The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Rating 3⭐s

You can buy The Picture of Dorian Gray...here

You can find out about the author...here

253 pages

• The Blurb...

Oscar Wilde's alluring novel of decadence and sin was a succès de scandale on publication. It follows Dorian Gray who, enthralled by his own exquisite portrait, exchanges his soul for eternal youth and beauty. Influenced by his friend Lord Henry Wotton, he is drawn into a corrupt double life, indulging his desires in secret while remaining a gentleman in the eyes of polite society. Only his portrait bears the traces of his depravity. This definitive edition includes a selection of contemporary reviews condemning the novel's immorality.

• Our Review...

Wilde's famous for his one and only novel. Dorian a young, very wealthy and strikingly handsome man loves himself so much he wishes for eternal youth as he is sitting, having his portrait painted. Low and behold after a while he notices his picture is ageing cruelly, but he is not. Dorian decides his life from now on will be one of excess and hedonism, knowing that there is no cost to his depravity (at least in the physical.) But how much depravity can one man sustain. How will it end. Will his past come back to claim revenge at some point?

Wilde famously was sent to prison for homosexuality, in a time when this was illegal. Reading The Picture of Dorian Gray (TPODG) feels like it is written by a man who wishes there was no consequences to his vices. If only Wilde could drain the shame out of himself and trap it in a painting, leaving him to lead a care free life. Of course the irony, these days his actions would not be illegal, he would suffer no guilt or shame. One century's crime is another centuries freedom.

Famous his wit and insight into society, TPODG is rife with razor sharp wit, beautifully balanced one liners and sage like asides on life and class. See selected quotes for just a few. So why only 3 stars? Well I feel the novel is less than the some of its component parts. It is pure upper middle class indulgent naval gazing, where the most pressing issue is how to deal with "ennui." No, i didn't know what it was either, It's a deep, existential weariness that comes from feeling like nothing is worth doing. I don't think i have ever been that far up the financial food chain to be rich enough from what is essentially very posh boredom. 

He is forever naval gazing and talking about himself. It is so very narcissistic and self indulgent. It is not a very attractive quality. "But it's just the character of Dorian Gray"  you say. But for reasons stated earlier Gray and Wilde seem to me to be one and the same person. His attitude to the lower class in general and women in particular speak to a lack of empathy. Yes he is insightful and witty but that wit is disparaging and cruel and self aggrandising. I can appreciate the humour and societal analysis but I don't think I'd go for a pint with Oscar Wilde/Dorian Gray.

• Selected Quotes...

The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They live as we all should live—undisturbed, indifferent, and without disquiet.

"she is a peacock in everything but beauty,"

The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself,

I should fancy that the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege of the rich."

In the common world of fact the wicked were not punished, nor the good rewarded. Success was given to the strong, failure thrust upon the weak. That was all.

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The Quiet American by Graham Greene

 

208 pages

Our Rating 5 ⭐s

You can buy The Quiet American...Here

You can find out more about the author...Here

• The Blurb...

Into the intrigue and violence of 1950s Saigon comes CIA agent Alden Pyle, a young idealistic American sent to promote democracy through a mysterious 'Third Force'.

As Pyle's naive optimism starts to cause bloodshed, his friend Fowler, a cynical foreign correspondent, finds it hard to stand aside and watch. But even as Fowler intervenes he wonders why: for the greater good, or something altogether more complicated?

• Our Review...

This is the third Graham Greene that I have read, after Brighton Rock and The Power And The Glory, and it is once again excellent.

Set in Vietnam in 1952 when the Vietnamese forces were fighting the French colonial power before they went on to defeat the USA. The tale focuses on three people. 

The old cynical English journalist Fowler, whose weapons of choice is a witty mind and a cruel tongue

His young local lover Phuong

An a newcomer to Indo-China. Pyle a young brash American. He is the human equivalent of a Labrador puppy. All innocent and bouncy but sadly lacking in nuance and decorum. He is working for the USA government in some pseudo industrial cartel/quango.

So the scene is set the males both want to be with Phuong. Phuong just wants a comfortable life. Pyle just turns up and oblivious to everyone else just blunders in  and Fowler is just hanging  on knowing his golden era is long gone but is just hanging on to the vestiges of life and love with Phuong. And so the three leads are obviously analogous to the politics of the time. ie the tug of war between the old powers and the new powers for countries that really just to be left alone. They have no interest in capitalism, communism or colonialism. They just want food, health and to be left alone. 

Greene manages to create a romance book about political intrigue in an historical flash-point that includes a whodunit and all the while it is an anti-war novel. That takes some doing not only that, it is one of the best books that I have ever read. 

