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One of the cities that have been on my "to see" agenda for a long time but never had to opportunity to concretize.

The novel is reminds one of Philip Kerr but if that was Wake's model he missed the mark by quite a bit. Where Kerr's work reveals a deep knowledge of Berlin and long research on the history of that period, Wake's work remains shallow at best, both in it's description of a city that has the reputation of being one of this planet's jewels and in his depiction of historical circumstances back then.

Easy to read but not very rewarding.

Written in the fifties, a book about a lesbian relationship in pension school.

Apparently un-publishable back then as it would have caused a scandal. Not very sure why as her writing is highly poetic (you can read a quote in the book's description here) .

At the time this author was pushed to Gallimard by Simone de Beauvoir, not published in it's original form but in a very edulcorated formulation...

It's a long book (715 pages) that tells of the saga of many characters in India from the beginning of the century to the 60's. English (as opposed to most latin languages) is difficult to turn into something beautiful but Verghese somehow achieves this in his writing. The problem is that he takes on too many characters and it's not long before you get a little lost and as a result it becomes difficult to root for one character in particular. He also uses a lot of native language sentences and words which certainly doesn't help. But a nice book nevertheless.
Apparently another book of his is much better: Cutting from Stone and I'm planning to have t look.

A bit long in the tooth but a relaxing read if you don't have anything else to do...

But turns out was one of his first unpublished. Not very good, felt like something written by a insomniac teen....

Well written, it kept me interested through it's 576 pages. But I have to say that there are many such stories (as well as movies made from them) which makes it a difficult subject to write about without giving the reader an impression of deja vu.

Anne Berest keeps the tone personal, telling the story from the point of view of different members of her family which manages to make the story more engaging.

First novel by that author for me and I was nicely surprised.

At the beginning, reading about three young girls doing some magic in the forest I was thinking, oh no, not another "she said and he said and they said, like..." work as is often the case.

But not at all, Marshall managed to deploy a narrative that kept me hooked, with numerous twists (somewhat predictable but still very well handled ) making me turn pages without realizing it. Had a quick look at her other works and all of them seem to have as subject matter women or young women so not sure how they read but will probably have a look.

I'm pretty sure it's not because I'm an atheist, but this work, that apparently the author worked on for 10 years, to me appeared to be a monumental waste of time. The work is long (500 pages) and the meager intrigue is plagued by incessant repetitions and flashbacks into the past that just weigh down the pace of the action and let you feel, after 100 pages or so, that this is going nowhere. I was stupid enough, awaiting an incredible revelation, to read to the end, and believe me, this is going nowhere...

Curious book where the narrator changes at about half the work. Lots of details where the narrators remember their past and solutions somehow, magically, appear out of nowhere.

I really had the feeling I was reading a manga without the images.

Not very sure how I cam by this book but once began I was intrigued, more by the style than by the plot itself...

It's quite strange to read. Nothing is more at the opposite of a thriller than philosophy. The result is weird, for instance there's a scene where he begins to kill her and that scene takes about 10 pages. The result being, of course, that before she actually dies he changes his mind. The sentences are very often as long as in a Proust writing which, you have to admit can certainly slow down dramatically the pace of the action. Yet the author obviously has a vast culture, citing authors from antiquity to modern times. And it's long, very long, about 700 pages. Not sure yet, probably will read another work by this author who apparently is well known internationally before posing a more assured verdict as to what I think.

Many English writers from the UK dig into the language to discover or re-discover words that are not used everyday but are nevertheless sometimes interesting, sometimes charming but always give more color to the narrative. Jo Blake is one of those and she succeeds well in creating a world in which you feel engulfed and included. With time it becomes a bit too much, as drinking something very sweet our sour can overwhelm after a little bit. I nevertheless enjoyed this book and am going to read other works by her. To give you a vague idea, allow me a quote from this book:" to a little park, where a brass band was parping out that particularly northern brand of nostalgia between borders planted with primulas and daffodils and hyacinths. Kids darted round on scooters, wobbled on small bikes. Dogs dragged old ladies after them."

That's about all I can say of this book. No great dramas or surprises in this book, lots of interesting details about life at the time, But all this is written in some kind of monotone unrolling of the life of this child slave. It's difficult to get attached to anyone and it's like reading a daily diary of someone esle's life.