Loner | Georgina Young #AWW

 

Oh, the existential angst!

Remember when you were 22 and you had no idea what you wanted to do or how you fitted into the big, wide world and it all seemed overwhelming, sometimes exciting, but mostly this big, huge, void of trying to be an adult, that you had no idea how to fill.

This is the story that Georgina Young has crafted in Loner. The title is a subtle play on our protagonist's name, Lona, and also sums up her beliefs about herself.

What I really liked about this story, is that Lona didn't have a big ah-ha moment or major crisis that suddenly dropped her into the adult world. It was far more real than that. Lona made some errors of judgement, nothing drastic, said no when she probably should have said yes, said yes when she probably should have said no, bumbled her way through moving out of home, caring for her sick grandfather, going out on dates, dropping out of uni because the art classes were leaving her feeling dead inside, alienating her best friend and working a couple of shit jobs.

Lona's voice was authentic and endearing, yet she was aimless, insecure and full of so much uncertainty that it made my heart ache!

One of my younger colleagues (closer in age to Lona than myself) also had a strong reaction to reading this book. She felt that she was still in the middle of Lona's angst, struggling to find meaning and purpose and confused about what it takes to become a fully fledged adult. 

I think we do ourselves (and our young people) a huge disservice, by not talking more about the journey we all go on to become an adult. It's not something that happens overnight on a certain birthday. Or when you move out of home for the first time, or get your first full-time job, or buy your first car. In fact, it's a lifelong journey that evolves with every decade and with each life experience. 

Having said that, though, there does seem to be a point in most people's mid-to-late twenties where things start to click into place. Maybe it's when you finally realise that this whole adulting thing is a lifelong journey after all and you finally feel significantly different to how you felt at 18 or 19 or 20. Or perhaps it's when everything stops being a 'first'.

Lona at 22 isn't there yet. Like the rest of us, she experienced no miraculous revelation or epiphany. There was no big character change or psychological growth. She didn't suddenly 'come of age' or work everything out. Lona simply clocked up some more life experience.

Facts:

• Winner of the Text Prize 2019
• Set in Melbourne, Victoria
• Kill Your Darlings interview with Georgina Young | 13th Aug 2020

#AusReadingMonth2020

The Rotters' Club | Jonathan Coe #UKfiction

I'm reading Coe's trilogy about the life and times of Benjamin Trotter the wrong way round, chronologically speaking. But after reading and enjoying the third book in the series, Middle England, so much last month, I knew I had to find out how the whole thing started.

The Rotter's Club is a 2001 novel set in 1970's Birmingham and just like Middle England, it is a curious mix of nostalgia and satire.

I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know a teenage version of Ben, Philip and Doug, but I did find their teenage lives a bit tedious by the end of 300 pages. Do you remember those boys at school who did nothing but talk about THEIR (superior taste in) music/politics/sport and how naff you were if you didn't agree with them? This is a book about them. I suspect Coe was one of those boys, but has come far enough through life, to be able laugh about it now!

All this self-conscious school boy angst existed within the political and social context of IRA bombings, punk rock, immigration, union strikes and UK class consciousness.

Coe celebrates ordinary, comfortable, middle England family life for what it was - a whole generation on the move from their working class backgrounds into more middle class privileges.

The story finishes with a stream of consciousness chapter that is, apparently, the longest sentence in literary history. Along with a number of letters, diary entries and school newsletter articles, Coe plays with text types, mostly successfully, until this last chapter, which felt rather self-indulgent.

A number of reviewers for Middle England mentioned their great love for The Rotter's Club and that Middle England didn't quite live up to their expectations. I was the other way around. I suspect these rave reviews were all men, who were once one of those boys who did nothing but talk about their latest amazing new musical find that you really should listen to.

There are some odd moments and writerly devices in The Rotters' Club that didn't quite work for me. Using Sophie and Patrick to create a frame story at the start didn't really go anywhere, which is a shame, as I would have enjoyed getting to know more about the contemporary Sophie/Patrick story as a contrast to the 1970's story. I also found the IRA bombing cliff hanger annoying as each additional chapter went by that failed to explain, acknowledge or reveal anything about what happened...and there were several such chapters and digressions, before we finally returned to this significant event.

Coe always intended this book to have a sequel, which is no doubt why a number of set-ups and possible red herrings were not followed up or resolved. At least, I hope this proves to be the case.

I enjoyed Coe's political digs and commentary in both books, however, the immediacy of Middle England, and the adult lives of the characters, appealed to me far more than the 1970's and a bunch of teenage boys doing teenage boy stuff.

Despite the flaws, I have become quite attached to these books and these boys/men. There is a warmth and affection and a nostalgia that is infectious. I feel confident that The Closed Circle will be on my to-be-read pile very soon.

Facts:

• Book 2, The Closed Circle (2004), is set in the 1990's.
• The Rotters' Club was made into a BBC2 TV miniseries in 2005.

The German House | Annette Hess #DEUfiction

The German House by Annette Hess was a fascinating read.

Translated into English by Elisabeth Lauffer, it's essentially a coming-of-age story about a young woman who works as a translator during the Frankfurt Trials of 1963-65. Her story is complicated by childhood memories that her parents gloss over, a controlling fiance, a co-worker with demons from his past and a sister who is completely disturbed and dangerous, yet works in the maternity ward at the nearby hospital. So many secrets, psychological problems and unresolved issues. All these individual and personal stories of guilt, culpability and responsibility echo the larger drama being played in the court room and across the country.

Hess covers this murky period of time, post-war, where the German people tried to forget the war, with a great deal of perception and sensitivity. The older generation's collective amnesia and motto of 'let the past lie' haunted the next generation as they grew up during a time of peace and well-being, completely unlike that of their parents. What their parents did during the war and how much did they know tainted and divided families with guilt, distrust and shame.

In the 1960's, Germany was enjoying a post-war boom and didn't want to be reminded of its past. The Nuremberg Trials, immediately after the war, had dealt with some of the big names of the Reich leadership, and for most Germans this was enough. The defendants were tried under the international crimes against humanity law. Everyone else was considered to have been just following orders, without really knowing or understanding what was happening in the camps.

In 1963, KGB assassin Bohdan Stashynsky was found not guilty of murder by a German court. Instead he was found to only be an 'accomplice to murder' as the ultimate responsibility lay with his superiors in the KGB.

According to Wikipedia, the implications for this meant that:

in a totalitarian system only executive decision-makers could be convicted of murder and that anyone who followed orders and killed someone could be convicted only of being accomplices to murder. The term executive decision-maker was so defined by the courts to apply only to the highest levels of the Reich leadership during the National Socialist period, and that all who just followed orders when killing were just accomplices to murder. Someone could be only convicted of murder if it was shown that they had killed someone on their own initiative, and thus all of the accused of murder at the Auschwitz trial were tried only for murders that they had done on their own initiative. 