In some ways Greene's novels are very diverse. Brighton Rock is about English Gangsters, The Power and the Glory is about the persecution of Catholic priests in Mexico, and the Quiet American is about political interference in Vietnam. However the backdrops may be different the same themes run through all. Morals, introspection, corruption both of the soul and the real world, loss, love and hope. 

The book is 73 years old but unbelievably it is more of the now than ever. I was born in 1967 so 73 years before that would have been 1894. I can't imagine a book written in 1894 being relevant in 1973 as The Quiet American is now. It forewarned of the naive, USA getting itself involved in a draining war over decades, which it had brought on itself by interfering in a different part of the word and a very different culture to itself which it has no idea about. For Vietnam 1955-1975 see Iraq 2003-2011, Afghanistan 2001-2021.

Similarly a film version was made starring Michael Caine and Brendan Fraser in a classic case of bad timing it was test screened in Sept 2001 but after 9/11 it was shelved for a few years as it was thought to be anti American.

However to focus on the political landscape of the novel would be to do it a disservice. There is so much more in this novel as hopefully the selected quotes will show. It encompasses a huge range of emotions and dilemmas. There are no good guys just guys who do the things they do for different reasons with different outcomes. No black and white just grey and shades.   

He just has an awareness of how emotions link  into small lives that link into bigger actions that develop into political and moral concepts. How everything in life relates to everything else like a circular butterfly effect.

I know others will read Greene and think  meh! 🤷 but he is just on my wavelength. I will read more Greene and look forward to reading his autibiography.

• Selected Quotes...

The Minister had a great respect for Pyle—Pyle had taken a good degree in—well, one of those subjects Americans can take degrees in: perhaps public relations or theatrecraft, perhaps even Far Eastern studies (he had read a lot of books).

Vietnamese Sureté that seemed to smell of urine and injustice.

It’s always the same wherever one goes—it’s not the most powerful rulers who have the happiest populations.’

The canal was full of bodies: I am reminded now of an Irish stew containing too much meat. The bodies overlapped: one head, seal-grey, and anonymous as a convict with a shaven scalp, stuck up out of the water like a buoy. There was no blood: I suppose it had flowed away a long time ago. I have no idea how many there were: they must have been caught in a cross-fire, trying to get back, and I suppose every man of us along the bank was thinking, ‘Two can play at that game.’ I too took my eyes away; we didn’t want to be reminded of how little we counted, how quickly, simply and anonymously death came.

Wouldn’t we all do better not trying to understand, accepting the fact that no human being will ever understand another, not a wife a husband, a lover a mistress, nor a parent a child? Perhaps that’s why men have invented God—a being capable of understanding.

‘And if you lose Phuong, will you be sensible?’ ‘Oh yes, I hope so. And you?’ ‘I doubt it. I might even run amok. Have you thought about that, Pyle?’ ‘I wish you’d call me Alden, Thomas.’ ‘I’d rather not. Pyle has got—associations.

You and your like are trying to make a war with the help of people who just aren’t interested.’ ‘They don’t want Communism.’ ‘They want enough rice,’ I said. ‘They don’t want to be shot at. They want one day to be much the same as another. They don’t want our white skins around telling them what they want.’

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Sinister Inheritance by Graham H Miller

 

Our Rating...4⭐s

You can buy Sinister Inheritance...Here

You can find out more about the author...Here

• The Blurb...

Melinda Lewis was the sole survivor when her family was murdered twelve years ago. She went on to die four years later. Which leaves Jonah Greene wondering why he's seen her in a cafe in France.

Anthony Bailey appears to have died in his sleep. But he leaves behind a property empire, and a widow that no-one in his family has ever met.

These are two of the cases that Jonah Greene must wrestle with when he returns from a break in France, while the powers that be try to shut both cases down. As the politics get more complicated, Jonah must use all his skill to investigate under the radar, and ensure justice is done.

• Our Review...

At last he is back.. "The Canton Columbo, The Shoestring of Splott." After 6 long years Jonah Greene, the Cardiff Coroners Officer returns to tackle not one but two cases of dodgy inheritance.

After recently reading a Pulitzer Prize winning novel, reading Sinister Inheritance felt like having a meal of fish and chips, after having a week on the froi gras and port. Simple but tasty but just what was needed after such a rich diet. 

So we have two potential perps (as the kid's say.) in one, if the person of interest is guilty they may have had provocation and mitigating circumstances. The other perp in the second crime is just an out and out wrong un. Contrast the two and even though both crimes are similar we view them in very different ways.

In the main case there is very little face to face confrontation. So much so that there is no direct dialogue between Jonah and his adversary until the last scene. This, I feel actually adds to the narrative. It has a feel of a cold war submarine war film. Both combatants, probing from a distance finding each others weakness. Imagine fighting an enemy you can't see.

