Mini-review: The Fault In Our Stars, John Green

 Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never beenanything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel's story is about to be completely rewritten. (cover blurb) 

The Fault in Our Stars is one of those intensely human books that make you laugh even while your eyes are full of tears and you can't read any further. Hazel and Augustus are clever, witty teenagers, quirky thinkers that you can't help loving immediately. Their relationship is fun and natural, and made me really believe in love again. By 200 pages in, I just couldn''t imagine the world without them. But this book is about both life and death, with two teenage cancer sufferers falling in love even while facing their own mortality, and it's not fair.

How can any single book be so funny, so uplifting and so heartbreaking all at once? I guess that's what life is. With a few, well-chosen words in the right order, John Green makes poetry of simple prose and helps to bring understanding of the incomprehensible almost within reach. Green is without doubt one of the cleverest writers for teens out there. He knows.

Special kudos to Green for his correct identification, use and strategic abuse of the word "literally," and for his understanding of what star-crossed lovers really are.

The Fifth Elephant, Terry Pratchett

Samuel Vimes, Commander of the Ankh Morpork City Watch and Duke of Ankh, is sent as an ambassador to Uberwald, for its coronation of the Low King of the Dwarfs. Uberwald is a wild country, home to werewolves, vampires, dwarfs and trolls. There is unrest between traditional and more liberal, modern-thinking dwarfs which could mean war, and when Vimes arrives, it is to discover that the Scone of Stone* has been stolen. Without the Scone, there can be no coronation - no Low King - no order.

Meanwhile, Watch Sergeant Angua has also made her way to Uberwald. She is a werewolf trying to make the best of her condition, but her family are perfectly happy with eating their neighbours or anyone else who might get in their way, and they, too, want domination of Uberwald. Angua’s boyfriend Captain Carrot, second-in-command of the Watch, has handed in his resignation and set off after Angua, leaving “one of nature’s sergeants,” Fred Colon, in charge at Ankh-Morpork.

Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books are always good comfort reads, and without a doubt my favourite sub-series is that which features the Watch. Yet, The Fifth Elephant and Jingo are not books I’ve re-read as often as the other Watch books. These two are not set entirely in Ankh Morpork, and therefore don’t have quite the same feel to them. By now, the city of Ankh Morpork is quite as much of a character as Vimes, Carrot et al, and has come to shape what I expect in a Discworld novel.

It is an absolute pleasure to read about Vimes, a very unwilling ambassador and a policeman to his core, defying convention, rubbing everyone up the wrong way and generally abusing his diplomatic immunity as an excuse to be as undiplomatic as you can imagine, getting away with it with sheer cheek and audacity. Sam Vimes prods some serious buttock.

We also see a vulnerable side to the sarcastic, tough-girl Angua. The Fifth Elephant contains an interesting explorations of the conflicts of a werewolf: neither human nor wolf and despised by both. Angua lives her life constantly fighting to remain decent and civilised, paying for the chickens she’s eaten in her wolf shape “because animals don’t,” and terrified that she might turn out bad, like her psychopathic brother Wolfgang.

I read the Discworld novels in no particular order, and it’s a little odd to see the first introduction of an element that I’ve got used to as a stock feature of the novels. In The Fifth Elephant, we meet for the first time the "Igors," the race of hunchbacked, scarred, henchmen who serve any self-respecting Uberwaldean household. (I suspect the Igors owe a lot to Igor Eye-gor in Young Frankenstein, and certainly all the other Igors he was based upon.) It’s strange to see Vimes getting confused by the fact that they are all called Igor, startled by an Igor appearing when he knew he had just left the room and closed the door, or it slowly dawning on Vimes that when an Igor offers to lend another Igor a hand, or swears that his heart is in the right place, he is not talking metaphorically. Later in the series, the Igors are just accepted with all their little ways alongside all the other strange residents of the Discworld.

On this reading, I found The Fifth Elephant to be a little bit heavy-handed with its theme of tradition versus progress, with Pratchett clearly favouring progress, which ends with the Low King using a metaphor of the ceremonial axe that has been in the royal family for hundreds of years… although the blade has had to be replaced a few times, and the handle, or the metalwork, until nothing is left of the original - but dare you say it is not the same axe? Still, The Fifth Elephant is a rollicking adventure, great humour and character-development. It’s not one of my favourite Discworld novels, but it is still a lot of fun.