The Frankfurt Trials attempted to bring to account many mid to lower level officials from the Aushwitz-Birkenau camps. Under state law, the judge could only indict for murder if there was a clear case that showed an individual had murdered on his own initiative. Those, for instance, who had operated the gas chambers, could only be indicted as accomplices to murder because they had been following orders.

No wonder the whole issue around complicity and culpability created tension between generations. How to come to terms with supporting and adoring, right to the bitter end, a charismatic leader. Where did his madness and evil end and individual responsibility begin?

The Germans have spent the past 70 years working through this concept of German collective guilt, or Kollektivschuld. I believe there are levels within levels that describe the various phases of this guilt over time.

One such idea is Vergangenheitsbewältigung, the 'struggle to overcome the past' or 'work through the past'.

Modern generations today may wonder about the extent of this generational collective guilt. Young Australians and young Americans seem to have very little concept of historical legacy. They seem to have completely drawn a line under anything that happened in previous generations as having nothing to do with them. The Gen Z's I know have almost no interest in anything older than them. George Santayana's famous and oft-quoted observation that 'those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it', is completely lost on them. I have been told numerous times that this history is not only forgotten, but irrelevant. They would never fall under the charm of a magnetic, yet dubious personality or do anything that they didn't want to do.

Oops. I didn't mean this post to become a soapbox rant about generational attitudes towards history. I've obviously been holding onto that one for a while!

As you can probably guess, I feel very strongly about historical precedent, bias, revisionism, lenses, patterns, cycles, who gets to tell the story of history, which bits get left out and what lessons can be learnt, if any. As Hess implies in her story, the contemplation of history is both a bitter and healing exercise.

The German House was meant to published in Australia on the 3rd December, but we are still waiting for it to appear on our shelves. I'm not sure why it has been delayed.

Facts:

• Lauffer was the recipient of the 2014 Gutekunst Prize for Emerging Translators.

Red at the Bone by Jacqueline Woodson #USfiction

I'm struggling, at the moment, to find the right words to describe my reading experiences, yet at the same time, I'm going through an amazing reading phase, with three back to back stunners. Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout, Girl, Woman Other by Bernardine Evaristo and now Red at the Bone.

My journey with Red at the Bone began about three months ago when our rep gave me an ARC and said 'watch this one, it could take off.'

I then spotted it on several of the lists that Kate @Books Are My Favourite and Best listed on her list of lists for 2019.

When I finished Olive, Again the weekend before Christmas, I wanted something completely different, new and slim. Red at the Bone jumped out of my TBR pile for all those reasons...and I'm so glad it did.

But how to review such a splendid reading experience?

Normally I avoid Goodread reviews and other blogs until after I've finished reading and reviewing the book myself, but when I'm struggling to write, I will turn to outside sources to find inspiration, or in this case to find a spark to fire me up.

Most of the reviews reflected my time with the book. They loved the writing style, they loved the family and their strength and resilience.

However, one reviewer caught my eye. She talked about the misery heaped upon misery that made it impossible for her to read or enjoy this book. I was left wondering if we had even read the same book! As the day wore on, I could feel a response forming, a rebuttal building up that had to be proclaimed.

I didn't know whether to feel sad or envious that someone could see the events depicted in this novel as misery upon misery. Had this reviewer had such a fortunate life that they and their extended family had never experienced any of the things within this story? Or was there something else at play that I wasn't aware of?

In the lifetime of the three generations in this particular family, we had some racial and gender discrimination events, a teenage pregnancy, a move, illness, some LGBTQ issues and eventually a death or two. We also had love and hope and resilience. We had a family living in the times they were born into as gracefully as they could. Different personalities coped in different ways. The times they lived in impacted on the choices they could make.

This was a family that valued hard work and education...and family. Because ultimately, during those times in all our lives when things go pear-shaped, it's the love and support of family that gets you through. I couldn't see any of these events as misery heaped upon misery. I just saw well-lived lives full of the joy and drama of human existence. Things most of go through at different times.

I understand that a structure that jumps between time lines and points of view is not for everyone. If it's just a device to hang a story on, then I get frustrated too, but Woodson used the different time lines and points of view to circle around one big event, that changed everything for those left behind. The poetic writing style may not suit everyone either, but I love elegant distillers of beautiful language, so I happily went along for the ride.

I didn't know anything about the 1921 Tulsa race massacre, but I do now. It wasn't necessary to have a full understanding of this event, to appreciate the choices the family made, as the story was about the consequences of those choices rather than an expose of the event itself. It was simply part of the family back story, much like the Depression and WWII informed my grandparents and parents views of the world. A powerful memory for those who lived it, but fading to insignificance for the generations that follow, who have their own demons or life-changing events to negotiate. Woodson was adept at exposing this generational divide.

As an outside observer, I'm acutely conscious of the race issues that plague America. They play out on our screens, in the books we read and on the news. In Australia, we have enough of our own issues to go on with, yet somehow, the American experience seeps into ours as well. Such complex topics are not easy to solve or discuss and they attract a wide variety of opinions, including the 'let's draw a line in the sand and call it done' approach. Simplistic solutions like this will never work all the while there are people alive who remember. Because memory becomes story, which then gets passed down from one generation to the next. All the while there is memory and story, that line in the sand will constantly shift.

However, we can choose which memories we turn into stories. And we can choose how to tell those stories. We can choose what lessons we want to learn and which ones we want to pass down to future generations. Woodson has chosen trauma triumphed by love.

I for one, will be looking out for more work by Woodson. Her voice and style appealed to me and I want to know more.

Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton

I suspect I'm going to be the lone dissenting voice when it comes to Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton.

This is a debut Australian novel garnering a HUGE amount of attention and rave reviews. In the lead up to our Christmas rush at work last year, this is the book many, many locals were asking for. Customers were returning to tell us how much they ADORED the book and every second book club, including mine, seemed to pick it for their summer holiday read.

I was thrilled that I was going to have a good excuse to make time for this book and I couldn't wait to get stuck into it.

To start with what I loved:

• The cover - just gorgeous, vibrant and psychedelic. The blue wren makes sense once you start reading. For an in depth look into how cover designers settle on the finished design read this fascinating piece from the Australian Book Design Association. They interviewed Darren Holt and Claire Ward, the Australian and UK designers for Boy Swallows Universe (as well as other designers for other books).
• The writing - Dalton took my breath away. I was completely and utterly WOWED.
• The protagonist, Eli Bell is a wonderful narrator. His voice is believable, charming and unique.
• The introduction of ex-con Slim Halliday as Eli's babysitter added a quirky touch.
• I loved the themes - a young boy looking for a 'good man' to love and model his life on, brotherly love, redemption and protection, a young boys fierce need for mother love.
• Early on I also began to suspect that this book was also heavily embedded in real life events.
• Slim Halliday was a real criminal who did his time in Boggo Road Gaol.
• How much else was real?

