The Explorer - Doppler - First Novel - The Making Of - Still - Kandak - Ghostwritten

Short of time but keen as ever to talk about the books I read you will have to indulge me a little as I compromise with a quick round up of several books that are worth mentioning. I apologise for not being able to go into as much detail as I normally would but I hope that something will be better than nothing (but please let me know if you disagree!)


The Explorer by James Smythe

Towards the end of last year I entered a proper reading funk. I couldn't engage with books I was reading at all, gave up on one after another, often knowing that they were probably really good. I was just too tired and stressed to read, a big worry for someone so keen on reading. I had a little break and then picked up this new novel which a couple of other bloggers had mentioned favourably and which I thought might be just what I needed. It really was. Smythe's novel is narrated by Cormac Easton, a journalist chosen to document a groundbreaking journey into space that will take humans further than they have ever travelled before. However, the crew of the Ishiguro gradually perish one by one until Cormac is the last survivor. What follows is a brilliant examination of fear and grief, remembrance and memory, loneliness, exploration and time. I love space movies but the problem most of them seem to suffer from is that whatever interesting themes they set up in the beginning they nearly always dissolve into humans being chased about by something or other and once you've seen Alien that can't really be topped (yes, Sunshine, I'm looking at you). Smythe's novel does almost the opposite. In a breakneck opening we witness the demise of the crew and the reader is left wondering how on earth he might fill the rest of the novel. I won't give away the brilliant device that is this novel's twist but only say that it is a coup that allows Smythe to make the novel far more philosophical, interesting and moving than I suspect most 'science fiction' to be (I know, I'm probably wrong on that). This novel, very similar in feeling to Duncan Jones' film Moon, comes highly recommended and a huge thank you to the author for breaking my funk and getting me reading again.

Published by Harper Voyager now

Doppler by Erlend Loe

The cover to your left makes this look like a perfect Christmas book and in many ways it is but not at all in a traditional sense. The eponymous Doppler is a  man who seemed to be leading a successful life in Oslo until an accident whilst on his mountain bike leads him to reappraise things altogether and determine on leading a solitary existence in the woods where he will live off the land. His resulting hunger leads him to kill an elk in the novel's opening pages and whilst he is successful in that endeavour providing himself with food to eat and meat with which he can barter for other supplies he also finds himself encumbered with that mother's baby elk as a surrogate child. Soon christened Bongo, Doppler uses his new companion as a sounding board for his various foibles with modern society and the two of them struggle to maintain their Eden in the wilderness as various other characters encroach on it. The quirk factor might put off some readers but I found it to be both funny and sharp-witted, a perfect antidote to the commercialisation of Christmas and a great (if belated) stocking filler for anyone in your family who tends to say bah humbug around tis time of year.

Published by Head of Zeus now


First Novel by Nicholas Royle

Already an early contender for cover design of the year, Nicholas Royle's latest novel has far more going for it than that. That title and those very recognisable 'clean white spine with plain black lettering' paperbacks on the cover might lead you to think this is his debut published by Picador but it is actually Royle's seventh novel, albeit his first under the Jonathan Cape imprint. There's lots of other bookish fun along the way as we follow writer, Paul Kinder, author of a novel which didn't do terribly well, now a teacher of creative writing and avid collector of first novels. This meta-fictional novel has many strands to it and part of the fun is trying to work out where you are half the time. Along the way we will encounter, housebreaking, dogging, fighter pilots and loss of various types, in a novel which shows how we all use narrative to shape the story of our lives. A strange, unsettling brew that simply entertains at first before revealing darker and more dangerous depths as it progresses; a dark and delicious treat for lovers of literary fiction who like to have their grey cells tickled.

Published by Jonathan Cape now

The Making Of by Brecht Evens

Brecht Evens makes the most gorgeous graphic novels. His first, The Wrong Place, had me smiling and admiring at the end of 2011. His latest built on that promise at the end of last year and showcases yet again his glorious watercolour work and fresh approach to graphic storytelling. Watercolour is an odd medium for graphic work, especially in the free-flowing style that Evens employs. Character is often simply delineated by colour or distinguishing features and it is an incredibly effective technique. One character has large hands for example, always dominating his exchanges. 'You should see my Dad's' he says and sure enough when he visits him in his hospital room on the next page what we see are those huge hands waving back. The novel follows an artist, Peterson, as he travels to a small village to work as part of a biennial festival. It's a much smaller operation than he anticipated but what follows is a hilarious exploration of artistic inspiration, expression and shortcomings. Fabulously diverse characters, artwork that leaps off the page and somehow manages to escape it at times, Evens is one to keep watching.

Published by Jonathan Cape now

Still edited by Roelof Bakker

Roelof Bakker is a photographer who focused on the disused Hornsey Town Hall for one project which ended in an exhibition of photographs entitled Still. Bakker then approached several writers to select an image and then write a story based on it, relocating the image so that it wouldn't be about its original location but more about what that image suggested to the author. The anthology is incredibly diverse, featuring some writers I had heard of and read before like Richard Beard, Nicholas Royle and Evie Wyld. Others were completely new to me and that of course is the joy of an anthology. The pictures are wonderful and each reader is sure to find new voices they will want to keep an eye on.