I like the fact that Jonah is a semi-insular soul. Yes he has acquaintances and relationships. Yes he works for the coroner but he is a department of one. He doesn't spend a great deal of time with any one group or even one person including his wife. He is of his time I think in that he is in large part a loner, and he is comfortable with that. This seems to be the trend in modern society. 

Oops I'm rambling again. Back to the book. I really enjoyed it, as I knew I would. It bears the hallmarks of Graham H Miller, intriguing, interesting and easy to read.

This is Jonah's third outing after "The List" and "Buzzard House" both twisty police procedural novels. Once again in my head Jonah is operating in my head in the same literal universe as DI Mandy Wilde in the novels of Jacqueline Harret and possibly DI Mark Fagin books by Jason Chapman. I can get all the murder mystery I want without leaving Glamorgan, Gwent and Powys!

Graham H Miller never lets you down. But please don't make us wait another six years for the next instalment. 

• Selected Quotes...

Despite the warmth and friendly atmosphere he felt a sudden melancholy. It was the forced recognition that his children were growing up, forging their own lives. He knew they'd always need him, but not as much as previously. He'd be someone in their lives, just not at the centre of it.

November in Wales was never going to be good for someone’s mental health.

'I know it's not fashionable and probably doesn't fit in with modern restorative justice theories, but some people are just born wrong. With something missing. They are evil. Hundreds of years ago they'd have been driven out of villages or hanged. Now, they just walk among us.

closure.' He chuckled to himself although there was no humour in it. 'Stupid American phrase. What are those parents meant to do, once they get the news? Their only child was killed. Once they know, are they supposed to close that chapter? Just forget and get on with their lives.'

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Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

 

Our Rating 5⭐s

You can buy Demon Copperhead...Here

Find out about the author...Here

• The Blurb...

Demon's story begins with his traumatic birth to a single mother in a single wide trailer, looking like a little blue prizefighter. For the life ahead of him he would need all that fighting spirit along with buckets of charm, a quick wit and some unexpected talents, legal and otherwise.

In the southern Appalachain Mountains of Virginia, poverty isnt an idea, it's as natural as the grass grows. For a generation growing up in this world, at the heart of the modern opioid crisis, addiction isn't an abstraction, it's neighbours, parents and friends. "Family" could mean love or reluctant foster care For Demon born on the wrong side of luck, the affection and safety he craves is as remote as the ocean he dreams of seeing one day.

Suffused with truth, anger and compassion, Demon Copperhead is an epic tale of love, loss and everything in between.

 

• Our Review...

Often, when I read a book that has won multiple awards and received huge hype I find myself sub-consciously raising the bar that the book get over to genuinely feel loved by me. It's a " you come into my zone all hyped up with your medals thinking you can win, well we'll see about that!" There have not been many up to the challenge. Barbara Kingsolver has done it easy pops. 

What a ride. Famously based on Charles Dickens's David Copperhead, it also feels a little like trainspotting meets The Dukes of Hazzard but without the happy bits. But OMG what a powerful, emotional book.. 

We follow the life of Damon, a melungeon child, from birth to adulthood. Damon (or Demon as he becomes known) does not win the lottery of life.. No life of Princes William or Harry for him. He is born to an  addicted, trailer-dwelling, poor mother with a dead father. And things just get worse from here on. It is hugely Dickensian in its depiction of childhood poverty and exploitation. Add to this mix an abusive stepfather, cruel foster homes and the cherry on the cake, massive industrial scale opioid abuse. It sounds like a horrific read and yes at times it is very challenging. If you have even an ounce of empathy it will make you cry. But this book makes you feel everything.

The novel is written in southern USA states vernacular which it had to be as the location is intrinsic to the story. It does take some getting used to as a Brit. But it is worth it as it adds an authenticity to the narrative. I felt a strong association with the people of Appalachia. A historically strong coal mining area that was the powerhouse of the country, both now having been sucked dry of both coal and money have been left to rot by their national political overlords. Good people that have been ridiculed in the media as stupid, incestuous, bestial. It seemed to me that she could have been writing about Wales, and it broke my heart just a little more. 

The book was choc full of literary gems. See selected quotes for a few. When reading I highlighted 60+ quotes that I could use to demsonstare Kingsolver's similie and metaphor use or to show her clarity of thought. A gifted writer she can explain complex situations in few words.. Masterful.