However around the 50 page mark, the underbelly criminal stuff started to take centre stage. Drugs, drug running and drug lords took over the story. Because I now suspected that this was based on a true story (I hadn't googled at this point) I made myself keep reading even though, every single extra sordid drug reference and act turned me off more and more and more. 

I've always believed that if someone actually had to LIVE through something ghastly, the very least I can do from my safe, white, middle class home, is read about it with understanding and compassion and a huge dose of gratefulness for my very ordinary upbringing.

True crime is not my usual genre, but I have been known to be fascinated by the occasional story. We watched the second season of Underbelly that starred Matthew Newton which was centred around the murder of Donald Mackay in Griffith in 1977, but I haven't been able to watch any of the other seasons. I also haven't got into Breaking Bad, The Sopranos or Orange is the New Black.

However, with Boy Swallows Universe, I got to a point, about 100 pages in, where the amazing writing and the affection I felt for the two brothers, wasn't enough to sustain me through the relentless criminal activity. 

I admire Dalton for finding such an incredible way to process the trauma from his childhood. There is so much love for this story 'out there', that I'm sure it will pop up in most of the Australian book awards this year. It deserves it too. The praise being heaped on it, is valid, but the content is just not my thing. There are so many books, about topics that I have way more interest in, waiting for me to read them, that I don't want to give too much time to one of those that just fails to fit the bill...for me.

Boy Swallows Universe has just been shortlisted for the Indie Debut Fiction Book Awards.

I've labelled this with the Did Not Finish tag, but it was more a case of skim reading the last three quarters of the book before slowing down to read the last chapter properly.

March update: I gave this to Mr Books to read because I suspected that he would love it. He did.
He felt the criminal activity was within context and didn't dominate the story. For him, the story of the boys, the search for goodness and what makes a person 'good' and the power of redemption were powerful, moving themes.
He was surprised I couldn't finish it, even though he has had years of watching me hide behind pillows and my hands in violent movies! (We're rewatching Game of Thrones in preparation for the final season. Because I know what's coming, I'm spending even more time behind the pillows than I did with the first viewing, when many of the violent/cruel scenes caught me by surprise. I also know to leave the room whenever Bolton walks on screen).

Facts:

• Longlisted for the 2020 International Dublin Literary Award.
• Winner 2019 ABIA Book of the Year Award | Literary Fiction Book of the Year
• Winner 2019 Indie Book Award
• Winner 2019 UTS Glenda Adams Award for New Writing | NSW Premier's Literary Awards
• Winner 2019 People's Choice Award | NSW Premier's Literary Awards
• Winner 2019 ABIA Matt Richell Award for New Writer of the Year
• Longlisted for the 2019 Miles Franklin Literary Award
• Shortlisted for the 2019 Colin Roderick Award

Smile & Sisters by Raina Telgemeier

Smile and Sisters have been two very popular books at work with 11-14 year old girls. Now I see why. Raina Telgemeier has created two very personal, engaging stories from two significant events in her pre-teen years. Smile details her rather horrific orthodontic work, while Sisters not only features her relationship with her younger sister, but explores a period of time in her early teen years when their parents marriage was on the rocks.

Most of us have a ghastly orthodontist story from our childhood, but not many readers would be able to take on Telgemeier's lengthy, painful and traumatic experiences in the dental chair. Via her and artwork, Telgemeier shows us the ordinariness of teen life as well as the individual self-consciousness that infects most teens anywhere in the world. She explores image, belonging (I was so glad when she finally moved on from that first group of friends - they were awful) and embracing who you are.

It was a surprisingly touching coming of age story with bucket loads of courage and perseverance.

Sisters wasn't quite as success to my mind. Here Telgemeier explores why her relationship with her sister may have been strained throughout their younger years. It felt believable and authentic, but also a little like she was stretching to find another book.

We've all had those challenging relationships with siblings at different times, when two very different personalities constantly rub up against each in daily family life. Sometimes things improve when you're no longer living together under the one roof; sometimes things don't.

But the thing that can bring you together is shared fear and shared adversity - when you think your parents may be about to split up.

In this case, Raina gave her sister a draft of this story several years prior to publication for approval. She also allowed Amara a chance to share insights into her side of the story.

I'm not normally a big fan of graphic novels, but these two books were easy to read and I really liked the colourful artwork. The simple designs were capable of conveying quite a lot of emotion.

Smile was the winner of the Eisner Award for Best Publication for a Teen Audience in 2011 and a finalist for the Children’s Choice Book Award.

Sisters won the Eisner Award for Best Writer/Artist in 2015.

Books 15 & 16 of my #20BooksofSummer (winter) challenge - drop-in titles
25℃ in Sydney
16℃ in Northern Ireland
I read these books during the July #reversereadathon

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

I like to think that I have taken my 'what to read whilst travelling' choices to an inspired level of brilliance, but I really outdid myself with our recent trip to Japan. Reading Murakami in Japan now feels like the ONLY place to read Murakami!

Not only does the usual Murakami weirdness make sense when you're actually in Japan, but you also realise just how important the environment is to Murakami and his characters. His descriptions of the trees, forests, waterways and urban spaces are everywhere as you move around the country. As are the crows.

In this case, the boy named crow is a mentor to our young protagonist, Kafka Tamura, perhaps an alter ego, a Japanese Jiminy Cricket. Whatever crow is or isn't, right from word one, Murakami is flagging that symbolism, mythology and psychology will be our prime concerns in Kafka on the Shore.

In Japanese mythology, crows are seen as a sign of 'divine intervention in human affairs' (wikipedia). Western mythology tends to associate the crow with bad news or as a harbinger of death. They're selfish, spread gossip and neglect their young. And they're everywhere in Japan. They sit on telegraph wires, fence posts and roof tops. You often wake up to their cawing, even in the city.

Cats are the other creatures that dominant not only Murakami stories, but many Japanese stories, yet curiously I didn't see one single cat in three weeks, let alone a talking cat! The opposite of the crow, cats are creatures of good luck, although still often associated with death and hauntings.

Silence, I discover is something you can actually hear.

There is no denying that Murakami is on very intimate terms with kooky.

If the talking cats weren't enough, a cameo appearance by Johnny Walker and Colonel Sanders of KFC fame might tip you over the edge. A reference to the (fictional) Picnic at Hanging Rock as an example of another group loss of consciousness event caught my eye. Did Murakami know that it was an urban myth? Is that what he was implying about his own story? The sense of mystery and other-worldliness was certainly a shared atmosphere between the two stories.

