A Line To Kill by Anthony Horrowitz

 

368 Pages

You can buy A Line To Kill...Here

You can follow Anthony Horrowitz...Here

• The Blurb...

Private Investigator Daniel Hawthorne and the writer Anthony Horowitz have been invited to a literary festival on the island of Alderney to talk about their new book . . .

Very soon they discover that dark forces are at work.

Alderney is in turmoil over a planned power line that will cut through it, desecrating a war cemetery and turning neighbour against neighbour.

And the visiting authors seem to be harbouring any number of unpleasant secrets.

When the festival's wealthy sponsor is found brutally murdered, Alderney goes into lockdown and Hawthorne knows he doesn't have to look too far for suspects. There's no escape. The killer is still on the island.

And there's about to be a second death . . .

• My Review...

This is the third book in the Hawthorne investigates series (book 4  A Twist of The Knife is out this August) Having written some Sherlock Holmes novels, the author has updated the format. There is still a "consulting detective" who is frustratingly idiosyncratic but with a forensic eye for detail.  (As an aside Hawthorne is played in my head by Phillip Glenister and has been in the first two books as well 🤷) The semi-bumbling sidekick now though is no longer an ex army doctor. The sidekick is an author, actually it's the author! The prose is therefore in the first person. I must say I really enjoy the format. It may be heresy to say so, but I like them better than the original Sherlock Holmes tales, which can be a bit odd ( I'm looking at you A Study in Scarlet!)

As well as solving whatever is the current murder, our protagonist author slowly uncovers more of Hawthorne's past in each book. So both our main characters are working on mysteries. This book is no exception, we find snippets of our hero's dark past, with the promise of more to come in the next book.

I chose this book to get me out of reading slump (see Here to read about my slump and how I got out of it.) Why? because of the standard of quality that the author consistently produces. A Horrowitz book is like a Marks & Spencers pair of pants, they'll never let you down.

The plot centres around a Literary Festival on the island of Alderney. The author believes he us on home ground at a literary event and Hawthorne will lean to him for guidance. How wrong he was!

Numerous characters have motives for the murder. The characters never jumble themselves up in my head reading a Horrowitz book. We pick through each suspect in turn. Yet again I failed to get the whodunnit. He is very good at hiding the wrong uns.

Another quality murder mystery from one of the big guns.

• Selected Quotes

"I’m afraid they’ll look for someone else who will.’ ‘They can’t do that, can they?’ ‘You don’t own Hawthorne, Anthony. If anything, he owns you."

"I’ve described many deaths in the course of my work, in books and on TV, but I’m not sure I’ve ever managed to capture the absolute horror of the real thing. It’s the smell that hits you first, sickening and unmistakable. Dead actors look nothing like dead people. Once the blood has settled and life has drained away, the human body doesn’t look remotely human."

"Hawthorne was far from straightforward, but he was always honest."

"The next thing I knew, it was morning and I was aware that I was no longer alone in the room. Someone had woken me up. I opened my eyes and then closed them again. Hawthorne was standing at the end of my bed. I couldn’t believe he was there. How had he even got into the room? ‘Hawthorne…’ I muttered. It was outrageous. I was asleep, unshaven, in my undershorts, in bed. ‘Tony, mate, get up and get dressed,’ Hawthorne said. ‘There’s been a murder.’"

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

The List by Graham H Miller... (click Here for our review.)

The Nesting Place by Jacqueline Harret (click Here for our review.)

And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie

• About The Author...

Anthony Horowitz is one of the most prolific and successful writers working in the  UK and is unique for working across so many media. Anthony is a born polymath; juggling writing books, TV series, films, plays and journalism.

Anthony has written over 40 books including the bestselling teen spy series Alex Rider, which he adapted into a movie that was released worldwide in 2006. The Alex Rider series is estimated to have sold 19 million copies worldwide. His highly anticipated novel, Oblivion, the epic conclusion to the Power of Five series, was published in October 2012. Anthony is also an acclaimed writer for adults and was commissioned by the Conan Doyle Estate and Orion Books to write two new Sherlock Holmes novels. The House of Silk was published in November 2011 and was internationally lauded as the top title of the autumn. The sequel, Moriarty, was published in October 2014 with similar success. Most recently he was commissioned by the Ian Fleming Estate to write the James Bond novel Trigger Mortis, which was published on 8th September 2015.

