Book Reviews

Photo by Simon Wilkes on Unsplash

Anthology #19

The Silmarillion, by J.R.R. Tolkien

This is the origin story of the better known, and undoubtedly famous [especially subsequent to the excellent film dramatisations] The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, although they were filmed in reverse order. This book is very long, consisting of five separate sections, the longest of which is Quenta Silmarillion: the History of the Silmarils. These are jewels which are imbued with a metaphysical light, emanating from two sacred trees in ancient times. Earlier sections—Ainulindalë and Valaquenta—deal with the creation of Middle-Earth [which might be our own Earth; and the the name is actually used; but it is not specified, so not clear] by a supreme being, and the different orders of beings who inhabited it over a series of Ages. The final section: Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age deals with events which are described in much greater detail in the later narratives mentioned above, although the existence of the Hobbits is related with no suggestion of their origin and, strangely, Tolkien spoils the plot of those stories for those unfamiliar with them by describing the ending! The origin of Gandalf, Saruman, and Radagast is given, however: they were Istari, aka Wizards, messengers sent from the West, over the sea, to contest the power of Sauron. There is also a foreword, a preface to the second edition, both by Tolkien’s son Christopher, a letter by his father, maps, tables of genealogies of what I would refer to simplistically as Angels, and Elves, notes on pronunciation, index of names, and an appendix of elements in Quenya [Elvish] and Sindarin names. If you can stomach mythical tales involving gods & kings, plus the occasional dragon, you will love this, but I’m afraid I’m too much of an egalitarian for these to sit comfortably with me: at least I’ve read the whole lot now. The paperback I read was published in 2013 by HarperCollinsPublishers, London [George Allen & Unwin, 1977], ISBN 978-0-0075-2322–1.

The Appeal, by Janice Hallett

This is a very clever book, and I say book, not story, because the way the story is presented is integral to its progression. As is often the case, the title has a double meaning, and the narrative is presented in a very 21st century form, as a series of emails and text messages, with other, more traditional type documents inserted where appropriate. At the beginning, two law students in an unspecified location are given by their Chambers tutor, a QC & senior partner in a law firm, the exercise of assessing the validity of a legal appeal against a murder sentence passed on an unknown perpetrator, by trawling through all the presently available communications between various members of an amateur dramatics group in a town called Lockwood; possibly in Cornwall. Some of these are involved in a fundraising appeal for medical intervention for a little girl; the granddaughter of the so-called alpha family of the amdram society, hence the other meaning of the title. As the narrative progresses, additional tidbits of information are tantalisingly fed in, to make arriving at an answer frustratingly difficult for both the students and the reader! For me, this format makes the book very easy to read—possibly easier than traditional prose, in which one can get bogged down with detail, especially trying to remember all the significant characters: here, there is more than one character list which can be easily referred to at any time. I really enjoyed this book [the amdram content was also an attraction for me, with my own personal involvement], and I hope I can find the relatively new author’s next offering. The paperback I read was published in 2021 by VIPER, part of Serpent’s Tail, an imprint of Profile Books Ltd., London, ISBN 978-1-7881-6530-3.

Reality and Other Stories, by John Lanchester

I’m not really a fan of ‘horror’ stories, either in print, or visually, as I have mentioned previously, in a review of a book by a doyen of the genre, Stephen King: The Colorado Kid. This book is a collection of “deliciously chilling entertainments—stories haunted by all the uncanny technologies and absurd horrors of modern life.”, as the back cover hyperbolically tells us, although I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I found any of the short stories genuinely disturbing, or frightening. I was attracted by the synopsis of one of the stories: “The wrong kind of cold calls”, because I had had an odd experience recently, wherein a voicemail message on my mobile service from an advisedly ‘spam’ number, had been just one word, “Goodbye”! This gave rise to speculation about different fictional scenarios, but my writing faculties don’t extend to fiction, I am happy to acknowledge. This author writes articulately, and in a variety of voices to suit the story being told, but some of his other books also look interesting, if it should be possible to find them, including Capital, Whoops! Why Everyone Owes Everyone And No One Can Pay, and How To Speak Money, so I think it is very likely that this author has some interest, and possibly involvement in, social justice, especially where it concerns that most pernicious, but unavoidable aspect of modern life: money. This book should engage the reader for a few blameless hours. The paperback I read was published in 2021 [2020], by Faber & Faber, London, ISBN 978-0-5713-6301-8.