I was also amazed by truck drivers who suddenly became classic music afficiandos, quiet librarians who turned out to be sex fiends and sex workers who quoted philosophers. What's not to love? The kookiness gets under my skin and into my head. Just like what happened to me with his previous books.

1Q84 is still roaming around in my head, Colourless Tsukuru less so, but it's still a memorable book experience.

Things outside you are projections of what's inside you, and what's inside you is a projection of what's outside you. So when you step into the labyrinth outside you, at the same time your stepping into the labyrinth inside. 

One of the really enjoyable aspects to reading Murakami in Japan is the place names. Suddenly they really mean something. Most of the action in Kafka takes place in Takamatsu on the island of Shikoku. 

We didn't get to Shikiko with this visit, but we did see one of the huge bridges, from a distance, that joins Shikoko to Honshu and we spent some time at the station that is the interchange for the JR line that goes to Takamatsu. Seeing the name of the city featured in my book up in lights suddenly grounded this surreal story into reality.

This is only my fourth Murakami (see my Author Challenge tab for details) so I'm not sure I can safely name all his common themes and ideas, but there are a few that I've clocked. Going into the woods/fear of getting lost, weird sex, talking creatures, dreams, random jazz references, loneliness and silence. And for me, the reader, there is an over-riding sense of bewilderment (WTF was that about?) as well as an overwhelming sense of wanting more (whatever it was a think I like it!) 

I'm caught between one void and another. I have no idea what's right, what's wrong. I don't even know what I want anymore. I'm standing alone in the middle of a horrific sandstorm. I can't move, and can't even see my fingertips.

Murakami doesn't wrap his stories up with a neat, tidy bow or resolve many of the story lines. This should be totally frustrating...and it is, but somehow you love being kept in the dark and confused at the same time. Perhaps it's the likeable characters? Or perhaps it's the not so subtle way he plays with your head? Or perhaps it is the hope that the next book he writes will bring you one step closer to understanding this maddening man and his ability to suck you into his world. 

Every one of us is losing something precious to us....Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That's part of what it means to be alive. But inside our heads - at least that's how I imagine it - there's a little room where we store those memories.

Image source

Murakami likes to do the whole books in books thing. Kafka's backlist was an obvious start -The Castle, The Trial, Metamorphosis and In the Penal Colony in this case. But he also referenced The Arabian Nights, the complete works of Natsume Soseki, a book about the trial of Adolf Eichmann (I can only assume it was Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem), Electra by Sophocles, The Tale of the Genji and 'The Chrysanthemum Pledge' in Tales of Moonlight and Rain by Ueda Akinari.

So many tangents, so many connections, which one should I tackle next?

The Shepherd's Hut By Tim Winton

The Shepherd's Hut is Tim Winton's much anticipated latest novel. I am a fan, but with reservations. I loved Cloudstreet and Dirt Music but hated The Riders (it has the dubious honour of being one of my very first DNF books). Breath was good but a bit blokey and Eyrie was okay, but a bit blokey. I adore his children's picture book illustrated by Karen Louise called The Deep. And his essays in The Boy Behind the Curtain were truly luminous.

So I entered The Shepherd's Hut cautiously.

The first 20 or so pages were a struggle for me. I know that there are awful dad's out there, I know what they can do. I used to be a teacher, I've assisted some of those families in negotiating the quagmire of domestic violence over the years. But I don't feel the need to read about such sad, brutal things.

So I struggled with the first part of the story where we experienced Jaxie's dysfunctional relationship with his father. I thought, I can't do this.

Later that night, I tried again.

Without spoiling anything for anyone, Jaxie was on the run and suddenly we had a full-on road trip/survival story underway. Unusually for Winton, there wasn't a beach in sight, as Jaxie headed inland to the scrubby, salty desert areas of WA.

Some readers might find Jaxie's vernacular hard going. It annoyed me at the start, but I think I'm at an age when teenager-speak is annoying in whatever form it takes! But once Jaxie hit the road, the voice became more considered and thoughtful, and was perhaps meant to reflect the influence that Fintan had on him. If you disliked Huck Finn or Lincoln in the Bardo because of the local dialect, then steer clear of this one too. The swearing may also put off some readers.

Fintan was the ageing priest that Jaxie stumbled upon in the bush. We don't know why he's living a life of exile, but there were obviously some issues around the priesthood and the Catholic Church that Winton was exploring here. I'm still not sure what they were.

The same goes for Winton's well-known concern about toxic masculinity. He discusses it in detail, but what is the solution?

Because it's also #ReadIreland month over at Cathy's blog, I thought I would highlight the Irish character in Winton's story. Fintan, the priest is described by Jaxie like this,

I never did know what to make of Fintan MacGillis....He was Irish, he told me that straight up. But I never found out what it was he done to get himself put there by the lake, what kind of person he was before....He was one of them geezers been out on his own so long he talks to himself all day....You had to sort through all these bent up words to figure which was bullshit and which was true. What I mean is he made a lot of noise but sometimes he didn't say much. With that accent of his and the way he said things fancy and musical, it was like camouflage and you knew deep down he'd been doing this all his life, hiding in clear sight.

The Shepherd's Hut is not an easy read, but, in the end I found it to be a worthwhile encounter.
It's not quite a coming of age story because the becoming part was still to happen and it's not quite a road trip story as Jaxie's journey was nowhere near done. It was more like a vignette, a moment in time, a snapshot in time.

I'm not sure I learnt anything new or gained any insights into domestic violence, the lost and lonely or survival, but I can see an action-packed, fast-paced, gritty movie on the horizon!

Eyrie by Tim Winton
Dirt Music by Tim Winton
The Boy Behind the Curtain by Tim Winton
The Deep by Tim Winton

Facts:

• Longlisted for the 2020 International Dublin Literary Award.

4 3 2 1 by Paul Auster

4 3 2 1 is a huge behemoth of a book that takes commitment and persistence to finish.

The first third of the book was absolutely stunning. I was nearly all the way through the first section of four chapters about Archie Ferguson, wondering when the four parallel lives were going to come into play, when I realised that I was already there. Being confronted with two conflicting stories about what had happened to Archie's father and his business caused me to completely reassess the previous chapters. Others may have worked out Auster's numbering device sooner but I was only reading a chapter a night before bed.

When I finally had my ah-ha moment, I doubled back to create a timeline for each life - where did each Ferguson live, what car did his mum drive, which cigarette brand did she smoke, what happened to his uncles and aunts and how did his dad's furniture business pan out? I thought I would never keep track of all the details.

However as we moved further away from the common story of Archie's origin, the four lives diverged so much that it actually became fairly easy to remember what was happening in each story and why.

