The Finkler Question

Title:  The Finkler Question

Author: Howard Jacobsen

ISBN: 978-1-4088-0910-5

Published: Bloomsbury

Date: 2010

Book quote:

“It was at that moment the sum total of his philosophy. Fuck it.”

The quote above it completely atypical of the diction and style of the book, but is in essence what the whole exposition boils down to. After exploring every conceivable angle of the Jewish Question, in the end we are presented with no answers, no guides, no opinion that seems ‘better’ than another. As far as the issue of Jewish identity and place in the world goes, Jacobson proffers no ‘solution’. Except perhaps that there is no solution and the question itself is inherent in Jewish existence.

The book is ostentatiously ‘literary’ in that it has virtually no plot, glacial progression and its whole soul is dedicated to stripping itself so bare it’s turned inside out several times like a distressed overcoat in the hands of a toddler. It is a delightful, funny read, and shines a kind and reflective light over proceedings; rather like the character of Libor: an old Czechoslovak Jew who has recently been widowed at the time the novel opens.

Reviewers have called it ‘blistering’, ‘furious’ and ‘terrifying’. If to be unashamed and honest is such, I guess it is.

The setting is London, and the main protagonists are three friends: Treslove, Finkler, and Libor. The latter two are Jews, the first is not. Then Treslove has an epiphany and decides he, too, is really Jewish. Then he probably decides he is probably not. And the story ends.

Howard uses Treslove’s reasoning as to why he ‘must’ be Jewish and the character’s personality as one of the tools to discuss the essence of ‘Jewishness’.

The only authorial opinion that seems to emerge from the seething discussions is that men are confused, women get on with life. This is not so much stated as actioned – in fact it’s so unbalanced a ratio of women who know what they’re doing to men who don’t you’d think there’s something going on. Tyler is Finkler’s (recently deceased) wife, who continually cuts through Finkler’s philosophical crap with near-spiteful brutality – yet puts up with it. Malkie is Libor’s (also recently deceased) wife who was an incomparable beauty, a talented musician, of high-class ancestry but of even better taste, who staved off the pathos of  dying by ‘talking dirty’ and who chose plebeian Libor over Horowitz because he made her laugh. Hepzebah is Treslove’s Nirvana of a woman who mothers him and for a while washes away his obsession with death and sorrow in a wave of earthy gusto and joi de vivre. Even Treslove’s past loves, the waif-like women he picks and adores because of their insubstantial fragility, all despair of him and leave him because of his fatuous fascination with some operatic, fatalistic view of life and romance. Tamara Krausz out-philosophers Finkler the philosopher, driving him mad with a mix of jealousy and admiration that morphs into a rather violent sexual fascination. There seems to be not a cleaning-lady in the book who doesn’t possess more common sense than the ‘best’ of the men.

And yet for all the enjoyable read, it leaves the reader disappointed with the ‘not a bang but a whimper’ ending. Perhaps it’s churlish to complain of this as it’s no doubt part of the message: nothing changes, there are no answers, the dog returns to his vomit. But it’s also a novel, and stories need structure, and that includes a head and a tail.

Great writing, engaging humour, wonderful insight and honesty. No plot, no resolution, no ending and barely any beginning that’s not a morass of the rest of the book. In all, I’d give it four moose-hoofs up out of five. Cool book but not quite sure I’d have given it the Booker - as someone else did. 

The House At Zaronza

Title: The House At Zaronza        

Author: Vanessa Couchman

Publisher: Crooked Cat Publishing Ltd    

Publish date: July 2014

ISBN-10: 190984182X

ISBN-13: 978-1909841826

The story of a Corsican woman in the early part of the 20^th century, set within the framework of the enquiries of an interested party from present-day UK. Engaging, intriguing and increasingly un-putdownable.