Over the years I have often read of the mythical quest to find the great American novel or author e.g. Hemmingway, Faulkner, McCarthy, Steinbeck. All of these authors I feel searching for the distillation of what is America. I get the impression that they see the essence of America as a candle light in the darkness, a hope that truth and justice will guide us home.  I feel Kingsolver sees  it for what it is. An oncoming train heading down the tunnel.A train  that doesn't care if it goes through you, your friends, your family or your people. People are a resource or source of income to be used and abused. Government of the people, by the people, for the people = absolute bollox. And the same applies in the UK. Corporations, Media, Tech, power, super wealth, corruption it all stinks like a whores draws. Nothing is done for the people and hasn't for a long time. Kingsolver sees this and this is why this is the great American novel.

When reading this book I think it helps if the reader is of a certain age and has suffered some of what circumstance and poverty can inflict. Demon may be our protagonist but ultimately it is the backdrop that takes centre stage. Life in all it's rawness will engulf us all at some stage. It can overwhelm for entire lifespan if we let it. Ultimately this book isn't about poverty, addiction, loss or fate, it's about a more important thing than that. It's about how we face these things. Do we curl up into a ball and just take the kicking or say no I am not accepting that. I am going to be better and tomorrow I will be better than today. What is inside me is more important than what is outside. 

This is a great book. It will be in my top 10 of all time and I will read the Poison Wood Bible. 

• Selected Quotes...

Kid born to the junkie is a junkie. He’ll grow up to be everything you don’t want to know, the rotten teeth and dead-zone eyes,

A whole new life for young Demon was Stoner’s plan, described to me one morning at breakfast after Mom left for work. I was going to learn self-discipline, like they teach you in the army. Not that Stoner had done military service, mind you. I reckon he saw the movie.

By the time Mariah got to the courtroom her scars were healed. Not his. If you’ve noticed, it’s the prettiest people that everybody wants to believe,

If you’re standing on a small pile of shit, fighting for your one place to stand, God almighty how you fight.

We both lay back down, and she looked at me in the eyes, and we were sad together for a while. I’ll never forget how that felt. Like not being hungry.

Being checked out of school mentalwise for the last year and then some, I was so far behind it looked like a race with my own ass. But the weirdness wasn’t in what I didn’t know. It’s what I did know. How to watch your back at all times. What a hooker means by “fun” and an asshole means by “discipline” and a caseworker means by “We’re working on it.” And money. Christ. Watching these kids pull it out of their pockets in fistfuls of fives or ones or tens, holding out the whole wad for the lunch lady to pick through, like they don’t know the difference. Or don’t care.

wondered how it would feel to like who you are,

Certain pitiful souls around here see whiteness as their last asset that hasn’t been totaled or repossessed.

The wonder is that you could start life with nothing, end with nothing, and lose so much in between.

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The Boy From The Sea by Garret Carr

 

You can buy The Boy From The Sea...Here

You can find out more about the author...Here

Our Rating 3⭐s

• The Blurb...

In 1973 on the west coast of Ireland, a baby is found abandoned on the beach. Who is he? Where is he from?

Ambrose a local fisherman, is far more interested in who he will become and – with a curious community looking on – takes the baby home and adopts him. But for Declan, the baby’s new brother, this arrival is surely bad news. Rivalries can be decades in the making . . .

Set over twenty years, The Boy from the Sea is about a restless boy trying to find his place, in a town caught in the storm of a rapidly changing world.

• Our Review...

The Boy From The Sea (TBFTS) tells the story of Brendan a new born baby washed ashore in half barrel to the shores of the West of Ireland. Taken under the wing of the village as something akin to a spiritual gift from the Sea Gods. He swiftly ends up being ensconced in the Bonnar household with kindly, hardworking dad Ambrose, caring and nuturing mum Christine and jealous as hell older natural born brother Declan.

We follow their adventures over the following decades through the trauma of Christine's fathers illness, the self sacrifice of her sister Phyllis, the ups and downs of the fishing industry and the slow depressing grind of Donegal catching up with the late 20th century and all that it brings. The main relationships feel like a battle. Always fighting repression, resentment and economic erosion. Will the adoptive brothers ever treat each other with love? Will Phyllis and Christine come to terms with the roles that they have slipped into? Will his family ever give Ambrose the peace he is looking for? The questions are well set but the answers, if they are answered at all, aren't what we desire. 

 The enduring after taste is one of sadness and depression. It took an unexpected left turn when of the main characters dies, and not just dies but dies off screen, so to speak. We only get to hear about it via a letter from a family member, which just felt odd. There doesn't seem to be a resolution to any of the conflicts raised between the family members, The plot doesn't feel like a plot, more just an unending soap opera with an Irish setting . It's ending just sort of drifts and doesn't actually end. Is there a message? if there is it must be that life is an awful grind so be prepared.

