What I'm reading ...

I have started Dissolution by C J Sansom, which is my next book club book. Here’s the blurb:

It is 1537, a time of revolution that sees the greatest changes in England since 1066. Henry VIII has proclaimed himself Supreme Head of the Church. The country is waking up to savage new laws, rigged trials and the greatest network of informers ever seen. And under the orders of Thomas Cromwell, a team of commissioners is sent throughout the country to investigate the monasteries. There can only be one outcome: dissolution.
But on the Sussex coast, at the monastery of Scarnsea, events have spiralled out of control. Cromwell's Commissioner, Robin Singleton, has been found dead, his head severed from his body. His horrific murder is accompanied by equally sinister acts of sacrilege.
Matthew Shardlake, lawyer and long-time supporter of Reform, has been sent by Cromwell to uncover the truth behind the dark happenings at Scarnsea. But investigation soon forces Shardlake to question everything that he hears, and everything that he intrinsically believes . . .

The Last Fighting Tommy: The Life of Harry Patch - by Richard van Emden

This book was, as expected, a very straightforward read. Some text is written by the author, so Harry is mentioned in the third person, and the rest is quoting Harry himself. I found this confusing occasionally, as the viewpoint is not clearly labelled, but this was not a big problem. Overall, my goal in reading the book was met: learned quite a lot. Apart from discussion of both world wars, I found the description of life between the wars etc. very interesting. As I lived in Bath for some years, I was particularly interested in Harry’s account of the bombing there. There were a few, easily-fixable, factual errors in some of Harry’s words. I am unsure whether the author didn't notice, didn’t care or left them in for the sake of authenticity.

What I'm reading ...

I have started The Last Fighting Tommy: The Life of Harry Patch by Richard van Emden, my next book club book. Here’s the blurb:

Harry Patch, the last British soldier alive to have fought in the trenches of the First World War, is one of very few people who can directly recall the horror of that conflict.

Harry vividly remembers his childhood in the Somerset countryside of Edwardian England. He left school in 1913 to become an apprentice plumber but three years later was conscripted, serving as a machine gunner in the Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry. Fighting in the mud and trenches during the Battle of Passchendaele, he saw a great many of his comrades die, and in one dreadful moment the shell that wounded him kill his three closest friends. In vivid detail he describes daily life in the trenches, the terror of being under intense artillery fire, and the fear of going over the top. Then, after the Armistice, the soldiers' frustration at not being quickly demobbed led to a mutiny in which Harry was soon caught up.

The Second World War saw Harry in action on the home front as a fire-fighter during the bombing of Bath. He also warmly describes his friendship with American GIs preparing to go to France, and, years later, his tears when he saw their graves.

Late in life Harry achieved fame, meeting the Queen and taking part in the BBC documentary The Last Tommies, finally shaking hands with a German veteran of the artillery and speaking out frankly to Prime Minister Tony Blair about the soldiers shot for cowardice in the First World War.

Boneland - by Alan Garner

I went straight on to read this book and read it quickly, as it was my next book club book and I had very little time. Here’s the blurb:

‘A woman was reading a book to a child on her knee.
‘“So the little boy went into the wood, and he met a witch. And the witch said, ‘You come home with me and I’ll give you a good dinner.’ Now you wouldn’t go home with a witch, would you?”
‘Colin stood. “Young man. Do not go into the witch’s house. Do not. And whatever you do, do not go upstairs. You must not go upstairs. Do not go! You are not to go!”’
Professor Colin Whisterfield spends his days at Jodrell Bank, using the radio telescope to look for his lost sister in the Pleiades. At night, he is on Alderley Edge, watching.
At the same time, and in another time, the Watcher cuts the rock and blows bulls on the stone with his blood, and dances, to keep the sky above the earth and the stars flying.
Colin can’t remember; and he remembers too much. Before the age of thirteen is a blank. After that he recalls everything: where he was, what he was doing, in every minute of every hour of every day. Everything he has read and seen.
And then, finally, a new force enters his life, a therapist who might be able to unlock what happened to him when he was twelve, what happened to his sister.
But Colin will have to remember quickly, to find his sister. And the Watcher will have to find the Woman. Otherwise the skies will fall, and there will be only winter, wanderers and moon…

Overall, although I found the book interesting, I really did not understand all the layers of the story. I believe that some ambiguity is intentional. I am slight curious to read the first two books in the trilogy [but I have been warned that they might not elucidate matters much].

Allegiant - by Veronica Roth

This book follows on very well from its two predecessors, with a pace that kept me turning the pages. I was initially curious about the change of viewpoint. The first two books are seen through the eyes of Tris; this book is told partly from her viewpoint and partly from Tobias’ perspective. here were minor logistical reasons for this, but a major one became apparent later in the book. A very strong aspect of this book, in my opinion, is that the dystopian world, that they live in, is mostly explained. It has a history that links it with the present quite satisfactorily. I will investigate other work by this author.