The Last House on Needless Street – Catriona Ward

Let’s start with the occupants of the eponymous dwelling: Ted Bannerman, his cat Olivia, and sporadically his daughter Lauren. Apparently, that is, as from quite early on it is clear that nothing can be taken at face value with these unreliable narrators, that include the cat.

More reliable, you would think, is the woman who comes to rent the house next door, presumably the penultimate house on Needless Street. It is from Dee’s third person perspective that we learn of events at the nearby lake many years ago, when her sister Lulu went missing never to be found, dead or alive, since. Dee reckons Ted Bannerman is responsible, and she is out to prove it. As her narratives progress, further details of Lulu’s disappearance are revealed, along with Dee’s efforts to find her.

As for Ted, Olivia, and Lauren, clues as to their involvement can be inferred (rightly or wrongly). More importantly, clues to their relationships are not so much revealed as scattered around for the reader to make of what they can. What is for sure is that the trio don’t get on well.

The psychological tension is built up, but the drive to turn the pages is not so much to do with the prose or the narrative as to finally rationalise the weirdness of the book and move on. To be fair, the denouement has its merits in terms of plotting, and just about justifies the effort in getting there.

A Thousand Splendid Suns – Khaled Hosseini

The tragic story of Afghanistan between 1960 and 2003 is told through the lives of two women.

Mariam, born out of wedlock and branded a ‘harami’, lives with her damaged mother in a ramshackle hut on the outskirts of Herat. Her father, already with three wives and ten legitimate children, does visit once a week to receive adulation from young Mariam and abuse from her mother. When the mother dies, Mariam assumes she will be taken in. Wrong. Aged fourteen she is married off to Rasheed, a shoemaker thrice her age, and is shipped off 650km to Kabul. Imagine her new life – no need, Hosseini tells it as it is.

Bigger events are at play as in 1978 the communist revolution takes place. The same year, down the road from Mariam’s house, Laila is born. She has a progressive father and benefits from the new regime’s programme of secular education (including for girls) for a while at least.

But not everyone in the country approves of the changes. They see the Russian support as invasion, communism as an atheistic attack on their religion, and call for Jihad. Laila’s older brothers answer the call, only to fall before the Russians are driven out. She barely knew them, but has a surrogate brother in schoolfriend, Tariq. As the friends gain puberty, friendship develops to love.

As the Russians pull out, Hell descends on Kabul as rival warlords fight for supremacy and control. People die and disappear. Laila needs a lifeboat and the shoemaker up the road, Rasheed, now in his sixties, makes her an offer she is in no position to refuse. Thus, Mariam and Laila are forced into an uncomfortable menage a trois.

The harsh realities of life in Kabul and a common violent enemy in their shared husband, pushes them into a mutual dependency that develops into trust and sisterly support. And that bond is tested, as events spiral, and conditions deteriorate in the city.

It is told with passion, pace, and prose that lays bare the horrors yet ennobles the struggle of the women. Tragic, yes; uplifting, maybe; thought-provoking, definitely.

Heroes – Stephen Fry

Stephen Fry retells the stories of the Greek heroes in his inimical style. And these are mortals, not gods, so their foibles are fair game, enabling Fry to tease out their personalities as well as their activities. The focus is mainly on the macho exploits of Perseus, Heracles, Orpheus, Jason, Oedipus, and Theseus, but in a nod to gender equality, Atalanta (a match for most of them) gets an airing.

The tales all tend to involve destiny, uncertain parenthood, great deeds, loves loved greatly but easily gotten over, fierce monsters of legendary descent, and the odd benign creature such as a winged horse or golden-fleeced ram. The gods, of course, are ever present in the background, begetting, seducing, challenging, tormenting, and otherwise interfering with their mortal puppets as they jostle for position in the Olympian pantheon.

It is tremendous fun and very illuminating as Fry expertly treads the fine line between easy-flowing prose and scholarly erudition. Footnotes give an option for more of the latter.

Just splendid as both an introduction to the Greek heroes and as a refreshing refresher.

The Bell in the Lake – Lars Mytting

In the beginning there were two bells, the Sister Bells, so called as they were cast in memorial to conjoined twins, Halfrid and Grunhild Hekne. The girls, despite their situation, managed well enough with the rigours of rural Norwegian life and excelled at weaving where their four arms moved in perfect harmony to produce beautiful tapestries. They fell ill and died young, expiring at their loom, working on one last masterpiece, completed by Grunhild with Halfrid dead beside her.

That was two hundred years before the story begins, on New Years Day 1880, when the Sister Bells call the faithful of Butangen to mass. Among them is young Astrid Hekne who, while resigned to her family’s subsistence level existence, has broader horizons. Better educated than most and fuelled by her reading of the parson’s discarded newspapers, she longs to travel. She also longs for the new parson, a young priest named Kai Schweigaard. He has feelings for her, too, but with the church mission and a fiancé back in civilization, they must be repressed. Anyway, he has work to do - the ancient stave church is cold, draughty, and too small. It needs replacing.

Fortunately, it has historic value. Some well-connected Germans wish to relocate it in Dresden as a cultural icon. Enter young architectural student, Gerhard Schonauer, to record its structure and supervise its dismantling, storage, and export.

We have a love triangle. Astrid obviously attracts both men with her good looks and feisty demeanour. She reciprocates their tentative attentions, but it is complicated. Their shared mission to remove the old church, and more importantly the bells forged for her ancestors, is anathema to her.