Anthony is responsible for creating and writing some of the UK’s most beloved and successful television series, producing the first seven episodes (and the title) of Midsomer Murders. He is the writer and creator of award-winning drama series Foyle’s War, which was the Winner of the Lew Grade Audience award for BAFTA. DCS Foyle was voted the nation’s favourite detective in 2011. Anthony has also written other original complex dramas for ITV, particularly thrillers. Collision, a major five part “state of the nation” piece was transmitted on ITV1 in November 2009 to seven million viewers a night. He followed this with the equally successful legal thriller Injustice, also for ITV 1 - transmitted in June 2011. Foyle’s War returned in March 2013 as a Cold War thriller and was greeted with such critical acclaim and demands for more that he wrote one final series, bringing the show to an end in January 2015. Anthony's latest show New Blood will premiere on BBC iPlayer later this year.

Anthony is on the board of the Old Vic Theatre. He regularly contributes to a wide variety of national newspapers and magazines on subjects ranging from politics to education and currently has a travel column in The Telegraph. He has been a patron to East Anglia Children’s Hospices and the anti-bullying charity, Kidscape, since 2008.

In 2019 Anthony became a Patron to Home-Start in Suffolk, a small local family support charity working with families across the Suffolk county, as they navigate through challenging circumstances such as mental health issues, bereavement, long term or terminal illness, isolation, domestic abuse, poverty and so much more. The valuable work the organisation does right in the heart of the community – bringing together trained volunteers into families lives to support them both practically and emotionally, helping them to grow in confidence and empowering them with the skills to raise their children to flourish – is why Anthony chose to support this dedicated and hardworking charity. And in Anthony’s own word – “For me, charity begins at Home-Start.”

Anthony was awarded an OBE for his services to literature in January 2014.

The Family Man by KimberleyChambers

 

491 Pages

You can buy The Family Man...Here

You can follow Kimberley Chambers...Here

Reviewed by Owen Powell 

• The Blurb...

Meet the Bonds

Kenny Bond is finally out of prison after doing a long stretch for killing a copper, and is determined to get back to life on the straight and narrow.

A family like no other

Kenny’s son Donny might lack his father’s edge but his twin grandsons, Beau and Brett – well, they are Bonds through and through. Like him, they won’t let anyone stand in their way.

But they’re about to meet their match

Family comes before everything else for Kenny, but there’s a feud brewing that could cause murder, and a new family on Dark Lane might bring the Bonds to their knees. Kenny’s determined that nothing, and no one, will threaten his family. But can the Bonds stick together when someone’s out to take them down?

• My Review...

I have never been more caught off guard by a book than I was with The Family Man. At first, I thought I had a pretty good idea of what this British gangland drama would entail. Dodgy dealings, elaborate heists, ruthless kingpins etc. Basically I was envisioning a novelisation of Guy Ritchie’s ‘Snatch’. However, this book completely subverted these naive expectations by offering something else entirely. This is not some dark comedy action romp. This is a tragic story of love, death, and most of all, family. 

I say story, but there are in fact many stories within this book. The same can also be said about its main characters. There is nothing that truly predominates anything else within these pages. The focus shifts from story to story and from character to character. The one thing that unites them all, however, is the Bond family. Unsurprisingly, ‘family’ is a major theme throughout The Family Man. However, despite it’s aptly-named title, a family friendly story this is most certainly not. This book deals with a lot of dark and explicit material and it is definitely not for the faint of heart. There are also no shortage of graphic sexual depictions, although thankfully these are brief. The story also spans multiple decades, we see how these characters have evolved from the often traumatic events they endured in years past, which I found rather interesting. The characters themselves are well-written and believable, with clear motivations for each one. They aren’t entirely likeable, but that was probably the point. The dialogue between them was definitely the standout of this book for me. You truly get an insight into who these characters are based solely on the way that they speak. There are also a few scandalous plot twists scattered throughout this book, which I am always a fan of. I feel that if a book can physically make your jaw drop, then it’s doing it’s job well.

That being said, there are a few aspects of this book that made me reluctant to return to it. This is a rather long book at 491 pages, and there were many rapid transitions from scene to scene which I found to be quite jarring at times. As well as this, there are a sheer abundance of characters in this book. There were so many people to keep track of that I found myself trying to remember who was who more than a few times. Finally, the ending I found to be rather abrupt and underwhelming, considering everything that preceded it.

Overall, The Family Man is a decent enough read for fans of British gangland dramas. It’s full of underhanded gambits, brutal acts of violence and heinous love affairs. It’s not a perfect book, but it does it’s job fairly well

• Selected Quotes...

‘You told us if anyone hits us, we gotta hit ‘em back twice as hard,’ Brett reminded his father. ‘I didn’t mean your bloody teacher, ya pair of doughnuts.’

Kenny took the lid off the bottle of Cognac. It had not only been a long day, it had been a long fucking month for him.

‘Me and you are the same. We’re family men. Move heaven and earth to protect our loved ones.’

