Tag: Helen Dunmore

Top 10 Books Of The Year – 2017- Part 1 (10-6)

On By philshanklinIn 100 Essential, Books, New Books4 Comments

In 2017 I managed to read 67 books which is thirteen down on my record breaking score last year but exactly the same number as I read in 2015.  Everything I’ve read has been reviewed on this site and this year I’ve awarded 10 books the maximum five stars, 31 four stars and 26 three stars, which seems to be to be a good spread.  I’ve not read anything which disappointed me enough to get a two star or one star read. I’ve read a lot more books as they are published or  soon after and looking at my Top 10 it is the first year ever where all the books have either been published in 2016 (with the paperback appearing this year), 2017 and in one not-yet-published case 2018.  I think that shows how good writing is at the moment.  I’ve not narrowed the list down to only those which appeared this year.  If I read it this year, then it’s eligible.  (The earliest dated book I read this year was 1931 and Margery Allingham’s “Police At The Funeral” but she hasn’t made the list).

What I haven’t done this year at all is re-read any books (I used to re-read about 10 books a year).  With publishers sending me books and with Netgalley pressures the re-reads have been pushed out, which is a shame as I love re-reading favourites and this is something I’ll need to rebalance in 2018.  Choosing the books for my Top 10 has actually been easier this year because of those 10 five star reads, so all I needed to do was allocate positions for my annual review of my year in books .  Anything that doesn’t make the top 10 gets culled from the bookshelves or off the Kindle, which means this year I’m losing a lot of very good books (but you can’t keep them all, I know I’ve tried in the past!)

Although I’ve read books before by two authors on my Top 10 list for all of them it is their first appearance on the list, so as far as I am concerned, these are likely to be the authors’ best books.  Those also a couple of debut novelists there.  The books are all fiction for the second year running and last year I had a fifty-fifty gender split this year the women have the edge with a 60/40 domination.  All of the titles have been  reviewed on this site- click on the titles to link to the full review.

10. Exposure- Helen Dunmore ( Windmill 2016) (Read and reviewed in January)

exposureThis was the second of Helen Dunmore’s novels I have read but her first appearance on my Best Of The Year list.  Set in 1960 in an England paranoid about the Cold War and high profile spy cases this is a thrillingly written thriller which focuses on this paranoia affecting a family when a secret file goes missing.  Helen Dunmore sadly passed away in June this year, aged 64, not long after the publication of her last book “Birdcage Walk” which I am yet to read.  She has left a legacy of 15 novels which demand to be discovered.

Current Amazon sales rating: #4592 in Books

9. The Golden Age – Joan London ( Europa 2016)  (Read in March, reviewed here in May)

goldenageAustralian author Joan London won awards in her homeland with her third novel and here was longlisted for the Wellcome Prize which focuses on books having an emphasis on health.  This was set in a polio hospital in the early 1950’s.  I described it as  “a beautifully observed, quiet novel which belies its grim subject matter and becomes a life-affirming testament to hope and love.”

Current Amazon sales rating: 202,593 in Books.

8. Small Great Things – Jodi Picoult (Hodder & Stoughton 2016) (Read and reviewed in January)

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The first of this American author’s 23 novels I have read.  Her fans have told me it’s not quite like her other books but there seems to be a general consensus that this is her best.  Picoult is a superb storyteller and I thought this “feels relevant, up to the minute and especially with the America their electorate has recently chosen for them, totally convincing.  There are so many layers to the conversations that readers could have about this book.  I cannot imagine a more ideal reading group book has been published in the last few years.”

Current Amazon sales rating: 136 in Books (probably the biggest commercial hit on my list- this was a big seller when it arrived in hardback and then again in paperback).

