Monday review - Late Nights on Air

I've been a fan of Elizabeth Hay's writing since A Student of Weather, which I loved. I'm a long way behind in reading Late Nights on Air - I was (as I often do with books I know I'm really going to enjoy) keeping it for a special occasion, for a time when I'd be able to read it - if not in one sitting, then over a short period of time without interruptions.

And I'm so glad I did.

Because I fell into this book and didn't want to get out.

I live in Vancouver and we live on the edge of the wilderness here. People get lost and die hiking in the mountains 20 minutes from my home. People get in kayaks or on sailboats 10 minutes from my home and sometimes don't return because they've got caught in a storm. Cats and small dogs get eaten by coyotes; skunks wander into stores and restaurants; people get bitten by raccoons; bald eagles and herons fly overhead; seals and the very occasional whale swim right past highrises on False Creek.

But the way Elizabeth Hay describes the real wilderness enchants me, frightens me, enlightens me. It's such a Canadian book (because it takes place during the year Thomas Berger was heading the commission about the northern pipeline and it's about radio - CBC Radio) and, at the same time, so universal. It deals with one of the great themes of literature: man (and woman) against nature. There are love stories and mysteries. There are births and deaths. It deals with relationships - and how one copes in the wilderness.

This is a book that's staying on my shelf because for sure I'm going to read it again - probably next time in the depths of winter.

Kate

Monday review - Half-Blood Blues by Esi Edugyan

If you're a musician, a music lover or just a fan of jazz, run, don't walk to the bookstore and buy Esi Edugyan's book - Half-Blood Blues.

I'm not going to spoil it for you by telling you the story, partly because you need to read it - it won't take long, it's like a great piece of jazz, you'll just get caught up in it and want to rush on to the end.

But also because, for me, though I enjoyed the story, it was the voice that drew me in. In fact, the voice blew me away.

The story is set mostly in Paris in the 1940s, the characters a group of dispossessed jazz musicians from German - dispossessed because they're not Aryan, but shades of black.

The voice of the story is Sid - an American who ends up in Germany and flees with his fellow musicians when the Nazis start harassing everyone who is even slightly different.

And that voice is a masterpiece. Here's a single sentence that I've picked totally at random: This was it, these dames swaying their hips in shimmering dresses, these chaps drinking gutbucket hooch.

There are other things to love about this book, the things I learned about jazz, about Paris in the 1940s, about Germany in the 1940s, but for me Sid's voice is what I remember, what I loved.

Kate

Monday review - A Discovery of Witches

Deborah Harkness's A Discovery of Witches is one of those books I kept looking at in the bookstore, kept picking it up, reading the back cover, and then putting it back down. I suppose - though I'm not sure I was ever conscious of this - that I was waiting for it to come out in paperback or at least trade paperback. I buy quite a few hardcover books, but they tend to be by writers I know and love - I seldom buy hardcovers otherwise.

Hardcover books are expensive. I'm happy to buy them for writers - Michael Ondaatje, William Gibson, Margaret Atwood, Suzenne Brockmann, for starters, plus other writers I love - I know I'll read and reread. I'm happy to make sure they get the best royalties possible by spending more money than I usually do on a book.

Why then did I buy this book in hardcover?

I was in Chapters one day (this book has been on the front shelves at Chapters for a very long time) and I picked it up again. This time I had gift certificates (that I'd bought for myself) and I read the back cover copy and said, okay, I could buy three paperbacks or I could put myself out of my misery and buy the book I'd been looking at for months.

It's a big book, 43 chapters, 579 pages - big, dense, complicated pages. What sold me on it? I think it was the reference in the cover copy to Oxford's Bodleian Library - a place I've dreamt about for years. It's one of those places I've always wanted to go but haven't yet managed - probably thanks to Dorothy Sayers, Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane - all three of whom went to Oxford and Sayers' books are replete with references to Oxford and the library.

A Discovery of Witches reminded me a bit of Sayers and it kept me reading, even though the references to alchemy were complicated and sometimes confusing. I loved the characters and the world-building - there were witches, and vampires, and daemons - but they weren't your usual "creatures" as they call themselves. This book is filled with highly intelligent and well-educated creatures - the heroine (a witch) is a professor, the hero (a vampire - shades of Romeo and Juliet) has degrees in all kinds of things (after all, he's had a very long life). There are terrific references to history (that he's experienced). The book ranges from Oxford to Massachusetts to France.