*Yes, I do mean it that way around. Dwarf baking is notoriously solid and doubles as weaponry - or in this case, the coronation seat of the dwarfs.

Mini-reviews 2: Grace Williams Says It Loud & Feet of Clay

Another post with a few thoughts on two more books I've been reading at the same time. Like the last two, these couldn't be more different!

Grace Williams Says It Loud, Emma Henderson

I bought Grace Williams at Waterstone's bookshop on a special offer for customers who use the Orange mobile phone network. It is an account of a life inside the Briar Mental Institute, from the point of Grace, a mentally and physically disabled girl. We follow Grace through her life from before her arrival at the institute aged eleven in 1957, through to the 1980s when she is living with carers in a smaller house. Although Grace has difficulties communicating with others, leading to dismissive attitudes from outsiders and even staff, she is observant and thoughtful, and the novel focuses particularly upon her friendship and romance with Daniel. Narrated in a sometimes stream-of-consciousness style by a girl limited by her lack of speech, Grace Williams can be a little claustrophobic and jarring in the contrast between how we see Grace - from within her own head - and how others see her, as a hopeless simpleton. Grace Williams Says It Loud is a challenging and sometimes disturbing but compassionate novel from a new author.

Feet of Clay, Terry Pratchett

My favourite Discworld books are by far the "Watch" sub-series. We first meet Ankh Morpork's City Watch in Guards! Guards! which takes place at a turning point in the Watch's history. At the beginning of the novel there are only three people foolish enough to police Ankh Morpork: drunken Captain Samuel Vimes, solid and thick - in every definition of the word - Sergeant Fred Colon and Corporal "Nobby" Nobbs - who was "disqualified from the human race for shoving" and needs a certificate to prove that he is (probably) human. The three remaining watchman have a settled lifestyle of plodding the streets, ringing a bell and saying "All's Well!" and looking away when, in fact, all isn't well. Enter new recruit Carrot Ironfoundersson, two metres tall, who when he was sixteen had to be informed by his father, a dwarf, that he was in fact adopted. Carrot knows the rulebooks inside out and, to Vimes' dismay, thinks that the watchmen should actually be fighting crime. Carrot's arrival is the catalyst for a complete overhaul of the City Watch into a force to be reckoned with. The second book in the sub-series, Men At Arms, introduces new recruits of nearly every species (but no vampires) into the force, and by Feet of Clay it has become a vital cog in Patrician and Tyrant Lord Vetinari's well-oiled machine that is Ankh Morpork.

In brief, Feet of Clay is - to use Friends terminology - the one with the golems, the one in which Lord Vetinari is poisoned and the one that introduces Cheery Littlebottom, the first dwarf to "come out" as female. (Of course there are female dwarves, a necessary evil for the continuation of the species, but it wasn't something dwarves really talked about, except for a few delicate conversations when courting.) Feet of Clay raises questions of personhood and slavery: are golems - clay-baked workers - machines or people? If machines, they have no moral responsibilities and cannot be arrested for committing crimes, any more than a sword can be arrested. If people - then their owners/employers have some serious thinking to do! The book is full of scathing comments on social hierarchies and comparisons of human "breeding" with farming. Full of Pratchett's trademark biting satire and groan-worthy "punes, or plays on words," there is also a brilliant whodunnit, howdunnit mystery with some wicked red herrings. In my opinion, Feet of Clay is one of Pratchett's finest stories.

A Tiny Bit Marvellous, Dawn French

As a general rule I stay away from celebrity-penned books, whether they be fiction or non-fiction, and always look at the inside pages to see if I can deduce who really did the writing. Actress and comedienne Dawn French was an exception: I was well aware that she is a. literate and b. absolutely hilarious, so when her second book and first novel, A Tiny Bit Marvellous unexpectedly turned up in my shop, I decided I would have a nosy.