This wasn't my cup of tea, it took me almost a month to get through.  This is probably down to my foibles and subjectivity although on the plus side I have discovered though that family saga novels may not be for me. I have no doubt that anyone who enjoys this genre may well give this 5 stars instead of the 3 stars that I gave it. 

That's not to say this novel is without merit. On the contrary the author does an excellent job of evoking the West of Ireland in the 70s and 80s. Laced through out the narrative are occasions of Irish charm and and whimsy but overall it left me feeling a little bit sad.

• Selected Quotes...

The tide brought the child in,’ he said, ‘he was laid in a barrel.’ Attempts were made to get sense out of him. ‘Who’s he belonging to?’ asked Justine O’Donnell. ‘He’s a gift from the sea,’

this was before contraception so things were simpler, so simple some of us went a year or two unsure if we were technically virgins or not.

By making it clear he wanted to impress her, Ambrose had handed Christine the role of being hard to impress, and therefore put her in command. She decided to keep hold of this position.

fundamentally, every child comes in from the sea, washes up against the ankles of their parents, arms outstretched, ready to be shaped by them but with some disposition already in place, deep-set and never quite knowable.

When Ambrose was young, shortage still looked like it did in history books: poor people had no electricity, no bank account, no teeth, but they didn’t have debt either; they lived outside money, in inherited cottages and supported by relatives and the community. But those people were gone, everyone had money now, just not enough. Shortage had become pernicious and harder to recognize. It crept into your brain and gave you no peace, keeping you at every moment aware of your home’s easy crushability. And it was almost impossible to talk about. Many families were this way, but you still felt alone with it, so alone.

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Still Life by Sarah Winman

  

Our Rating 4.5⭐s

You can buy "Still Life"...here

You can find out about the author...here

• The Blurb...

1944, Italy. As bombs fall around them, two strangers meet in the ruined wine cellar of a Tuscan villa and share an extraordinary evening.

Ulysses Temper is a young British soldier, Evelyn Skinner a 64-year-old art historian living life on her own terms. She has come to salvage paintings from the wreckage of war and relive memories of her youth when her heart was stolen by an Italian maid in a particular room with a view. Ulysses’ chance encounter with Evelyn will transform his life – and all those who love him back home in London – forever.

Uplifting, sweeping and full of unforgettable characters, Still Life is a novel about beauty, love, family and friendship.

• Our Review...

This is a very different book for me to read, totally not of my usual fare. I normally go in for twisty plots, thrilling chase to a climatic end and a denouement of the arch villain. This book isn't like that. It is akin to a family saga (although the protagonists are mostly unrelated) that covers roughly 75 years from about 1900 on. It does so in two stages 1945 to 75ish and the last part of the book relates to Evelyn remembering her early twenties.

Evelyn and Ulysses cross paths during the war and the story follows them as they weave their way through the subsequent years until they both end up where they first met in Florence, birth place of the Renaissance. Indeed Florence is as much a presence in this book as any of the characters. It and its art and its architecture and its soul are intertwined in every chapter. You would do well to keep a phone or PC next to you when reading this book to look up the numerous works of art and areas of the city that are constantly mentioned throughout. I only did this towards the end of the novel and wished I had started doing so earlier.

So the author clearly has a huge passion for both Florence and the appreciation of art. The love of art in this narrative is borderline obsessive with a sprinkle of pretentiousness. hence the 4.5 instead of 5 stars. Maybe I am a bit too basic in my outlook. I think art is a pleasure in life, this novel puts art on a level with love as being one of the vital drivers of life which is a little bit of a reach for me. I suppose the pursuit of art becomes more of a priority if you don't have to think about where your next meal, or the payment for the roof over your head is coming from. This is not a criticism, it is just my lived experience. 

The decades long soap opera of a story follows the working class found family of Ulysses in London's East End and the life and loves of Evelyn a teacher and art lover from a very privileged background, who comes across many famous artists and authors including a young E.M. Forster. The cast is wide and deep including a very wise old man, who doesn't really know how wise he is, a love interest who is hard as nails and a heartbreaker and the most intelligent and linguistically gifted parrot in the whole of literature. Life happens to them all. Lifelong unrequited love, coming of age, loss, friendship, good luck, bad luck and serendipity. Fortunes are never too good nor too bad but a little of both and at often at the same time. From the book I think the lesson is it matters not what tribulations may come it is how we face them that is of more importance. And the best way to do this is with friends and above all kindness. What can I say, I like books with a moral compass.

