The Most Natural Thing in the World

'Sealed' by Naomi Booth (Dead Ink, 2017)

I love it when publishers put a shout out for book bloggers on Twitter.  This has led me to some absolutely incredible books, books that I would never have known about otherwise, let alone read.  'Sealed' by Naomi Booth is just one example.

'Sealed'
by Naomi Booth
(Dead Ink, 2017)

When the heavily-pregnant Alice and her laid-back partner, Pete, move out of the city to a remote house in the mountains, they believe it's a fresh start.  Away from urban pollution and the deadly skin-sealing disease it may be causing, they hope that they can put tragedy and worry behind them and prepare a safe home for the new arrival.  But the grass isn't always greener, and not only does their new location provide new dangers, old ones prove hard to escape too...

Boxing Clever

Last month, the lovely people at Waterstones made a bit of a boo-boo and sent me two books through their Read and Review system just a couple of days apart.  One was 'The Devil in the Marshalsea', the other 'Bird Box' by Josh Malerman.  On the one hand, I was delighted to have two new interesting books to read.  On the other, I knew that I'd never get through both of them in the requested time frame.  So, with humble apologies, here are my thoughts on 'Bird Box'.  Sorry they're late.

'Bird Box' by Josh Malerman
(HarperVoyager 2013)

Malorie hasn't looked outside in over four years.  Human society has disintegrated as an unnamed and unknown horror has swept across the globe, bringing instant madness to anyone who sees it.  Before long, even the most ardent sceptics have boarded up their windows and locked themselves away.  Now, years later, Malorie is trapped in a house with two small children, Girl and Boy, remembering the past and nervously waiting for the right moment to escape.  But escape into what?

This is a fantastic book.  I really wish I could say something cleverer or more entertaining about it, but this really sums it up.  'Bird Box' is the first book I've read in a long time that I've found impossible to put down - a definite case of 'just one more page before bed'.  From the beginning, I was gripped by the story, intrigued and unnerved by the frightening reality our world had warped into.  The build to the terrifying climax is expertly paced, but the journey is not one for the faint hearted.

Although I thought this was a great read, it wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea.  It's very dark and violent, claustrophobic and horrifying, with key themes of madness, suicide and being trapped by circumstances beyond the characters' control.  In a way, it's very, very stressful, but it's also got a number of glimmers of hope.  Readers are kept guessing right to the very end, however, and it's not until then we know for sure whether this is a tale of survival or disaster.  Even then, after everything that's gone before, it's hard to believe that everything will be entirely OK.

Overall, if you enjoy science fiction/horror along the lines of 'I Am Legend' or 'The Year of the Flood', you will probably enjoy (if that's the right word!) this book too.  I look forward to seeing more from this author.

The Ballad of Zeb and Toby

I've just finished the recently published 'MaddAddam' by Margaret Atwood, the last in the superlative 'Oryx and Crake' trilogy. Must've been good for me to finish it in just a week!

'MaddAddam' by Margaret
Atwood  (Bloomsbury, 2013)

'MaddAddam' begins as 'The Year of the Flood' ends. The human race has been largely wiped out by a mysterious virus, but a handful of outsiders have survived. Many are former God's Gardeners, a Christian Environmental sect that values nature and cultivates self-reliance, or members of MaddAddam, a terrorist group that dispensed with the Gardener's pacifism and used genetic know-how to cause disruption to the ruling corporations.  But they are not the only people left alive. Two psychotic competitors from the Painball games have escaped the plague and want nothing more than to torture, rape and kill.  Having saved Amanda from them once, with the help of Ren and the unexpected arrival of Snowman-the-Jimmy, Toby lets down her guard and the Painballers escape.  Will Toby and the other survivors find them before it's too late? How can they protect the innocent Children of Crake? And what of the mysterious Zeb?

Atwood has pulled off a fantastic hat trick with these three books and 'MaddAddam' is the captivating conclusion to a thrilling trilogy. While books one and two told the stories of Glenn, Jimmy, Ren and Toby, here we find out about the enigmatic Zeb and spend more time with the Children of Crake, the genetically modified replacement for human beings.  Once again, Atwood juggles the varied voices involved fantastically and it's easy to forget that they all come from the mind of one author.

'MaddAddam' is probably the most surreal and fanciful of the three books, but it is set after the apocalypse and feels right for the world that Atwood has created.  Or should I say predicted?

The ending did leave me feeling bereft, but, as any reader will tell you, that's not unusual when you've enjoyed a book and grown attached to the characters involved.