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

Outcast by Kerry Barnes

Turf War by Mark Romain

Her Revenge by Emma Talon

• About The Author

Born and bred in Dagenham, I left school at sixteen with no qualifications and not a clue what I wanted to do in life. My mother was a tough woman, old school, and when she threw water over my head one morning, demanding I get up and get myself a job, I took myself off to Roman Road market.

“Need any help?” was my chat up line and, luckily for me, a lovely stall holder called Harold took a chance on me. I started around the back of the stall as a tea girl on eight quid a day. But I soon got promoted around the front when I rugby tackled a woman who ran off with a handful of our coats.

I spent many happy years selling ladies fashion down the Roman, until Tower Hamlets council decided to wreck the market by stopping free parking and by bringing in permits. In just six months, everyone was struggling and the best market ever was as dead as a dodo.

A big fan of music I fell into DJ-ing next, nothing special, just local pubs and clubs. It was a good laugh at the time but was never going to be a job for life, and I soon moved on to mini cabbing. I did that for ten years, working nights around the Romford area. I’d always been a bit of a wild child and led a colourful existence and used to joke to my pals that one day I’d write a book. And at 38, still driving a cab, I took the bull by the horns.  I didn’t have a clue what I was doing but after I got over the first chapters of Billie Jo, the rest kind of came naturally to me.

It took me a year to finish that book and then within twenty-four hours of sending it off I had an agent on the phone. Four other agents contacted me shortly afterwards and it all took off from there.

My first book deal was a small one, with a new imprint at Random House. But by the time Billie Jo hit the shelves, I’d finished my second book and signed a new contract which enabled me to give up the mini-cabbing and become a full time writer.

The Betrayer quickly followed, along with my trilogy, The Feud, The Traitor and The Victim. It was at that point that I moved to HarperCollins and penned The Schemer. My fortunes improved after I moved publisher, as my books got into the supermarkets and began to climb the charts. Getting to number 1 on the Sunday Times bestseller chart with Payback, the second in the Butler series, was literally one of the best moments of my life. It was completely unexpected and totally surreal.

However, I still can’t type and all my books are written by hand. I’m as thick as two short planks with computers and have no keyboard skills whatsoever. But I’ve tried not to let that hold me back – you can’t be good at everything.

My biggest regret is that my parents aren’t around to share my success, but I like to think that they are looking down on me.

I’d like to say a massive thank you to all of my readers, as well as my ex work colleagues and the brilliant team at HarperCollins. Each and every one of you have played a part in helping me get to where I am today.

My story is an unusual one, but I’m living proof you should never give up on your dreams.

A Shadow On The Lens by Sam Hurcom

 

231 Pages

You can buy A Shadow On The Lens...Here

You can follow Sam Hurcon...Here

You can follow the publishers, Orion Books...Here

• The Blurb...

1904. Thomas Bexley, one of the first forensic photographers, is called to the sleepy Welsh village of Dinas Powys. A yound girl by the name of Betsan Tilny has been found murdered in the woodland. But the crime scene appears staged and worse still: the locals are reluctant to help.

One night, he develops the crime scene photographs in the cellar of his lodgings. There, he finds a face dimly visible in the photographs - the shadowed spectre of Betsan Tilny.

In the days that follow, Thomas senses a growing presence watching him as he tries to uncover what the villagers of Dinas Powys are so intent on keeping secret...

• My Review...

A very well plotted and crafted debut from Sam Hurcom, boasts the best of both worlds. It is simultaneously an engaging murder mystery and creepy supernatural nerve tingler.

Its 1904 and a gruesome murder takes place in the sleepy hinterland village of Dinas Powys. Hard to think of it as a sparsely populated rural idyll as it is only 5 miles west of Cardiff and today it has a population of 9000. So it's intriguing to see it stripped back to it's historical bare bones. The newly appointed Forensic Photographer is dispatched from the London, the beating heart of the Empire to this rural backwater. He is an outsider and this is very much a "local village for local people."  There is a whiff of The Wicker Man about the place.

Upon arrival Thomas Bexley begins to feel watched, hallucinations haunt him and even the weather seems to have dark intentions towards him. Coupled with this are the strange mother of the victim who lives in a hovel in swampland outside the village and the reluctance of the locals to actively engage in finding the killer as tales persist of a demon spirit abroad in the words. It all makes for a difficult and creepy investigation for our hero.

The author's prose hits the sweet spot too. It's rhythm and syntax is ever so slightly archaic, so as to point to it's Edwardian time frame, without being obtrusive. This added a bit of seasoning to the brew.

