Two Films and a Novel

I have not managed to get to the cinema to see as many movies as I would have like, but recently I did manage to fit in two, and both were very good.   The first was The Time That Remains by Palestinian director Elia Suleiman.  Though a Palestinian, Suleiman was born in Nazareth and is therefore an Israeli citizen.  And it is the experience of Palestinians in Israel that forms the basis for the film.  It is though a very personal account as it tells the story of Suleimans’ parents.  It is not however a conventional narrative, rather a series of vignettes, some bordering on the surreal.  These vignettes begin with the war of 1948 and the creation of the state of Israel.  For the Palestinians this period is known as Al-Nakba, the catastrophe.  As Israel triumphed, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians either fled or were forcibly ejected or surrendered.  In all cases great brutality was used against them.  Both physical and psychological violence and these opening scenes are quite terrifying.  You really do feel you are the one being blindfolded and forced to kneel on the ground in an open field, not knowing if you will be shot or not.   The rest of the film essentially shows us what it is like to live as a defeated and second class people.  Life goes on, but there is a pervading sense of hopelessness about this life.  Suleiman is suggesting that for Palestinians living in Israel, life has lost its meaning and purpose.  Thus we are shown a series of ever more absurd vignettes in which the Palestinians are the put upon victims.  There is not a lot of hope in this film.  The title itself is somewhat enigmatic.  The time that remains - for what?  Just to keep on living?  This seems to be the lasting impression from the film - live goes on and each character has to work out whatever works to help them live through the time that remains.  A very powerful and impressive film, though not a bundle of laughs.

Whatever Works is of course the title of Woody Allen’s latest film.  And after a series of not very successful films shot in Europe, Allen has returned to his real and spiritual home - Manhattan.  Though not one of his masterpieces Whatever Works is a very fine and very funny film.  Though the premiss of the  plot is that life sucks and is pretty much meaningless, this is a surprisingly upbeat film.  There is in fact a happy ending for just about every character.  As in all good Woody Allen films the central character is either Allen himself or an Allen lookalike.  In this case he is played by Larry David who is primarily a comedian and writer and star of an American sitcom.  David’s character is a more strident and arrogant version of Allen.  He really doesn’t like the world, especially his fellow human beings, most of whom he despises for their ignorance, incompetence and lack of taste.  Like Allen though, he is Jewish, though an atheistic Jew and his performance is peppered with sarcastic one-liners.  This is in many ways a typical, almost old fashioned Allen film.  The main character has a nihilistic outlook on life and twice tries, and fails, to kill himself.  Again, as in most Allen films he is somehow saved by the attractions of a very much younger woman.  This time she is a rather naive and innocent southern belle, played with spirit and charm by Evan Rachel Wood.  Somehow she and David hit if off.  Though their affair does not last it lasts long enough to bring about the beginnings of change in the Larry David character.  Life may suck, it may even be pointless, but happiness when it comes is wonderful, so seize it any way you can - whatever works for you.  In the latter part of the film this motto  extends to all kinds of other characters, all of whom somehow end up finding happiness.  A fine return to form for Allen and a film well worth seeing.

The Elegance of the Hedgehog is a novel by French writer Muriel Barbery, who teaches philosophy in her day job.   Like the two films, this novel is also about how to cope with living in a pretty senseless and ugly world.   This world is so irredeemably nasty it seems that the only way to cope is by either retreating into your own world or to commit suicide.  For these are the paths chosen by the two main characters in the novel.  And more different they could not be.  The main character and the hedgehog of the title is Renée Michel who is the 54 year old concierge of an apartment building.  Though from a poor working class family, Renée is a self-taught lover of erudition and all things of beauty.  However she hides this from all of the very rich residents whom she despises as part of a snobbish, parasitical and ignorant elite.  Her way of coping with the world is to create her own little sanctuary in which she all alone can continue with her quest for knowledge and where she is free to appreciate the beauty of artistic creations.  The other main character is Paloma the 12 year old daughter of one of the rich and snobbish families who live in the apartment block.  However Paloma too is appalled by the world as it is.  In her case she despises the despicable vacuousness of her family and their friends.  Her solution though is to commit suicide on the day she turns 13.  In the meantime she keeps a journal of her profound thoughts and the movements of the world.  A real precocious child is Paloma.  Most of the novel consists of Renée’s and Paloma’s sarcastic and biting critiques of modern day France and their meditations on the beauty to be found in nature, art and language.  There is not much of a plot and what little there is comes in the form of a new resident, the very cultured and intelligent Mr. Ozu.  A retired Japanese businessman he acts as a catalyst for the denouement of the novel.  By a series of accidental meetings Mr Ozu manages to engage with both Renée and Paloma.  Through his gentle proddings and kindness both women come to realize that they are not alone in their love of art and beauty.  This causes both to reconsider their current approach to life.  Opting out of life no longer seems such an elegant choice.  But what will they do?  This is a lovely little book.  The choice of a Japanese as the catalyst for change is most appropriate as Muriel Barbery now lives in Japan and has clearly been much influenced by Zen Buddhism.