Auster, well known as an adherent of metafiction, used his characters to play with his ideas about parallel lives at various times.

Archie 3 said early on,

The world wasn't real anymore. Everything in it was a fraudulent copy of what it should have been, and everything that happened in it shouldn't have been happening....but an unreal world was much bigger than a real world, and there was more than enough room in it to be yourself and not yourself at the same time.

Later on Archie 4 remarked,

there seemed to be several of him, that he wasn't just one person but a collection of contradictory selves, and each time he was with a different person, he himself was different as well.

All of the Archie's developed a few influential friendships and key interests (sport and literature in particular). They appeared in different ways and took different forms for each Archie.

The early years of the four Ferguson's were clever, fascinating and exciting writing. I was hooked.

I reached the halfway point of the story so quickly, I felt sure I would finish the rest within a week. A personal chunkster record! But then we hit Archie's early twenties and my attention and enthusiasm began to flag. I had been waiting for some 'big event that rips through the heart of things and changes life for everyone, the unforgettable moment when something ends and something else begins.' Just like Archie 1.

Instead, the stories had settled into just another coming of age story in America in the sixties.

I put the book aside for a couple of weeks to see if a mini-break would help.

It didn't.

I ploughed my way through the next four chapters of Archie, but failed to recapture my enthusiasm. Everything that had charmed me early on just annoyed me now.

Usually I love books that mention books that the characters are reading, but by the end of 4 3 2 1, Archie's huge reading list felt like nothing more than a whose who of classic and modern literature with no surprises and seemingly little relevance to the story. To discover that one of the Archie's was writing a book called The Ferguson Story added another metafiction layer, but failed to excite me.

I have worked and reworked this response to 4 3 2 1, and I'm still not happy with it. Like the book, I feel it is unsatisfactory and overly long. But an inadequate posted review is better than an unposted draft waiting for brilliance.

Perhaps that's how Auster felt too.

For another 4 3 2 1 review try My Booking Great Blog.

Swords and Crowns and Rings by Ruth Park

Ruth Park (1917 - 2010) won the 1977 Miles Franklin Award with her penultimate adult novel, Swords and Crowns and Rings.

Until it was republished under the Text Classics umbrella in 2012, I had never even heard of it, let alone read any reviews about it.

I've been wondering how this was possible?

I read and loved some of Park's children's books when I was young - Callie's Castle, Playing Beatie Bow and When the Wind Changed. In 1986/7 I adored the TV series based on her books Harp in the South and Poor Man's Orange and subsequently read both books. But I never knew she had won Australia's primary literary award.

The Miles Franklin Award aims to celebrate a novel each year that 'is of the highest literary merit and presents Australian life in any of its phases.'

Swords and Rings and Crowns is all of this.

There is nothing experimental or challenging about the format or structure of the book. It is straight forward historical fiction with a coming of age element and some romance. But it is beautifully realised.

Park's writing is evocative and authentic. She brings the hardships and the details of Depression era NSW to life so vividly that you can feel the hunger, the cold and the fear along with her characters. However, the bleakness of the times was compensated for by the warmth and grace of her central characters.

Jackie, the dwarf, his mother, Peggy, and stepfather, Jerry are a loving, strong unit. They tackle life with practical good sense, kindness and a togetherness that is enviable. Jackie's dwarfism was never allowed to be a disability although it obviously played a large role in shaping his character. His parents taught him resilience and that being a good man had nothing to do with size but everything to do with who you are on the inside. Their mission in life was to make Jackie's 'soul grow.'

They gave him books on mythology that featured whole worlds of 'clever and heroic dwarfs'. When he was young, Jackie believed that the nearby hills housed a whole race of people like him because 'the mines in the hills (were where) the dwarfs dig gold and makes swords and crowns and rings.' This sense of mythology and belonging served him well as time went by. It became the solid foundation that was never rocked by the trials of adult life.

Jackie was also blessed throughout his life with the unconditional love of two young women. Cushie, the girl next door and Maida, the cruelly treated step-cousin.

Clearly, Jackie's personal growth and sense of self was heavily informed by Park's own growing interest in Zen Buddhism at this time in her life. He was able to live for the moment and accept 'the fate that seemed to be his.'

Although I studied the events and effects of the Depression at school, it was still shocking to be reminded about the harsh conditions of this time. In the hands of Park, who had an intimate knowledge of the poverty and joblessness during the 30's, the scenes of Jackie and Jerry wandering the countryside looking for work, are heart wrenching in their authenticity. They brought to mind the gritty, dirty realism of Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath and Emile Zola's descriptions of grinding poverty in Germinal.

The Sydney scenes were particularly meaningful to me. Cushie's grandmother lived in Balmain (my home for the past 8 years) 'in a house she would not leave, though the district was running down and becoming industrial.'

Cushie's first experiences of living in Sydney were familiar as she came to terms with the old narrow, winding streets for the first time.

So she began to learn a little of the city that lay, like a lump of irregular, time-worn stone, on the palm of a huge hand that was the blue-fingered Harbour. It was a city she had not even guessed....The warmth and squalor of the unknown town appealed to her strangely; she felt almost happy sometimes.

Sydney can have that affect on you!

The ending was predictable, although Park kept it from us for as long as possible. I would have liked to see Jackie and Cushie together, working to bring her grandmother's behest to help the poor, to fruition.

But I guess that's what imagination is for.

#AusReadingMonth
#AustWomenWriters

The Greengage Summer by Rumer Godden

I love it when I discover a new-to-me author.

Margaret Rumer Godden (1907 - 1998) was an English author who wrote over 60 books of fiction and non-fiction.

She had a fascinating childhood.

Her father was a shipping company executive in Narayananj, India (now in Bangladesh). She and her three sisters spent their childhood divided between time in Colonial India and boarding school back in England. Godden trained as a dance teacher and returned to India to run a dance school with one of her sister's for twenty years.

She wrote her first novel during this time, in 1939, The Black Narcissus.

The Greengage Summer was written in 1958.

My 2013 Pan Macmillan edition has a preface from Godden herself explaining that this story is 'partly true'.

When she was 15 (in 1922), her mother, in a fit of despair declared 'we are going to the Battlefields of France.'

What followed was an exquisite coming of age tale about discovery, deceit and international thieves! Godden evoked the long, hot, lazy summer of rural France to perfection. All those awkward young adult urges and desires are remembered in painful detail. She also used foreshadowing and hindsight to great effect via her narrator, Cecil.

I enjoyed reading the story not knowing which bits were real and which bits were made up. The story was deliciously melodramatic at times and I would think, 'that can't possibly be true.' Reading the preface at the end was a wonderful realisation that sometimes life is indeed stranger than fiction.

I loved this so much, that I have now ordered a couple of Godden's Indian based stories - The Peacock Spring and Coromandel Sea Change.