This is well balanced book. Both the investigative and the supernatural aspects are intriguing and intertwine seamlessly together. You'll find yourself thinking is it supernatural or some other plausible explanation and your deduction will swing with every chapter. I found myself desperate to read on in the latter stages racing to the conclusion. I think this sort of engagement in a novel is the gold standard. When the book catalyses this emotion, you know its a good 'un.

I think I would have liked to have known a little more about Thomas Bexley's background but no doubt this may be further explored in the sequel "Letters From The Dead," which I'm just off to order now. Can't wait. 

• Selected Quotes...

"For years I could not speak of what is written in these pages. It marked the change in my life, the death of the man I once was. Only now, as an ever- deepening fear of what is to come plagues me, do I feel compelled to write of all that I have seen."

"Promiscuous girls are asking for trouble,’ Cummings said boldly. The man’s ignorance became clear to me then. ‘You would blame the shopkeeper who has his produce taken by the thief?"

 "In a sleepy shire such as this, it is all too easy in the bright light of day, with the songbirds whistling and the mediocrity of life being played out around you, to dismiss such fears as old wives’ tales for children who have not done all their mother’s chores. At this late hour though, with the heavy black of night as company, with the whispering of draughts through crooked rafters and the hollow, unnatural hoot of the night owl unseen, the mind wanders to its darkest corners and thinks of all too dreadful things."

"We don’t talk about it because we know it’s there. We know it’s real, feel its presence every day.’ He glared at me with his red, bloodshot eyes. ‘Don’t tell me since you’ve been here you haven’t felt it too."

• If You Liked This, You May Like...

An Inspector Calls by J.B. Priestly

Mists and Megaliths by Catherine McCarthy (see our review...Here)

Fatal Solution by Leslie Scase (see our review... Here)

• About The Author...

Sam Hurcom was born in Dinas Powys, South Wales in 1991. He studied Philosophy at Cardiff University, attaining both an undergraduate and master’s degree. He has since had several short stories published, and has written and illustrated a number of children’s books. Sam currently lives in the village he was raised in, close to the woodlands that have always inspired his writing. A SHADOW ON THE LENS is Sam’s debut novel.

The Silent Brother by Simon Van der Velde

 

325 Pages

You can buy The Silent Brother...Here

You can follow Simon Van der Velde...Here

You can follow the publisher Northodox Press...Here

I received a free copy in return for an open and honest review.

• The Blurb...

The Past Never Dies. When his beloved little brother is stolen away, five-year-old Tommy Farrier is left alone with his alcoholic mam, his violent step-dad and his guilt. Too young to understand what has really happened, Tommy is sure of only one thing. He is to blame.

Tommy tries to be good, to live-up to his brother’s increasingly hazy memory, but trapped in a world of shame and degradation he grows up with just two options; poverty or crime. And crime pays. Or so he thinks.

A teenage drug-dealer for the vicious Burns gang, Tommy’s life is headed for disaster, until, in the place he least expects, Tommy sees a familiar face…

And then things get a whole lot worse.

• My Review...

This is, in places, a heart rending novel. A cross between Shuggie Bain and Brighton Rock but set in Newcastle. 

It tells the all too familiar tale of Tommy. A young lad with an alcoholic mother, violent step dad and a younger brother taken into care. Sadly his life is mapped out for him. Squalor, drink, drugs, petty crime, after all apples don't fall far from trees, do they? Is there a chance for redemption? Can he rekindle his love for his childhood sweetheart? Can he find his lost brother? More importantly can he survive the grubby, seedy backstreets of Newcastle.

The writer has a definite gift for placing you IN the story. It's like VR with 360 vision. However it is a  double edged gift. We have all seen places like the one depicted in the story and all know people like Tommy. If like me you can't stand to watch the news anymore for all the sadness and deprivation in the world, then through the writer's skill you will feel the sadness and deprivation in Tommy's world. I think I often read to escape this world not to experience it again through prose. The words can feel too real sometimes and that's not denigrating the author : it's praising him. It is an emotional hard read in places. I don't set much stall by how many stars a book gets. I think its more about the review narrative. I gave this 3.5 stars  basically because I don't like heart breaking sad stories that reflect the world I was brought up in, it's a bit raw, a bit tender. However I think most people will give this emotionally immersive novel more stars than this grumpy old man, who has seen the reality of Tommy's story played out in real life too many times.

The author has a distinct style. It catches certain, definitive, individual snapshots of the past and sees them through a lens of memory such as the moment when Tommy's brother is taken, or the fight following the football match. He writes like how I remember my youth. Not getting the full flow but shining a bright beam on the highlights (or lowlights), and letting you deduce the path between them. It reminds me a lot of how David Peace writes.

