Never mind yer Trainspotting - this is the definitive Scottish novel. John McLeish is an ageing supervisor of security installations who has reached the end of his tether. Reclining on a bed in some run down motel with a bottle of whisky and a huge supply of pills, he begins to drink and write a pornographic story inside his head. Thoughts and memories begin to intervene during his narrative and gradually this turns into a poignant and exhilarating account of his life and how it went gloriously wrong. There are few books that draw you so well into someone's mind, and few books that can maintain a life story for nearly 350 pages without descending into tedium. Alasdair Gray exhibits a writing style that can switch inexorably from slut porn to drama and pathos to hallucinogenic weirdness. Reading 1982 Janine for the first time was something of a revelation, as I had never expected it to be this good. I rarely quote blurb from the back of books in reviews, but in this case I can't resist it: "Though full of depressing memories and propaganda for the Conservative Party it is mainly a sadomasochistic fetishistic fantasy. Even the arrival of God in the later chapters fails to elevate the tone. Every stylistic excess and moral defect which critics conspired to ignore in the author's first books is to be found here in concentrated form." Quite.
RATING: 10/10
Perhaps the most notorious book of the early 1990s, American Psycho continues Bret Easton Ellis' savage dissection of eighties American society, begun in his earlier novels, 'Less than Zero' and 'The Rules of Attraction'. Although infamous on account of the much publicised violence and torture, American Psycho does not really deserve its 'sick' reputation. The violence is there, and in places it is very extreme, but really it is no more than a distraction to the real story of what society, or rather wealthy society, has become. The characters within the book are generally shallow, vain, arrogant, thoughtless, bored and generally unlovable; ordinarily reasons enough to distance the reader from any work of fiction, but the author has a knack for turning the most mundane details into a grotesquely fascinating series of snapshots. Chapters containing the reviled scenes of violence are book ended with chapters describing Patrick Bateman's choice of toiletries and his opinions on Huey Lewis and the News. Bret Easton Ellis can be accused of using too much dialogue, of revelling in brand names, of writing essentially plotless books, but the simple fact is, he does it very, very well. It is true to say that American Psycho captures the spirit of the greed obsessed eighties. Depending on how much money you had at the time, this book will either remind you of all the things you loved or despised about that decade. And the moral of the story? Patrick Bateman never did get caught. Just like real life really.
RATING: 10/10
Now mostly forgotten, this revised version of a 1954 novel was, in its time, a seminal work that influenced the modern Fantasy genre. Anderson wrote a dark, bloody story set in the cold wind swept marsh lands and forests of the early dark Ages, presupposing a time when human beings still crouched, fearful, in their wattle and daub huts at night, as the creatures of faerie walked the earth. It is a time of dying magick, the twilight of an older race, reluctant to pass over the torch of supremacy to this new pig-like race of humans. Drawing on the essence of the Norse myths, The Broken Sword tells the tale of the last great war between the Elf kingdom and their mortal enemies the Trolls. But this is no cute cuddly Tolkien tale. The Broken Sword reads like a forgoten chapter of our history, excised perhaps from the pages of time by our priesthood. From the very first chapter it becomes obvious to the reader that this story will end in misery and pain, and that there will be no winners. It reflects the absolute truth of war - that it ravages both sides equally and brings the proudest, loftiest empires to their knees. I first read this book on a dark winter's night, sitting beside an open fire with the wind beating against old Cornish windows. I can think of no finer way to read this book. It's certainly not the sort of book you'd take with you on holiday to Greece...