My early thoughts on The Greengage Summer are here.

Highly recommended as an easy, engaging read when you're in the mood for a simple but pleasurable break from your heavier reads.

The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf

It has taken me a while to write this review for The Voyage Out, as I had got myself into a bit of a muddle.

A literary muddle.

After reading such a fine literary classic, full of clever literary devices, I felt duty bound to write a clever, literary review in appreciation.

But, of course, there are already so many of those fine, clever literary discussions out there - what could I possibly add that would be fresh or new or exceptional?

That's when I remembered the raison d'etre for my blog - to document my reading journey and reactions.

Therefore I could talk about rites of passage and the role of civilisation and modern life, or discuss the ideas about internal and external exploration. And we could unpack the feminist issues and Darwinian elements to our hearts content.

But did I enjoy the book?

I attempted To the Lighthouse in my late twenties...and failed miserably. I abandoned the story after the first handful of dense rambling pages that were unable to hook my interest.

I've also dipped into A Room of One's Own a few times over the years with an equal measure of pleasure and rage.

This taught me that I could read Woolf - but perhaps it was only her non-fiction that would suit me?

Therefore when I spotted Ali's #Woolfalong post last year I decided, that if I was going to do Woolf properly with the justice I felt she deserved, I would have to start at the very beginning.

The Voyage Out was Woolf's first novel and one her most highly revised and reworked books.

It is also one of her most accessible works.

Early on, during the actual voyage, I thought it was going to be a Cowardesque country club comedy of class. But Woolf's relationship with her characters was more affectionate than that.

Then I thought it was going to be a clash of cultures novel as the Europeans encountered the natives.

And it was a little bit of that. It was also a little bit of a coming of age story for Rachel, a romance and a Shakespearean tragedy.

But the thing that carried me through and affected me quite deeply, page after page, was Virginia's depression which all her characters wore on their sleeves in one way or another.

From tears and tantrums to thoughts of suicide, despair and hopelessness were experienced by all who inhabited these pages.

Never again would he feel secure; he would never believe in the stability of life, or forget what depths of pain lie beneath small happiness and feelings of content and safety.

They pondered the meaning of life and debated the purpose of human relationships.

The lives of these people," she tried to explain, "the aimlessness, the way they live. One goes from one to another, and it's all the same. One never gets what one wants out of any of them.

Woolf's fragile emotional state clearly shone through but so too did her creative intelligence and her literary knowledge.

As the Introduction in my Oxford World Classic edition says 

the book is full of references to books of all kinds, from Austen and the Brontes to Balzac and Ibsen to Gibbon and Burke to Milton and Shelley, and Sappho and Pindar.

Rachel's story was terribly sad and terribly fascinating at the same time. 

Ali @Heavenali is hosting a year long #Woolfalong.
This post is also part of my Women's Classic Literature Challenge.

Six Bedrooms by Tegan Bennett Daylight

Six Bedrooms has been on my radar ever since an ARC turned up at work last year, but something about "the dangerous, tilting terrain of becoming an adult" from the back blurb put me off.

The becoming an adult stage was traumatic enough to live through first time around; I wasn't sure if I was brave enough to relive it all over again via Tegan Bennett Daylight's stories.

But now, Six Bedrooms has been shortlisted for this year's Stella Prize as well as the Victorian Premier's Literary Awards and lots of interesting, intriguing reviews are appearing. Enough to make me ignore the ghastly front cover design and finally dive into the short stories inside.

Daylight starts with a quote from Tim Winton's Aquifer, which sets up her stories perfectly,

...the past is in us, and not behind us. Things are never over.

A handful of the stories present Tasha at various stages of her coming of age - awkward, destructive and defiant - while the rest explore relationships exposed to loss, pain and sexual longing and confusion.

Daylight's writing is evocative and painfully honest.

Her story about a teen party full of wanna-be Madonna's doing 'Like a Virgin' moves across the sunken lounge room could have come straight from my own history! Daylight recreates that scary, exciting sense of being hopelessly adrift in the big wide world for the first time. All that rebellion and determination to do better, be better than your own parents making you brash and abrasive and oh so vulnerable. Trying desperately to find a place to fit in but still feeling out of place everywhere.

The sign of a good book, dare I say, a profound book, is one that instils in you a desire to be a better person.

Reading Six Bedrooms has been a timely prompt for me to remember just how full of angst this phase was as my stepsons now enter this unknown terrain themselves. A reminder of how important it is to always have a safe harbour to sail into when it all gets too much.

Carol by Patricia Highsmith

Usually, I prefer to read the book before I see the movie, but in this case, our long hot summer got the better of my good intentions.

I recently escaped the heat by watching Brooklyn and Carol back to back in our local cinema.

Both movies were fabulous for very different reasons and I came away determined to read both books as soon as possible. I decided to use this experience to test the movie-before-the-book theory.

It has taken me a month to get both books read but I can now confidently say that I preferred the movie of Brooklyn a little more than the book.
Really!

I engaged with the movie characters far more than I did with their book versions and I experienced a wider range of emotions. The book, of course, had more detail and back story which was interesting, but the movie had a heart and soul that won me over in the end.

The movie of Carol was tremendous and very moving, but quite different from the book which made the reading experience almost like discovering the story anew.

Carol was a good title choice for the movie because it really was all about Carol. Carol as observed by Therese (and us). Perhaps this evolved during the filming thanks to Cate Blanchett's portrayal of Carol. Blanchett is such a dominating presence on screen, that like Therese, we're a little in awe of her splendidness.

In the movie we never really feel like we get into or under Therese's skin. There's a vague sense of Carol as the older, experienced cougar-like woman seducing the younger, innocent ingenue. The movie really delved into the devastating impact of Carol's sexual choices. The happy ending came at a very high cost.

The book, originally titled The Price of Salt in 1952 and published under a pseudonym, showed us a much more informed and nuanced Therese. She was clearly very aware of how she was feeling and what she was hoping for with Carol. She gained several personal insights along the way about why she had such a strong fascination for the older, glamorous woman.

The ending of the book, was not only a happy one, but one that allowed the reader to see that the new relationship forged by Carol and Therese would be one based on a more equal footing. It was actually Therese's coming-of-age story.

This theme was reinforced by Highsmith's choice of reading material for Therese when she first visited Carol - James Joyce's Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man.
Goodreads tells us that:

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man represents the transitional stage between the realism of Joyce's Dubliners and the symbolism of Ulysses, and is essential to the understanding of the later work.

The novel is a highly autobiographical account of the adolescence and youth of Stephen Dedalus, who reappears in Ulysses, and who comes to realize that before he can become a true artist, he must rid himself of the stultifying effects of the religion, politics and essential bigotry of his background in late 19th century Ireland.