However, where this book towers above the herd is how the author delivers the big poignant moments in life. You don't read this book, you feel it. It'll make you double cry, tears of both happiness and despair.  There are times in life e.g. when your father passes away or when you hold your grandchild in your arms for the first time, when time stops, and you connect with...with well everything and the author conveys these many moments in this novel. The sweet sadness of life and the sad sweetness of death tear on the threads in your emotions. It feels as if you are living the opening scene of Disney's "Up" or that scene from Jon Voight's "The Champ." It is amazing to think that just looking at words in a book can induce such wild emotions in the reader. It really is a kind of magic or legal drug dealing. Sarah Winman should change her name to Houdini Escobar. Wow.. just wow.

• Selected Quotes...

The man was a dreamer, he said. Had a loser’s luck and a winning smile and was never happy unless he had a churn in his guts that denoted money riding on an outcome. A feeling he often equated to love.

We like beauty, don’t we? Something good on the eye cheers us. Does something to us on a cellular level, makes us feel alive and enriched. Beautiful art opens our eyes to the beauty of the world, Ulysses. It repositions our sight and judgement. Captures forever that which is fleeting.

She’s gone up in the world. Typist. Sixty words a minute and that’s just her gob.

You’re a good mum, Peg. No I’m not but it’s good of you to say. Your mum was a good mum, Temps. That’s what a good mum is. Mine was competition.

Her beauty had been her currency. Always had been. No one talked about when the bank ran dry as it inevitably would.

We shall be at war one day with your European brothers, as you call them, Mr Collins. It’s inevitable, said Mr Lugg. They’re not like us. But they want what we have. And do we not want what they have, Mr Lugg? Michelangelo? Dante? Beauty? Wine on a sun-drenched terrace? Villas nestled in the hills going for a song? Mr Lugg ignored Mr Collins and reached for a plate of stinking goat’s cheese. Yes, but will you fight? said the reverend, bringing the conversation back to British imperialism. It’s a simple question. For what cause? said Mr Collins. Cause is irrelevant. Cause is not irrelevant. To teach another nation a lesson, then, said the reverend. A nation is not a person. And so I will not.

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      Sarah Winman author of Still Life

Mick Herron; The New Charles Dickens?

 

While recently re-reading the wonderful Mick Herron's Slow Horses, a re run of Oliver the musical was on the TV. This serendipitous coincidence led me to muse on the writings of both master story tellers. I began to jot down a few similarities, the list grew quite quickly. Here are some of my more coherent thoughts ...

Mick Herron's Slough House series and Charles Dickens' works, particularly Oliver Twist, share striking similarities, especially in their portrayal of misfits, institutional corruption, and the grim reality of London. Both authors use a cast of eccentric, flawed characters to critique the failings of the system, a system that spits out those it deems unworthy.

​The Unlikely Mentors: Jackson Lamb and Fagin

At the heart of both narratives are morally ambiguous patriarchs who preside over a group of outcasts. Jackson Lamb, the flatulent and slovenly head of Slough House, is a modern-day Fagin. Like Fagin, Lamb is a master manipulator who thrives on the margins, using the failures of others to secure his own position. He's a cynical, often cruel, mentor to his "slow horses." Just as Fagin's gang of pickpockets is a family born of circumstance and survival, the slow horses are a family forged in professional purgatory. Lamb's decrepit office, a mirror of Fagin's squalid den, is both a refuge and a prison. It's a place where the unwanted are given purpose, however inglorious that purpose may be.

​The Aspiring Apprentices: River Cartwright and the Artful Dodger

​Within this motley crew, the young, ambitious, and often reckless River Cartwright stands in for the Artful Dodger. River, like the Dodger, is full of bluster and a misplaced sense of competence. He has a quick wit and a desire to prove himself, but his impulsiveness and a naive belief in the righteousness of the system often get him into trouble. While the Dodger's aspirations are criminal, River's are noble—he wants to be a "real" spy. Both characters are defined by their potential, their street smarts, and their struggle to navigate a world that has branded them as failures. The Dodger is an expert pickpocket; River, for all his mistakes, has a certain raw talent for espionage.

​The Tragic Figures: Kathryn Standish and Miss Havisham

​The parallel between Kathryn Standish and Miss Havisham (not from Oliver Twist but from Great Expectations) is one of profound sadness and shattered lives. Just as Miss Havisham's world stopped on her wedding day, Kathryn's life was irrevocably broken by the death of her boss and hero Charles Partner. Both women are trapped in a past they cannot escape. Standish, like Havisham, is a haunting presence, a figure of melancholic despair. Her struggles with alcoholism and her constant emotional fragility are a testament to her arrested development, a life on pause. She serves as a poignant reminder of the collateral damage caused by the cold, unforgiving world of espionage, much as Miss Havisham embodies the tragic consequences of a life consumed by bitterness and a broken heart.