RATING: 8/10
Simon Lindsay and I were discussing the Fantasy genre some days ago. We were bemoaning the lack of what we were referring to as 'fringe' or 'sub' Fantasy' - books that are effectively mainstream fiction but with just a hint of something fantastical. After I came off the phone I remembered this classic novel from 1985. Occupying much the same ground as 'Gormenghast' and Moorock's fringe works such as 'The Brothel in Rosenstrasse' and 'Gloriana', Caracole is the story of a young man called Gabriel, raised and reared on a crumbling country estate called Madder Pink. The story sees him pursuing his young love, the bewitching Angelica, to a baroque and decadent city referred to only as 'the Capital'; a great cultural centre under siege and fermenting with insurrection. It is a story of sexual desire, social intrigue and politics, in a setting that often resembles early 20th century Paris or Prague, before the Great War. The book often tips its hat to the imagery associated with the likes of Aubrey Beardsley and Oscar Wilde, but retains a modern, jaunty turn of phrase, which books like Gormenghast do not. If you have any interest in the sub-Fantasy genre, Caracole is a must read.
RATING: 7/10
"It's lucky for the world I'm willing to stop at one murder. Together we could rape the universe." So says Ben Reich, head of Monarch Utilities. The Demolished Man is a defining novel of its genre, one of a select few books that seems to make everyone's Top 10 of SF. Set in a future where ESP policemen make it impossible to commit murder, since they are capable of detecting your intent in advance or, failing that, read your mind afterwards, Ben Reich is determined to murder his business rival to save his corporation from disaster. But how do you commit the perfect crime in a world where your thoughts are no longer your own?
The Demolished Man was written at a time when SF was only just beginning to throw off its pulp fiction beginnings. With this, and his other classic novel, The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester set out to prove that SF could be entertaining and serious fiction at the same time. I first read this as a kid and marvelled at the attention to detail, such as the mind block song Reich carries in his head to disguise his thoughts. It is testament to Bester's genius that the words alone are enough to convey how irritating the tune must be. The immediate post war period was to be a defining moment that in turn would lead to the splendour of the experimental new wave fiction of the sixties. Quality like this wasn't to last and sadly now SF is synonymous with poorly written Star Wars and Dr Who novels.
RATING: 9/10
This book tries to be erotic and clever, but really it’s a case of sex by numbers, which is not to say it’s bad, it’s just average. The novel is a snapshot of the life of four sexually insecure women, Julia, Chantal, Philippa and Helen, who seem to descend into flights of sexual fantasy for each others entertainment. The author suggests a double meaning… maybe these encounters are real, or maybe they are just chapters in Philippa’s book (entitled ‘Eat Me’ of course). The problem is, by the time you get to the end of this relatively slim volume, you don’t have much more than a passing interest in any of the characters. Consequently, their sexual advances leave the reader cold and, frankly, a little bored. This is sex without much in the way of feelings. The book suffers accordingly.
RATING: 4/10
This is the first of several volumes featuring Moorcock's greatest creation, the irrepressible Jerry Cornelius. In the mid to late sixties, Michael Moorcock became the editor of New Worlds magazine and set about changing the face of British science fiction. Before Moorcock came along, New Worlds featured the usual quota of aliens, space ships and square jawed science heroes that made SF such a throwaway pulp genre in the eyes of the educated public. Along with his counter culture cronies, Moorcock established a new style of writing; experimental, adventurous, and down right psychedelic, in keeping with the cultural revolution that was occurring at that time. Jerry Cornelius was conceived as a 'shareware' character that could be used by any of the contributors to New Worlds. Moorcock created an iconic pop culture anti-hero set in a vaguely recognisable 196? where he exaggerated every aspect of modern society, often playing around with our accepted conventions of what a novel should be and how a narrative should unravel. As this is the first in what was soon to become an increasingly experimental series, The Final Programme actually displays some indications of a plot, and can be read fairly easily, compared to, say, The Lives and Times of Jerry Cornelius. You won't find any of the standard concepts of science fiction within this book, rather it is a fetishistic tale of excess, and sixties decadence, played out against an encroaching apocalypse. The characters reinvent themselves from book to book, and often chapter to chapter, littering the book with pop culture references and knowing nods to 20th century esoterica. This is a difficult book to categorise. If you like SF, you may not like this book. If on the other hand you like A Clockwork Orange, this may just be the novel you're looking for.