A Tiny Bit Marvellous is told from the points of view of various members of the Battle family: mother Mo, daughter Dora and son Peter Oscar. It was clear right from the start who the author was of this book, and it took me a long time to shake Ms French's voice out of my head, at least in Dora's and Mo's chapters. Oscar was another entity entirely: a teenage boy who is convinced that he is Oscar Wilde. He is not. His voice is not believably that of Wilde, but is heavily influenced by the playwright, and gives the sense of someone who is trying too hard. Interestingly I found myself reminded more of Wilde's modern-day counterpart, Stephen Fry, but the teenage Fry as captured somewhat self-denigratingly between the pages of his first memoir, Moab is my Washpot, and then caricatured as much as possible.

My early expectations of Marvellous were that it would be a bit of light-hearted, rather brainless and amusing fluff. The characters all live in their own little bubbles, and there is humour in the irony of two family members completely misunderstanding each other. Yet very quickly I came to recognise deeper levels in the narrative. First impressions of Dora, who turns eighteen very soon, are of a loud, obnoxious and bratty chav girl, reminiscent of Catherine Tate's character Lauren "Bovvered?!" Cooper. Underneath her rage and attitude is a pile of insecurity, even self-hatred - bringing to mind another Catherine Tate character, Doctor Who's Donna Noble. Mum Mo spends most of the book in bafflement about every aspect of her daughter, then shows some surprising insight. The irony and misunderstandings become more heartbreaking as they show the characters' loneliness and I found myself wanting to sit everyone down and make them talk about what they really think and feel.

There isn't a lot of plot, it has to be said. French does an excellent job at capturing family life where everyone feels isolated and confused, but are held together by thin but sturdy ties of love. After a slow start, the story kicks off in about the last third of the book, with a bit of suspense, danger and a shock twist. At the climax, it becomes clear who is really the sane person who holds the family together when it seems it should have fallen to pieces long ago.

An enjoyable, easy read with a big heart.

I Shall Wear Midnight, Terry Pratchett

Terry Pratchett's latest Discworld novel is the fourth and final installment in the Tiffany Aching and the Nac Mac Feegle subseries. The Wee Free Men, A Hatful of Sky, Wintersmith and now I Shall Wear Midnight make up a quartet of books specifically aimed at the Young Adult market and also enjoyed by adults (as opposed to the others which are adult novels also appreciated by teenagers.) The subseries follows child witch Tiffany as she trains for her career, which includes fighting the Queen of the Elves with a frying pan, kissing the spirit of Winter, and is watched over by the Nac Mac Feegle, a chaotic clan of fairy warriors who were probably thrown out of fairyland for being drunk and disorderly. By the beginning of I Shall Wear Midnight, Tiffany is fifteen years old and is established in her role as the witch of the Chalk.

The book's title refers to a comment by Tiffany in one of the earlier stories: "When I am old, I shall wear midnight." (It also evokes the wonderful poem by Jenny Joseph that begins, "When I am an old woman, I shall wear purple.") As you might expect, this is very much a coming-of-age story, and explores more mature themes than its predecessors. Very early on we are plunged into a chapter that is comparable with the previous darkest scene of the Discworld, (The Cable Street Cells And What Vimes Found There in Night Watch,) and this in a kids' book! The scariest moments are those where there is nothing fantastical about the monsters at all - because the monsters are entirely human.

Not that Pratchett's other monster isn't scary as well. The big baddy is the Cunning Man, the ghost of an evil witch-finder of long ago, who stirs up people's suspicion of the witches, and their headology, first sight and second thoughts.*

"Poison goes where poison's welcome."

The Cunning Man seems to have evolved from something human into the personification of an idea, something that appears again and again, that a witch may be able to defeat for now, but not for ever. He seems more than a mere monster, like a vampire or even a malevolent ghost. To me it seemed that the Cunning man represents the darkness of the human heart and a warning that it can grow independent and out of control.

But I Shall Wear Midnight is not all darkness, doom and gloom. For one thing, we meet the Nac Mac Feegle again, who persisted in making me cackle insanely with their banter and their twisted logic, their sly trickery and sheer stupidity! It's not possible to tell you enough about the Feegles to give you an accurate picture, so I'll show you instead:


The Nac Mac Feegle



"Why is it, Rob Anybody, that you persist in lying when you are caught red-handed?" [asked Tiffany]

"Ah, weel, that's an easy one, miss," said Rob Anybody, who was technically the head an of the Nac Mac Feegles. "After all, ye ken, what would be the point of lyin' when you had nae done anything wrong? Anyway, now I am mortally wounded to my giblets on account of me good name being slandered," he said, grinning. "How many times have I lied to you, miss?"

