Deepa Anappara: Djinn Patrol on the purple line,

Chatto & Windus, UK, 9781784743093, C format paperback

 

The quirky title of “Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line” led me to pick up this unusual debut novel by former journalist Deepa Anappara.  She has worked as a reporter in India before moving to England and in that capacity was confronted by facts of hundreds of children disappearing every day without any investigation by the Indian police every being launched.  Wondering what might have become of these children who mostly came from very poor backgrounds, she decided to write a novel telling their story through the eyes of endearing nine year old Jai whose voice gives this novel a special feeling.  

Her narration made me feel like reading a YA novel at 

times, particularly during the first few chapters but this feeling disappeared towards the middle of the book when the novel becomes more serious and darker. Jai and his friends Pari, a very smart girl, and Faiz, a Muslim boy live with their families in dirt poor circumstance in an Indian slum/basti. When two of their school friends disappear and not one missing report filed by their parents leads to a search by the police,  Jai, whose life dream is to become a detective, convinces his friends to start their own investigation. Very soon they find themselves in dangerous, dark circumstances before Jai's life in particular is affected dramatically. 

Deepa Anappara’s  decision of choosing a format by letting a nine year old boy narrate the story, her vivid description of the harsh life in an Indian slum and blending in the voices of those who are about to go missing,  makes this such a stand out, captivating debut novel. The last third of the book in particularly had me glued to my chair. Spoiler alarm: there is no Bollywood happy ending.

Liz Moore: Long Bright River, 9781786331632, trade paperback, Hutchinson UK/Penguin Random House, available now,

German edition: Long Bright River, CH Beck, hardback,

 

Liz Moore’s “Long Bright River” is set in Kensington, a part of Philadelphia heavily populated by addicts in search of heroin or other substances, once a respectable neighborhood. The author has done neighborhood work there and her familiarity with the people living in this part of town makes this novel and the characters in it so very authentic.

“Long Bright River" is at times dark and heart wrenching, part crime fiction but mostly a story of two siblings, Kacey and Mickey Fitzpatrick, who grew up in rough circumstance with little love apart from the intimacy and bond they had between each other.  To toughen them up for the unfairness of life was the prime goal of their grandmother Gee, leaving little room for affection in her household where they grew up after their mother died, their father disappeared and where money was always tight.  The two sisters could not be more different in character: Mickey, shy, introverted, very smart , responsible, always protecting Kacey, eventually choosing a career as a police officer and raising a child as a single mother; Kacey a dare devil, outspoken, with a track record of bad man ending up on skid row as a heroin addict and prostitute.  The sisters haven’t spoken to each other for years but Mickey keeps track of her whereabouts on her patrol. When Kacey disappears after the murder of a heroin addicted young prostitute and someone Mickey knows from their childhood is also found murdered, she goes in frantic search of her sister as the killer clearly has it in for addicted prostitutes.  I will not be a spoil sport, but the solving of the murder actually plays a minor part in the novel, the history of the Fitzpatrick family and the unravelling of family secrets makes this such an intense and often almost painful, realistic read.  I like Liz Moore’s clean, clear cut prose which fits with the plot.

Isabel Allende: A Long Petal of the Sea, Ballentine Books/Penguin Random House USA, 9780593158425, Trade Paperback,

German Edition: Dieser weite Weg,  Suhrkamp Verlag, Hardcover

Isabel Allende is one of my favorite Latin American storytellers ever since I read her famous „The House of Spirits“.  A few years ago her novels no longer held me captured as they used to and I read her more infrequently. She now has my full attention again; her latest novel “A long Petal of the Sea” was an absolute pleasure to read, written in the best tradition of Latin American storytelling.   Allende spins a captivating yarn combining historical facts of the Spanish Civil war in the 1930ties weaving them into  a love and family saga which ends in Latin America. The subject at the heart of the novel, the importance of home for wellbeing, is a very timely one, with hundred thousand fleeing their countries currently for a multitude of reasons, reminiscent of the masses that fled Europe during the 1930/40ties because of their Jewish heritage or political convictions.