RATING: 8/10
The horror… the horror… it's Vietnam, the way it was, and perhaps also the way we imagine it to have been, through the lens of films like Apocalypse Now and Platoon, only this is the (semi-fictionalised) account of Tim O'Brien's tour of duty through the madness of what is generally thought of as the first rock n' roll war. There is pain and suffering in his account, interspersed with the exhilaration of still being alive as each day brings him that one step closer to returning home. Tim's book reads fast and furious and is probably one of the finest examples of its genre.
RATING: 8/10
If you only ever want to read one post-modernist novel in your life, this is the one to buy. I can't stress too much what an experience it was to read this ground breaking novel. Like The Magus, it's one of those books that comes along once every four or five years and reminds you how good literature can be. The story, if you can call it that, begins on the cover, written in the second person, with you the reader as the principle character. Basically, you've just gone to a bookshop to buy Italo Calvino's new novel, 'If on a Winter's Night a Traveller' and now you've rushed home to your favourite armchair to read it... As the joy of the book is the experience of an original concept and writing style, I can't really say any more, except perhaps to quote Salman Rushdie: "I can think of no finer writer to have beside me while Italy explodes, while Britain burns, while the world ends." Give this book a home on your bookshelves and you need never feel embarrassed about those Terry Pratchett novels again.
RATING: 8/10
School boys behaving badly, and taken to extremes. This classic fifties novel is part of the new wave of English fiction that made English Lit lessons worth attending. Telling the story of a group of evacuee school kids stranded on a pacific island during the Second World War, we observe a brilliantly executed descent from British civilization and discipline to a primitive and barbaric state that suggests the dark animal inside us all is only barely repressed by the glossy veneer of civilization. Golding managed to combine the qualities of fine literature with the tub-thumping drive and thrills of a rattling good yarn. He laid the foundations for a new type of story telling - classics for the common man who found the cloistered tones of Thackeray and Dickens too stifling to read. Lord of the Flies will be best remembered for its powerful sense of imagery - the darkness descending on the island and the dark beasts of the boys' imagination being kept fearfully away by the small fires; the cries of 'kill the pig, kill the pig,' as the boys daub themselves with war paint; and the images of the dead pilot, hanging from a tree, suspended by his billowing parachute - barely glimpsed by the boys who believe it to be the devil. Lord of the Flies is an exercise in imagination second to none. A classic amongst classics.
RATING: 8/10
It is very easy to get carried away in reviewing a book. It is even easier to fall into the habit of awarding books extremely high or extremely low marks. The Magus gets a ten out of ten score because it is simply the best book ever written, full stop, end of sentence, start a new paragraph. John Fowles has engineered a novel built like an onion. The reader begins on the outside skin and gradually peels away layers and layers of literary deceptions as he works his way through to the centre. Written in the first person, the Magus tells the tale of an all too modern anti-hero, Nicholas Urfe, who decides to relocate to an island in Greece to teach English. Before he goes, he is warned by the previous English teacher to stay well clear of an eccentric old man, Conchis, on the neighbouring island. Of course Nicholas doesn’t, and what transpires next is the most fascinating and involving story I have ever read. Conchis proceeds to play games with the main character and, through him, the reader. What is real? What is actually happening? If ‘A Catcher in the Rye’ is the book that everyone should read when they are 16, the Magus is the book everyone should read in their early twenties. Like all the best books, you will either love it or think it hideously overrated. Its influence can be felt in many other works of fiction, from the film ‘The Game’ to Bret Easton Ellis’ ‘Glamorama’. John Fowles never scaled such great heights again. The Magus, his first full novel, was and is the pinnacle of his writing. File under Cult books, Post Modernist Fiction, and the Best Books Ever Written. Full stop, end of review.
