Harper Lee's invigorating Go Set A Watchman

I was critical of New York Times review of this new release for breaking the publisher's July 14 embargo - it would have been party to a clear breach of contract - but nevertheless Michiko Katukani's take on the book is well worth reading. For her this 'sequel' was unexciting and unlovely in its focus on the now bigoted racist, Atticus.

A more positive review by Stephen Romei, literary editor of The Australian, does the book far more justice.

There have been lots of reviews - the majority rather negative.

But I agree with Romei. Go Set A Watchman is wonderful, stimulating, and a real pleasure to read. 

As much as anything it's a novel of dialogues, debates and ideas. And wit abounds. Scout, known by her real name Jean Louise and now in her mid-twenties, is a delightful, highly intelligent and feisty young woman who has spent the last few years in New York. This is a very playful telling by Lee who obviously identifies with her richly drawn and extremely likable character. 

Jean Louise's adult awakening to Atticus is so much more meaningful knowing as we do the child Scout's naive view of her saintly father in To Kill A Mockingbird. The two books enrich each other immeasurably. In fact they both need each other. It was pure editorial genius that Lee was persuaded to first retell the story from the child's point of view rather than proceed to publish Go Set A Watchman. But why did Lee and her publisher decide not to release the first book at all, rather than a few years later? Perhaps so as not to destroy the magic of Atticus that had taken hold in the public imagination? I guess we'll never know.

Unlike in TKAM, a strain of high amusement runs through the GSAW narrative. It has a vastly different tone, at times reading like a satirical village comedy. But Lee manages to expertly combine this playfulness with a serious and savage critique of racism in the South. It is a fiercely passionate denunciation of white supremacism and Lee is very angry indeed. The writing in the heated arguments, particularly those between Jean Louise and her father, is rich, powerful and disturbing. The contrasting ideas and beliefs are fully articulated and the reader served a sumptuous, invigorating feast. 

The final few chapters are intense, and some critics doubt their realism and credibility. Atticus is condemned, in fact demolished by an out of control Jean Louise, but gets a chance to explain his position. It's rational. He's a liberal, as we've always known, but now in his senior years, an Establishment one. He's a lawyer.

I thoroughly recommend you read this book, but if you haven't read TKAM you must read that first.

Richard Price's Exhilarating The Whites

I had planned an enthusiastic review of this superb crime novel and then made the mistake of reading this piece in The New Yorker by Joyce Carol Oates which said everything I wanted to say, only of course far, far better.

Stephanie Bishop's unnerving The Other Side of the World

This book has come with enthusiastic recommendations from many critics and booksellers I deeply respect. Martin Shaw from Readings, a very discriminating reader, proclaimed: '...without  question one the finest Australian novels of 2015'.

I had to read it, despite the cover, once again, turning me off. (Down Under, get it?) 

The book is powerful, no doubt about that. The power kicks in about two thirds of the way through and then is relentless. It's confronting and asks far more questions than it answers. It's a domestic drama about marriage, children and especially motherhood. And a profound and uncomfortable depression. 

The problem I had with the book was the author's obsession with describing in micro detail the natural environment in which the characters move - in rural England, in suburban Australia, and in provincial India. The narrative is frequently buried in long and poetic descriptions of the ordinary goings on in the physical world - birds, trees, winds, breezes, flowers, seasons, rivers, insects, rocks, moths, spiders, weevils, beetles, mosquitoes, etc, ad nauseum.  

There isn't a paragraph, no matter how short, that doesn't digress into description. The writing is sublime, the phrasing poetic, there's not a word out of place or a cliche anywhere. But how much more of this Boys Own Guide to the Natural World am I meant to bare? Frankly, it verges on the tedious.

But in the end, because of the overwhelming power of the story, the book is a triumph. 

So persevere with this, enjoy the writing, and be deeply moved and emotionally shaken by the drama.