​The Institution and the City: Slough House and Victorian London 

​Mick Herron's Slough House is a physical embodiment of the broken bureaucracy of MI5, much like the workhouses and legal systems of Victorian London were to Dickens. Both authors use their settings as characters in themselves. Slough House, with its decaying facade and stench of failure, is as much a symbol of systemic decay as the smog-choked, crime-ridden streets of London in Dickens' novels. Both environments are teeming with misfits and those abandoned by society, forced to fend for themselves in a world that has no use for them. Herron, like Dickens, masterfully crafts a world that is simultaneously bleak and darkly comedic, exposing the absurdity and cruelty of institutions that prioritise power over people.

The brooding bullies: Lady Diana Taverner and Bill Sikes 

Every story needs a bad guy/boogeyman. Ours are both compelling antagonists who embody different facets of a ruthless world, yet share a core similarity in their unwavering focus on self-preservation and control. Both are intimidating personalities and they know others see them as such. Both use this fear of themselves to their  own advantage. Both have a position of power over our protagonists (Lamb and Fagin.) While Taverner operates within the polished, bureaucratic world of MI5 and Sikes in the grimy underworld of Victorian London, both characters are defined by their ambition and their willingness to use others as a means to an end.

​Taverner, often referred to as "Lady Di," is the quintessential modern-day schemer, using manipulation and political manoeuvring to climb the ladder at MI5. Her primary motivation is to ascend to the top position, "First Desk," and she views people, including her colleagues, as pawns in a long-game chess match. She is an embodiment of the "new corporate world of espionage," where image and success matter more than principles.  This parallels Bill Sikes's brutal and pragmatic approach to his criminal enterprises. Sikes, a professional burglar and murderer, uses intimidation and violence to assert his dominance and ensure his survival. While his methods are primitive and visceral compared to Taverner's calculated psychological warfare, the end goal is the same: to get what he wants, regardless of the human cost.  Both characters maintain a tight grip on those around them, demanding absolute loyalty and obedience. Taverner's cold and superior demeanour instils fear in her subordinates, a tactic she is "definitely aware" of and uses to "turn up the volume." Sikes's control is more overt and physically brutal, exemplified by his abusive relationship with Nancy. Both characters see emotional attachments as vulnerabilities. Taverner's lack of empathy is a key part of her personality, allowing her to make ruthless decisions without a second thought. Sikes, though a "somewhat conflicted character" with a "small spark of compassion," ultimately proves his monstrous nature by killing Nancy when he perceives her as a threat to his position and freedom. The two characters, despite their vastly different settings, are united by their shared nature as cold, calculating individuals who prioritise their own interests above all else.

The former colleagues now the harbingers of doom: Jacob Marley and Dickie Bow.

Even minor characters echo each other e.g. a former colleague's death plays heavily on our protagonist's mind. Something is amiss. Our protagonist feels an overwhelming need to correct a wrong. Could Jacob Marley be a precursor to Dickie Bow (which in itself sounds like a Dickensian name!) 

The evolution of descriptive scene setting.

It's not just in the characters I see Dickens influence. Some of the descriptive writing is eerily reminiscent of Dickens. I place before you a sample of A Tale Of Two Cities 

"There was a steaming mist in all the hollows, and it had roamed in its forlornness up the hill, like an evil spirit, seeking rest and finding none. A clammy and intensely cold mist, it made its slow way through the air in ripples that visibly followed and overspread one another, as the waves of an unwholesome sea might do. It was dense enough to shut out everything from the light of the coach-lamps but these its own workings, and a few yards of road; and the reek of the labouring horses steamed into it, as if they had made it all."

Now, compare to this to Herron's description of the darkness of  night creeping over London in London Rules.

When dusk at last comes it comes from the corners, where it’s been waiting all day and seeps through Slough House the way ink seeps through water; first casting tendrils, then becoming smoky black cloud and at last being everywhere, the way it always wants to be. Its older brother night has broader footfall, louder voice, but dusk is the family sneak, a hoarder of secrets. In each of the offices it prowls by the walls, licking the skirting boards, testing the pipes and out on the landings it fondles doorknobs, slips through keyholes, and is content. It leans hard against the front door – which never opens, never closes –and pushes softly on the back, which jams in all weathers; it presses down on every stair at once, making none of them creak, and peers through both sides of each window. In locked drawers it hunts for its infant siblings, and with everyone it finds it grows a little darker. Dusk is a temporary creature, and always has been. The faster it feeds, the sooner it yields to the night."

When comparing the two it's like comparing a photo of my son to a photo of my mother. They are different but the same genes can clearly been seen to run through both. 