RATING: 10/10
Pete McCarthy has been described as Bill Bryson without the boring bits and this, his first book, is a comfortable fireside companion that takes you with the author on his trail across Ireland, working on the premise that one should never walk past a bar that has your name on its sign. That the author's name is McCarthy obviously helps this time around. Pete is a genuinely warm hearted writer and this shows through in his travel writings. Whether he's recounting amusing anecdotes from his travels to some god forsaken piece of Irish turf, wind swept and desolate, or he's trying to keep a straight face when presented with the true horrors of the traditional Irish tourist trade, McCarthy achieves precisely what a good travel book should - a steady quantity of belly laughs. The reader comes away from the book feeling like he's actually been to these out of the way sites, and he feels almost compelled to send McCarthy a post card should he ever go there for real. Great reading for the late autumn months.
RATING: 7/10
It’s not a good idea to get on the wrong side of the Milk Marketing Board, as Brixton anti-hero, Alby Starvation discovers in Martin Millar’s surreal tale of the urban counter culture. Alby Starvation likes Speed, The Fall, and early 60’s/70’s Marvel comics, though not necessarily in that order, as the cliché goes. What he doesn’t like is milk, and as soon as he discovers that his ongoing illnesses are directly linked to the consumption of said product, he gives it up and is cured. Only thing is, he goes on to suggest this remedy to a number of other people suffering from milk allergies. In Millar’s surreal backyard, the Milk Marketing Board see sales slump to an all time low. There’s only one thing left to do… put out a contract on Alby Starvation. How does Alby save both his life and his precious comic collection? OK, at face value this may sound pathetic, bordering on silly at best, down right crap at worst; but in Martin Millar’s hands the reader simply accepts that this is what the world is like. Crazy, mixed up, and kinda fun. Martin Millar has built his reputation on projecting an attractive image of the urban counter culture of the late eighties. His characters are larger than life, but instantly recognisable to anyone who has heard of Half Man, Half Biscuit. In a perfect world, Martin Millar would sell as many books as Irvine Welsh. But then, in a perfect world, the Velvet Underground would have sold as many records as Jimi Hendrix. Know what I mean?
RATING: 7/10
That Irvine Welsh has a lot to answer for with his broad Scottish accent style of writing. Like Trainspotting, the narrative of this novel takes some getting used to at first, but persevere and you've got a quirky and original read on your hands. Warner ignores the bright lights of Edinburgh for the wind swept highland sea ports in the North of Scotland where his sultry heroine, Morvern Callar works as a lowly paid nobody, stacking shelves in what passes for a supermarket in her one horse town. Then, one morning just before Christmas, she wakes to find her boyfriend dead, a suicide note close to hand, and thousands of pounds that she didn't know about salted away in his bank account. Girls just want to have fun, y'know, and Morvern does just that. Combining a rights of passage tale, with an insight into the amoral attitudes of people today, Morvern Callar is at times a macabre and unpleasant read, but all the stronger for it.
RATING: 7/10
Not being someone who normally buys or reads crime fiction, this book did well simply to attract my attention in the first place. Set in a backwater area of Yorkshire, in of course the year 1974, when the papers were full of 'Christmas bombs and Lucky on the run, Leeds United and the Bay City Rollers, The Exorcist and It Ain't Half Hot Mum', a time in the early seventies that I'm only just old enough to remember properly. The story itself concerns a young naïve crime reporter, Ed Dunford, starting work on a local paper, The Evening Post, and picking up the story of a series of brutal murders of children in the local area. Reading like a cross between the BBC series Heart of Darkness, and Our Friends in the North, it's easy to forget that this imaginative and atmospheric novel has been pigeonholed simply as crime fiction. Haunting and realistic, it deserves better than that.