Three very different artistic creations, though all united by a pervading nihilistic outlook on life.  This need not lead to despair - there are too many things of beauty around to be discovered and experienced,  These three works for example.  You just need to create your own meaning for life - whatever works.

These Foolish Things

This was the Reading Group’s book for June and a very enjoyable read too. I had already read a previous novel by Deborah Moggach - Tulip Fever. That was a kind of romantic thriller, set in Amsterdam in the 17th century and also very good. These Foolish Things could not be more different. Here the setting for the novel is a retirement home for elderly Brits located in India. This does not seem a very promising idea and could easily have degenerated into the Anglo-India equivalent of 'Allo 'Allo!. However Moggach is far too clever and serious a writer to fall into that trap. For this home for the elderly is not set in one of India’s beautiful tourist centres, but rather in Bangalore, a modern bustling city, home to India’s high tech industries, and with little to offer the sightseer. The home itself is a somewhat dilapidated former bungalow, now rather somnolent guest house, where some of the staff are older than the retired residents.

So the backdrop for the novel is the real India, nothing fancy and a bit down at heel. And Moggach uses this backdrop to weave a gentle, but entertaining and witty tale which features a rich and vividly drawn range of wonderful characters. The novel is unusual in that there is really no central character. The Kapoor family - husband, wife and father-in-law - feature prominently, but this is not just about them. In telling the stories about the various retirees from Britain and the local people associated with the home, Moggach is able to touch on some serious and important subjects - racism, the attitude of Brits to India and Indians, family relationships and of course growing old. No doubt because it is mainly set in India, the novel is able to contrast the differing attitudes to aging, caring for elderly relatives and to death itself. For one of the strengths of the novel is that it does not attempt to paint a rosy picture of growing old. People die and others suffer pain and loss. On the other hand life goes on and some people, even elderly people can make a fresh start - get married, re-marry or just come to terms with growing old.

Given the perilous state of the UK economy and a government hell bent on cutting public spending, perhaps the idea of setting up cheap retirement homes in India will become a reality. Though please not in Bangalore. If I am to end up in India, make it somewhere nice, like Goa or Kerala. Now where is that statue of Ganesha!

The Millennium Trilogy - Stieg Larsson

There is an air of mystery about the author Stieg Larsson. He was mostly known as a graphic designer and dedicated campaigner against racism and right-wing extremism. At some stage he started to write novels in his spare time after returning home from his job in the evening. He had completed the manuscripts for three novels when he suddenly died from a massive heart attack, aged just 50 years old. The books were published successively in Sweden in 2006, 07 and 08 to great acclaim and success. Since then the books have been translated into most languages, with the English translations coming out in 2008 and 2009. A Swedish company - Yellow Bird has filmed all three novels and the first one is due out in the UK in March.