Of course he used this signature style in his excellent earlier anthology Back Stories. Where you are invited to guess the unknown famous/infamous protagonist in several short stories.

After reading this book, you feel that you have lived through it vicariously.

• Selected Quotes...

"Sure, you cant change where you're from, but you can change where you're going. And if you do, then you can change who you are."

" They wouldn't call this a community pub. But there's one thing it's got in common with the Black Boar. The drug, This is Saturday night and people are out to get pissed. Laughing, fighting or f*****g, they're out to escape from themselves."

"He was bluffing like the rest of them. Lying his head off because that's what the world is. Doctors, lawyers and the prime-f*****g-minister, all telling us everything's going to be alright when the truth is nobody really knows what they're doing."

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

Brighton Rock by Graham Greene (see our review Here)

Back Stories by Simon Van Der Velde (see our review Here )

• About The Author...

Simon Van der Velde has worked variously as a barman, laborer, teacher, caterer and lawyer, as well as traveling throughout Europe and South America collecting characters for his award-winning stories. Since completing a creative writing M.A. (with distinction) in 2010, Simon’s work has won and been shortlisted for numerous awards including; The Yeovil Literary Prize, (twice), The Wasafiri New Writing Prize, The Luke Bitmead Bursary, The Frome Prize, and The Harry Bowling Prize – establishing him as one of the UK’s foremost short-story writers.

Simon now lives in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, with his wife, labradoodle and two tyrannical children.

All Come To Dust by Bryony Rheam

 

526 pages

You can buy All Come To Dust...Here

You can follow Bryony Rheam's blog...Here

I have received a free copy of this book from AMA books and Parthian Books 

 in exchange for an open and honest review.

You can find AMA books...Here

You can find Parthian Books...Here

• The Blurb...

Marcia Pullman has been found dead at home in the leafy suburbs of Bulawayo. Chief Inspector Edmund Dube is onto the case at once, but it becomes increasingly clear that there are those, including the dead woman’s husband, who do not want him asking questions.

The case drags Edmund back into his childhood to when his mother’s employers disappeared one day and were never heard from again, an incident that has shadowed his life. As his investigation into the death progresses, Edmund realises the two mysteries are inextricably linked and that unravelling the past is a dangerous undertaking threatening his very sense of self.

• My Review...

Well, what an unexpected gem.

All Comes To Dust tells the story of black Police Officer Edmund investigating the murder of wealthy ex-pat Marcia Pullman in modern day Zimbabwe. I think the book succeeds because it engages the reader on many levels. 

Firstly there is an excellent, convoluted, multi-layered murder mystery ala Agatha Christie or PD James. Or I should say there are three mysteries at play. Who (if anyone) murdered Marcia Pullman, who defiled her corpse and what happened to the McDougal family. The McDougal family were Edmund's mother's employers who took a special interest in Edmund, ensuring that he got a good education. However, one day during Edmund's childhood they just disappeared. 

There is also a slightly comedic/tragic aspect to Edmund. He is a very shy, bookish introvert bumbling along in his investigation. He finds a collaborator in semi-alcoholic,white-trash, handyman Craig. Craig is a cynical and resentful man. Set this against the incompetent and corrupt background of the comically under resourced  Zimbabwe Police Force and it can make for a  situation ripe for ridicule.

In addition the author offers some very interesting takes on a culture that is alien to most western readers and one that would also seem to be in a slow decline. She gives a fascinating insight into the once powerful but now diminishing  white Zimbabwe/ ex Rhodesian community.

As well as the regional insights into class, culture and colour of her community, the author also portrays parts of the universal human experience very well. Loneliness, religion, despair and hope are deftly handled. How the past comes back constantly and intertwines with the present is also a thread through out this intriguing novel.

The first part of the novel is steadily paced, but ramps towards the end and the denouement. Where Edmund gathers the suspects together and goes through their various, nefarious and complicated intrigues one by one. If there was a tweak to be made, I think the complex plot and numerous back stories, while all well done, means the narrative is possibly slightly too long.

I started this book expecting a bog standard cozy crime caper. I was pleasantly surprised. The balance of cozy to crime was just how I like it. The hinterland of excellent socio-political with a philosophical tinge writing was a huge bonus.

• Selected Quotes...

"I envy you, Chief Inspector

Me? Why?

Because your black. You belong to a community, a race. Living here,being white is such a burden. We've been cut adrift from wherever we came from, amputated like a gangrenous leg that no longer works. We have no roots, no base."

"The kind of policeman she was used to was watchful but for other reasons. Their eyes followed you with a watchful greed. How could they get what they wanted be it money or goods - or sex? But the truth, the truth was rarely something a police officer looked for unless it benefited them in some way."