"Seven hundred and fifty-three times," said Tiffany. "Every time you promise not to interfere in my business."

This is the final book of the Tiffany Aching series, and it rounds off nicely, leaving Tiffany at sixteen, with a comfortable career and a bit of romance. This book contains cameos from other subseries, such as the original three witches, (Nanny Ogg is on top form!) and various members of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch. And fans of Pratchett from the earliest books get to meet an old friend.

*Headology should not be confused with psychology. Headology relies on the idea that people's understanding and beliefs shape their reality. When Granny Weatherwax is attacked by vampires in another book, they find themselves desperately craving a cup of tea. First sight is seeing what is really there. Second thoughts are when you think about what it is that you're thinking.

Unseen Academicals and Monstrous Regiment, Terry Pratchett

Having no interest in football, and the Wizards subseries of the Discworld books not being one of my favourites, I managed not to read Pratchett's latest novel, Unseen Academicals until this week. Coincidentally, it happened to be the weekend of the Saints v Pompey (Southampton versus Portsmouth football clubs) match. It was quite eerie to be reading about how (I paraphrase) it is easier to hate the football teams closest in proximity than those based further away, while the radio news reported the numbers of police in force - some on horseback! - at the game to try to prevent violence! It was easy to get muddled between reality and the book at that point.

I needn't have worried about this book, however. You don't need to be in on the joke or have football expertise to appreciate Pratchett's commentary, although perhaps it helps if you are aware of the football culture in England. Pratchett cleverly wove Romeo and Juliet into the context of professional football context, with Romeo (or Trev Likely) as a reluctant footballer, son of a footballing legend and Juliet as beautiful-but-fick WAG (an acronym I personally hate in the singular but struggled to construct the sentence in a way to make it work as it should be used, in plural) who goes into modelling. I was surprised to find myself warming to Juliet and Trev. I live in a culture where footballers and their wives/girlfriends are at once idolised and savaged, that it was refreshing to find them shown as, if there is such a thing, well-rounded stereotypes.

Being a bit of a Vetinari fangirl, I was pleased to see plenty of Ankh-Morpork's Tyrant, pulling the strings of everything that went on in the novel, as he does so well. It was also good to see Glenda, head of the Night Kitchen at the Unseen University, standing up to him, and barging into the Oblong Office without so much as an invitation. (But she had a pie.)

In Unseen Academicals Pratchett reveals hitherto unrecognised (by me, at least, to this extent) powers in touching not only the funny-bone but the heart. This is thanks to the character of Nutt. Nutt is (possibly) a goblin, from Uberwald, very polite (if stilted and not always quite sure of the right things to say) seeking to earn "worth." Someone who begins as a rather comic character develops into something deeper. His inner battles are heart-rending and, again, evoke sympathy for a character you wouldn't expect.

Before Unseen Academicals, I read The Monstrous Regiment, a Discworld novel that other people dismissed as "not being up to Pterry's usual standard." Trusting their opinions, I had never got around to reading that one, but when I did, it turned out to be not at all what I was expecting. Somehow I found it very powerful, and I find myself, a few days on, stopping and musing on the book in a deeper way than I expect from a Discworld novel. Thinking deeply about what, I'm not entirely sure. Monstrous Regiment has been accused of being not-too-subtle propaganda against war, or something like, but that wasn't what I took out of it. While reading it, I laughed aloud a lot, as each member of the regiment disclosed a secret, and when the officer, Lieutenant Blouse, declares that he is the only one who can be convincing as a woman.

But the more powerful parts of the book, for me, came in the back stories of some of the soldiers in the Regiment, of which we are given just enough information to make it feel a lot darker than Pratchett's usual style. In Doctor Who, the most shocking and powerful stories are the ones where the aliens are incidental and that the humans are the monsters. Some of the soldiers are running to find something, or someone, while others are running away. And it is not from vampires, or assassins, or such villains that they are running, but the Working School, a place of horror that is darker than the usual monsters of fantasy due to its containing none. The characters are eccentric and amusing, but they are damaged, damaged by other human beings, and that is what remains after the book is finished and the covers are closed.