One of these ‘rules’ is that one should avoid books that include family trees.  My theory is that anything complex enough to require a diagram outlining the rise and fall of generations in one family is going to be confusing and a drain on one’s grey matter, and also take a looooooong time to read, what with all that flicking back to the start of the book to remember who Gertrude is and why she’s important. It’s one of the reasons I’ve avoided classic Russian literature for so long, having developed an understanding as a young person that all of those thick and heavy books were part cold misery, part family saga and that I would spend an entire year trying to read them and never quite understand them.

We get ideas from strange places, and I can’t tell you where the above theory came from, just that it exists; and, as usual, it’s not as if I haven’t read, comprehended and enjoyed books that include family trees—Wuthering Heights features one for a start. And yet a dedicated page showcasing a genealogical chart will, more times than not, set my reader’s heart in a pittering of anxiety and a metaphorical pulling up of one’s britches in preparation for trying times ahead. A dramatis personae at the start of a novel causes exactly the same reaction. In fact, it may be worse. At least with a family tree you know the characters are connected by DNA and marriage…

Today by David Miller includes a dramatis personae. When I first opened the book it made me hesitant, but the novel’s general appeal kept me strong and I believed that, as had occurred in the past, the breaking of one of my rules could lead to a new discovery.

Today is a small, thin novel with a beautiful cover featuring filigree-like type. The blurb uses words such as understated, fragile and profound. Sitting on top of my flatmate’s radiator it was appealing for its elegance, brevity and its suggestion of an English country house. All these things outweighed the existence of the characters list and anyway, it was a small book—how complicated could it be? The answer to that is: not especially. Mind you, this does encourage a second question: why did the book then need a list of players? And my answer to that: it probably didn’t. If you didn’t want to include every person who turns up on a page for two sentences. Which the author clearly did want to do.

Though the presence of an unnecessary character list didn’t affect my enjoyment of Today one way or another, the novel proper, I’m afraid to say, did. This in no scientific way proves that a family tree/dramatis personae at the start of a book indicates that it should be avoided, but it does, unfortunately, help to solidify my noted presumptions about what the presence of these literary aids means about my liking of a book.

A father, husband, writer of note, friend and employer (all the same man) dies just before a planned gathering at a big English house near Canterbury. The novel follows the events in the house and the reactions of those closest to the deceased in the aftermath of his death. We see most characters through the eyes of, or their interactions with, two characters: one of the man’s sons, John, and the man’s secretary, Lilian. Lilian and John share a close friendship, despite the difference in their ages and the seeming complexity of Lilian’s role in the family.

As the blurb suggests, this novel is quiet and understated and explores the idea of bereavement in an intelligent way, but I think for me it was a little too quiet, a little too understated. While reading Today I always felt a distance between myself and the characters. I wasn’t able to get close to them or empathise with them in the way that I felt I should due to the subject matter; I was merely observing them all as some of the characters were observing each other and it was in a disinterested way, and it therefore caused me to be disinterested in what I was reading. Even though I believe this distance and emotional withdrawal was part of the author’s intended exploration of notions such as (a type of) Englishness and (some) families, the exploration didn’t seem to include me enough as a reader.

In the end it wasn’t the inclusion of a dramatis personae that caused me to feel so ‘blah’ about David Miller’s Today, but neither can I say that reading this novel was an interesting or exciting time for me. I recall feeling quite uninspired about it all as I was reading it, and having to little to say when people asked about it.  The characters seem so intent on ‘doing the right thing’ and staying calm and reserved, that it left me feeling fairly numb; and although I appreciate that this might have been the reality of the situation, and of the times, it doesn’t much make for a novel I want to be reading. I didn’t dislike Today, I just didn’t care about it. And I’m the kind of person who likes to care about things.

And then you calm down and try to re-embrace your sense of adventure and acceptance of experiences new; you remind yourself that moving to the other side of the world away from your regular life, comfort zones and loved ones is difficult at the best of time. And, really, I’m basically having the best of times; I can’t complain at all. But the homesickness has caught up with me of late and it seems a long road back, despite all the good things and wonderful people around me, to those half cockney/half crocodile hunter union jack waving pip-pip jolly good times. But I know it’s a phase that will soon pass. I’ll stop drudging about, buy myself a decent coat, and be all warm and keen and able to blog like a decent proper book blogger.