This was obviously an important clue about Therese that Highsmith left for her readers to tease out for themselves.

Carol turned out to be one of those rare cases where the book and movie were both fascinating but for rather different reasons.

Freya by Anthony Quinn

It has been ages since I read a book in manuscript form.
Its kind of fun.

There are no cover distractions, author bio's or quotes from other well-known authors.

It's all about the words on the page.

And the words that make up the story of Freya by Anthony Quinn are very well-chosen ones indeed.

Quinn gives us Freya's coming of age story.

Freya worked as a Wren during WWII.
At the end of war celebrations she meets up with a young woman, Nancy, who becomes her best friend through all the trials and joys of the subsequent years at Oxford and in London as a journalist.

Quinn writes an easy-to-read, easy-to-believe friendship (despite a few writerly conveniences). There are allusions to Brideshead Revisited (especially in the Oxford scenes) and a big nod of homage to My Brilliant Friend.

Apparently there are some characters from Quinn's previous novels in here, but having never read any of the others I was unaware of these connections until recently and it certainly didn't impact on my enjoyment of the story.

This is old-fashioned story-telling at its best.
Quinn uses Freya to show us life in post-war England. We also explore broader world events and issues like the Nuremberg trials, women's rights and the homosexual witch hunts of the 50's through Freya's eyes.

It's not often that I yell at the pages of a book in frustration, but Quinn succeeded in getting me so riled up when Freya was unable to hold her tongue at a crucial point in the story. It was completely in character, but, oh so annoying. I nearly threw the book across the room.

I also enjoyed  the numerous literary references throughout Freya - Waugh, Maugham, Austen, Henry James and Trollope - just to name a few. Books IN books certainly seems to be my thing this year.

And there were loads of Thelonious Monk jazz moments as well (I've included Freya's favourite piece below) to keep us vibing along.

Freya would make a fabulous holiday read - an engrossing, page-turning story - easy enough to put down when it's time for a dip in the pool and easy to pick up again when you're done and the cocktails have arrived!

Brooklyn by Colm Toibin

Usually, I prefer to read the book before I see the movie, but in this case our hot summer weather beat me to the punch.

Last weekend was hot, humid and very unpleasant. My family of boys were absorbed by all things pre-season soccer, so I escaped the heat and the testosterone and sought out the cool, dark comfort of our local cinema.

I watched Brooklyn and Carol back to back. It was heaven on a stick!

Both movies were heart-achingly fabulous for very different reasons and I came away determined to read both books as soon as possible.

I have decided to use this experience to test the pros and cons of seeing the movie before reading the book.

There is no doubt that books offers up much more detail and that most movies have to cut, condense or merge scenes, dialogue and even characters.

Brooklyn is no different.

As I was reading the book, I quickly discovered that Eilis and Rose were not the only siblings - they had three brothers who had moved to England to get to work.
Later, at work in Brooklyn, Eilis talks about the nylon sales and the subtle prejudices at play when black women are encouraged to shop in the store. No such scenes existed in the movie.
There was also an uncomfortable vague lesbian scene with Eilis and Miss Fortini during the bathing suit scene that didn't make it into the movie.

However, the movie provided an emotional depth that I found missing in my reading of the book. I found Toibin's writing to be so subtle and nuanced, that I didn't really enter into Eilis' emotional state in the same way I did as when I was watching the movie.

Perhaps the movie images stole my ability to emotional connect with the written words? I already had Eilis' face, especially her expressive eyes, in my head. Those images were very powerful and Toibin's words alone were not enough to capture all the emotional states I experienced in the cinema.

The movie also taught me how to enunciate Eilis' name correctly. Her lovely Irish name is pronounced Ay-lish.

I've included the movie-tie-in cover because this particular scene in the movie was wonderfully moving & added to the romantic nature of the movie interpretation. It was not one based on the book.

The book ending was more about Eilis and her personal freedom. It was a declaration of independence - rooted in her past but heading forward into her future. It was hopeful and empowering  and practical rather than romantic.

Two further points.

During Eilis' first Christmas in Brooklyn, she helps Father Flood feed the homeless. At the end of the meal one of the men sings a traditional Irish song. It's a poignant scene in both movie and book. The movie scene depicts all the characters feeling homesick and nostalgic.

Whereas the book scene is more about Eilis - each time the singer reaches the chorus he looks at her "managing to suggest even more that he had not merely learned the song but that he meant it."

The chorus ma bhionn tu liom, a stoirin mo chroi can be translated as "if you'll be mine, be mine, oh treasure of my heart". It's easy to imagine that these hard-living, lonely men saw in Eilis the embodiment of all they loved and remembered as being good about Ireland.

Secondly, Nora Webster.

Towards the end of Brooklyn, when Mrs Lacey is telling Eilis about all the people who have visited in the wake of the funeral, she mentions Nora.
I love how authors connect their books and their characters.
After reading Nora Webster I had heard that the story was based loosely on Toibin's own childhood, which now makes me wonder if Eilis' story is also loosely based on someone he knew. Especially since Mrs Lacey reappears in the early chapters of Nora Webster chatting about life in Brooklyn and Eilis and Tony.

At the end of Nora, I declared my desire to read more Toibin. I'm glad I listened!

My review of Nora Webster.

Brooklyn won the 2009 Costa Book Award and was longlisted for the Man Booker.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling

Ahhhh, this is more like it.

After the slight disappointment of my Chamber of Secrets reread, it has been very pleasing to feel myself back in the warm embrace of a long lost friend with The Prisoner of Azkaban.

From the first page, Rowling hooked me back into Harry's magical world.

She kept the recap of previous stories to a minimum and wove these bits into the story in a far more subtle and natural way (than she did in CoS).

I think one of the major differences with this book compared to the first two in the series, is that it no longer feels like we're adults reading a kids book. There is a darker edge creeping into this story.

Let's face it, those Dementor's and their soul-sucking habits are just plain freaky.

This is also a proper teenage coming-of-age story now in the making.
And typical of that 13-14 yr old experience is the desire to rebel against adult authority just as they discover that those same adults are not the all-knowing, all-wonderful figureheads of their childhood. Shades of grey, complexity and nuance begin to creep into the characterisations and story lines.

The reason these books work so well and win over the hearts and imaginations of children and adults alike is how safe they are. Behind all the scary You-Know-Who Voldemort stuff is a traditional boarding school story, where adults impart knowledge and the children learn to become socially accepted members of their community all wrapped in a heart-warming message about the power of love.

In scary times, the world turns to stories that make them feel better and help them to believe in a better world.