The Millennium in the title for the trilogy refers to a monthly magazine of that name. The magazine, or rather, staff from the magazine are intimately involved in the main stories that make up each novel. In particular each novel features Mikael Blomquist as the main character. Blomqvist is the middle-aged publisher and co-owner of the magazine, which focuses mainly on economics and social problems. He is also the main investigative journalist and each novel is built around one of Blomqvist’s special investigations. Blomqvist is in the main a very likeable character, though he is very self obsessed and tends to give his colleagues a wide berth when he is deeply involved in an investigation. He is single, though he has an unusual long term relationship with Erika Berger who is the editor of Millennium. Though she is married, Mikael and Erika are both friends and lovers. Their relationship is well known and accepted by her husband. Despite this relationship, Mikael is open to sex with other women, something which occurs quite regularly throughout the trilogy. Blomqvist and the other members of the staff at Millennium are what provide the continuity for all three novels. However each book can be read as a stand alone novel.

The first of the trilogy is The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. This starts with a failed attempt by Mikael Blomqvist and Millennium magazine to expose a corrupt businessman for financial fraud. As a result Blomqvist has to go to prison. This however alerts Henrik Vanger, a retired industrialist who wants to hire Blomqvist to investigate the disappearance of his niece almost 40 years ago. Vanger promises Blomkvist the means to clear his good name as part of the payment and Blomkvist accepts. Thus begins the gradual exposure of the dark underbelly of this famous Swedish family. The title of this book in Swedish is Men who hate women, and this is a more accurate description of what the novel is about. For the Vanger family hides a very dirty secret - incest and serial sex killings. Blomqvist does of course eventually ferret all this out. Not only the mystery of the disappearance of Vanger’s niece, but he finally succeeds in exposing the financial corruption with which the novel started. And he does so with the clandestine help of the rather unusual Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Lisbeth Salander does have a dragon tattoo - and much else besides. She is a very, but very determined young woman who has suffered atrociously and brutally at the hands of her family and the Swedish care authorities, and is legally under guardianship. By the time she appears in the novel she is 24 years old, pale and very thin with dyed black hair, a dragon tattoo on her shoulder and pierced nose and eyebrows. She is also almost completely asocial. However she does some occasional investigative work for a security firm on account of her special, indeed unique skills. For Salander is a brilliant computer hacker and has a photographic memory. As a result she also gets hired by Henrik Vanger and thus begins one of the strangest duos in detective fiction.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo reveals what will continue to be the main themes of the whole trilogy - violence against women and the abuse of power by those in authority. This particular novel starts quite slowly, but soon gathers pace, excitement and suspense. The novel builds to a quite thrilling and violent climax when all is revealed and resolved. Very good novel.

The second novel in the series is The Girl who Played with Fire. This is the only one of the trilogy to have the same title in Swedish and in English. Perhaps because this one is in part about Salander herself. The novel opens with an update on what has happened to Salander since the conclusion of the previous novel. Now an exceedingly rich woman, as a result of her hacking skills, she has acquired a fabulous apartment in an exclusive part of Stockholm and treated herself to a boob job. She is very proud of them and her now conspicuous breasts become a recurrent, lighthearted feature of the novel.

Salander has had no subsequent contact with Blomqvist, but continues to use her hacking skills to clandestinely keep in touch with his computer. She is therefore fully aware of what new investigative lines Blomqvist and the Millennium team are involved in. However on this occasion, as the story develops she becomes not only one of the hunters, but the hunted.

For what the Millennium team are researching is sex-trafficking in Sweden and the abuse of underage girls by those in high office. Abuse by those in authority is something of which Salander has personal experience and she decides to get involved in the case - but on her own, unbeknown to Blomqvist. Indeed it is not until the very end of the novel that they meet up again in person.

It is while pursuing her investigations that we, the reader, become more aware of Salander’s own past. We find out why some people in very high positions in the state security services have taken such a personal interest in her. In particular why she was placed under guardianship. As she discovers more about her past, those in authority, including Bjurmann, her current guardian, are trying to find ways to keep her silent for ever. At this point Salander discovers a link to one of the people involved in the sex-trafficking - the hitherto mysterious Zalachenko. For some reason this Zalachenko is important and significant to Salander and not in a good way. She becomes determined to track him down. However before she can do anything three murders occur on the same night - the key Millennium researcher and his partner and Bjurmann. Salander’s fingerprints are found on the gun which was left behind.

