October has been a great reading month. I've technically got through ten and a half books - the half is a huge book which I'll finish in the next few weeks, but the rest are done and dusted. If I look at the stats, there's been five audiobooks, four paper copies and one on the kindle. There have been eight fiction books and two non-fiction books. The average page count is around 300 pages, though this averages out as two books were really short.
Also, all were good to read.
So here we go, in order of reading.
1) Whistler by Ann Patchett - Paper - 4.5 Stars
Ann Patchett novels are gentle. Gentle, beautifully crafted, sensitive and often end with a glorious gut punch. Whistler is one of her finest.
A family story, Daphne is reunited with her step-father, Eddie at an art museum in New York after many decades. He suddenly disappeared from her life abruptly after an incident that left everybody confused. Over the course of the novel, you discover the intricate family dynamics and characters that make up this family who are very good at glossing over things.
This is a novel for grown-ups, beautifully crafted, each chapter egging you on to find out more. I loved this. It's going on my book group long list for next year. Ann Patchett is a master.
2) Unsheltered by Barbara Kingsolver - Audio - 4 Stars
Barbara Kingsolver is another favourite author of mine. Demon Copperhead and The Poisonwood Bible are two of my favourite books. Unsheltered has been sitting in my TBR pile for ages, but I picked it up on sale on Audible. Barbara Kingsolver is a writer with ideas and a social conscience. This is no different.
In Unsheltered, we find two interweaving stories. Journalist Willa finds herself trying to protect her family in harsh economic times - not they would normally be perceived to be in trouble. Her husband, also an academic, cannot get tenure, and they're placed in a sub-standard house for the academic year, with no real knowledge of where they will go next. Her son is dealing with a newborn baby and a tragedy. Her avant-guard daughter is roaming around the place and her father-in-law is causing massive difficulties. With all this going on, Willa, starts to investigate the town and the street they live on.
The other story is set in the 1800s and looks at the street and the people who lived there, with some rather big associations to a lot of big historical scientific figures.
Willa must try, against the odds, to keep the family together.
Although this wasn't at the same level as her more famous novels, this is still very engaging. It made for a great listen.
3) Reckoning by Magda Szubanski - Audio - 4 Stars
After seeing Magda Szubanski at the Melbourne Town Hall for the launch of her new book, I was intrigued to listen to her first memoir, Reckoning, that takes on her father's story. The audiobook was read by her, giving this an even more intimate view of her family's story and her own life in Australia up until the early 2012 when she came out to the nation.
Born in Liverpool to a Scottish mother and Polish father, the family moved to Australia on a skilled workers passage, her father being a scientist they family settled in Melbourne. Szubanski looks at her childhood, her family and her ascendancy to the comic stratosphere. She also talks of her father's surprising role in the Second World War, both sides of her family and her own struggles.
This is a fascinating memoir and well worth delving into this intelligent, thoughtful woman's life. I want to read her second memoir too, which broaches her mother's slide into dementia and her own health battles.
4) On Friendship by Andrew O'Hagan - Kindle - 4 Stars
My other non-fiction book for the month, this small book of essays discussed the themes of friendship. The essays are lovely to delve into, where O'Hagan discusses various elements of friendship under many guises.
I loved listening to him speak at the Capital Theatre at the Australian launch of this book. For better or worse, he discussed most of the essays in detail at this talk, which left little to discover for me. Still, he's a great Scottish writer and this was well worth the (second) read.
5) The Lady with the Dog by Carrie Tiffany, illustrations by Noel McKenna - Paper - 4 stars
Carrie Tiffany is always worth reading.
6) The Brightest Star in the Sky by Marian Keyes - Audio - 3.5 Stars
I'll start this by saying that The Brightest Star in the Sky is not my favourite Marian Keyes novel. Sure, it's entertaining, but having consumed this on an audio book, I found it rather convoluted and I had a bit of trouble keeping the characters in line until I was about halfway though the book.
The novel looks into the lives of the residents of 66 Star Street. They all have their problems and issues. They're all okay as characters go, however, you don't really work out what's going on until the last fifty pages. You have to put in a lot of work to get there.
I prefer Keyes's Walsh Family saga more. It was okay, but I can't write much more about it without mentioning that it left me frustrated in places until I got a real handle on the characters. I might have been better reading this on paper.
7) The Underworld by Sophie Laguna - Paper - 4 stars
This was our book group book for the month, and as with most of Sofie Laguna's work, it spoke to me on a deep level.
The Booktopia website provides the blurb of:
"Martha Mullins is a misfit. Her mother is glamorous, aloof and judgmental. Her father, mostly absent. If only she had brothers and sisters with whom she might share her feelings, her confusion ... Academic and shy, Martha finds herself fascinated by the underworld, a place she learns about in Roman mythology classes at school. To Martha, the underworld and its divine inhabitants provide a place of refuge, escape, imagination and desire.
But Martha also finds joy in friendship. Connection. Intimacy. It's Martha's band of friends who show her the value in spontaneity, fun, laughter.
Until things go wrong.
How will Martha find her way in the world where she cannot be herself? Will she ever find a home for the love she feels? The call of the underworld is difficult to resist..."
I was always going to like this. As a misfit and a Classics student, I got a lot of what Martha was about. The alienation. The finding your tribe.
I really enjoyed this.
8) Nine Days by Toni Jordan - Audio - 4 Stars
I was going to love this. It's set just down the road and up the hill in Richmond. The novel looks at the Westaway family, taking a day out of one of the family's lives, from 1939 to the modern day, taking in the family folklore and mysteries. Jordan has the remarkable skill of taking your right back to working-class Richmond, the back streets, the times, the people. First published in 2012, this is well worth a read. The structure is interesting, but it works well. You also get a forensic look at a family with their secrets that need to be kept for decades.
For me, I had to take a drive down some of the streets she mentioned just to see how much they had changed.
This is another novel to hunt down, particularly if you live in the area and like social history.
9) Women and Leadership - Real Lives, Real Lessons by Julia Gillard and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala - Audio - 4 Stars
I picked this up after the tragic events concerning Helen Haines in Wangaratta. The book is extended research into woman who have taken the highest offices of their respective lands. Julia Gillard and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala interview women leaders from both sides of politics. Theresa May, Hillary Clinton, Jacinda Ardern, Erna Solberg, Michele Bachelet, Joyce Banda and Christine Lagarde are asked the same questions and provide interesting perspectives on what it is to be a woman in politics.
The book is engaging, inspiring and frightening all at the same time as these relentlessly strong women tell their stories.
It's another book I'm glad I consumed.
10) The German Ward by Pip Williams - Paper - 4 Stars
I'm a big fan of the authors other books The Dictionary of Lost Words and The Bookbinder of Jericho, and this book takes on the view of another associated character from her Oxford stable, a very minor character in her second book.
Tilda, a good friend of the twin's mother, finds herself as a part of the Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) in the second world war, working as a nurse at the Etaples hospital base in France. Tilda is a bit of a reprobate. She is also very capable and her skills are noticed, along with her unconventional way of living. It is there she takes on shifts in the German ward, where enemy prisoners are nursed back to health. It is there that she meets a German doctor, Hugo. Over the years she spends doing night duties alongside Hugo, a forbidden love develops.
Nobody would know about this relationship until a researcher uncovers a woman war artist's drawings at the Australian War Memorial over 100 years later.
The writing in this is urgent, visceral and tender. It shows the horrors of war and the redemptive nature of love in all its forms. Williams research, as always, is remarkable.
You could read this as a standalone book however, I reckon it reads better if you have the knowledge of her first two books as it rounds out the experience and gives it more depth.
