Mini Reviews: Terra, The Miniaturist, That's Not A Feeling

Terra: Mitch Benn

On a routine expedition to Rrth, Llbp discovers what seems to be an abandoned, unloved child, so he does what any decent being would do: takes her home to his own planet and raises her as his own daughter. Terra grows up knowing that she is an alien, but is accepted by her peers. But when she starts school, she has to confront the differences between herself and the people of Fnrr, as well as their similarities.

I found Terra to be a really lovely science fiction novel, easy to read (once you get used to all the names that look like keysmashes) and refreshingly optimistic for the genre. If the story's conflicts were a little too easily resolved, that is a small criticism. The world of Fnrr is a society evolved quite apart from ours, even perhaps a utopia, but one which reflects so much that is to be celebrated about people (whether human or not.) I came away from Terra smiling.

Shelve next to: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

Key Quotes:

"I guess I'm just wondering if everybody hates the G'grk because they're so angry and violent, or whether they're so angry and violent because everybody hates them."

"There's no point knowing something if you don't know WHY you know it."

"A bad scientist tries to prove himself right. A good scientist tries to prove himself wrong, and only when he fails does he conclude he's right."

"The cleverest of the scientists and astronomers admitted - privately at least - that any really intelligent life would be smart enough never to allow its presence to be detected by the human race. It wouldn't have cheered these scientists and astronomers up one bit to now that they were right."

The Miniaturist: Jessie Burton


Amsterdam, 1686. Nella Oortman arrives at her new husband's house to find a frosty welcome. Her sister-in-law and servants seem to have made up their mind to dislike her, while her husband Johannes wants nothing to do with her. On one of his rare attentive occasions, Johannes buys Nella a lavish wedding gift of a doll's house cabinet, and when Nella decides to furnish it, the miniaturist sends unsolicited and disturbing additions: items and characters which show too much knowledge of Nella's family, home - and future.

The Miniaturist explores the role of a woman in the seventeenth century, the expectations of a merchant's wife, and Nella's quest to make a place for herself in this unfamiliar new world. Set against the backdrop of the sugar trade, The Miniaturist takes the part of those who do not conform to the expectations of an oppressive society, that even the privileged classes find their own prisons. The cabinet plot is eerie and full of foreboding; there is a sense of a fate neither escapable nor quite understandable until it is too late. I grew emotionally invested in the family and ached for a happy ending, but tragedy is a foregone conclusion from the very first chapter. An extraordinary debut (and a beautiful cover.)

Shelve next to: The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters

Key Quotes:

"It is not a man she has married, but a world."

"Growing older, Nella realises, does not seem to make you more certain. It simply presents you with more reasons for doubt."

"Everything about this cabinet was indeed distracting. So much happened while I was looking the other way. I was sure I'd been standing still, yet look how far I've come."

 

That's Not A Feeling: Dan Josefson

That's Not A Feeling shows a year in the life of Roaring Orchards School for Troubled Teens, seen through the eyes of newcomer Benjamin, who was abandoned there by his parents after attempting suicide. The novel has an air of surreality from the start, which could perhaps be attributable to Benjamin's fragile mental state. I have read other books that gave me the same distorted view of the world, but at no point could I actually believe in Roaring Orchards. The creation of a man with unique ideas about the treatment of "troubled" children, there was a troubling lack of distinction about whether it should be viewed as a psychiatric institution or a reform school. There was a regular administering of medication, but no medical staff unless you count the school nurse and counsellor, mentioned only in passing. The school's regime is full of ridiculous jargon, useless and sometimes abusive therapies, staff with no idea of boundaries, and, as the title suggests, the students/patients/inmates are never listened to, only told what the staff want to hear. That's Not A Feeling reads as a parody of alternative therapies, or teaching, or reform schools, but the lack of depth or understanding of the mental health issues touched upon meant that I could not fully engage with the text. Disappointing.

Key Quotes:

"Seeing us as objects of fun let the faculty imagine we were somehow protected, I thin, as comic figures are able to survive all kinds of harm."

"I didn't like the feeling of separating myself in two: the Benjamin who was doing the thinking and the Benjamin that was being thought about."

Sunday Summary: First book splurge of 2014

My Precious...

January always feels like a long month financially, after the Christmas spending, presents and food. No matter how careful I think I'm being in December, somehow I always find my money stretches thinner after Christmas. Up to this point, my book-buying consisted of one children's book, second-hand, while I worked my way down the to-read pile and rereading old favourites. But Friday was payday. I fell in love with the new Lord of the Rings hardbacks as soon as I saw them, and figured that as my paperbacks have been read so many times that they're falling to pieces, replacing them with nice hardcovers would be a good investment. Payday fell on Friday this week, and I took myself down to Waterstone's. On taking the books to the till, I then discovered that Waterstone's were having a 20% off weekend - an added bonus!

This was going to be the end of my book-buying for now, but somehow my feet led me to The Works, who were filling their shelves with new stock after a big clearance. Lo and behold, the first thing I saw was a book on my wishlist - and the second thing I saw was another book on my wishlist; one that several people have given rave reviews of recently. Both were on the 3 for £5 offer, and it did not take me long to find a third title that caught my fancy, saving at least £15 on the full retail price. Evidently this weekend is the time for a good bookish bargain.