Victor Dalmau comes from a family fighting Franco’s Fascists, he treating the wounded as an army doctor in the field. Among the thousands fleeing Spain over the treacherous mountains into France is Roser, a gifted pianist and the lover of his brother Gillem, pregnant with their child. In order to survive, Victor and Roser decide to enter into a marriage of convenience after it becomes clear that Gillem is dead and the only way they could gain passage on the SS Winnipeg to start a new life in Chile is as a married couple particularly since Roser is heavily pregnant.  I was completely unaware of the fact that the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda had actually chartered such a ship in 1939, the SS Winnipeg, gathering a total of two thousand refugees transporting them to a safe new life in Chile.  Allende uses these two richly drawn protagonists to describe the atrocities of the Spanish Civil war period, the ensuing hard years in Chile and Venezuela with all their political upheaval and the effect on the destiny of the Dalmau family.  Her vivid imagination and her own life experiences created a fascinating tale of love, family, and the power of belief, endurance and hope.

I loved this uplifting, compassionate saga, Roser and Victor felt like family, I was sad when their story ended after 314 pages – Allende at her best!

Irvin D. Yalom: When Nietzsche wept, 9780062009302, Harper Perennial Modern Classics,

German Edition: Und Nietzsche weinte, btb Taschenbuch

In my opinion, Irvin Yalom is one of the wisest thinkers and friend to mankind, a psychotherapist one hopes to encounter when in troubled waters. His work as an author spans from reflections on his long time experience as a therapist to novels. One of my favorite pieces of his work is a film called “Yalow’s cure” (Anleitung zum Glücklichsein in German). He has a unique gift of passing on invaluable philosophical knowledge and advice about life’s perils and how to become closer to happiness based on his own life experience and that of his patients. The film is superior to anything I have seen available on the subject matter. 

I have read several of his books and am currently reading "Staring at the sun"  but “When Nietzsche wept” has been on my “Want to read list” for quite some time. I finally bought a second hand copy in Austin/Texas and read it over months alongside other novels. 

It is a fascinating imagined account of an encounter in 1882 by two great men that actually never happened but nearly did: Friedrich Nietzsche, the tormented philosopher and Dr. Josef Breuer,a famous Viennese physician who today is regarded as the originator of the talking cure, eventually introduced by his friend Sigmund Freud, then a young doctor he had regular intellectual exchanges with. When Dr. Breuer agrees to treat Friedrich Nietzsche, who had been plagued by terrible, debilitating migraine headaches almost his entire life using his “talking cure”, both men have no idea that the exchange between doctor and patient will eventually be reversed over the months they regularly meet. Breuer himself is plagued by inner demons and marriage problems and finds great comfort in their philosophical, often painful yet healing exchanges. Yalom blends fiction with acknowledged facts creating a powerful novel prompting the reader to reflect on one’s own life experiences. 

If you are interested in philosophy or psychology, this is a wonderful, thought provoking novel I loved reading.  

Alex Michaelides: The Silent Patient, Orion Publishing, 9781409181620, paperback
German Edition: Alex Michaelides:  Die stumme Patientin, paperback, Droemer Knaur

“The Silent Patient” by Alex Michaelides was a record selling thriller in 2019, a New York and Sunday Times bestseller  with  rights sold into 39 countries world- wide as well as film rights. This means I started reading my first book of 2020 with very high expectations indeed.

The story of this psychological mystery sounded very promising and compelling: a successful painter, Alicia Berenson, is convicted of having shot her beloved husband five times and has refused to speak ever since concealing what led to her actions.  All efforts by psychologists at the clinic where she is kept have been in vain; she remains silent and even became violent at times. Enter Theo Faber, a psychotherapist who has become obsessed with the case, convinced he can treat Alicia and bring her back to the real world. He is even prepared to give up a promising position in another clinic just to be able to treat her as his patient.  Being a happily married man himself he is totally puzzled why Alicia should have killed the man that had given her all the love and stability she had graved for….. 