Lockdown, by Peter May

It was inevitable that the recent [but, thankfully, receding into memory] Covid-19 pandemic, and associated lockdowns should either feature in, or inspire [if that is appropriate?] fiction output, and I have remarked upon it here already; Peter May, an author who seems to be able to convey an atmosphere of underlying tension in seemingly ordinary situations [which this is not, of course] has decided to posit an alternate reality in which the pandemic is caused by an infection which the world experienced nearly 20 years ago now, before Covid, but which did not take such drastic hold as portrayed here: H5N1, aka Bird Flu. The reasons for our lucky escape are not given in the foreword, but May does say that, in addition to telling us that this story had to be shelved at the time of completion because of lack of interest—ironic with hindsight, of course—“Bird flu, or H5N1, was being predicted by scientists at the time as the next likely flu pandemic…and …with a mortality rate of sixty per cent or higher—[it] was being forecast to exceed that [of Spanish Flu] by a wide margin”. The protagonist, Detective Inspector Jack MacNeil, on his final day working for the Metropolitan Police in London, is given the task of identifying a bagful of bones found on a building site, and what he finds is a lot more than the bare bones [sorry] of a story. Overall, the story is well written, and MacNeil is a character one can empathise with, but it is marred by a frankly ridiculously implausible plot premise near the end which, of course, I can’t reveal here. The ending isn’t specific, but the implication that it is terminal for one of the characters is obvious, which makes the foregoing in the story seem all rather pointless; although one object is achieved, however. The paperback I read was published in 2020 by riverrun, an imprint of Quercus Editions Ltd., London, ISBN 978-1-5294-1169-0.

Book Reviews

Photo by Simon Wilkes on Unsplash

Anthology #1

Dolphin Junction, by Mick Herron

It’s always a pleasure to find a book by this author, and this is a collection of his short stories, one of which features some of his Slow Horses characters; there are also two featuring his private investigators Zoë Boehm and her hapless, erstwhile husband, Joe Silvermann. Herron seems to have the knack of being able, cosynchronously, to write both contemporaneously and classically; although maybe by that I mean that his writing is cogent, a quality not always found in current fiction; and he is very clever in how he sets the reader up for a conclusion, only to often turn these assumptions on their head. There are eleven stories in this collection, and they are all of the right length, so each new one is anticipated with pleasure. This hardback was published in 2021 by John Murray (Publishers), London, ISBN 978-1-5293-7126-0; there is also a paperback, ISBN 978-1-5293-7127-7.

Our Man in New York, by Henry Hemming

This non-fiction book deserves to be read very widely: I say this as the author of a non-fiction biography, but the remit of this biography is arguably much wider than was mine, so I have every sympathy for this author with regard to the research he must have had to undertake. He is the grandson of a very good friend of the subject, William [Bill] Stephenson, but that notwithstanding, his documentary & anecdotal sources in his family were more limited than he would have liked; nevertheless, he has produced what I consider to be a very well-researched & important record of the British government’s efforts to influence American opinion enough, in 1940, when Britain was on its knees against the merciless onslaught of Hitler’s Germany, to persuade President Roosevelt to bring America into the war on the side of the Allies. Whether Stephenson’s background as a Canadian made a significant difference to his attitude & effect in this campaign is debatable, but suffice to say that, by the time Japan attacked America in December 1941, American opinion had revolved enough to make the country’s contribution a foregone conclusion. A must-read! The paperback I read was published in 2020 [2019] by Quercus editions Ltd., London, ISBN 978-1-7874-7484-0.

The Peppermint Tea Chronicles, by Alexander McCall Smith

I have already alluded to this series; the 44 Scotland Street stories, set in Edinburgh; in a review of another series, the Inspector Varg novels, by this author [no diaeresis over the first A of his name here, as I expected], and I was curious to read how different, or otherwise, this might be from the aforesaid Malmö-set Varg stories. This is trumpeted as “now the world’s longest-running serial novel”, and it is with no little regret that I have to say that this reads like it; that said, it is very pleasant reading, which does have some measure of closure for a couple of the characters, but otherwise, it is a gentle meander through the lives of the characters during a short length of time in “Auld Reekie”. One thing I did find slightly irritating is that, for all the writing is cogent, there is an ever-so-slightly supercilious air about the latin quotations which are used without translation: some I knew, and some I wasn’t 100% sure of. Nevertheless, as said, this is very pleasant, undemanding reading, so I will be very happy to find another instalment in the series, whenever it is in the timescale. The hardback I read was published in 2019 by Polygon, an imprint of Birlinn Ltd., Edinburgh, ISBN 978-1-8469-7483-0.