The Miles Franklin winner for 2015: Sofie Laguna's The Eye of the Sheep

First up - this book is a very worthy winner indeed. It caught me and most other readers and critics by surprise. The smart money was on Joan London's The Golden Age and Sonya Hartnett's Golden Boys. I had read both these novels and enjoyed them thoroughly.

Frankly, I had avoided reading Laguna because, superficial as I am, the cover turned me right off. A small boy and a big dog, and there must be sheep in it as well? Nup, not for adults who don't generally go for YA. But the cover sends entirely the wrong message. The novel is a powerful and visceral adult drama even though Jimmy the young boy is the central character.

Jimmy's mildly autistic, perhaps suffering from Aspergers - we're not told - but he's a fully drawn, loveable, rich and thrilling character. His enthusiasm for life's basics is infectious. He suffers from 'speeding' and speaks in threes: 'your book, your book. Your book, mum'. He also refers to his school as 'enemy territory'. In a word, he's delightful. 

The central drama is not his condition, however. It's the domestic violence in his home. It's ugly indeed. Laguna skilfully conveys the horror but without emptying the father of all sympathy. Jimmy and his older brother Robby have a warm and loving relationship with both their parents. The deep connections between them are explored. Jimmy and his father Gavin have a bond that survives Gavin's extreme volatility. Gavin is a frustrated man who resorts to the Cutty Sark in the top cupboard for relief. He is eventually made redundant from his printing job, thus taking the narrative to a much darker place. 

And the ending is very satisfying, both emotionally and intellectually.

Laguna has written an excellent, highly dramatic novel, a deserving winner of this much coveted award. What gives the book so much power is the innocence, joy and vulnerability of Jimmy. It's a magnificent portrait and it won't let you go. That boy gets under your skin.

Also shortlisted for the 2015 Miles Franklin, Sonya Hartnett's Golden Boys is a major achievement. Coincidentally it shares similar themes with Sofie Laguna's The Eye of the Sheep.

Comparing the two novels on all sorts of levels would make a good Aus Lit 101 essay question.

Hartnett's always been hooked on fancy names for the young adults who people her narratives: here we meet Colt, Bastian, Freya, Marigold, Avery, Declan, Garrick...there's no Robert, Ben, Anna or Amy in sight.

There are also your stock figures: a big dumb bully, a sensitive awakening girl, a nerdy young kid, etc.

But it soon becomes clear that this novel is fundamentally not about adolescents at all. It's a rather savage critique of the adult world via two sets of parents: One father, a dentist, maintains a rather disgusting 'playroom', a place full of expensive toys for his and the neighbours kids, and the other is a violent and abusive drunk. 

Their fathers' propensities do not escape the kids' notice.

Hartnett gives us a slow build. It's very subtly done. The dentist's eldest boy, Colt, senses his father's sins and knows why they've had to move to new areas every few years. Freya, the eldest daughter of Joe, becomes increasingly angry about his violent bashing of her mother.  

Hartnett handles the increasing tension as the drama develops exceptionally well, but the resolution not so much. 

One thing that impressed me about Laguna's novel was how grounded her characters were. These people were from Altona, a working class suburb of Melbourne, and they reflected it in every way - what they ate, how they dressed, what music they listened to, what TV shows they watched, what buses they caught, how they spoke, etc.

Hartnett, on the other hand, refuses to locate her narrative entirely. It's not her concern. It's not important, but the negative is it doesn't constrain her from exaggeration and unreality. The maturity, moral strength and powers of reasoning and articulation of too many of the young characters are overdone. There is a fantasy element there, which I think is misplaced.

This shows up in the ending. There is a bashing and it should be condemned not deemed useful, and the victim shouldn't be a victim at all.

Talking about adolescents thrust into an ugly, violent, adult world, this book by American author Jim Shepard is truly astonishing.

It's an extraordinarily moving and sad story of the Warsaw ghetto created by the Nazis when they invaded Poland. It focuses on the children in an orphanage over the two years prior to their fatal train trip to the Treblinka camp and its ovens.