RATING: 8/10
This is the book I wanted to study in English Lit at school, but I was palmed off with the cloying sentimentality of ‘To the Lighthouse’ instead. 1984 is a powerful claustrophobic novel that evokes an impression of a post war, brown-grey, totalitarian Britain where a national state of emergency is maintained to preserve the status quo. Everything about this book is original for its time, from the use of Newspeak, to the overwhelming sense of paranoia and fear that infects every thought and movement of the central characters, to the chilling reminder of just how frail the human spirit really is. 1984 can only be judged as a ground breaking literary event. Whether Orwell was writing to warn of the ‘horrors’ of communism, or the austerity of post war Britain is irrelevant. What he has single handedly achieved is to define the very essence of dystopian fiction. The date 1984 has become a brand term of description for mind control, totalitarianism and the police state. At the time Orwell wrote this, no piece of fiction had been as brutal or as terrifying in its portrayal of ideas and the determination with which a ruling body could obliterate them. It is hard to imagine the effect his novel could have had on its readers at the tail end of the 1940s. The book opened my eyes to a lot of things. I just wish the book had done so when I was 14.
RATING: 9/10
This falls fairly and squarely in the rip-roaring pulp historical fiction market. It's a jingoistic tale of early 19th century English colonialism where one plucky English officer is all that's needed to spank the bottoms of a small army of jumped up natives. Whereas the Flashman novels take a cynical view of 19th century British history, and the Sharpe novels see things from the blood and snot level of the common working class grunt, this series of books owes more to the original source material ala Thrilling Boy's Own Stories and Heroes of the British Empire. The main protagonist is a plucky young cavalry officer, fresh from the field of Waterloo and keen to prove himself in the service of the Duke of Wellington. In all other respects it follows the traditional Sharpe/Flashman plot format - loyal, competent natives, plus dastardly plotting natives, with a smattering of incompetent military natives and of course a token love interest and lots of gripping blood and thunder battles. It's the battles that make the books worth reading. Improbable they may be, (Matthew Hervey seems capable of destroying forces three or four times his size, equipped only with a few cavalry and a galloper gun) but as a spot of light reading on a hot summer's afternoon it does the trick. The book gives you exactly what it promises on the cover. No more, no less.
RATING: 7/10
Bukowski's books are an acquired taste. They paint a cynical and amoral view of the world. Generally autobiographical in tone and content, they chronicle the life of his alter ego, Henry Chinaski as he veers from low paid, 12 hour jobs, to drunken puking in tenement slums, to cold and heartless sexual relationships with women who seem to exist only to be hurt. Post Office is the book that brought Bukowski to fame and fortune, and it is a bitter read, though not nearly as heartless as his later work, Women. Here at least Chinaski is still young enough to yearn for a better life, even though deep down he knows it will never come. Post Office views life from the bottom, looking up at the world through an upturned whiskey glass. Here but for the grace of God goes you or I.
RATING: 7/10
Like many people, Elizabeth Wurtzel has problems. Unlike most of them, she's written a book about it. Prozac Nation tugs at the heartstrings of a generation raised on early Manic Street Preachers albums and the timeless legacy of The Smiths. From the classic cover photo of a wasted, painfully beautiful girl, to the closing chapter, Elizabeth Wurtzel succeeds in simultaneously turning the act of being depressed into an art form, whilst also showing it to be a harrowing waste of life. You can either read the book from the perspective of someone who thinks ‘yes, that’s my life, yes, you’re right’, or perhaps ‘uh, maybe I’m not quite as fucked up as I thought I was…’ To be able to write what is essentially an autobiography at such an early age, and make it readable and valid, is quite an achievement, although I do wonder during some chapters whether artistic licence comes into play. The book will stand the test of time as one of the benchmarks of cult self-analytical prose writing. On that basis, please feel free to append an extra point to the score if you have a poster of Richey Manic on your bedroom wall, or two points if it’s that picture after he carved ‘4 Real’ into his arm.