What I've been Reading:

One of the heroes of 2013 was Canadian astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield, who spent a large chunk of last year aboard the International Space Station. His autobiography, An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth is an inspiring read and a fascinating insight into what it takes to be an astronaut: a lot more than merely having good brains and an interest in space. Hadfield is revealed to be ridiculously determined, having started planning for a ridiculously unlikely career from a very young age, but also wise and well-balanced, working hard to become an astronaut and go into space, but not making that his only purpose. It's astonishing how much you need to know, because when it's just you and a couple of other people in a spaceship, no one else can step in, your survival depends on your attention to detail, quick thinking and a wide range of skills. (An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth also brought home how completely improbable the storyline about Howard Wolowitz going into space was in The Big Bang Theory. It doesn't work like that, chaps.) But Hadfield's book is not just about space travel: as is suggested by the title, it is full of wisdom that can be applied to everyday life even for those of us who are destined to keep our feet on the ground.

Pretty Girl Thirteen is the story of Angie, a teenage girl who returns home after being missing for three years, with no memory of anything that has happened. This is part page-turning thriller, and part an exploration of someone trying to go back to living a normal life in the aftermath of a catastrophe. What marks Pretty Girl Thirteen as different is that Angie's lost memories are due to Dissociative Identity Disorder, which I'd never come across in fiction before. As it's a condition I'm unfamiliar with, I'm not sure how accurately it is portrayed in the novel, but it was an enlightening read, if sometimes striking me as feeling a bit supernatural. The brain is a very complicated thing. Although Pretty Girl Thirteen contains traumatic subject matter, it wasn't a particularly distressing read, due to Angie not having any memories of her missing three years. I read through this book in a single sitting on my day off.

Perfect - Rachel Joyce

In 1972, two seconds were added to time. Could this be to blame for what happened next? Eleven-year-old Byron Hemming thinks so. Byron is a bright, imaginative child, and he worries about the effects that could come of humans meddling with something so constant as time. When his mother, running late on the school run, takes them on a detour, something terrible happens, and with his friend's help, Byron hatches Operation Perfect, a plan to put everything right. But can perfection be achieved - and if so, at what cost?

Viewed from the outside, Byron's family life might appear perfect. He lives in a big house, is sent to an exclusive public school, and his father has just bought his mother a swanky new Jaguar. But money cannot buy happiness. Rachel Joyce presents the Hemming family as viewed through the eyes of a child on the edge of adolescence, narrating what he sees and leaving the reader to understand what is shown and not told. Byron's father, Seymour, lives away from home during the week, working hard to earn piles of money, shower his wife Diana with gifts which he then uses as power over her. Diana acts the part of the dutiful wife, but this fancy lifestyle is not suited to her nature. We see Diana only from her son's perspective, but her character is brought to life as much by what is concealed as what is shown: the hints and secrets of the past of which she can never quite let go.

Perfect is a very British novel, examining attitudes towards class and social mobility, and making the reader think very carefully about their own preconceptions. We see this in the aftermath of the accident, when Diana befriends Beverley from the dreaded Digby Road, who seems to be exploiting Diana's feelings of guilt for her own gain. But I didn't feel quite comfortable to accept this interpretation of Beverley's behaviour, expecting the author to throw in a plot twist that declared: "Aha! You're just as prejudiced as Seymour and Diana and the other mothers!" On the other hand, is it completely patronising to refuse to accept that a lower-class person can be a scheming, conniving piece of work just as much as a wealthy person? Either way, the relationship between Beverley and Diana is completely toxic, and as the book progressed, I felt the absolute certainty that the plot was building up to something dreadful. Rachel Joyce teases us with the idea that a conflict was resolved, more or less, before opening up another can of worms.

Between the chapters about Byron's summer of 1972 are those of another story. Set in the present day, this other story follows a man called Jim, who has spent his entire adult life in hospital being treated for obsessive-compulsive disorder and possibly other mental disorders. Jim is now in his fifties, living in a van and working in a supermarket cafe cleaning tables. His days are dictated by rituals, and he still lives in the shadow of a terrible event of his youth, which could be connected to the something dreadful of Byron's summer. It seems clear where Jim's story fits beside Byron's, if not the details of how, but somewhere near the end started to question my assumption. The story as I understood it did not quite gel, and there came a powerful dawning realisation before the big revelation came. The novel is made all the more poignant by the joining of the two halves. I cried.

Deceptively simple in style, Rachel Joyce's prose is powerful and hard-hitting, yet it is not without hope or beauty. Perfect leaves the reader with a lot to think about and to feel, concerning family, class and mental illness, the power of friendship, the nature of time and the struggle for an impossible perfection.

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day Two

Day Two: What is your bedtime reading ritual?

I wouldn't say I have a regular ritual when it comes to reading before bed. What I like to do is get ready for bed early, and spend half an hour or an hour winding down and reading - but more often, I will be on the internet right up until bedtime, or beyond, and then wonder why I can't get to sleep. Or watch one more episode of whichever boxset I'm working my way through. If I'm not looking forward to the next day, then I try to delay it as long as possible - you can tell I'm not in a good place if I'm sitting up till 1AM knitting, while my mind is worrying away. All terrible habits, because if I'm not sleeping, then it all just gets worse and worse.

And, as Ned Stark would remind us, Winter Is Coming. It's not August yet, Katie, you say, looking at me with a concerned and perplexed expression. But I work in retail, specifically bookselling, and already the Christmas annuals have started coming in. I swear it gets earlier every year. The autumn and winter are always difficult for me, so I have promised myself that I can reread Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, the ultimate in comfort reading. I intend to get back into the habit of having an early night and reading a chapter or so before I go to sleep, to help me to wind down and relax - and if I allow myself to read these books only at bedtime, that might be more of an incentive to actually get into a routine.

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.