returns to London. It's surprisingly quiet. Then 2 spies talk to him, one of whom he met in Morocco. They say that Mantis has been killed. They discuss Resurrection. Kit defends their principles though like Lara he doesn't like their lurch into terrorism. They release him. He sees them with Lara. He begins to think that Lara was a British agent. He's kidnapped, meets Ivan. Whose side is he on? The Russians, and they funded Resurrection. Ivan wants to kidnap Lara with Kit's , hinting that they've got Kit's father. Kit thwarts them. Ivan's killed. Lara becomes a spy again, and Kit is invited to do more spy work.

I was hooked most of the time. I liked the Morocco details. It's also known as "The Moroccan Girl".

Other reviews

• pittenweemlibrary (He delights in the chance to perform the spy role for real and pats himself on the back several times for how well he is doing. ... Such clichés are send-ups by the author. It is fun to spot them in this clever and witty book.)
• Barry Forshaw

"Rattle" by Fiona Cummins

An audio book.

Clara (who has her middle 3 fingers missing) is abducted by the bone collector, a man whose family through generations has been collecting unusual bones. She's 5. Her mother had been against her having an operation. Her father, a doctor, has solicited under-age women in the past.

The man keeps Jakey under observation, awaiting an opportunity to abduct him too. His bone disease means that his life expectancy is 36 years. His father Erdman has been a journalist on a Psychic magazine. He gets sacked, assaulted by a gang, gets himself to hospital and disappears. His twin brother died about 30 years before of the bone disease than Jakey has. His body was stolen. His wife Lilith became an orphan in childhood.

DI Fitzroy, 37, isn't making much progress. Her father, an ex-policeman moved abroad 2 years before with his new wife. She and her partner David are about to have an appointment at a fertility hospital. But David doesn't turn up. Her sister pesters her, saying that her niece wants a visit. She decides that having a child is more important than preserving a marriage.

A year before a girl called Grace was abducted, though she wasn't known to have a bone abnormality. Now it's discovered from her mother that she had an extra pair of ribs.

Lilith finds Erdman drunk in a park. Jakey is taken to hospital because his illness has flared up. His parents go there. Jakey is abducted.

The bone collector would like to cut up a live body. He uses beetles etc to remove flesh from bones. He leaves rabbit skeletons as calling cards. The police study the skeletons and contact beetle sellers, leading them to think that the culpit works in a museum. From his PoV we learn that he has an ill wife and no children.

Erdman has worked out that the criminal works in the hospital and is the man who's been following him. He tries to find son to make up for his imperfect behaviour in the past. Fitzroy works out the hospital connection too, Brian Howley has been a cleaner for 40 years. His boss knows that his father died and left him a house. Brian suspects that they're on his trail.

Fitzroy had over-reacted during the Grace case, and is being kept away from the front line. She goes to Brian's father's house. He tells her about Grace then stabs her and carries her in. Erdman watches, and goes in to save Fitzroy. The two find the skeleton of Erdman's brother. [Would Brian really be so careless? Would they really not contact the police (who are outside the wrong house)?] There's a fire. The police arrive in time.

6 months later, Erdman and Lilith are happy together and Jakey is ok. Brian escaped from the police. Clara might still be alive. Her parents have separated. Grace is dead.

[The plot isn't always convincing. The writing's best when first-person women are worrying. "rectangular-shaped" isn't good.]

Other reviews

• nonsenseshewrote (a mess ... Rattle‘s biggest issue is not knowing what genre it wants to be. It’s an everyday crime thriller, without any supernatural goings-on, that still owes half its page count to horror stories. ... two-thirds of the novel is spent setting up these strange goings on and the last third utterly forgetting about them. Two-thirds of the novel don’t advance the plot or the characters in any way, choosing to draw out these creepy moments instead which, ultimately, mean nothing since the story doesn’t have a supernatural resolution. ... Coincidence-driven’, ‘stupid-decision-driven’, ‘otherwise-smart-characters-making-terrible-out-of-character-decisions-to-serve-the-weak-plot-driven’, sure. But Cummins drives her characters with all the subtlety of a freight train.)
• bibliomaniacuk (This novel flits between crime, psychological thriller and horror; nothing is ever overstated or over sensationalised, keeping the reader completely convinced and on tenterhooks from the beginning to end.)