7. All The Wicked Girls – Chris Whitaker (Zaffre 2017) (Read in June, reviewed in July)

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Chris Whitaker is great and you should all be buying his books.  He just missed out on my Top 10 last year with his debut “Tall Oaks” and when his latest American set crime novel arrived I was convinced he would be topping best-seller lists.  He impressed me here with “how authentic the author’s creation of small town America feels, in terms  of speech, the environment, their cultural references and lives.  The prejudices and obsessions of  a small community is so effectively conveyed and I found the whole thing totally involving.”  Chris is a great friend to us bloggers.  I have interviewed him twice and he is the only author this year to make a comment on my review.  I have been told by other bloggers how enthusiastic he is about us all when appearing at book talks.  Oh, and his comment to me, just in case you haven’t seen it : “I love you, Phil. (I worry I don’t tell you that enough)”.  It wasn’t his flattery I succumbed to but the quality of his novel!The best crime novel I read this year.

Current Amazon sales rating: 61,735 in Books (it’s great commercial fiction which should be in Amazon’s best sellers).

6. Home Fire – Kamila Shamsie (Bloomsbury Circus 2017)  (Read and reviewed in September)

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Honestly, it is unlikely that I would have read Kamila Shamsie’s modern retelling of the Antigone myth had it not been longlisted for the Man Booker prize.  I was amazed it did not make the shortlist as I ask everyone who returns a library book copy whether they have enjoyed it and it universally gets the thumbs up.  The author, in this, her seventh novel has recast the ancient Greek characters as a Muslim family from Wembley. I said of this “Shamsie is educating, entertaining and gripping her readers in a manner which explores the potential of the plot in eye-opening, thought-provoking ways.  This feels like a very important novel for our times and yet has an age-old story as its framework.” A bag of M&Ms has a lot to answer for in this book.

Current Amazon sales rating: 2,197 in books

Next post – My Top 5 reads from 2017

100 Essential Books- Exposure – Helen Dunmore (Windmill 2016)

On By philshanklinIn 100 Essential, Books, New Books, Uncategorized4 Comments

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exposure

Helen Dunmore had me from the beginning of the first chapter;

“What could be safer than a primary school in Muswell Hill?” questions mother of three Lily. Well, as an ex-headteacher of a primary school in Muswell Hill I could certainly send her quite a list but the author had certainly grabbed my attention early on with this, her fourteenth novel.

I’ve read one of these before, “House Of Orphans” (2006) which was set in early twentieth century Finland.  I thought it had a very good first half but it fell apart for me towards the end, providing an enjoyable reading experience but it was not a book I loved nor did it have me rushing to read more.  Dunmore’s reputation has continued to grow and for the last few years I have suspected that I’ve been missing out on a major talent.  There’s enough evidence with her latest to suggest that this is the case.  This was, for me, a considerably more impressive novel.

Set in an England in 1960 still paranoid over high-profile Cold War spy cases such as Burgess and Maclean the effects of this paranoia on a family is effectively conveyed.  Ex-Cambridge student Simon Callington is working for the Admiralty when one evening he receives a phonecall from a colleague who has been hospitalised after a drunken fall.  The colleague, Giles, with whom, we discover, Simon has a history, has taken home a secret file and he asks Simon to collect it and return to the office.  This begins a chain of events which makes for gripping reading.

With Giles in his hospital bed and the evidence building against Simon the focus shifts to Simon’s wife Lily who has to manage the day to day things, such as survival and bringing up the children in straitened circumstances and away from the prying of the press.  It’s very much a story about attempting to maintain a semblance of normality under extraordinary conditions.  Lily knows about reinvention, a German Jewish refugee who escaped to England with her mother as a child, she has hidden her German roots but these inevitably come back amongst the waves of suspicion against her and her family.

Plot-wise it is simple but it works so well because of its introspection which has the characters focusing on the smaller details while big things are happening and yet alongside that it works like a thriller with tension building up.  Despite the simplicity there is a richness and a depth that I loved. On more than a few occasions it reminded me of a more modern adult “Railway Children”.  If this was intentional it is a clever nod to the children’s classic with its echoes of train whistles and a family adapting to life without father.  Helen Dunmore is also an award-winning poet and her feel for language is present throughout.  I really enjoyed this and the race for my reviewsrevues best read of 2017 starts here.

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“Exposure” has been shortlisted for the Bookhugger Book Of The Year over at Nudge books.  Take a look to see the other nominations and if this is your favourite read of the year vote for Helen Dunmore.  You have until 10th February to register your vote.

“Exposure” was published in paperback by Windmill Books in August 2016