"I went to Sir Herbert Stanley Primary School he said without really knowing why he said it. In his embarrassment he wanted to find a reason for his intelligence, as though he didn't deserve it. I was very fortunate to have been sent there by my mothers's employers.

Her wry smile broadened. You're very lucky. But intelligence has little to do with education. I know a lot of educated people who aren't very clever at all.

"Always he felt the loss of that faith. It was like the loss of a childhood belief in faries or Father Christmas.What was the difference in those beliefs - God and Father Christmas - except at a certain age someone told you the truth about the latter and let you get on with the former? What would life be like as an adult if you still believed in a fat bearded man who came down the chimney once a year? You'd be mad. Yet a God who was never seen, never had been seen lived on and on - and on"

• If You Liked This, You May Like...

The Last Resort : A Memoir of Zimbabwe by Douglas Rogers

My Brother-But-One by TM Clark

• About the Author...

Bryony Rheam was born in Kadoma, Zimbabwe. Her debut novel This September Sun won Best First Book Award in 2010 and reached Number 1 on Amazon Kindle. She has also published a range of short stories in anthologies. In 2014, she won an international competition to write a chapter of an Agatha Christie novel. She has attended the Ake Book and Arts festival in Abeokuta, Nigeria and Africa Utopia at the Southbank Centre in London. Rheam is a recipient of the 2018 Miles Morland Writing scholarship. She is an English teacher at Girls’ College and lives in Bulawayo with her partner and their two children.

Resistance by Owen Sheers

You can buy "Resistance"...Here

You can follow Owen Sheers...Here

• The Blurb...

1944. After the fall of Russia and the failed D-Day landings, half of Britain is occupied . . . Young farmer's wife Sarah Lewis wakes to find her husband has disappeared, along with all of the men from her remote Welsh village. A German patrol arrives in the valley, the purpose of their mission a mystery. Sarah begins a faltering acquaintance with the patrol's commanding officer, Albrecht, and it is to her that he reveals the purpose of his mission - to claim an extraordinary medieval art treasure that lies hidden in the valley. But as the pressure of the war beyond presses in on this isolated community, this fragile state of harmony is increasingly threatened.

• My Review...

I decided to review this book for several reasons. The invasion of Ukraine by Russia had just occurred and as such the book was topical. I am familiar with the Black Mountains which are my favourite place in the world and Owen Sheers is a high profile presence in the Welsh literal world. (as can be seen on his website in the link in the preceding section)

This book is set in an alternate history of Germany winning World War 2 and invading the UK. In a small, isolated valley in Wales, the farmers wives wake up to find all their husbands gone, presumably to join the Resistance. The women are at first dumbfounded, but soon realise that they have to carry the several farms work as nature waits for no-one. They expect and hope that the war will pass them by. There would be no need for the enemy to occupy their rural backwater. But come they do, in the form of a small hand picked patrol on a secret mission, led by English speaking, Oxford educated Albrecht.

Albrecht leads his men to the valley and they are quickly snowed in. He faces a dilemma. He knows the farmers have left to join the Resistance, so he should have the wives shot for aiding the insurgency but he is tired of war, and the rest of the German war machine neither know nor care where his patrol is. If he finishes his mission, his men will be drawn back into the meat grinder of the battle for London. They come to compromise and now the real Resistance begins. The wives must resist the creeping comfort of the invaders, who gradually supplant their missing menfolk. They become ever more closely entwined as the women count on the soldiers for the physical demands of farming. Both the women and the cut off patrol lose all sense of context with the war and the world in general. It becomes harder to keep their sense of whose side they are on. Both sides operate in this vacuum and it becomes ever more difficult to resist settling into the idyllic pastoral life and ignoring the real world forever.

I have read a few alternate history, Germany invading UK books in the past but this one is very different. There is a small amount of action but this book is full of the subtle, nuanced emotions of resistance and acquiescence that may be misconstrued as collaboration. I think it's a more true to life telling of how an invasion would play out in a rural area that was never really connected to it's own country in the first place.

I originally thought that I would have liked the author to give it a bit more blockbuster welly. In some sense I found this book frustrating. There isn't a great deal of action. It isn't a WW2  testosterone fuelled adventure. In addition there are a lot of tangents left unfulfilled, especially around the escaped husbands. Also the ending is open to interpretation, which is a thing that often annoys me. With these factors in mind I was  going to give it a 3* star. I had fallen into the trap of being more interested in the destination rather than the journey. 