Overall, I would really recommend the Oryx and Crake trilogy to anyone who enjoys thought provoking books which challenge the way we see the world. This is Speculative, rather than Science, Fiction at its best.

Now, back to Bernard Cornwell's Saxons vs Danes Round Five: Pride Comes Before a Fall. I'm only on page 48 and I think I can see where this is going! Really don't mind though. Honest.

Apocalypse Wow

Technically, I've lived through several expected apocalypses.  I survived both the fever caused by the Millennium Bug in 1999/2000 and the end of the Mayan calendar in December 2012. Oh, and that time that asteroid skimmed past the Earth a couple of years ago. I'm sure there have been many more 'false alarms', but I somehow find our obsession with the end of the world intriguing, particularly as in all likelihood we either won't see it coming or will ignore it's coming because we don't want to change our destructive ways.

Anyway, I've just finished reading 'The Year of the Flood' by Margaret Atwood, the second book in the 'Oryx and Crake' trilogy.  'Oryx and Crake' has the rare distinction of being one of only a handful of books which I've read within two days.  Aren't train journeys great?

'The Year of the Flood'
by Margaret Atwood
(2010, Virago)

'The Year of the Flood' runs parallel to 'Oryx and Crake'.  Both books cover the lead up to and immediate aftermath of a terrible pandemic that wipes out the majority of mankind, but told from two very different perspectives.  While 'Oryx and Crake' witnesses the end of days from the upper class, high security compounds of society's elite, 'The Year of the Flood' explores the poorer and criminal strata of the population in the hard and vicious pleeblands.  The pleebs are home to Toby and Ren, two women who have survived the plague and now tell their own, intertwined versions of events.  Toby is living alone on the roof of the AnooYoo spa, nurturing her rooftop garden and nervously watching the horizon for disease carrying humans, predatory wolvogs and inquisitive pigoons. Meanwhile, Ren is trapped in quarantine in Scales and Tails, a high class strip club, wondering just how long her food will last and if anyone will find her before it's too late.  Are they the last human beings alive? Will they find each other?

As you might've guessed from my recent tweets (@Girl_LovesBooks), I thoroughly enjoyed this book (if that's the right word for it!  The story is incredibly dark and violent in places. But the end of the world was never going to be cheerful.).  I loved 'Oryx and Crake' and Atwood's other famous apocalyptic novel, 'The Handmaid's Tale'.  Atwood is an absolute master when it comes to looking at modern trends and extrapolating plausible futures from them, making her stories different and captivating yet familiar and real.  On top of this, 'The Year of the Flood' is pacy and Ren and Toby flawed, fragile and human characters that you root for.  It's an irresistible combination that makes 'The Year of the Flood' a real page turner, even when you know what's coming.

I also absolutely love the way Atwood plays with language. As well as the AnooYoo spa, there are the genetically engineered animals including rakunks and Mo'Hairs, new technology like the Sea/H/Ear Candy ear phones and foodstuffs including Zizzy Fruits, ChickieNobs and Happicuppa.  This adds a playfulness to the story which makes it easier to handle its darker elements.

Overall, I enjoyed this book so much that I've moved straight onto the third in the trilogy, the recently published 'MaddAddam'.  It'll be an interesting test, especially after the bad experience I had recently trying to read the whole Cousins' War series by Philippa Gregory in a row. So we'll have to see.

The world has ended. So what now?

We Apologise for the Delay...

Alright, alright, I'm sorry!  I know I've been a bit rubbish this week and taken several days to get around to writing this post.  It's just been one of those weeks where time is in very short supply.

Time being in short supply is a bit of a theme for the latest book I've read, 'In-Flight Entertainment' by master short story writer Helen Simpson.  This is the third book of Ms Simpson's short stories that I've read, after 'Hey Yeah Right Get a Life' and 'Dear George and Other Stories'.  I first found out about her when I read the chilling 'Diary of an Interesting Year' in a weekend newspaper, a story which is included in this collection.

'In-Flight Entertainment'
by Helen Simpson
(Vintage, 2011)

'In-Flight Entertainment' contains 15 short stories mostly connected by the theme of impending doom due to global warming and humanity's tendency to bury its head in the sand.  The stories include 'Diary of an Interesting Year', a story of survival after environmental catastrophe, the claustrophobic 'In-Flight Entertainment', charting the shifting discomfort of an air passenger as he converses with a fellow traveller, 'Channel 17', which captures snapshots of the relationships of hotel occupants, and 'I'm Sorry But I'll Have to Let You Go', a tale of cold hearted idiocy.