One thing that I think will help a lot is that this week I went to a meeting about joining a newly formed (well currently forming) book group. It was very exciting and my potential book group members were lovely and enthusiastic, and the organisers of the wider company of book groups (my group will be no. 18 or so that they have helped put together) were friendly and organised and encouraging. I’m very much looking forward to it kicking off. Stay tuned for a discussion of the first book selection.

On the day of that meeting I was ill, over my job, tired and lacking in any recognisable features of charm or sense. By the end of the get-together I no longer felt quite as ill, nor as world-weary, nor as overwhelmed by that wispy feeling of being a long, long way from home and I cheerfully trotted off to the tube and into a pub for the night’s next appointment.  It didn’t cure my antipodean homesick blues, but even the initial manoeuvrings of a book group get-together shone a lot more light on my little world. I felt like I might be finding some of my people – well some new ‘my people’ – and it reminded me how comforting, and also inspiring, the book world is for me, and how much I miss being a part of it; even if only as one of the many who like to meet up over a drink and talk about a novel for an hour. At the new pub, when I went to the bar to order a drink, there was definitely a little more of a Dick van Dyke chimney sweep in my voice than there had been for a while.

But this time. This time. No mucking around, no babble, no gushing, no sitting on fences. I’m embracing in my blog-personality that which is more apparent in my everyday non-blogging existence. I’m going to be straight with you good people: I did not like Val McDermid’s Trick of the Dark.

Charlie Flint is a psychologist who is asked by a former college professor to find out who killed her daughter’s husband on their wedding day. The mother suspects her daughter’s new girlfriend, Jay, a wealthy and powerful businesswoman who both Charlie and her teacher know from the college. It seems people who get in Jay’s way keep ending up dead, and Charlie takes it on herself to discover if this successful and rich business celebrity is actually a serial killer.

When I say I did not like this book, I mean it fairly comprehensively. I didn’t get much enjoyment from reading it, I didn’t have enough interest in or empathy for any of the characters, I didn’t find much in it to appreciate, I wanted to read it quickly but only so I could finish it. It wasn’t terrible (if it was I could at least lampoon it) it just wasn’t, well, it didn’t do anything for me and I couldn’t see how it would do much for anyone else. I found myself running through the questions I would have asked the author if I was editing the manuscript and the suggestions I would have made for changes to the text, and believe me, it is not a good sign when I am reading for pleasure and my editorial hat takes over. The significance of these opinions, for all the significance my opinions usually have, is that in the past Ms McDermid’s books have done something for me; I have enjoyed them very much. But here is the key difference: never before have I read one of Val McDermid’s novels that wasn’t a part of the Tony Hill series.

So I’m pondering a few things: Did the author just have a bad one? Did I just not get it? Is it only that I am terribly attached to the characters in her Tony Hill books (due to both the books and the television series) and those characters rise high above all others? Or are those novels Ms McDermid’s true calling and other stories are not?

There was a new Tony Hill novel released recently, and once it is in paperback I will be getting myself a copy to read (I almost splurged on the hardback when I was in Edinburgh a couple of months ago). But I don’t think I’ll go running towards Val McDermid’s other novels for some time. Trick of the Dark left me too disappointed.

Mr Evans is a fine writer and his narratives are well-honed. I would describe them as ‘quietly told’ but I always find myself helplessly wrapped up in them and eager to continue paddling along. He is very good at communicating the private sides of his characters, and can write of slightly ‘damaged’ individuals and their soul-searching without resorting to clichés.

His stories tend to be set in natural environs, perhaps because he knows he has strong skills in describing landscapes, or perhaps because he just prefers writing about them. In any case his tales are mostly set in mountains, on farms, in small towns, on the plains. (And in America, although he is an Englishman who lives in England.) Because of these settings, sometimes his narratives include an animal-theme, for example in The Loop we learnt a lot about wolves.  But sometimes, they don’t. This doesn’t bother me, but it seemed to bother some of his publishers. Well, they at least sometimes appeared to ignore this fact, and continued to attempt to shove an animal onto any of his covers that they justifiably could. After all, this is the man who wrote The Horse Whisperer, the reading public might not be smart enough to work that out if they didn’t see a furry creature staring back at them.