The book takes an unflinching look at what it meant to be female at that time and place, with a realistic first-person narrative. The fictional author voice’s credibility stems partly from changing over the course of the novel, from naïve young woman to WW1 nurse and beyond – this with the added complexity of the narrative being written as a retrospective memoir. The portions on nursing on the Front are for me the most gripping. They fit in with the ruggedly un-melodramatic stoicism of the main character to pack a force of narrative that leaves one quite stunned.

Would recommend without reservation.

Red Mist

 

Title: Red Mist

Author: Patricia Cornwell

Publisher: Putnam          

Publish date: 2011

ISBN: 970-0-399-15802-5

 

This was my first Patricia Cornwell novel and also (obviously) my first Scarpetta novel, and I discovered after the event it wasn’t a particularly good place to start. Avid Cornwell readers complain of the interminable dialogue, the lack of action, the dreariness and general lack of motivation to keep reading. A lot of reviews swear at the end they won’t read another Cornwell book after that. And I can understand the disillusionment.

To a Cornwell novice, it would appear self-evident that in the Cornwell world:

·         We do not kill our adjectives and adverbs. In fact, we spread fertilizer on them to make them fatter, and give no nutrients to verbs or nouns at all, which struggle through the cracks in the adjectival forest.

·         We ENDLESSLY employ the ‘Bit-of-Dialogue’ followed by ‘Inane action’ scenario. ‘No,’ she said, and picked up the chopsticks. ‘I think,’ she said, turning the gas on…. Ad infinitum until the author finally forgets herself and allows a bit of dialogue without endless interruptions.

·         We do NOT eschew the no-no tell-not-show words of ‘feel’, ‘think’, ‘consider’, ‘see’, etc. We employ them mercilessly. We drag the reader through every passing thought the MP has and leave nothing to the imagination.

·         We do not build up tension or lead the reader on. We do drop clues but they’re endlessly repeated and not of great interest anyway, and the plot is brow-raisingly dubious.

 

In all, it’s not the impression I expected to get of such an acclaimed writer. Perhaps I’ll try an earlier Scarpetta next time. This one needs so serious editing. In fact, go for a re-write. In fact, scrub that, just don’t bother at all.

 

Gets 1 out of 5 Moose Hoofs up.

 

 

The Racketeer

 

Title: The Racketeer

Author: John Grisham

Publisher: Random House           

Publish date: 2012

ISBN: 978-0-7393-7843-2

 

Malcolm Bannister is a former attorney convicted for money laundering and serving ten years at Frostburg Prison Camp. Then a federal judge gets murdered and the tough get going as the proverbial going gets tough.

 

I smiled a lot while reading this novel, and have to confess to a personal liking for it for several reasons.

a)      By the end of the first few opening chapters you find yourself rooting for Bannister, an ex lawyer, not even a successful one, technically did the crime he’s convicted for but holds himself morally innocent and blames the government. At first glances it doesn’t sound like an easily likeable character. But Grisham pulls that first stunt off with remarkable ease.

b)      The story winds round itself in an audacious dance of literary, self-referential flirtation. Now, this is often attempted but seldom pulled off. As Malcolm morphs into his new identity under the Witness Protection Program, we literally see the writer at work, choosing his character, drawing up the plot diagrams, forging the story – within the story. And it’s amusing, not the self-aggrandizing and navel-gazing display that’s often put on show by lesser mortals. It continues for the rest of the book, with the reader quite happy for the main character to be in cahoots with his author and leading you by the nose over some rather rough territory.

c)       It’s meticulously plotted prior to writing, but a bit slapdash on character development. Why is this a good thing? Well it’s not, but it happens to be how I write, too. If John Grisham can get away with it, there’s hope for me yet. Even the ending is one I sympathize with: the increasingly devious and unbelievable plot is thrown at the reader’s feet in a messy pile of happy-ever-after with a ‘there, that’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?’ echoing behind the residual sound of fingers hitting the keyboard. I dig it. Although if there were one thing I’d like to change it would be to hang onto reality a little more towards the latter quarter of the novel, but hey, who’s counting.

In short, recommended. Gets 3.5 out of 5 Moose Hoofs up.

