Down but not out

Hermy

Man's Search for Meaning - Victor Frankl: A book I've heard mentioned again and again but it didn't quite live up to my expectations. While the first part where he recounts his time in Auschwitz was powerful testimony, the second part with its intimation of suffering as something noble was lost on me.

Hermy

Unsettled Ground - Claire Fuller: This months book club choice was not a good one. One of those books you stick with till the end desperate to see if there's any point to it, only to discover that there isn't. With a setting similar to that of Strange Sally Diamond it tells the highly unconvincing and improbable story of a brother and sister's descent into poverty and homelessness following their mothers sudden death. There were various contrived plot twists along the way, most of which remained unresolved, and in the end even the writing, which started out okay, couldn't save it as that went the way of everything else in the book. Awful stuff altogether!

Hermy

Long Lankin - John Banville: Not Banville's first published work - that was a short story The Party published in The Kilkenny Magazine in 1966 - but his first book, the short story collection Long Lankin was published in 1970 and reissued in revised form in 1984 with two stories excised from the original. A first edition of Long Lankin is now quite expensive so it may be a while before I get to read those two unfortunately! Banville is often dismissive of his early works, particularly Nightspawn which came after this, but these brief tales - snapshots, brief glimpses even - which leave so much untold, are really good and aught not to be dismissed as the author is so wont to do.

Hermy

Station Eleven - Emily St. John Mandel: This months book club choice - a piece of post-apocalyptic fiction set in the recent past as a deadly flu virus decimates the global populace, leading to the collapse of civilization as we know it - was a good book but at the same time not really my thing. While the writing was generally good, particularly when describing certain of the more dramatic moments post-pandemic, the abrupt switching of time and place to develop the backstory, as well as the similarly abrupt and, at times, rather convenient conclusions of certain plot lines, made it a less satisfying read than it ought to have been.

Hermy

Sixty Million Frenchmen Can't Be Wrong - Jean-Benoît Nadeau & Julie Barlow: Continuing my French odyssey, this was exactly the book I've been looking for, a book that explains the origins of modern everyday France, how's it's distinctly different from its neighbours and other westernised democracies around the world, and just what it is that makes the French so uniquely French! The authors, a writer-journalist couple from Canada, spent two years in France at the turn of the millennium to write the book after Jean-Benoît was granted a scholarship to study the reasons why the French were resisting globalization. On the face of it this wouldn't necessarily have been my cup of tea but the book is about so much more and gives some real insight into French society, politics, education, commerce and their attitudes to themselves and the rest of the world. My only minor issue with the book was the authors' tendency to repeat themselves from time to time - perhaps better editing was needed. Otherwise a great read.

Hermy

Just to add, if anyone has any recommendations for books about France I'd love to hear them.