And finally...

Of course all of this is just conjecture. If I may create an idiom car crash I might say my ramblings may be the delusions of a fan trying to hammer a round peg into a square hole with his with his rose coloured glasses and tunnel vision blinkers on. Or perhaps I'm barking up the wrong tree. Whatever the answer I would hate if Mr Herron ended up flogging a dead horse. It doesn't really matter where he gets his inspirations as long as his Slow Horses series continue galloping along. Thank you for listening to my Ted Talk 😁

x

The Welsh Man by Dave Lewis

 

Our Rating 3⭐s

You can buy The Welsh Man...here

About the author...here

• The Blurb..

An authentic British road trip and old-fashioned love story. A violent but compelling tale of grim landscapes and dark morality. Paul Thorne is no angel. A hard man with a troubled past, his mistake was to fall for the wrong girl. When he said yes to love, he opened the door to death.

A tragic accident finds him running for his life from a vicious London crime boss. He seeks sanctuary in a sleepy, Welsh seaside town but instead of solace, he finds jealousy and betrayal.

A brutal journey through the underbelly of 80s and 90s Britain. Violent and sad. Powerful, beautiful prose lingers like a bruise, haunting the mind, long after the last page is read.

• Our Review...

The Welsh Man tells the tale of Paul. Big  lovable but rough man from a lovable but rough part of the world. The Welsh Valleys are a place like no other. To most brits going to the valleys is like going back in time 50 years, which can be a good thing or a bad thing.

 Due to their weird geography they are not your average urban rough area. Most valleys run north–south, roughly parallel to each other, creating a “hand and fingers” pattern of development. flanked by steep hillsides, often covered in open moorland or dense forest. Between the valleys lie high, relatively remote plateaux that contrast with the busy valley floors. The topography restricts movement between valleys, with only a few high passes connecting them. Settlements stretch along the valley bottoms and lower slopes, forming long, narrow towns rather than compact cities.The geography shaped the rise of coal and iron industries in the 18th and 19th centuries, with mining communities built into the hillsides. Railways and roads snake through the valleys, linking communities but rarely crossing the uplands. 

The result is often ribbons of semi autonomous urban wasteland. very different to the rougher areas of London, Manchester or Glasgow. I often thought of the valleys as being like heroin. Amazing but cruel and can even drag you down to despair. But I love it (The valleys not drugs obv) 

The humour is self deprecating. eg. more blown out windows than Beirut, twinned with Mordor. Being a valley commando (as locals are known within Wales) is akin to being a member of the mafia, or the IRA. Once you're in you're never out. Fierce enemies and fierce friends, they will rob your last penny but will give you their last penny. They are honest and honest to your face, which some find rude. 

It is hard to find novels set in the valleys. As always Wales flies under the radar. So I chose this novel to read in part to see how the author (a fellow valley boy) portrays the mothership. And he's got it bang on. Hard as nails with a heart of gold.   

We follow Paul from Porth. A kind but tough kid from a broken home who finds his way into being a bouncer back in the 90s. He meets and falls in lovely with Charley. So far so good, but Charley one day just leaves, leaving Paul heartbroken. He eventually drifts to London and ends up working for some very serious gangsters. I'll leave the story there to avoid spoilers.

The story isn't a particularly complex one, but then not all stories have to be complex. The novel is very violent, as the subject matter dictates. The prose is sparing but accurate. Reminded me of Cormac McCarthy but from Wales with better punctuation.

 Overall I though it was OK and nice to read about the valleys.  

• Selected Quotes...

The valleys left a mark on you for sure and I’ve certainly inherited the sick sense of humour and extraordinary spirit about the place. Deprivation and hardship became a badge of belonging. You know what I mean? Everyone’s had to suffer something; otherwise you wouldn’t fit in.

The bouncers know the clubs are swimming with drugs, the punters know, the dealers know, the manager knows and of course the cops know. Nobody does anything though. There is just too much money to be made and it’s too much hassle to try to stop it. Everyone knows this except the poor, law-abiding parents of the unfortunate sods that get poisoned every weekend.

It’s getting late and Charley decides it’s time Cara was safely tucked up in bed. Michael wasn’t arguing and was keen to do the tucking, with a capital F.

The legacy of the Tory policy to divide and conquer, leaving the hapless and hopeless to scrounge around for the scraps thrown to them by those lucky enough to have been dealt a better hand in life’s sick poker game.

I decided enough time had elapsed to risk it. I’d go home. Back to the land of my father. The father who was god knows where.

• If You Liked This Then You May Like...

East of England by Eammon Griffin (review here)

Get Carter by Ted Lewis

He Died With His Eyes Open by Derek Raymond