Admissions, by Henry Marsh

This name might not mean a thing to many people, but is you are a supporter of assisted dying, as I am, you might have seen his name as one of the high-profile supporters. He was a neurosurgeon [aka brain surgeon] before he retired, although he had not completely retired when he wrote this book; he was only working part-time though, and he also did stints in Ukraine [before the most recent Russian invasion] and Nepal, working with erstwhile colleagues. These foreign sojourns were partly altruistic, but it is fairly apparent from his personal musings that he has something of a restless nature; he has also seen, in his working career, which has encompassed many aspects of the medical profession, the despair which can overtake human beings who are suffering terminal illnesses, and the anguish which this can cause their loved ones, so this explains why he supports the concept of assisted dying. This has been decriminalised in many countries, and other countries are engaged in rational discussion about its advantages, but Britain doggedly refuses to countenance this humanitarian change, despite many well-informed & high-profile supporters: I can only hope that this resistance is dropped in the not-too-distant future. The paperback I read was published in 2018 [2017] by Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, ISBN 978-1-4746-0387-4.

Book Review

Photo by mostafa meraji on Unsplash

Pulse, by Felix Francis

This is another of the “written by me, but masquerading as my father” novels in the series which was alluded to in a previous review of this author’s work, Guilty Not Guilty and, as before, horse racing figures in the story, somewhat more heavily in this one. The book’s title doesn’t immediately conjure up a connection with horse racing, but as the plot develops, the association becomes clear. The narrator is Chris Rankin, at the beginning of the story the senior consultant physician on duty in the Cheltenham General Hospital Accident and Emergency Department, and I wonder if the gender of the person was deliberately initially withheld, facilitated by the use of an androgynous given name, to gull the unsuspecting into thinking this is a man, until the revelation that Chris is actually female, given that she has seen a gynaecologist? If so, I have to plead guilty; no excuses; but this shame could have been avoided by the simple expedient of reading the back cover synopsis: something I do try to avoid, however, preferring to approach the story as a tabula rasa.

Chris has some serious mental health issues so, even prior to the incident which sets this story in motion, her professional reputation is in some doubt. The death of a patient who has been brought in unconscious from Cheltenham races, and who was under her care, precipitates her suspension, consequently exacerbating her anxiety, but she refuses to sink into a spiral of self-recrimination, preferring the course of discovering, initially, how the man died, over & above the simple fact of the unknown intoxication, and subsequently, why he died, refusing to believe that it was suicide. When it becomes clear that she is making some progress, efforts are made to warn her off, but they don’t succeed, and she has to contend with doubt from her husband, given her recent demeanour, and the police officers who are investigating the death; this doubt is reasonably well-founded on her husband’s part, on the basis of her aforementioned mental health issues, but not from the police, who seem stereotypically slow to give Chris any credence.

The motive for the death is proved to be somewhat prosaic, but it is one which pervades horse racing completely, and probably always has done. The value of this story is not so much whether Chris will succeed in her quest, but how much it will affect her wellbeing, and if she will emerge a stronger person at the end of it, so from that point of view, the outcome is positive. Personally, I would feel somewhat presumptuous as a male writing in the voice of a female but, given that inhibition, I think Francis does a decent job in that respect. The book is not overlong; although 436 paperback pages is not inconsiderable; but the tension builds nicely, with the usual jeopardy for the protagonist along the way, so I think this is an acceptable addition to the author’s canon. The paperback I read was published by Simon & Schuster UK Ltd., London, in 2018 [2017], ISBN 978-1-4711-5553-6.

Website Update

With reference to my previous post, as a result of, sadly, inevitable postage price increases, and very probably an indirect result of Britain’s recently leaving the EU, it has become necessary to update the Wilfred Books website to reflect this, because the postal charges included for despatch of the print version of Black Shirt and Smoking Beagles have been insufficient, for all areas of the world, for some time now. I should also point out that the book’s retail purchase price has NOT increased, neither are there any plans for this to happen. To achieve this update, certain sections of the site have been ‘refactored’, as it’s called, but it has not been a simple matter of just editing a few items of text; the reason for this is that a new price group, specifically for delivery to the EU zone, needed to be introduced: previously, the first non-UK price group included Europe, but this is no longer the case. More details can be found on the website’s about page, where there is a link to the book’s own page, and there is also a purchase link there.