It wasn't an easy read but it was amazing. Each character was fascinating, deep and rich and real. The world-building was the same - I never felt as if she was cheating or taking short cuts with the characters, the setting or the world-building.

So I'm sorry now that I didn't buy it earlier, but I've put it back on my TBR pile and will read it again in a few months. I know I'll get even more out of it the second time when I won't be in such a rush to see what happens, when I can simply linger over details and events, rather than rushing through them.

Definitely a worthwhile buy - even in hardcover.

Kate

Monday review - Breaking the Rules

Most of you know how much I love Suzanne Brockmann - I talk about her often enough.

You know that she's one of the few writers I buy in hardcover because I can't wait for the book to come out in paperback. I buy her in hardcover because I love her characters, the pace of the books, the romance.

This book - her new one - did not disappoint me. I picked it up Saturday night, I kept reading until it was almost 2 AM, and I woke up at 7 Sunday morning so I could finish it.

It's an amazing combination of two stories which were begun in earlier books, of the birth of a post-millenium kind of family, of the growth of trust and love and ...

Well, I don't want to spoil it for you. I will say that Izzy Zanella and Danny Gillman are the Navy SEALs in the book - and that, if you're a Brockmann fan - is enough to tell you just where this book is going.

It's fast, it's sad, it's scary, it's perfect.

Kate

Monday review - Erin Morgenstern's The Night Circus (Part 1)

I couldn't wait until I finished this book to tell you about it. There are a couple of reasons for this. The first is that I'm savoring it, working my way slowly through the wonderful prose, enjoying every minute of the journey -

Now, I'm a gulper. I gulp down books at a tremendous rate. If I have a whole day to myself with nothing to do, I might read two or three books. I can't help myself - I'm always desperate to find out what happens at the end and NO, I absolutely do not ever read the ending first.

So, I'll write about the book in the fullness (I'm assuming) of its beautiful self when I'm finished it - probably sometime in the next couple of weeks.

But what I really wanted to talk about right now is the physical book. Not the words. Not the writing. Not the story or the characters. But the book itself.

It is, without doubt, the most beautiful book I've picked up this year. From the cover to the frontispiece to each individual chapter. It is gorgeous -

And the drawings and the art of it - as far as I can tell so far - just add to the reading experience. It's dark. It's beautiful. It's a little bit frightening. And so is the art. The designers did a terrific job in taking the story and turning it to truly evocative art.

I love it. Next time I'll tell you about the book.

Kate

Review - Zero History

I'm a huge fan of William Gibson, have been since I picked up Neuromancer, read three pages, and realized that I'd only understood about half of what I'd read.

But I persisted and I fell in love. Sometimes the harder we have to work, the brighter the romance, and that's always been true with me and Bill - I allow myself to call him that because that's what his fabulous website calls him. You can check it out at http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/index.asp.

I often think of Bill as the dark side of Bill Gates - showing us the possibilities of what might happen in the new world we're arriving in right this minute.

I finished Zero History yesterday afternoon and I have returned it, as I do with only a very few books (and his are always included) to my to be read pile, to read again sometime in the next few weeks. He's in that pile along with Michael Ondaatje and Suzanne Brockmann and Pat Conroy and Nora Roberts' romantic suspence. I read them once - fast - because I'm dying to find out what happens (and I can't read the last few pages first) and then I read them again, lovingly and delightedly and slowly so I can enjoy every minute of the process.

Zero History is terrific. I've told you the above because you'll know you're unlikely to get a bad review out of me of books by any of my favorite writers. But this book, for me, is terrific for a whole bunch of reasons.

• the book itself is beautifully designed, each page is a delight with the footers and the opening page of each chapter
• I'm fascinated by the chapter titles - I know when I reread the book, the titles will give me insight that I didn't have the first time, especially since I kept going back because I was in such a hurry to find out what happened, I kept forgetting to read them
• several characters appear in this book who were in previous books - and I was so happy to find out what had happened to them
• I learned, as always, many things about how the world is changing and I know, as I have with every one of Bill's books, that I will soon see in advertisements and news stories and stores exactly what he's writing about

If you haven't read Gibson and you're ready for a book that's going to blow your mind, READ THIS BOOK. Or Neuromancer or Pattern Recognition or... Or, if you want to start with a movie, you could try Johnny Mnemonic, based on a short story of Bill's.

Try it. Hang in there. It's worth it.

Kate