The Guest List – Lucy Foley

 Jules and Will are getting married. They are both attractive, and successful in self-made careers that benefit from a high social media profile. So the wedding has to be a bit special.

Wedding planner, Aoife, has the perfect venue, a folly that she and her husband have renovated, located on an otherwise deserted island off the west coast of Ireland. It is exclusive, romantic, and available at a discount. The premium guests arrive the day before. They include Johnno, Will’s old school friend and best man; Olivia, Jules’ half-sister and sole bridesmaid; and Hannah, the plus one to the bride’s oldest friend (and possibly ex-lover).

These six characters narrate events over the weekend, in two timelines: Now – the wedding reception; and Earlier – beginning the day before as they all arrive. And these events involve divulgence of secrets, recriminations over past misdeeds, settling of scores, a power cut and, yes, murder in the dark. Who is dead, and who done it, is revealed late and in fine style.

The set up is the same as Foley’s previous debut hit, The Hunting Party, but why change a winning formula that, on this evidence, can take at least one encore. The characterisation is good, the prose is pacey, and the plot complex enough to keep the reader guessing to the climactic end.

The Accidental – Ali Smith

 The Smart family are on an extended summer holiday in Norfolk. Twelve-year-old Astrid is not impressed, everything about the cottage and its locality is, in her words, substandard. The views of her seventeen-year-old brother, Magnus, are not known; he is not speaking to anyone and has mainly withdrawn into his bedroom. Mother, Eve, spends all day in the summer house struggling with her writer’s block. And stepfather Michael, his academic career mired in gross moral turpitude, is concerned with his latest trade of grades for sex.

Into this dysfunctional menage comes, uninvited, Amber MacDonald. She falls between the Smart generations, charming them all despite her penchant for saying it how it is. Eve assumes she is one of Michael’s ‘special’ students; Michael assumes she is one of Eve’s fans. By the time they realise their mistakes, the cuckoo is well established in the nest.

Astrid sees a role model; Magnus has a reason to come out of his funk; Michael senses a possible new conquest; and Eve sees a lost soul to save. They are all wrong, but Amber’s intervention changes the family dynamic; for better or worse is a moot point.

The structure is unconventional with each of the family taking a turn to be centre stage in the narrative, their four streams of consciousness flowing in distinctive styles, appropriate to the character. Their secrets are revealed to the reader. With Amber as catalyst, will they be spilled to the rest of the family?

The unusual structure and the idiosyncratic characters, not least Amber, make for an interesting and entertaining read.

Crown & Country – David Starkey

 A history of England through the monarchy is the book’s sub-title, which accurately describes the content of this jaunty march from the end of Roman rule to the golden jubilee of Elizabeth II.

Covering twelve hundred years in five hundred pages makes for a relatively whistle stop journey. While sacrificing detail and complexity it gains in the coherence and visibility of broad themes and key points when the nature of monarchy and governance change.

The emergence of the first Saxon kings; the Norman conquest and its aftermath; the power struggle with the barons and the great charters; Henry VIII’s break with Rome; religious conflict, leading to the interregnum and, later, the installation of Dutch and German princes as kings as Parliamentary power grew; all feature large.

In the early and middle centuries, the centrality of the monarchy to the political life of the country is evident, as (mainly) kings take taxes and make war as they please, so much is covered. In the later centuries, as Parliament takes control of finance and policy, important political events are less central to the narrative and the account inevitably become more personal.

But that is fine, other histories fill that gap. This book does what it says on the cover and does it well in a relaxed and readable style.

Us Against You – Fredrik Backman

This, the sequel to Beartown, takes up the story soon after the climactic end of its predecessor. The survivors, mostly damaged, take up their fractured lives and try to regain normality.

That seems futile for the Andersson family, as each member looks to their own escape. For father, Peter, it is to save the ice hockey team from extinction; for mother, Kira, it is immersion in her career; for daughter, Maya, it is her music; and for young Leo it is a drift into moodiness and vandalism.

New characters join the cast: duplicitous local politician, Richard Theo; leader of the local hooligan ’Pack’, Teemu Rinnius; and new A team coach, Elizabeth Zackell, unconventionally female, if not feminine. Theo finds a new team sponsor but sows discord; Zackell ruffles feathers and invites prejudice; Rinnius glowers in the shadows, self-appointed guardian of the team’s identity. Peter Andersson flounders, trying to square their irreconcilable demands.

The youth team players, Benji, Bobo, and Amat, graduate to the A team, and prepare for season defining games against deadly local rivals, the team from Hed.

Love and loyalties are tested; trusts are betrayed; rivalry descends into hatred and violence, stoked for political purposes; tolerance is tested, and insecurity is rife, as the war for control of the club’s soul is fought alongside more personal battles.

As in Beartown, the present tense narration builds tension, and the Scandi-forest atmosphere and memorable characters make the story compulsive reading.

Review of 2020 Reading Year

 Reading was boosted by the lockdown and 39 books were read, almost half by ‘new to me’ authors. Last year’s gender imbalance was corrected with female authors edging it this year by 20 to 19 and smashing the highlights reel 7 to 3. Though the reading groups closed down in March, two of their five choices make the best-of list. The ‘bookpacking’ reading journey remained stranded in Africa where only one book was added, albeit a cracker.

My ten best reads of the year include regular stalwarts Atkinson and Atwood but mainly were from new-to-me authors. (Month of full review in brackets.)

 

The Museum of You – Carys Bray: Touching tale involving a father and young daughter who are dealing with the loss of a wife and mother in different ways; laced with humour and pathos. (March)

 

Five Quarters of the Orange – Joanne Harris: Sumptuously written twin tracked narrative about a woman running a café in rural France and her childhood exploits under WW2 occupation. (March)

 

The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing – Mary Paulson-Ellis: Another twin tracked story in which a down-at-heel heir hunter unravels an inheritance that goes back to WW1, balancing the comic present with the tragic past. (April)

 

The Martian – Andy Weir: Compulsive and inspirational tale of an astronaut marooned on Mars, using his wits, scientific knowledge, and determination to survive the hostile environment while Earth scrambles to rescue him. (May)

 

The Wall – John Lanchester: Post Brexit, post climate change Britain is protected from immigrants by a wall around the coast, patrolled by young conscripts; dystopian and all too believable. (May)

 

Alias Grace – Margaret Atwood: Fictionalised account of the life of 19^th century Canadian Grace Marks; her emigration from Ireland, her involvement in and conviction for murder, her imprisonment, and subsequent attempts to free her; cleverly and ambiguously told. (June)

 

Born to Run – Christopher McDougall: Fascinating account of the barefoot, ultra-long distance running Tarahumara people of the Mexican Sierra Madre, incorporating nuggets of physiology, anthropology, history, and bonkers feats of endurance. (July)

Big Sky – Kate Atkinson: The latest Jackson Brodie novel meets its high expectations with a cast of brilliant characters, a serpentine plot, and trademark dark humour, all set on the beautiful North Yorkshire coast. (August)

The Wych Elm – Tana French: A young man relates, none to reliably, how a violent robbery sets off a chain of life-changing events that make him re-evaluate relationships; a slow burner that keeps giving to the end. (October)

The Poisonwood Bible – Barbara Kingsolver: Four daughters of an evangelical preacher posted to Congo in 1959 relate, in contrasting styles, how their changed lives move from exasperation and humour to desperation and peril as colonial rule is overturned. (November)