RATING:7/10
Relationship books are the new penny dreadfuls - they are to fashion conscious twenty/thirty somethings what Mills and Boon novels were to the domestic housewife of the 70s and 80s. This book is just typical of the genre that was born from the loins of Nick Hornby and Helen Fielding. Matt is about to turn 30 when his long-term relationship with his girlfriend in America breaks up. Feeling rejected and alone he returns to his native Manchester to pick up the pieces of his shattered life, and in doing so makes contact with his old friends from school. Drowning in nostalgia he tries to reinvent himself from where he left off, only to learn the cruel lesson of life that you can never go back home again. And this being a trendy relationship novel there's lots of politically correct insights into life and love and the meaning of happiness. Where this book falls down (and where most books of this ilk fall down) is in the insipid quality of its character. The characters are all invariably well mannered and nice and understanding and compassionate and they all need a kick up the arse to make them do or say anything interesting. The dialogue consists of 'witty' sound bites of the kind you'd get in an episode of Friends rather than real life. It is patently clear that the author has no experience of any of the emotions or problems he is attempting to write about. That he used to be an agony uncle for Cosmo style magazines makes it patently clear where his inspiration comes from - the plaintive letters and e-mails from distressed career girls who have been brought up to believe they could indeed have it all. But in life having it all does include the bad as well as the good. A real writer could wring pathos and drama from the premise of this book. Mike Gayles succeeds only in convincing us that emotional problems are about as deep as a shallow frying pan.
RATING: 4/10
The Romans have left Britain, and the long dark night begins to cover the land… this is historical fiction as it should be written…dark, bloody, funny at times, with characters that you actually care about. Arthurian novels really are ten a penny these days and Bernard Cornwell must have been very aware of this fact when he opted to write a trilogy based upon the legends. What he has done is to go back to the original Dark Age and craft a Britain set during the twilight days of paganism, as the Christians begin to make themselves heard, as the warring tribes strive to hold back the Saxons from their lands, as the Roman technology begins to crumble, rust, and be forgotten. In doing so, he has written the only Arthurian books worth reading, outside of Robert Nye’s classic ‘Merlin’. The subtleties within this book, and the trilogy overall, are marvellous… is this a fantasy novel? Well, there’s plenty of magick, but it’s of a psychological nature… you’re never quite sure whether magick actually works… certainly the characters believe it does, but there’s always a rational explanation for any effect, in addition to a supernatural one. The first book of the series sets the scene, introduces the characters and allows Arthur to make his initial mistakes, the repercussions of which will dog him until the bitter end. The key to the series is realism. Battles are fought with shield walls of frightened men who need to get drunk before they have the courage to charge. There is mud, and there is rain, and there is the slight glimmer of hope that Arthur’s plans really will build a better Britain…. And then it all goes horribly wrong… These are real people, with real emotions, not the stock, cardboard clichés of nearly all Fantasy novels these days. The Winter King is an exhilarating start to a classic series. If you have any interest in Fantasy and/or the Dark Age period, this really is about as good as it gets.
RATING: 8/10
These days if you call yourself a poet, the chances are you’re living in a run down bed sit, working in an office to pay your rent, and circulating your unpublished poems around a small circle of like-minded friends, who probably own far too many Morrissey singles. In the early seventies however it seems that being a poet meant two things; firstly, you drank two bottles of Jack Daniels every day and secondly, you spent most of your time enjoying the carnal pleasures of adoring young twenty something girls with long legs and big breasts. According to this book anyway. Ostensibly this is a semi-autobiographical work of fiction in which a 50 something poet, Henry Chinanski, drinks, pukes, and fucks his way through the post-hippie dream of west coast America. Let’s be quite frank here: take away the scenes of hard drinking (followed almost inevitably by scenes of hard vomiting), take away the sex scenes, and you’re left with not much else. This is the poetry equivalent of Hunter S Thompson’s Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas… gonzo poetry, if you want to call it that. Chinanski is an irredeemable character who, now that he is famous, wants to catch up on all the hard living he missed out on when he was unknown. It is hard to believe that a grizzled old poet could possibly attract so many nymph like women, but then I never did understand the early seventies. There is no moral to the tale, except maybe that fame is fleeting and you may as well enjoy it while you can. A friend of mine told me today that the author has been dead for a couple of years. On the basis of this book, I’m surprised he lasted that long…
RATING: 7/10