 

 

At Home, A Short History of Private Life by Bill Bryson

AT HOME, A SHORT HISTORY OF PRIVATE LIFE by Bill Bryson

Book Quote:

“On one occasion in the 1890s, Lord Charles Beresford, a well-known rake, let himself into what he believed was his mistress’s bedroom. With a lusty cry of ‘Cock-a-doodle-doo!’ he leapt into the bed – only to discover that it was occupied by the Bishop of Chester and his wife.”

What would the world do without Bill Bryson? One simply wants to sit at his knee with a huge grin and listen interminably. I’m an irredeemable skinflint and get all my reading material from the library, but At Home is one book I would seriously like to buy for myself. Considering I have almost no books apart from reference books, my Complete Shakespeare and a Bible I once found in a discard pile somewhere, that’s saying quite a lot.

The volume is in essence a long and amiable discourse on the marvel that was the Victorian era. It’s loosely based around (and supposedly inspired by) the Victorian rectory Bryson lives in. The chapters have titles like: “The Hall,” “The Kitchen,” and so on. The theory is that “houses aren’t refuges from history. They are where history ends up.” However, apart from in the early chapters (notably “The Hall”) there’s little talk about anything prior to the Victorians. It’s the speed of change and the immeasurable vigor with which so many Victorians pursued their eccentricities and interests that really fascinates Bryson, and he re-tells it at the top of his engaging best.

The downside of the book may perhaps be that it has little structure. It is a little like swimming through thick soup, but oh such good soup! It’s the perfect book for sitting companionably of an evening. The urge to exclaim “Listen to this one!” and regale anybody within earshot with the latest snippet of fascinating information Mr. Bryson has dredged out of history for you, probably occurs about once every fifteen minutes. Which, incidentally, is the perfect interval for this sort of activity: any less and it’s startling, any more and it gets annoying.

The best thing about it is that it’s simply so shockingly knowledgeable. The bibliography alone goes on for 25 pages of dense text, with a further note at the bottom: “for Notes and Sources, please go to www.billbryson.co.uk/athome .”

Despite this, there are a number of curious little niches which harbour the oddest throw-away statements. Like the one that claims the dining room really came about because of the advent of upholstery, with the Victorians not really wanting people smearing greasy chicken over their expensive sofas. What on earth were all those Medieval dining halls doing, then, one wonders briefly? Or the later Elizabethan private dining rooms? Oh Billy, one thinks – but it’s such a lovely idea that a specialised room should be invented because people couldn’t quite envisage a table napkin that one quite forgives it.

These little anomalies only seem to add to the charm: they’re like “Easter eggs” in a computer game. The vast majority of the time, one is overwhelmed with gratitude at the sheer volume of reading and dredging that has been done to winkle these pearls of Victoriana from dusty obscurity. They range from the obscure (why forks usually have three tines: actually it’s never quite explained but apparently people have experimented with other numbers and it’s never quite right) to the monumentally important (such as the discovery of the sources of cholera and scurvy). Electricity holds sway over a whole chapter in “The Fuse Box,” and seems to hold a particular fascination for Bryson, as the “characters” who feature here pop up throughout the book. Perhaps it is not surprising, as without electricity so much of further development would simply not have been possible.

I would recommend this unreservedly to anybody, but actively prescribe it if you are feeling glum. Perhaps that’s why I’d like it on my shelf permanently. It’s cheering for three reasons. The unquenchable amiable spirit it’s written in, along with the sheer love of language and words that beams through the pages are two of these reasons – but any Bryson fan will already be familiar with these. The third is that the book will immerse you entirely in the day-to-day reality of Being Victorian. Which includes carrying 40 bucket loads of hot water upstairs nightly for a bath, having to take clothes apart and re-stitch them together for the laundry, refrigerating food (if one were so lucky) with ice brought over from lakes in the States, and countless other inconveniences and checks to daily living that we would simply never consider possible. The writing is so engrossing one’s arms almost ache with the weight of the water-buckets… only to look up and find that: joy! One can just turn the hot water on instead. If you think you’re bogged down with a tedious job or an unrewarding existence or poor working conditions, just read this. You’ll be skipping in no time.