Things move even faster after this. The police, fed false information by sources in the security services, are convinced that Salander is not just guilty, but a dangerous psychopath to boot. Salander goes underground and continues her pursuit of Zalachenko and his henchman, Niedermann, while Blomqvist, equally convinced of her innocence tries to help her. The bloody climax takes place in an isolated farmhouse on the outskirts of Gothenberg, where Salander finally confronts Zalachenko. Though bloody, it appears that nobody has actually been killed and the novel ends in complete suspense.

The third and final novel, The Girl who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, takes up the story at exactly the point where the previous novel ended. Both Salander and Zalachenko are quickly transferred to hospital, with Salander in particular in a very critical condition. She was so badly injured that in fact she spends most of the novel in the hospital. Niedermann has managed to escape leaving a trail of murder and mayhem behind him. At this stage the full implications of Salander’s past emerge. And a deeply murky and nasty past it is. Due to Salander’s relationship with Zalachenko and the knowledge she has of him, she is deemed to pose a threat to Swedish security. Or at least to the members of the “Section”, a small, secret core of very nasty people who have created their very own secret network within the official secret police - Säpo. It turns out that Zalachenko was a major Soviet defector and this secret group - The Section - gave him a new identity and have sought to protect him ever since. If the Zalachenko affair was to become open to public scrutiny the members of the Section would be themselves exposed and finished. To prevent this the Section decides to try and keep Salander quiet by duping a pompous prosecutor into seeking a court order to confine her permanently to an asylum. The Swedish title for this novel - Castles in the Air get blown up - makes clear that it is the machinations of this secret group that is the main focus for the book.

Thus the novel becomes a race against time as the friends of Salander - Mikael Blomqvist, of course, and some of the more honourable members of the police forces - try to find evidence of the existence of the Section. In this they are abetted by Salander herself, who from her hospital bed is still able to carry out her famed computer hacking. At the same time the Section continues to feed the prosecutor and his team false information. Bit by bit Blomqvist and Co manage to unravel the complexities and the faces behind the Section. On the way there is much suspense and not a little violence as people involved with Zalachenko seek to settle old scores or frighten off Blomqvist.

Finally Salander gets her day in court and very soon the prosecution’s case is exposed as a fraud, and Salander is freed and no longer deemed to be in need of guardianship. There are still some lose ends to tie up, including a rather brutal and bloody confrontation between the hitherto missing Niedermann and Salander. In many ways this is very traditional morality tale - all the bad guys end up either dead or in prison. Whether the rest will live happily ever after is less clear.

Overall this is an excellent trilogy. It seems that Larsson planned to write more novels and had apparently started on the fourth volume which leaks suggest has Salander somewhere in northern Canada. However the three published novels do justify the title of a trilogy. The finale does wrap things up very satisfactorily, while leaving open the possibility of further adventures and investigations.

Though Blomqvist and Salander are the key characters, it is interesting and most unusual that apart from the first novel they hardly ever meet each other in person. The internet is their favourite, indeed sole means of communication. This of course is in keeping with Salander’s asocial personality and her deep distrust of anyone in authority. However the third novel ends on a more positive note as it looks like she is at last prepared to accept Blomqvist as a friend.

The other characters are in the main well drawn and we see them as real people with lives of their own. This is particularly true of Erika Berger, Blomqvist’s friend and occasional lover. Only the main villains seem to lack a real, complex life. Perhaps this has to do with what is clearly Larsson’s main purpose in writing the novels - namely to expose the extent of male violence against women and the abuse of power. In Larsson’s eyes the two are inextricably linked. It is noticeable that in the Millennium trilogy all the bad people are men. While some men are clearly good - Blomqvist obviously - none of the women are portrayed as bad or nasty characters. They may not all be angels, but none of the women are shown as evil. In a way this makes the novels a bit one dimensional at times. But it is the very rage that Larsson feels against male violence that gives the storylines such an edge and a real sense of plausibility.