The sheer courage, spirit and deep humanity of these children and the adults they interact with are inspiring. They are being pushed out of their houses, starved, shot, and finally shipped off and gassed. But right to the end they struggle, manoeuvre and fight for life and survival, including constantly pushing against each other for advantage.

This slow build of a novel is a powerful and emotional kick in the guts. I've read many novels about the evil of the holocaust and this is one of the best. It personalises it through the experience of young, defenceless but feisty kids and brings it intensely alive.

Highly recommended.

Two New Australian Novels: One Excellent, One a Failure.

This is a very powerful novel that frequently brought me to tears but mostly made me intensely angry.

It interweaves the lives of four Australian women living in Melbourne from the years of the first world war until the 1990's. While very young they became pregnant to young men who deserted them or treated them cruelly. Their parents were no better, imprisoned by the moral, social and legal strictures of the day. They were also battling poverty and unemployment.

Single motherhood was an absolute no-no. Marriage was compulsory, or the baby forcibly removed for adoption. The story of Anna, a feisty teenager brought undone by the Salvation Army's excruciatingly awful 'home for girls in your situation' is one of the most moving and dramatic pieces of social history you're ever likely to read. It will make your blood boil.

Jones brings his characters vividly to life. His writing is measured and assured, the stories tense and deeply emotional.

No doubt this wonderful book will be shortlisted for a number of awards, and deservedly so. It is magnificent. It will also become a celebrated ABC TV mini-series, no doubt.

Steven Carroll's last book, The World of Other People, was the co-winner of the Prime Minister's Literary Award in 2014, and deservedly so. I heaped praise on it here calling it 'a very fine work indeed. Subtle, nuanced, immeasurably sad and well worth the PM's prize.'

So I approached his just published Forever Young with high expectations, despite knowing that it was not another in his T.S.Eliot series. Unfortunately I was badly let down. 

The novel is the fifth in Carroll's 'Glenroy' series about the lives of ordinary Australians in ordinary suburban Melbourne. You don't have to have read the previous four to fully appreciate this one, as it includes so many reflections and memories of those earlier times and events that flesh out the characters and place them in context.

The setting is 1977, the year that Whitlam, for the second time, lost the election to Fraser, and then retired from politics altogether. This is presented as a 'moving on' for the country, a loss of its youth, a loss of the 'Mountain' for young people, a government that belonged to them.

The problem with the novel, quite frankly, is that it's boring. Carroll never succeeds in breaking through the banality and ordinariness of his theme of lost youth and idealism, and the moving on and settling and never being able to return.

And his writing style, previously and constantly praised by critics as being 'unfailingly assured, lyrical, poised' (Debra Adelaide) and 'astonishingly assured' (James Bradley), fundamentally lets him down this time. His habit of constantly repeating phrases becomes tiresome in the extreme. It feels as if he's got his boot on your throat and is pressing down harder. The same phrases are on an endless loop, para after para. What is meant to be a ruminative reiteration simply amplifies the banality of the theme. 

For the fact is this book is about nothing much at all. Young people growing old and, er, changing - moving on, escaping, discovering, making mistakes. Carroll brings to this familiar dynamic a leaden sensibility. 

Thankfully there are moments of genuine narrative tension and genuinely good writing. In the main, though, they are overwhelmingly buried.

Which makes this novel very hard to recommend, and will deny it the success Steven Carroll otherwise deserves.

Some Excellent New Reads

Dennis Lehane's new book World Gone By is just brilliant. 

It's as good, if not better, than Live By Night which introduced Joe Coughlin as an up-and-coming gangster during the depression and prohibition years of 30's America. When I read the first in the series, The Given Day, published in 2008, I was completely overwhelmed by Lehane's power as a chronicler of early 20th century America and its developing and frequently ugly power structures. 