It is slow burning and moody with repressed emotion. The landscape and the turning seasons form more than a backdrop; folk in Butangen live and die by the weather. As the snow melts, and the sap rises, things begin to move. Astrid has a plan to save the bells, but can she get her suitors to cooperate? There again, maybe the bells have a plan for Astrid.

There is resolution of sorts, but as one story ends, green shoots of another couple emerge. As the first volume of a projected trilogy, it may take some time and lots more pleasurable reading before the final fate of the Sister Bells are known.

Playing Nice – JP Delaney

The set-up is a nightmare scenario. Pete Riley has got back from depositing two-year-old Theo at nursery when two strangers knock on his door. One introduces himself as Miles Lambert, the other is a private detective, and they have news for him.  The boy he just dropped off is not Pete’s son, but Miles’s, and here is the DNA test to prove it.

Shocked Pete’s first thought is that partner Maddie had played away, but no. It seems two premature babies were mixed up at the intensive care unit, the error coming to light after recent genetic tests on the other boy, David. It is now clear that Miles is Theo’s father, and Pete’s son is David.

The one crumb of comfort is that Miles and Lucy seem a nice couple, eager to discuss and agree a way forward – do we swap, do we keep, do we share? But appearances can be deceptive. As the narrative is carried forward by Pete and Maddie it is interspersed with extracts from court papers that indicate any resolution is anything but amicable.

The direction of travel is worryingly clear from clues that pepper the narratives, as each innocent action (and some engineered situations) are noted, documented, and misinterpreted in the court papers. It is excruciating and all too plausible. The characters of Pete, Maddie, Miles, and Lucy are developed and laid bare for scrutiny; none are saints, but some flaws are more forgivable than others.

The story races along, driven by the need for resolution, but what would constitute a satisfactory ending for all involved, especially the kids? That we get one of sorts, is a relief after being put through such an emotional wringer.

Recommended, but not to parents of children under three with no confirmatory DNA evidence to hand.

Exit – Belinda Bauer

Exit exists to ease the passing of those with terminal illness who do not want to linger until it takes its natural course. Actually, it more speeds up than eases the passing, by making available a cylinder of nitrous oxide (undetectable after death) with a tube and breathing mask attached. These are already in place when the volunteer sitters, the Exiteers, arrive to provide company in the final moments and to clear away the suicidal evidence.

That it is all legal does not mean it can be done openly. There are the feelings of the relatives to protect, and the insurance pay-outs to preserve, so it is all done in the clients’ homes with no witnesses. Discretion is the watchword, and the Exiteers are careful to maintain anonymity even among themselves by the use of false names.

But when ‘John’ (real name Felix) is paired in an assignment in Bideford with young rookie ‘Amanda’, disaster strikes. First, an instinctive intervention by Amanda means they have overstepped the legal mark. That is manageable, thinks Felix, no harm done, except, second, it is the wrong person they have helped into oblivion. Third, it appears, someone has spotted them entering the premises and a police car is approaching, siren blaring.

Felix, law-abiding for all his seventy-five years, is prepared to accept responsibility, even if it means jail. But not just yet, he needs to make arrangements for his dog, make sure Amanda is not implicated, and warn his handler, so he does a runner. It takes time to put his affairs in order, during which it begins to dawn on him that some things don’t add up. He needs to investigate, then he can present the police with a full confession and clear explanation.

Meanwhile the police are now investigating an unexplained death and are on Felix’s track. Will they get to him before he gets to the truth?

It is a fine mixture of black humour and pathos – Felix’s motivation for becoming an Exiteer is his own grief at losing loved ones. Plotting and characterisation are convincing enough but expect more cosy crime than Devon noir.

Exciting Times – Naoise Dolan

The book-packing journey reaches Asia, touching down in Hong Kong in the form of a girl called Ava.

Unhappy in Dublin, Ava has decided to try elsewhere. On completing her finals, she blows her savings on a flight to Hong Kong and a month’s rent on a room. She gets a low-paid job as a TEFL teacher, imparting the mysteries of the English language to schoolchildren. It pays the rent but covers precious little else.

She meets Julian in a bar. His job as a banker funds a spacious apartment and an expensive lifestyle, which Ava has no qualms about freeloading into. The relationship develops, but it is complicated. Not even Ava and Julian are sure what it is. They jog along.

When Julian is posted back to Europe for a few months, Ava stays in his apartment. She makes friends with Edith, full name Edith Zhang Mei Lang, a Hong Kong local but schooled in England and a Cambridge graduate. Not even her pay can match Hong Kong rents, so she lives at home with her family. That means she can enjoy living the high life in the city bars and clubs, as can Ava, who still has access to Julian’s credit card. They have fun. The relationship develops, but it is complicated. Not even Ava and Edith are sure what it is. They jog along.

With Julian due back to the island, Ava must examine her attachments to her two friends, while taking account of economic realities. Does she have to pick one and ditch one, or can she somehow manage the situation?

Ava’s narration is quirky, maybe it is the Irish accent coming out or just her off-kilter way of expressing herself. It is peppered with references to social media; Ava uses draft texts and Instagram posts to articulate her thoughts but deletes rather than sends them. The Hong Kong location seems more incidental than intrinsic to the story, so there is no real sense of place.

The book is probably not aimed at my demographic, so I found it interesting rather than engaging, providing an insight, bewildering rather than empathetic, into how relationships are managed in that generation.