All I can say is thank god Mr Evans went back to the horsies so that novel, publisher, cover and reader were aligned again. Not that The Brave is really about horses, but there are storylines involving hollywood westerns, cowboys and indians, horse handlers and mountain riding. I certainly won’t quibble with the equine-flavoured cover, which is, in my opinion, quiet stunning. What the novel mostly discusses, though, is courage and what it means; when it is false, when it is true and when it falters.

Tom Bedford is our protagonist and we hear his tale from two ends: 1959 when he is a quiet English boy obsessed with westerns, who is thrust into Tinseltown when his sister marries a TV-star cowboy; and 2007 where he is an academic and writer living with a secret from his childhood that is brought to the fore when his soldier son is charged with murder.

When I was reading The Brave, I struggled somewhat to succinctly explain to others what the plot was because, like Mr Evans’ previous novels, there was a complexity to it that warranted more than a one or two lines from the likes of me. When I call the novel ‘complex’ I don’t mean that it is difficult or convoluted; I mean that it is layered, involved and considered. The experience of reading The Brave is a quiet one; but it is an intense quiet, full of emotion and raw introspection, cleverly constructed by a talented author who deftly leads you through his tale. Layered, involved, complex, and there are key plot points you don’t want to reveal to others for fear they will ‘ruin’ the story, plus a general sense that this is not a book to summarise for others; more one to suggest that they should read and experience for themselves, and hopefully enjoy.

I may not have been able to quickly outline the plot of The Brave for you while I was reading it, but I could have told you that I was absolutely taken with it. I could have told you that I felt as if I carried some of the emotions of the characters around with me during this time, and that I used any spare moment to pick up the book and read a few pages more. I could have told you that the parts of the story set in 2007 were very good, but the parts set in 1959 were excellent. I could have told you that I had always been a fan of Nicholas Evans’ books and that I was just so pleased that he’d had another book published and that it was, plain and simple, a very good book.

But you’ll be pleased to know (well, at least I’m pleased to tell you) that most of my little jaunts outside of London have involved some key book locations. Edinburgh, as mentioned last month, and also Paris (where some Victor Hugo-related sites in particular were visited, but how do you even start listing the authors and books connected to Paris that resonate with you), the Dorset countryside (for Thomas Hardy’s cottage and gardens; pictured), Lyme Regis (setting for one of my favourite Jane Austen novels Persuasion), and of course there’s London itself; setting and home to oh-so-many stories and their writers. I’m reading Bleak House at this very moment (perhaps I’ll post on it in about eight months’ time) and loving that I now have more of a proper sense of where all the streets and areas Dickens writes of are.  

Last week, this happy book-world jaunting took me to Bath. The sometime home of Jane Austen is a modern pilgrimage site for literary types, and you really can get yourself as much Austen-related fun and souvenirs as your little heart can manage if that is your wish. Apart from that, it’s simply a very picturesque and lovely city to visit and if you can cram in an Austen-inspired high tea, then so be it. On this occasion, I was happy to stroll the streets, tour the Roman Baths (excellent, by the way) and lounge about eating and drinking. As happy to concede to an Austen walking tour as I’m sure my boyfriend would have been, I decided to save up some of that literary tourism for another time, perhaps with a female conspirator in tow. Mind you, we discovered we were missing by only a matter of days both the Jane Austen Festival and a classic car weekend, so perhaps next year we could visit at that time and flit between the two when either bonnets or carburettors become too much.

This week I am lucky enough (thanks to my much-missed editorial colleagues in Sydney) to be going to the Savoy Hotel for afternoon tea. It is slightly book-related (apart from being given to me by booky people) as the grand hotel does have a much-desired writer-in-residence program. You can see authors the world over pegging crumpets at each other for a turn at that, can’t you? As someone currently struggling with even managing a blog post once a fortnight or so, a month in a luxurious hotel suite would surely give one the boost they need to hit the keyboard again. And if not, it would certainly be a memorable experience…