However, in the days since I finished the book, it has been stuck in my head like a bee in a jam jar. This is always a good sign in a book. What we have is an intelligently, nuanced narrative that operates in the vast moral desert set between the imposing mountains of right and wrong. What is morally acceptable and what feels right are often not the same thing. At the risk of sounding a little sexist, this is a book about war that women can enjoy as much, if not more than men. While some strands of the plot may have disappeared into the ether the author does possess a lyrical turn of phrase that befits the most famous living poet in the land of bards. Some phrases just drip off the tongue like chocolate honey. The author also provides an afterword about his encounter with a local man in his youth who was recruited by the UK Government for resistance work during WW2. Fascinating stuff. All round It was a thought provoking read. So I bumped it up to a 4*. A slow burner that gets to you in the end.

• Selected Quotes...

"The tail of the marching infantry was passing behind him. The slow ones. The blistered ones. The broken souls with broken soles."

"He read the order twice. The typewriter ribbon needed replacing. The letters were chipped and bitten, every ‘r’ faded, ghosts among crowds of the living."

"There was something about the severity of its slopes, as if a cleaver had b"een driven into the soil and wrenched out with no movement from side to side."

"As ever, her speech was sparse, but Albrecht had come to understand that for every word spoken there were another ten shadowing it, unsaid within her. The words she did speak were like stones dropped into a well to determine its depth. Few, but resonant beyond their own sound."

"He’d intervened in nature, hiding the bruised and bitten rodent in the garden hedge. But he’d known it was only temporary. That he was only keeping at bay, just for a moment, what he knew all too well to be inevitable. The cat would find the mouse, the wolf will find the lamb and the war, like the river they walked beside now, would always rediscover its course, however much he wished to dam it with the insignificant pebbles of his own intentions."

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

Fatherland by Robert Harris

SS GB by Len Deighton

The Eagle has Landed by Jack Higgins

* While the above books share the alternate history of Germany winning WW2  they differ in style from  Resistance. Fatherland is a criminal investigation piece, SSGB is a political thriller and The Eagle Has Landed is an out and out war adventure book. Sadly I could not think of an alternate history book that is as subtle and quietly emotional as Resistance.

• About The Author...

Owen Sheers is an author, poet and playwright. He has published two poetry collections, The Blue Book and Skirrid Hill which won a Somerset Maugham Award, and has recently been announced as the 2018 recipient of the Wilfred Owen Poetry Award. His debut prose work The Dust Diaries, a non-fiction narrative set in Zimbabwe won the Welsh Book of the Year 2005. Owen’s first novel, Resistance has been translated into eleven languages. Owen co-wrote the screenplay for the film adaptation, released in the UK in 2011. In 2009 he published the novella White Ravens, a contemporary response to the myth of Branwen Daughter of Llyr, as part of Seren’s ‘New Stories from the Mabinogion’ series. His most recent novel, I Saw A Man, was published in June 2015, and was short-listed for the Prix Etranger in France.

Owen’s theatrical writing includes the script and novelisation (The Gospel of Us) for National Theatre of Wales’ 72 hour site-specific production in Port Talbot, The Passion, a play created with wounded service personnel, The Two Worlds of Charlie F, which toured the UK and Canada and won the Amnesty International Freedom of Expression Award, and NTW’s Mametz. His verse drama Pink Mist, commissioned by BBC Radio 4 and published by Faber in June 2013, won the Hay Festival Poetry Medal and the Wales Book of the Year 2014 and was produced for the stage by Bristol Old Vic. His BBC film-poem to mark the 50th anniversary of the Aberfan disaster, The Green Hollow, won three BAFTA Cymru awards and was nominated for BAFTA and Grierson awards. The book of the film has recently been published by Faber.

Owen has collaborated with composers on two oratorios. The Water Diviner’s Tale was created with Rachel Portman and performed at the BBC Proms in 2007, while A Violence of Gifts, inspired by a period of research at CERN, was created with Mark Bowden and premiered at St David’s Hall in April 2015. Owen is currently developing an original opera with Mark for the Welsh National Opera.

In 2012 Owen was Artist in Residence for the Welsh Rugby Union. His resulting non-fiction work on the Welsh team, Calon was published by Faber in February 2013.

Owen also presents arts and literature programmes for TV and Radio. In 2009 he wrote and presented A Poet’s Guide to Britain, a 6 part series for BBC 4 about poetry and landscape. The accompanying anthology is published by Penguin. His other documentaries include one-hour studies of the poets Dylan Thomas and Keith Douglas. His professional positions have included being Writer in Residence at The Wordsworth Trust and a 2007/8 Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Fellow at the New York Public Library. He is currently Professor in Creativity at Swansea University and a trustee and co-founder of the Black Mountains College project.

