A Street Cat Named Bob – James Bowen

When James Bowen first comes across a ginger tom cat sat on his tenement stairs he just gives it a stroke and moves on. After a day or two it becomes clear it has no home and is in need of food and attention. James knows how it feels to be in that situation – he is off drugs but on methadone and trying to live on what he makes busking around central London.

This is not a lot but despite his meagre resources he takes in the cat, who he has named Bob, with a view to nursing it back to health and releasing it back to the streets. Bob has other ideas and sticks to James, even following him across London to sit in the guitar case as James plays, boosting takings in the process.

It is new to James to have responsibility for anything as his life since adolescence has been troubled, with each ‘second chance’ thrown away regardless of consequences. Now though, with Bob’s welfare to consider, he realises that he has to sort himself out.

It’s hard - there are hurdles and setbacks for James as he tries to come off methadone and get on to the legal side of the street; but through it all he has Bob’s unconditional affection and knowing looks to anchor him to the real world.

James Bowen is not an author, he is a musician, but his writing is simple, clear and genuine. As a cat ‘owner’ I found his descriptions of some of Bob’s more familiar antics spot-on, but Bob’s talents go much further than the average moggy.

The read is easy on the eye, but sheds discomforting light upon life on the streets today. In future buskers and Big Issue sellers may get a more sympathetic response from readers. But the strength of the book is simply in its remarkable story which is told well enough.

The Humans – Matt Haig

The good news for Professor Andrew Martin is that he has just achieved his lifetime ambition as a mathematician by discovering a proof of the Reimann Hypothesis, key to understanding the distribution of prime numbers (not that you need to know that).

The bad news is that his discovery is perceived as a threat to the rest of the civilized universe by its self-appointed guardians, the “Host”. Their view is that mankind’s lack of social development and a propensity to violence would make such a discovery dangerous. As a result the professor is immediately abducted, killed and replaced by a look-alike agent of the Host with instructions to eliminate all traces of the discovery. So bad news too for Andrew Martin’s wife, son and close colleagues at Cambridge University.

Haig has fun pointing out some absurdities of human customs, which take some getting used to even for the super-intelligent imposter. This is not helped by learning the English language and a skewed view of social behaviour from perusing a copy of Cosmopolitan.

At first these absurdities strengthen his contempt for humans. However as he establishes his position in his new typically dysfunctional family he slowly realises that beneath the superficiality of style and posturing there is something he has never known before – a feeling of belonging and responsibility for others.

The initial premise is easily swallowed, and then the book runs smoothly through the gears. From its comedic start it moves through insightful comments (my favourite that everything on Earth is wrapped up and hidden from plain view – food, bodies, even feelings) to emotional turmoil and tension as the new Professor Andrew Martin tries to resolve divided loyalties to his mission and his increasing respect for these earthlings.

A good book on more than one level.

When Will There Be Good News – Kate Atkinson

Joanna Mason’s mother, sister and baby brother were killed in a senseless attack when she was just six years old. She escaped unscathed and thirty years later is living happily in Edinburgh with a nice but dim husband and small baby. But thirty years was Andrew Decker’s sentence and now he is out.

It falls to DCI Louise Monroe to let Joanna know. The policewoman has got married since her previous outing in “One Good Turn”, but still broods on what might have been with Jackson Brodie (ex-army, ex-police, ex-private eye and current uncomfortably well-off man of leisure). He too has moved on in marital terms if not emotionally, with a new wife and a possible son from the previous relationship.

Brodie’s trip to Yorkshire, to surreptitiously gain a DNA sample from the potential son, propels him northward by train to crash back into Louise Monroe’s personal and professional life.

Added to the mix is sixteen year-old Reggie Chase, Joanna’s ‘mother’s help’ devoted to her and the baby but struggling to cope with a ravaged home life. And there is Joanna’s dog – Sadie the German shepherd.

Atkinson does what she does better than most – developing interweaving plot lines with such ease that the complexity is hardly noticed until a connection is made with a satisfying “ahh” from the reader. It’s not just the plot though; characters are interesting and engaging, with well-articulated opinions and emotions. Sardonic humour and social comment are blended in seamlessly.

It gets serious though when Joanna goes missing with the baby. Has she run, has she been taken, is her husband not so nice after all? We are kept guessing on that and the many subplots right to the end, when the book is closed to a final, satisfying, spine-tingling link.

Just excellent.

Skios – Michael Frayn

Skios, the Greek island home of the Fred Toppler Foundation and destination of Dr Norman Wilfred, eminent scholar, booked to deliver the prestigious annual lecture to the great and the good gathered there.

Skios, also the destination of Oliver Fox, feckless philanderer, for an illicit assignation with the gorgeous Georgie in a luxury villa borrowed from a friend of a friend.

Skios Airport, where the confusion begins: first, Dr Wilfred and Oliver Fox have identical suitcases; second, Oliver eyes the ‘discretely tanned, discretely blonde’ Nikki Hook holding up the sign to welcome Dr Wilfred and he just can’t resist the opportunity for a free ride from the airport, probably a free meal, and possibly more besides. Particularly as Georgie is delayed.

Dr Wilfred is left with no luggage and no limo, but it is not all bad as Oliver’s taxi, the luxury villa and Georgie (back on schedule) have become available.

Frayn’s capacity for farce in theatre (Noises Off) and cinema (Clockwise) translates well into the written word as he skilfully keeps all the plates spinning as characters enter and exit foundation and villa, with two Greek taxi drivers, brothers Stavros and Spiros, providing the necessary, if largely unremunerated, shuttle service.

It’s clever and funny, but Frayn provides some food for thought through Dr Wilfred’s belief (well tested here) in cause and effect; and in his realisation that not being Dr Wilfred is not all bad.

The read is light but fairly breathless as events hurtle towards a finale full of possibilities. Dr Wilfred would argue they are probabilities based on cause and effect, but would have to concede that this ending is at the lower end of the bell curve.