(First published in Mostly Fiction Book Reviews, 2011)

ALL IS FORGOTTEN, NOTHING IS LOST by Lan Samantha Chang

ALL IS FORGOTTEN, NOTHING IS LOST by Lan Samantha Chang

Book Quote:

“I am imprinting this upon my memory,” she said. “The southern exposure of a winter morning light, the sounds of thaw, water dripping off the eaves, the squirrels…Sometimes I seem to know, in the split of a second of a moment, that it will be a moment I’ll want to keep.”

This is a beautiful book. If you want to read something that has the same effect as gazing at a vast and perfect ink-wash painting, calming and yet utterly absorbing, reach for this. Like the tiniest haze of seeping ink will be skillful enough to convey a distant village nestling in the hills, or the flight of a crane; there is not a word misplaced in this small and lovely work. Its theme is poetry, and indeed the exquisite style does full justice to the subject.

The plot follows the lives of a handful of graduate poetry students and their teacher. The initial focus is on their interactions and early relationships during university years, but as the story progresses the camera lens zooms with painful precision on subsequent pinpoints of time.

The technique of the writing is such that it leaves one with an impression of overlapping layers rather than a well-woven tapestry, the latter of which is the more usual impression in a well-plotted novel. Life depicted here is more a palimpsest than a continuous narrative. There’s an almost fatalistic crystallisation of the view of the past seeping into the present (or the ongoing) that’s highly peculiar, and entirely seductive.

It’s even more astonishing to find such alluring excellence in a book that is essentially about writing. Generally, tomes ranting away about the torment of literary endeavours and the social inadequacies of their perpetrators are best put out of their misery immediately by means of a swift bonfire. But rather than wallow first-hand in the self-absorption and uncertainty as so many of these efforts tend to, Chang depicts a view onto these same themes that’s as unnervingly detached as a high-resolution spy satellite picture: taken from space, but accurate enough to read the print on a newspaper. The style is formal, bordering on the stilted, the tone even and quiet.

Two of the central characters are the poetry student friends Roman and Bernard. Roman is driven, moderately gifted, insistently handsome and, eventually, inordinately successful. Bernard is his counterpart, with caricature-like introversion, religious torment and more than a hint of obsessive compulsive disorder born out in poverty, and the novel makes no bones about his role in the narrative as the “traditional” poet.

These extreme stereotypes should be flat shadows by rights. Instead they’re almost luminous, depicted by refraction, like a painter using the space that is not to denote the presence of an object. These two characters vie with each other, in their peculiar way, for the attentions of their teacher Miranda Sturgis, the acclaimed and established poet. Their differing approaches, viewpoints and degree of success in gaining her approval and attention are at the core of the novel.

Along with the much-debated question of “why write poetry,” the novel explores facets of the role of the teacher (or mentor), the relationship of the mentor with the recipient, and the progression of the student in turn becoming mentor. The development here is linked structurally and thematically to the ageing process, which gives the novel as a whole a feeling of natural evolution; something organic and inevitable. Perhaps this is why I can’t remember reading anything with so little a sense of contrivance. Despite, or perhaps because of, the meticulous precision with which it’s put together.

The character reveal is also atypical. It’s not so much a reader discovering an already-formed entity but the entity and the reader making the discovery together. Again, the sense of extreme detachment fused with extreme intimacy is slightly dizzying.

If you read action thrillers exclusively, then I suppose this book is not for you. Apart from that I’d recommend it to anybody. You don’t need to know about writing or poetry, just be ready to think about why art is necessary for life. And read a jolly good story in the meantime, complete with romance, betrayal, suspense and verve. It’s quiet, but it’s a page-turner.