Published by Negative Press now

Upcoming Audio Books

Kandak by Patrick Hennessey

Ghostwritten by David Mitchell

As some of you will know I sometimes get the opportunity in my work as an actor to record audio books and I am in the process of recording a couple right now. Patrick Hennessey had great success with his first book The Junior Officer's Reading Club and Kandak follows his exploits training and fighting alongside the fledgling Afghan National Army. What comes across clearly is the confusion of the project, the clash of cultures and the suspicion that develops when things go wrong and soldiers even find themselves under attack from their own side. Hennessey is keen to write however about the bravery, integrity and comradeship that he experienced, something that brought him back to Afghanistan after he had finished in the army to search out those that had clearly become friends during his time there.

Ghostwritten was Mitchell's debut novel and after I recorded the bonkers number9dream last year I now have the task of doing justice to this multi-layered novel. Having read it before but a long time ago it was interesting to see how I felt on a second read. I was pleased to discover that I had roughly the same opinion of it as a novel, slightly daunted by the prospect of narrating effectively its very different sections but always pleased to have something challenging like that to keep me honest.

Both of these will be available unabridged later in the year from Whole Story Audio and W F Howse.

Read more...

'where's Robbie?'

The Wrong Place
by Brecht Evens

As you can see from the cover above Brecht Evens graphic novel is a colourful affair. Painted in watercolour throughout the Belgian artist uses his palette brilliantly to delineate character, to create vast scenescapes, to capture movement and in a few pages near the centre to create possibly the only convincing sex-scene I've found so far in graphic fiction (you can see just how graphic below). In a book which is light on plot there is still loads to enjoy in its depiction of social interaction, akward personal relationships and the frenzy of an impulsive night out. The energy that is created by people desparate to have a good time is what drives this book along and that energy is just as likely to end up exploding in a moment of tragedy as of triumph, and how lovely and dangerous that is.

Two entirely mismatched friends are at the heart of this book. First of all we meet Gary, a drab persona rendered in grey who is hosting a party in his flat which many people (mainly female) seen to be attending because they expect his friend Robbie to make an appearance. Gary is the kind of guy who'd prefer it if you smoked in the kitchen and turned on the oven extractor fan. The kind of person who joins a conversation and effectively kills it, as we see him do several times in the opening pages. Through the awkward chats at his party we begin to form an idea of his friend Robbie, a man so infamous that he has several imitators, one of whom is even rumoured to have had plastic surgery to look more like him. Whilst Gary is the grey man, Robbie is an electric-blue satyr, a party animal par excellence who has managed to turn around the fading fortunes of a nightclub called Disco Harem through his attendance. But whilst he has managed to make that place the coolest in town by coming again and again, his no-show at Gary's party sends the assembled guests off into the night and Gary is once again alone in his drab apartment.

We then meet Naomi, recently dumped by her boyfriend but encouraged by a friend to go out on the town, even adorning a pair of kitten ears and even a new persona under the name of Lulu. Identified easily by her bright red colour, Evens creates some brilliant panels where a supposedly static wide shot of the nightclub actually contains several highlighted Naomis which track her progress through the room.

Naomi's night at Disco Harem lifts off when a case of mistaken identity brings Robbie himself hurtling into view. Naomi is literally swept off her feet and treated to exactly the kind of evening that her friend thought she needed, providing us with page after page of excitement as Naomi is swept from one location to the next, Robbie is pawed at by one person after another and the two of them finally fall into a room and upon each other to satisfy their carnal desires.

Then it's time for Gary to have his night out and at Disco Harem once again he hooks up with his incongruous friend Robbie. How these two ever became friends is a mystery but I'm sure you can think of a couple of people in your own life who really had nothing in common with each other and yet somehow hit it off and became inseparable. Such is the case with Gary and Robbie who have a catch up, pop up to another room to have a sword-fight (as you do) and then create the evening's climax in a moment of extreme crowd-surfing that will define the two men

On a first reading to be absolutely honest this book didn't make a massive impression. Perhaps it was the lack of any real 'plot' but I was able to flick through it quickly and be left with not much of an aftertaste when I got to the final page. Subsequent viewings however have shown up not only that brilliant use of colour I mentioned but also the way in which Evens is able to hide lots of complexity in seemingly simple brush strokes. On many pages and in many panels a character is really only depicted using a few dashes of colour and a couple of details and yet even with those restricting tools we can see sensuality, vulnerability, fear and ecstasy. It even takes a few viewings after that to realise that you are looking at work that is influenced by painters like George Grosz and deserves to be taken incredibly seriously for its artistic merit alone. As I've said before I cannot draw to save my life so I would never denigrate the talents of any artist but this isn't mere doodling, this includes some really fantastic watercolour work, particularly in the crowd and wider-angle shots and Evens deserves plenty of praise for those panels alone.

If the perfect night out is all about being in the right place at the right time then perhaps this book is more about the slightly jarring sensation that comes when things don't align quite so fortuitously, those nights when you might need a little help to piece together the exact sequence of events and find yourself shaking your head ever so slightly at the ways in which it seemed to be enjoyed by someone who wasn't quite you.

Read more...