This is where I will stop talking about the plot which is a very engaging,a slowly building one with a clever twist towards the end. But despite staying interested and wanting  this book to grab me, it never really did for whatever reason, be it that I have read zillion thrillers and mysteries over the years working in publishing which is perhaps why I am a little demanding or that the development felt  a bit too constructed towards the end for my taste.  It is a very clever plot now doubt and I can see why the story appealed  to so many readers as it clearly did; I was just not one of them. ….

Jojo Moyes: The Giver of Star, Michael Joseph (Penguin Random House UK), 9780718183231, large paperback

Last review of 2019, perfect read between Christmas and the end of the year, a terrific yarn from the fabulous Jojo Moyes based on historic facts about the female Horseback Librarians of Kentucky who during the Great Depression employed by the US government WPA program went on horseback through ice, snow and heat bringing books and joy to dirt poor people in the Kentucky hills despite a lot of resistance from narrow minded folks and criminals. It’s a story about five strong women who followed their heart and conviction supporting each other.  

There is Alice Van Cleve, an educated, well brought up English woman who married into Kentucky royalty, a corrupt yet pious mine owning family finding herself stuck in a loveless, suffocating marriage.  

Margery O’Hare, whose tough childhood with an abusive felon of a father leads her to live a life as a self-reliant rebel horse- woman becoming the heart of the Horseback Librarians teaching them about horseback riding, the countryside and the Kentucky mountain folks.  She is not afraid to use her gun on occasion.

Izzy Brady, crippled after contracting polio as a child, has pretty much given up on a life for herself until her mother forces her to enter the Horseback Library.

Beth Pinker brings with her the toughness of a woman growing up with 8 brothers who is not afraid to ruffle feathers.

Last but not least Sophia Kenworth, the backbone of the library and keeper of the books, a trained librarian who spent 8 years in a colored librarian forced to return to Baileyville to care for her brother William after he suffered a mining accident in the Van Cleeve mines.

“The Giver of Stars” is a true page-turner of a novel with well crafted characters and a captivating storyline.  Jojo Moyes said this is the book she loved writing the best spending some time in Kentucky researching and writing, it clearly transpires, she had me greatly entertained.

Kali Fajardo-Anstine: Sabrina & Corina, One World New York, Penguin Random House, small hardback

Kali Fajardo-Anstine’s  “Sabrina & Corina” was a finalist for this year’s  National Book Award and has been listed several times as one of the best books of the year, deservedly in my opinion. She is definitely someone to watch, falling into the writing steps of Sandra Cisneros and Julia Alvarez.  The book has one of the most beautiful covers I have seen all year, you want to pick up a copy  just alone for that.

Kali Fajardo-Anstine’s literary short stories have a kick, most are set in Denver / Colorado describing the everyday world of Latinas. Reading them off and on, they had a powerful effect on me every time, I often felt unsettled when a story was finished. In parts reminding me of the subtle way Elizabeth Strouts’s describes the undercurrents running in seemingly ordinary lives, Fajardo-Anstine tells life stories in her very own distinctive voice. The tales of Latino working class women, their tragedies,  loves and abuse are so very real,  their story painful and aching at times.  But they also tell of female strength and family bonding.  “Sabrina & Corina” is probably the most powerful one, giving the collection its name. But they are all exquisitely written, be it “Galapago”  where a grandmother kills an intruder or “Any further West” where a  sex worker picks up her daughter heading for San Diego to find a new life,   “Remedies”  where New Mexican heritage and a half sibling provide strength to a young girl  or “Ghost Sickness” which also has a Native American element.  

Sandra Cisneros’ quote says it best: These stories blaze like wildfires.