In conclusion a word or two about the differences between the titles in the original Swedish and the English translation. This applies to the first and the last of the series. As explained above the original Swedish titles - Men who Hate Women and Castles in the Air get blown up - are more in keeping with what the two novels are about. So why did the English publishers go for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo for the first novel and The Girl who Stirred the Hornet’s nest for the third? I can think of two justifications. Using the formula The Girl with ... or the Girl who .... emphasizes the continuity of the novels and makes it clear that this is a trilogy. While there is no doubt an artistic argument in favour of these changes the unity of the titles would also be a commercial advantage as it would make it easier for the buying public to see the connection between each novel. As the second of the Swedish novels, the one which has the same title in both editions - The Girl who Played with Fire, was already published before the first English translations, the English publishers would have been aware of this title.

The other justification seems to be purely commercial. By emphasizing the Salander character the publishers could make sure the covers featured a scantily dressed attractive looking young woman - to show off the tattoo of course. As a bit of an unreconstructed old man, I have to admit this ploy did work with me. I was attracted and intrigued by the title and the cover. If it encourages more people to read the novels then the means justify the ends? I do find the covers a bit controversial as they seem to fly in the face of what Larsson was writing about. Whatever, don’t let the titles or covers put you off reading what is a wonderful and thrilling trilogy.

The Rose of Sebastopol

The Rose of Sebastopol by Katherine McMahon was the reading group’s book of the month for December. The Rose of the title is Rosa Barr a young woman who is determined to make a career in medicine and somehow manages to get herself to the Crimea to work as a nurse during the infamous Crimean War. However, though a crucial person in the novel, Rose is not the main character and the novel is not primarily about the war. Rather the novel is centred on another young woman - Mariella Lingwood, Rosa’s cousin. For the novel is almost a coming of age tale. We see Mariella grow from a sheltered and innocent young girl to a woman who has painfully and stumblingly become aware of the sometimes cruel vicissitudes of life and love.

The starting point for the novel is the discovery by Mariella that Rosa is lost somewhere in the Crimea during the war. Mariella is pressed upon to go in seach of her cousin and the novel is Mariella’s first person account of this adventure. From her account we learn not only about Mariella and Rosa and their families, but also about the controversies and developments in medicine and nursing in the 1840s and 1850s. This of course covers the period in which women began to strive with some success, to break out of their corsets, so to speak, and to break into the make dominated world of the professions. The novel has much to say about these changes and how they were perceived by polite society. Mariella herself is somewhat ambivalent about these changes and only becomes reluctantly involved through the incessant prodding of Rosa. Mariella is content to pass her life within the traditional confines open to women in 19th century Britain. She is desperate to marry her beloved Henry and have lots of children. Rosa on the other hand is made of much sterner stuff and is equally desperate to enter the world of work and independence.

Though the novel is not primarily about the war, once Mariella reaches the Crimea, then the war does become the backdrop to everything that happens. And Mariella does not spare us any of the horrors and suffering of that war. Though not herself on the front line, she, and we, learn much about the brutality and the stupidity of the war from her encounters with wounded soldiers. Though there is much bravery, this picture of the war painted here is not a pretty one.

The worlds of medicine and the war provide the background to the novel, but the heart of the story is Mariella’s own growing self-awareness. And this part of the novel reads as a love story. Or perhaps more accurately at least three love stories. We begin with Mariella and Henry. This is a very formal and traditional love affair, with much affection, not a lot of love and zero passion. Once in the Crimea Mariella slowly and gradually begins to fall in love with Max Stukely, Rosa’s half brother and an officer in the Crimea. This affair is full of passion and is a stark contrast to the insipid affair between Mariella and Henry. The other love story is the least developed and that is Rosa’s love for Mariella. That Rosa has a not so secret passion for Mariella is obvious to all, except Mariella herself. It is one of the weaknesses of the novel that this relationship is not fully developed and abruptly terminated with the death of Rosa at the end of the novel.

This is a well written novel and successfully deals with some very interesting aspects of our past - the changes in medicine, the changing role of women and the Crimean War. However in telling this tale, the novel goes back and forth both in time and in place. Thus we start in Italy in 1855, then in the next chapter we are in London in 1840. Subsequently we switch back and forth to Derbyshire in 1844, back to London then to Italy, back to London and on to the Crimea in 1856. Not at all sure what all this to-ing and fro-ing adds to the novel. A bit of mystery and confusion. I kept expecting that something revelatory would emerge, but alas nothing did. I also feel that the whole does not really hang together that well. It is almost as if the author started writing one novel which has Henry as one of the key characters and then half way through changed to one in which Henry barely features and Max suddenly becomes the male hero. Mariella herself is not the most likable or attractive of heroines. Most of the time she is very conventional, narrow-minded and blind to feelings of others. As a result she misjudges just about everyone. Still, on the whole an enjoyable read.