Hogwarts is such a world.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was the winner of the Whitbread Children's Book of the Year in 1999 (this prize is now called the Costa Book Award). As fas as I know, it was the only one of the Harry Potter series to win a major book award. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

If you have read The Prisoner of Azkaban recently and would like to leave the link to your review in the comments below, please do. I'd love to read your thoughts.

Amy's review @Lost in a Good Book which includes some fascinating fun facts.
#PotterBinge #XmasinSummer

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling

There is often a heated debate about whether you like or loathe book five of the Harry Potter series. From memory, I really enjoyed The Order of the Phoenix.

For me, the one that makes me go 'meh' is this one.

To my mind, The Chamber of Secrets falls flat on it's face after the thrill and promise of The Philosopher's Stone.

The Chamber of Secrets annoys me from the get-go with it's lengthy recap of the first book.

It's the one thing I truly loathe about reading a series. I feel that the loyal readers of a series, in order, should be rewarded by the author launching straight into the new story. Anyone coming in late, should feel like they're missing out on something....and go back and read the books in order to find out what it all means!

But maybe it's just me?

The Chamber of Secrets feels a bit like a history lesson - we get the history of Hogwarts and Voldemorts back story as well. We learn a few more spells and charms like polyjuice potion. It feels like a set-up to get us to the rest of the stories - where the real action and drama will be.

If I'd been reading these books as they were published, I probably wouldn't have felt a huge anticipation about the next book.

The humour often felt contrived or forced,

Ron's old shooting star was often outstripped by passing butterflies.

But I did LOVE that a little bit of my story featured in this book. Really!

At the beginning of chapter ten Professor Lockhart has Harry helping him to act out his capture of a werewolf - officially named the Wagga Wagga werewolf.

Wagga Wagga is a large inland city in NSW. It was my home for four years whilst I attended uni (& co-incidentally, it's where I met Mr Books - be still my beating heart!)

Have you discovered the origins of any of the other names used by Rowling in her books?

I'm also re-watching the movies as I finish each book. Part of the fun is annoying my family with the "that wasn't in the book" or "they left this bit out" comments all the way through!
We all agreed that the Chamber of Secrets is not our favourite HP movie. The young actors were just at that awkward age when their acting abilities hadn't quite got there yet. Some of the scenes were over-acted and lacked subtlety, but maybe that was the Director's fault?

Don't get me wrong. I didn't hate this book.
I just didn't love it as much as the others.

Leave the URL for your review of The Chamber of Secrets below - I'd love to see what you think too.

Amy @Lost in a Good Book's review with fun facts is here.
This post is part of #PotterBinge and my #Xmas in Summer challenge

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling

I will be rereading my Harry Potter books over the next few months or so as part of Andi's #PotterBinge.

There's not much that I can say about these books that hasn't already been said many, many times, so like Andi, and Katie before her, my posts for these rereads will be my random thoughts and observations.

I will avoid major plot spoilers as much as possible, but there will be references and allusions to certain events and character developments.

My first happy, happy joy moment occurred when I used this readalong to treat myself to a copy of the new fully illustrated (by Jim Kay) edition of The Philosopher's Stone.

Jim Kay has a fabulous website where he discusses how he came to create some of the pages.

For example, the sorting hat patches (below) came from a book of fabrics that Kay saw in the Royal Museum, Edinburgh years ago.

My understanding is that there will be a new fully illustrated hardback edition of each book over the next ten years (the last three books being split in half). I was also thrilled when I read the illustrator notes on the jacket sleeve to discover that Jim Kay was the person responsible for the amazing, eerie pictures in A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness.

My first 'WTF is that about' moment occurred when I realised that the UK/Australian edition of this book is called The Philosopher's Stone and the US edition is called The Sorcerer's Stone.

What's that about?

A philosopher and a sorcerer are very different character types?

The Philosopher's Stone (lapis philosophorum) is also a real, albeit, ancient and mythological symbol that has been the inspiration for writers, scientists and philosophers down through the ages. It has been linked to the likes of the biblical Adam, as well as Plato and Thomas Aquinas.

Does the word you choose to use change the meaning of the story?

At one point in the story, they discuss the real-world links to this ancient alchemy. What do they do in in The Sorcerer's Stone version at this point?

A sorcerer is a magician or wizard, although in medieval times the term was also used to describe someone who practised science in a laboratory.

Does the choice of word make one book appear more 'magic' and 'other-worldly' than the other?
Does this mean that the US version misses out on some of the delicious, tantalising 'could this be real' feeling?

Part of my love for Harry Potter is its 'world-within-a-world' set up.

All the references to real-world places and ideas such as the Philosopher's Stone make these stories feel plausible. There is a sense that if you could just find the right portal, you too, could enter Hogwarts.

I love how Rowling blurs the lines between our world and Hogwarts.
A simple boarding school, coming-of-age story about the power of love, captures our hearts and imagination because Rowling makes our mundane, everyday, real-world seem to be suddenly full of magical possibility.

Because I was curious about this change, I did a little research.

Most of the comments seemed to reflect the belief that American kids would find the word 'sorcerer' to be more fun. One reference alluded to a popular US drug of the 70's being called the philosopher's stone and concern that parents would not buy their children a book with this word in the title.

Several English words were also changed in the book - from clothes, food, common phrases and of course, words like mum, colour and favourite.

It has been reported that Rowling regrets agreeing to these changes, but I guess a debut author doesn't have much say in these things.

I wonder if these changes dilute the very Englishness that Rowling embedded the Hogwarts world in?

Are their any US bloggers who've read both versions of the book to see what, if any, impact the differences have?

On to other matters....

I enjoyed the foreshadowing that Rowling used throughout The Philosopher's Stone.

*The early mention of Sirius Black when Hagrid borrows his motorbike to bring baby Harry to the Dursleys.
*Hagrid's mention of Quirrell's year off  "ter get some first-hand experience" in the Dark Arts.
*Harry's dream on his first night at Hogwart's about Quirrell and his turban.

I was curious about Harry Potter Day.
What happens on this day? How is it celebrated/commemorated? When is it?

There were also many more tests to get through to the Philosopher's Stone than I remembered from my first read and the movie.

During the reread it is also obvious how these tests were designed to play to their individual strengths - which we had become familiar with throughout the book - Harry's flying/snitch catching abilities, Ron's chess skills and Hermione's logic and reasoning.

One could almost feel a little manipulated by Rowling at this point, except she cleverly suggests that it was, in fact, Dumbledore who devised these tests knowing full well that Harry would be the one to go through them.

I'd love to hear your thoughts as you reread these books too, so feel free to leave a link to your HP reviews in my comments below.

A big thank you to Andi for me giving me the excuse I needed to re-enter the world of Harry Potter.

For a review with lots of fun Potter facts check out Amy's posts @Lost in a Good Book.
#PotterBinge #XmasinSummer