(First published in Mostly Fiction Book Reviews, 2011)

The Days of the King by Filip Florian

THE DAYS OF THE KING by Filip Florian

Book Quote:

“Having burnt their lips and their peace of mind on a soup of Brussels sprouts, the four – General Nicolae Golescu, minister of the interior and of foreign affairs under Bibescu Voda, member of the 1848 revolutionary committee, the provisional government, and the first Princely Lieutenancy; Lascar Catargiu, with his wolflike senses, honed until then only in appointments as prefect and en famille; Colonel Nicolae Haralamb, landowner, son of a court victualler from Craiova; and Ion Ghika, bizarre Turkophile revolutionary of 1848, longtime Bey of Samos – were now so prudent that they would have blown even on a bowl of yoghurt before tasting it.”

It’s 1886, and the dentist Joseph Strauss follows Karl Ludwig of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen from Prussia to Bucharest, where the latter is crowned King Carol I of Romania. Carol’s relationship with Joseph strays beyond the dental boundaries and they develop a certain camaraderie, particularly when Joseph arranges for the services of a blind prostitute to be made available (in strictest secret) to the politically beleaguered king. It is precisely the intimate nature of the knowledge Joseph carries which eventually leads to the king’s deliberate distancing of himself from the dentist. However, when the three-year-old Princess Maria dies of scarlet fever, and no further heirs seem forthcoming, Joseph wonders whether the King ought to be informed that the blind whore now has a son with a suspiciously aristocratic nose.

Filip Florian is a highly regarded Romanian author, and his first novel, Little Fingers  won numerous awards.

Now, how can I put this. I have an off-hand familiarity with the Continental predilection for convoluted language in both fiction and non-fiction. The ability to twist thirteen sentences into one contortionist-like knot and still somehow come out grammatically on top is often regarded as a sign of intellectual and linguistic brilliance. It’s little wonder in that case that Florian’s work has won high regard.

Sentences in this novel are frequently one and a half pages long (well, on Kindle at least). Subject is violently sundered from object, blown apart by sub-structures and interjections to make the reader’s mind dark with confusion. Why use one adjective when you could use twenty three, interspersed with thirteen sub-clauses and twelve asides? There is certainly nothing wrong with the translator’s (and I suspect Florian’s) grammar or vocabulary. After parsing the first two sentences out, though, I found it far too wearisome to follow the exact meaning of the text, and had to rely on intuition and guessing to struggle on, or risk going mad.

One advantage to these verbal acrobatics was, admittedly, the revival of several infrequently-used adjectives. It was refreshing to see some of the recesses of the rich English language being taken out and dusted off: I hadn’t used “nacreous” in quite a while and as for “canicular,” never. (“Having the quality of mother-of-pearl” and, in this application, “referring to the dog-days” respectively, in case you were wondering.)

The off-putting garb of tortured sentence structure which Florian of necessity wears is, however, doubly unfortunate because there is a highly talented writer lurking under there. Somewhere. It’s noticeable when the narrative narrows down to a point of excitement, or when rapid action takes place. He can’t help allowing sentences out in short breaths, and suddenly the scene springs to life. The characters start gasping for breath, their gags and restraints momentarily loosened. Unfortunately the action inevitably comes to an end. Then it’s time for either narrative, or asides, or observations and descriptions – all of which would be interesting and vivid were they cut up and served decently rather than being thrown at one’s face like a giant custard tart. Techniques of delivering backstory through dialogue or implication are obviously frowned on in Romania.

Much as I’d like to, I can’t say I would recommend this book to anyone who doesn’t know the sort of things Continental writing can get up to in its spare time. I am left wondering whether Florian will consider aiming his writing more at an English-speaking audience, but I’d guess that’s (sadly) unlikely. It’s a bit much to ask a nation to change its accepted linguistic style so that we can enjoy a few more decent translations. In the meantime poor Mr Florian might be doomed to languish in the obscure corners of the English translation pond.

(First published in Mostly Fiction Book Reviews, 2011)