Enduring Love

Enduring Love by Ian McEwan was the Reading Group’s choice for November. This is now the fourth book by Ian McEwan that I have read and I have enjoyed them all. The previous ones were Atonement, Saturday and On Chesil Beach, his three most recent novels as it happens. Enduring Love is an earlier novel, published in 1997.

In some ways enjoy is not the right word to use about a McEwan book. Perhaps appreciate is a more appropriate word. You appreciate and at times marvel at the quality of his writing. This is certainly the case with Enduring Love. It is a beautifully written book. The story is both strange and banal. After witnessing a fatal accident, Joe Rose is obsessively stalked by one of the other witnesses to the fatality, Jed Parry. The novel, written in the first person, is Joe’s account of what happened and how he tries to deal with the consequences of this obsession.

This obsession is caused by a real medical condition - de Clerambault’s syndrome. This is form of paranoid delusion with an amorous quality. For no apparent reason a person comes to believe that a particular person is deeply in love with them. A lack of response is rationalized and pursuit and harassment may occur.

What gives the novel a pronounced eery feel to it is how Joe does retell and react to the events. Joe is a scientist who failed to make it as a scientist and is now a successful journalist. And his account both of the accident and the stalking are written almost as a scientific case study. There is a coldness and over emphasis on precision in his account of what happened. Here is an example from early in the novel, when Joe is going over with painstaking deliberation what he remembers happened.

A beginning is an artifice, and what recommends one over another is how much sense it makes of what follows. The cool touch of glass on skin and James Gadd’s cry - these synchronous moments fix a transition, a divergence from the expected: from the wine we didn’t taste (we drank it that night to numb ourselves) to the summons, from the delightful existence we shared and expected to continue, to the ordeal we were to endure in the time ahead.

This little extract is a very good illustration of the strength of McEwan’s writing. It is not just beginnings that are artifices. The whole writing itself is an artifice, and in McEwan’s hands he uses the beautify of the language to write about some pretty horrible and terrifying things. This short piece also brings in a neat reference to the title. In this tale, enduring love is an ordeal that one has to endure.

Joe’s response to this ordeal goes from the dismissive to the obsessional and in the process he almost wrecks his own happy relationship with his wife Clarissa. It is one of the ironies of the novel that it is a real loving relationship that suffers most while the delusional one endures, unaffected by reality. In a sense the whole novel is a fictional reflection on what is reality. It is a recurrent theme as Joe in particular painstakingly tries to recall what really happened and discovers that it is impossible to know what really happened.

As the novel develops, Joe’ s relationship with Clarissa breaks down and one or two side plots develop. These also are about discovering the truth or what passes for the truth. The novel builds to an unexpected and violent climax. In keeping with the detached tone of the writing the novel ends with two appendices. One is a fictional article from the British Review of Psychiatry on de Clerambault’s syndrome. This article includes as a case study the very story we have just read. And it is through these medical-scientific notes that we learn that Joe and Clarissa were reconciled. Perhaps real love can endure too.

As hinted at above, Enduring Love is not really an enjoyable book, though it is well worth reading for the quality of the writing.

The Return of John Macnab and Romanno Bridge

Andrew Greig's novel was the reading group's book for June. I knew that this was a modern day follow-up or reworking of a John Buchan novel entitled simply John Macnab. However not having read the original, I had no idea what to expect. The first surprise is that there is no John Macnab as such. Instead we have three middle aged friends – Neil, Murray and Alasdair - who have decided to embark on a series of daring escapades in the Highlands of Scotland. The escapades take the form of a wager which involves relieving three Highland estates of a salmon or a brace of grouse or a deer. The challenge is published in the Scotsman and is the same challenge as in John Buchan's novel. In order to hide their real identities the three conspirators use the name John Macnab as a sort of nom de plume.