Another complication is that there is now a veritable plethora of possible screen sizes for all of the devices which people can now use to access websites, compared to when the book was first published, in 2013; and, indeed, there are now even narrower screens than the first smartphones had [which I find slightly incredible, but I’m old-fashioned, and prefer a laptop for accessing websites]; so, each possible screen size had to be checked, to make sure that the new layout of the page a buyer is taken to when purchasing a print version of the book, looks acceptable with the new EU postal delivery price group included, so although this was relatively straightforward, as mentioned above, it was not a quick undertaking!

I hope the page looks acceptable across all devices, but I must stress that I am not a professional website developer; although I was confident that I could produce a functional & attractive site to make my book available direct, with no middle-man in the process, other than PayPal, which processes the purchase securely. So, if I have missed a new device size, or slipped up when formatting the page for an existing device, please don’t hesitate to let me know in the comments.

Finally, dare I remind readers that a present-buying opportunity [in addition to normal impulse-buying] is rapidly approaching, so if you know of someone [or yourself!] who would enjoy reading a comprehensively-researched examination of the febrile inter-war period of the 1920s & -30s in Britain, please ensure that a purchase can be delivered in good time! The book focuses specifically on what made an ardent socialist like Wilfred Risdon from Bath, who saw action as a medical orderly in the first world war, and worked in the Tredegar coal mines alongside Aneurin Bevan [who, as we know, went on to a sparkling political career], drastically change his political allegiance to support Oswald Mosley who, although he started out also as a socialist with the best of intentions, fairly soon swung to the opposite side of the political spectrum before the second world war. During the war, after a short period of internment in Brixton Prison under the notorious Emergency Regulation 18B, Wilfred sensibly decided to leave politics behind as far as possible, and concentrate on his passion for animal welfare, advancing to the position of Secretary of the prestigious National Anti-Vivisection Society, before his death in 1967; before that, he engineered the bold [and confrontational!] move of the Society’s London headquarters to Harley Street, the heart of the British medical profession, that still [and continues to, sadly] relied upon animal testing, which involved [Wilfred would argue, unnecessary] hideous & painful procedures. Given the state of the world in general, and British politics in particular now, a knowledge of how we arrived at this point can be very illuminating, so I can heartily recommend Black Shirt and Smoking Beagles: but, then again, why wouldn’t I?

A book for Christmas?

Just by way of an annual reminder (you can’t have forgotten, surely?), books make an excellent Christmas present, especially at the moment, when we might have rather more time on our hands than hitherto, so if you enjoy reading biographies of people with fascinating/engaging or even objectionable lives, why not think about, either for yourself, or as a gift, the life story of Wilfred Risdon? He was a man whose career divides itself quite neatly into two distinct halves (although there was some overlap, to be fair, in terms of the principles that drove him): the early political activism, fighting for the interests of the British working man (and woman, or course), which took him eventually down the dark road of fascism, in its British manifestation; and the second half, fighting the cause of defenceless animals, endeavouring to impede where possible, or ideally curtail completely, the barbaric practice of experimenting on animals in the cause of human medicine.

The book is available in paperback (and it still only costs GBP15.00, plus postage & packing!) and delivered by post (so please take delivery times into account when ordering), and digital download forms (still only GBP5.00): all variants are available; PDF, ePub, and both popular formats of Kindle, .mobi & .azw3. Each chapter is fully supported with comprehensive notes, and there are also several appendices at the end, with faithful reproductions of literature which was relevant to Wilfred’s life; the most significant of which was his interrogation by the Defence Regulation 18B(1A) Appeal Committee in July 1940, to decide if he could safely be released from internment in Brixton Prison; and even some biographical information about a (second world) wartime Polish pilot, Jan Falkowski, who bought Wilfred’s house in Ruislip, north west London. Whatever your views about the rights and wrongs of right & left in political affiliation, this is a very detailed examination of the life of a 20th century activist who is not well known, but whose work does deserve to be better known. The book can be ordered direct from the Wilfred Books website (which is, assuredly, safe, despite what over-cautious browsers might want you to think) by clicking on this link. If you do order the book, thank you, but nonetheless, Merry Christmas!