Joe Coughlin was the youngest son in a powerful Boston family which virtually controlled the police force and the emerging union movement. In the second volume Live By Night he leaves for Florida, finally emerging as a smart, charming but brutal head of a major crime syndicate controlling alcohol and drug distribution on the Eastern seaboard as well as running gambling dens and casinos. As you would expect there's a lot of violence. 

The final novel brings the story to its fascinating but grizzly end. 

The series is well worth your time. All the novels are exquisitely plotted, gripping and absorbing on every level, and with all the tension and atmospherics you hope for in a quality read. 

I'd heard of Renee Knight's Disclaimer from early reviews in the trade press - obviously comparing it favorably to Gone Girl, the contemporary benchmark for relationship thrillers - so was looking forward to reading it.

The press were right. Structurally the two novels are similar. There are various narrative voices and time shifts, and they share a husband and wife focus.

I enjoyed it immensely. It's well written, far more credible than Gone Girl, and the drama has an incredible drive and tension that unfolds at just the right pace. It's a cliche, but I did find this book hard to put down.

And, thankfully and all too rarely, the ending is perfect. Deeply satisfying, intellectually and emotionally. 

No wonder the bids for the publishing rights went through the roof for this. It will be a mega seller and a blockbuster movie.

This is just superb. Kilcullen, a Middle East and counterterrorism expert, was a senior advisor to General David Petraeus and US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice from 2005 to 2008, and was an advisor to the UK and Australian governments and NATO prior to this. 

In the first half of the essay he delves deep into the disaster that was Iraq, and how absurd the original decision to invade was. He then describes how the forces unleashed via that hellhole, the  warring tribes, traditions, factions and personalities, gave rise to ISIS. The final section of the essay presents the challenge the West now faces, and how it should deal with it.

I found it very persuasive. And Kilcullen can write clear English, which helps.

Well worth reading. 

This new Australian tome on copyright and the digital age was published a few weeks ago. It defines what it means to be a 'curate's egg': good in parts.

It's a collection of opinions edited by Phillipa McGuinness, publisher at NewSouth Publishing/UNSW Press. Phillipa wrote the Introduction. Unfortunately it's one of the bad parts. She name-drops copyright gurus such as the highly respected US author William Patry but never intellectually engages with them. Like many of the content industry representatives in this collection the sneer and the scoff are meant to do the job.

The many good pieces in the book however more than make up for the bad. Film critic Marc Fennell is excellent, as is Professor Sherman Young, authors Carolin Window and Linda Jaivin, broadcaster Dan Ilic, historian/librarian Tim Sherratt and academics Dan Hunter and Nic Suzor. Their views are progressive and insightful. While respecting copyright they know the law needs serious reform.

By far the worst and in fact most disgraceful piece in this collection is by Jose Borghino who is currently Policy Director at the International Publishers Association (IPA) and was formerly with the Australian Publishers Association. It's elitist, nasty and cynical. Users and reformers are moochers. They are 'freetards'. It's truly awful, braindead stuff, but unfortunately so typical of industry representatives constantly mouthing the old and by now discredited corporate line. I'm always reminded of Upton Sinclair's famous dictum: 'It's hard for a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it'. 
                                      

         

Sascha Arango's Very Lame 'The Truth and Other Lies'.

What a one-dimensional, lame effort this is!

Highly lauded in the usual places of course, but in no way whatsoever does it live up to the hype.

Let's not dignify it as a 'thriller'. It's just a pretty ordinary mystery with a plot that jumps around all over the place and plot connections that are flimsy at best.

It grinds on to a slow and laborious denouement, and I was only interested right to the end just to see how the author would wind it all up, bring all the disparate elements together, resolve it in an emotionally and intellectually satisfying way - you know, do what's normally required - but no, none of that happens. It just peters out.

All the vaguely interesting characters die along the way or are simply abandoned by the author.

And the translation is often clumsy. For instance: 'The estate was in the waking coma of industrial decay'. What on earth does that mean?! 

A really second rate effort that should never have been published. It's a first draft that needed an experienced structural editor that it obviously never got.

Grrr!