I've got to be honest, I struggled a bit with this book.  I bought it because I'd been intrigued by 'Diary of an Interesting Year' (which has lost none of its power.  Since re-reading it, I've found myself trying to be a bit less wasteful and a bit more environmentally friendly as I go about my business.  There's not many stories that have snuck into my psyche like that!) and wanted something small and portable to take with me to read at a wedding (well, not at the actual wedding, obviously, but at the hotels the night before and night afterwards.  Given the chance, I'd probably have filled the bags with books, so this was my attempt at being practical!  Anyway...).  I still feel it's a bit patchy and I felt more engaged by some stories than others (I've still no idea about 'The Tipping Point') and, sadly, I feel that the theme of environmental catastrophe was clumsily handled at times.  It felt shoe-horned in in places and I felt a bit nagged really.

Looking at it now, though, I've realised that I actually enjoyed a lot more of it than I realised at the time.  Also, I feel that a second reading when I've got fewer distractions might mean less of it flies over my head.  To paraphrase the classic line, it's not the book, it's me.

I liked that some of these stories were a bit of a departure from others that I've read, focussed on more than relationships.  'Diary of an Interesting Year' is almost Science Fiction, while 'The Festival of the Immortals' was almost fantasy (well, for a book worm anyway!).

On the whole, I'd say this is not the best Helen Simpson book to start with, but I would recommend her as a writer to anyone, although her usual themes are likely to appeal more to a female audience.  This is her fifth collection, so there are four others to try first.  I've only read two, so don't feel I can recommend one just yet, although at least one Tweeter (Alex Griffith/@jalexgriffith ) praised 'Constitutional' when I mentioned it on Twitter.  Perhaps that's the one I will go for next, once I've got a few more titles off the list!

There's Something at the Bottom of the Garden...

I'm never going into a garden again and if you think I'll look at any future eclipses or other astronomical events, you've got another thing coming!

As you might be able to guess, I've just finished John Wyndham's 'The Day of the Triffids', probably the best known of this British author's novels. 

'The Day of the Triffids' is a story of human survival in the midst of a terrifying worldwide apocalypse.  Bill Mason wakes in a London hospital, his eyes bandaged following eye treatment.  Confused and frightened by the lack of normal noise either in the hospital or outside his window, he cautiously removes the dressings and finds himself in the middle of a living nightmare.  A 'meteorite' storm the previous night has blinded most of the world's population and, as he travels through London in shock, Bill finds that life as he knew it has gone for good.  As he begins to encounter other survivors, he realises that the catastrophe has often brought out the worst in people.  As the remaining population begins to find ways to group and cope with the new circumstances, a new, terrible threat emerges - the determined, devious and deadly Triffids...

Now, first things first.  There was one part of this book that made me very, very irritated.  One group of intellectualised survivors band together at a London university.  One of the earliest things they do is call a meeting at which an eminent Sociologist talks about the future of society and how it will be necessary to leave elements of the old moral framework, behind for practical reasons.  Fair enough.  But why is sex their main priority when they haven't even found a safe way out of London yet?  London, which is already littered with suicides and brutal gangs and already a breeding ground for disease?  And when they only have one, shy nurse to provide pre- and postnatal care?!

I can only assume that when this book was written in the 1950s, talking about sanctioned sexual promiscuity was terribly, terribly shocking in a way it simply isn't today.  Then it would sort of make sense.  But to my modern (female) eyes, it just seemed like putting the cart before the horse.  No point in having babies if you can't feed them or keep them safe, even if you are trying to save mankind.

On the whole though, this book is a real page turner, a brilliant combination of horror, socio-political comment and old fashioned adventure.  It did get a bit preachy in places, particularly when an idealistic but impulsive character called Coker comes on the scene, but I think I understood most of the comparisons the author was drawing with different political ideologies.

I know I shouldn't be, but it still surprises me how relevant the science fiction of the last century still is.  'The Day of the Triffids' could be read as socio-political comment, environmental parable or analysis of how we might cope with extreme disaster.  As a result, it's incredibly interesting as well as entertaining.

And, of course, you have a fantastic villain: The Triffids.  Human beings may have had a hand in creating their predicament, but the constant and escalating onslaughts by the seven foot tall, alien-looking plants really is a danger all its own.  They're clever, they're everywhere and they're topped with lightening-quick stings which can kill a man several feet away.  As I say, Prince Charming can do the gardening from now on!

'The Day of the Triffids' begins with probably one of the most famous opening lines ever.  Striking the reader like a slap across the face from the start, the book doesn't let up at any point.  Before you know it, you've turned the last page... And you're wondering whether that rustling really is just the breeze through the trees.  Shudder!