Book Review

Devil’s Feast, by M. J. Carter

This is not the sort of book I would generally feel was worthy of review; it is not a biography (but see below, to explain the main image), but a workmanlike murder mystery set in Victorian times, published by Penguin Books, 2017 (ISBN), and although the pace is somewhat stodgy, it is a decent enough read, with the culprit not being revealed until very near the end; also, the contemporary historical detail, including the political climate of the time, seems authentic; what interested me, once I had finished the book (with only a small sigh of relief) was the historical afterword. This explains that a few of the characters, and most of the places in the story really existed, although the timeline has been adjusted in places, to suit the narrative.

The setting is London, and the primary location is the Reform Club, which was set up in 1837 by a group of Radical MPs (I am shamelessly lifting these details from the book), including one William Molesworth, one of our characters. There was some tension between the Radicals and the Whigs, who later formed the main body of the Liberal Party, but these comprised the membership of the Reform; Molesworth remained a Radical all his life and was the only one to serve in the Liberal government of 1853. An added element of tension, albeit very mild, is injected into the story as one of the ‘sleuths’, ex-East India Army Captain William Avery, is a Devon Tory by birth and conviction (so thereby treated with some suspicion or even hostility by some of the club’s Committee), which seems somewhat odd, given that he is a man of modest means & upbringing; although that is possibly to judge him too much by current standards?

When the Reform Club’s grand new building opened in Pall Mall in 1841, its kitchens were dubbed “the eighth wonder of the world”: the most modern & advanced of their kind, and thousands were able to take tours of them. Credited with the excellent reputation of these kitchens, in no small part because he invented numerous “practical, ingenious ideas”: cooking paraphernalia as well as pioneering the use of gas as a cooking method; a Frenchman, Alexis Soyer, 1810-1858, “was the first real celebrity chef, a brilliant inventive cook and a shameless self-publicist … part Heston Blumenthal, part Jamie Oliver.” Throughout his time at the Reform Club, Soyer had a stormy relationship with its Committee: he was censured for insolence and, in 1844, for financial dishonesty, when he was accused (although he was not alone in that) of having falsified the butcher’s account; despite a vote of the Committee to sack him being narrowly lost, he resigned anyway. Another of this story’s characters, the club Chairman, Sir Marcus Hill, was able to use his influence & careful management to get Soyer reinstated; however, the matter “left a permanent bitterness in the relations with the club.”

Three are several murders in the story, although not all are initially interpreted as such, and the second of the pair of sleuths, albeit the more proficient of the two, Jeremiah Blake, is not able to participate actively in the investigation until roughly half-way through the book, for reasons that I won’t reveal here; in fact, for the majority of the investigation he has to masquerade as Avery’s manservant, which is understandably somewhat inhibiting, although more for Avery than for Blake himself! There is also some historical information about poisonings in the afterword, given that it is the method of murder here, which I don’t think is revealing too much about the story, and mention is also made of Thomas Wakley, founding editor of the Lancet, and he is also one of the book’s characters. Week after week, in the pages of the Lancet, still one of the world’s most respected medical journals, Wakley exposed evidence of food swindling: legislation didn’t arrive until 1860. So as said, not a top-flight story, but easy if slow reading, and for me, at least, the historical accuracy makes the story all the more enjoyable.

Free book for Christmas!

For a limited time, the PDF version of Wilfred Risdon’s biography of Robert Lawson Tait, the Edinburgh born surgeon, can be downloaded free! This could be the ideal Christmas present for somebody who enjoys non-fiction in general, and biographies in particular.

Robert Lawson Tait was born in 1845, and was clever enough to be accepted by Edinburgh University at the surprisingly precocious age of 15.

After graduating, he became a surgeon, and took a special interest in women’s medical problems, especially those associated with childbirth; but he was also a committed advocate for the admission to the medical profession of women, on the same terms as men. What initially brought him to Wilfred Risdon’s attention was that he was fervently opposed to the use of animals in medical research, which made him many enemies in the medical profession. The latter concern is still very relevant today; thanks to the work of Tait, and others who shared his aspirations, women now rightfully work as equals to men in medicine.

Please leave your email address in a comment, if you would like to download this book for free, and I will send you a link. I look forward to hearing from you!