The story then develops much like an old fashioned rip-roaring adventure yarn, with lots of daring-do, obstacles to overcome and cunning and potentially violent adversaries to outwit. There is a distinct feel of Enid Blyton's Famous Five about the novel, though with the added ingredients of sex, drugs and rock 'n roll with copious amounts of booze thrown in for good measure. The three adventurers all have a past which gradually emerges as the tale develops. This allows Greig to present his characters as real people and not merely stock figures. In their quest they are soon joined by the beautiful and feisty Kirsty, who has her own past demons to confront. Their adversaries are also presented as interesting people in their own right, especially the local policeman, Jim MacIver and the somewhat mysterious Ellen Stobo, sent up from London to find out what is really going on. As two of the estates are foreign owned and the third is HM's very own Balmoral there is plenty of scope for discussion about privilege, land ownership and access, not to mention adding a bit of colour and mystery to the tale.

This is a cracking good tale and a thoroughly enjoyable read. Fast paced and written with a light touch you are kept in suspense right up to the last page. Part of this suspense is provided by the uncertainty over the identity of the narrator. It is never clear, until the very end, just who has written the tale. The very first sentence – “Begin the afternoon in August when an old blue Ford Escort quietly enters a small Highland town.” - creates an atmosphere of uncertainty and mystery. Every so often the narrator includes references to the future, one of them about what some minor character will do seventy years on, when even the narrator will be dead. This air of uncertainty as to the status of the tale and its narrator is continued right to the end. The last chapter begins by repeating a line uttered by one of the characters earlier in the tale: “Everything I have told you is true. You must decide whether to believe that or not.”

Romanno Bridge

This is Andrew Greig's follow-up book to The Return of John Macnab. And another cracking good adventure yarn it is too. Featuring the same cast from John Macnab with a few newcomers thrown in for good measure. Two major differences though, one relatively minor – the main focus is Kirsty – it appears to be her story. The other really significant difference is that this book is much darker and violent with an ever rising count of murders to rival Taggart.

The possibility of a follow-up is hinted at in the last chapter of John Macnab, especially the last few pages, when Neil meets up with Kirsty again. Interestingly the new book does not begin with this. Instead the first third of the book is all about Kirsty and her new life in Dumfries as she starts afresh after the excitement of John Macnab's adventures. This is when she makes the acquaintance of Billy Mackie, a retired stonemason who tells her a strange tale about the Stone of Destiny. Hooked, she starts to make enquiries and soon the new adventure begins. For Romanno Bridge is about the true tale surrounding the mystery of the Stone of Destiny, or should that be the Stones of Destiny? Quite a few stones appear in this tale as well as rings with hidden messages.

Kirsty does meet up with Neil again and the account is pretty much the same as in the ending of John Macnab, with the key difference that this time it is told in the third person, by the unknown narrator. Once again there is a bit of a mystery as to who this narrator is. By then we have met most of the new characters including Leo, the youngish Kiwi working in the Samye Ling Buddhist monastery and most spectacularly, Mr Adamson, the cold blooded and very violent villain of the piece. The other key newcomer – Inga Johanssen from Norway - has been mentioned but does not appear until later.

As with John Macnab this is an excellent adventure tale, well written and fast paced. Greig has a lovely way with words, which enlivens the book and takes it beyond mere adventure. Here is an example of a cheeky use of metaphor. Leo the Kiwi is thinking about the challenges of life:- “For sure it is a threatening and uncertain world. Don't complain, mate – do something or get used to it: his dad's mantra. He didn't do metaphors, the old fella. He didn't beat about the bush.”

In the main Romanno Bridge features much of the same mix as before – a bit more sex and drugs and still quite a lot of booze. There is more busking than Rock 'n Roll this time. What makes it very different though is that this time the world is a much darker place. Real suffering occurs and a lot of people die, usually very unpleasantly. This may have something to do with the fact that though the action starts immediately after the end of John Macnab, Romanno Bridge wasn't written until 2008 and the darker ambience probably reflects the changes that have taken place in the world over the previous 12 years.