(From owensheers.co.uk)

Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep by Phillip K Dick

 

You can buy "Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep...Here

• The Blurb...

This is the classic sci-fi novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The Inspiration for the classic Sci Fi film of Blade Runner.

By 2021, the World War has killed millions, driving entire species into extinction and sending mankind off-planet. Those who remain covet any living creature, and for people who can’t afford one, companies build incredibly realistic simulacra: horses, birds, cats, sheep. They’ve even built humans. Immigrants to Mars receive androids so sophisticated they are indistinguishable from true men or women. Fearful of the havoc these artificial humans can wreak, the government bans them from Earth. Driven into hiding, unauthorized androids live among human beings, undetected. Rick Deckard, an officially sanctioned bounty hunter, is commissioned to find rogue androids and “retire” them. But when cornered, androids fight back—with lethal force.

• My Review...

Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep (DADOES) is a complex and interesting novel. It feels like deep philosophical questions wrapped up in a kafka-esque science fiction version of a near future earth. 

The reader is forced to consider what (and who) is real and what (or who) is not. Variously during the reading of this novel, I thought everyone was an android and no-one was an android. The scenes where there is an interrogation of a potential android were tense and to be honest, often I didn't know who I was routing for. The ever so subtle questions to check the person/androids feelings of empathy were benign and terrifying at the same time. I do have a tendency to go off an a mental tangent now and again. I thought how could you apply this in other genres. Interviewing vampires to distinguish them from humans, that could make for an interesting scene. Then I thought interrogating illegal immigrants must be just as terrifying for the interviewees. Anyway I digress back to the book.

The author does an excellent job of recognising future trends. Earth has been ravaged and animal populations all but wiped out. This  book is set in 2021 but was written in 1968 way before climate change (although the destruction in the book was due to nuclear war, which in many ways seems closer than ever.) The line between Artificial Intelligence (AI) and humans is so thin as to be non-existent. I think the only thing he missed was that AI could possibly merge with human intelligence rather than be camouflaged into it. Elon Musk is apparently developing chips that could stream an internet type thingee straight into the brain. The author also fore saw a declining religion based on mutual suffering being gradually overpowered by aggressive consumerism led media. As an overall snapshot of the future it was pretty much bang on and our world continues to grow towards the world that the author envisaged. 

So the background of the story is fascinating and relevant. It is so good that the actual story has a massive amount to live up to. It starts off well with the chase for the replicants (android humans) and their evil leader Roy Batty. I know he just doesn't sound like a android monster, he sounds like someone from Coronation Street. The ending from a purely storytelling mode is a bit of a disappointment. I feel the author pulls the is real or fake trick just once to often. Readers always want a full stop, a conclusion, a fundamental change. In this regard this is one of those rare times when the film does it better than the book.

All in all a fascinating insight into our shared scary future. It asks one big question without actually asking it directly namely...What does it mean to be human? As a warning it is amazing. As an adventure sci fi it is pretty good too if slightly flawed. If you like a bit of philosophy with your Sci Fi this is the book for you.

• Selected Quotes...

“Empathy, evidently, existed only within the human community, whereas intelligence to some degree could be found throughout every phylum and order including the arachnida.”

“Maybe there was once a human who looked like you, and somewhere along the line you killed him and took his place. And your superiors don’t know.”

“An android,” he said, “doesn’t care what happens to another android. That’s one of the indications we look for." “Then,” Miss Luft said, “you must be an android.”

“I never felt this way before. We are machines, stamped out like bottle caps. It's an illusion that I - I personally - really exist; I'm just representative of a type.”

“Empathy, he once had decided, must be limited to herbivores or anyhow omnivores who could depart from a meat diet. Because, ultimately, the emphatic gift blurred the boundaries between hunter and victim, between the successful and the defeated.

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

Blind Faith by Ben Elton (Click Here for review)

1984 by George Orwell (Click Here for review)

A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

• About The Author

Phillip Kindred Dick (December 16, 1928 – March 2, 1982) was an American science fiction and short story writer. Dick explored sociological, political and metaphysical themes in novels dominated by monopolistic corporations, authoritarian governments, and altered states. In his later works, Dick's thematic focus strongly reflected his personal interest in metaphysics and theology.

He often drew upon his own life experiences and addressed the nature of drug use, paranoia and schizophrenia, and mystical experiences in novels such as A Scanner Darkly and VALIS. While his interest lay in metaphysical issues, his sympathy always lay with the quiet dignity of the common man facing the difficult challenges of everyday life. (from newworldencyclopedia.org)

Phillip K Dick's writing provided the basis for the films Blade Runner, Total Recall and Minority Report and the TV series The Man In The High Castle.