Bombsites and Lollipops: My 1950s East End Childhood - by Jacky Hyams

This book is a quite well written [the author is a journalist] memoir of growing up in the East End of London in the 1950s. She describes living at that time very well and I thought that she gave a very good feel for what life was like. The latter end of the story - she finishes as she enters adulthood - coincides with the first few years of my life. So, I have no memory of those times, but it does have some familiarity. Some things were a surprise, of course. Most notable was the author and her friends encountering strong antisemitism in Paris in the early 1960s. The book is a nice blend of her personal story and an illustration of the time.

What I'm reading

Time for non-fiction again. I have started Bombsites and Lollipops: My 1950s East End Childhood by Jacky Hyams. I stumbled across it and thought that it sounded interesting, particularly as my own family had its origin to the East of London. Here is the blurb:

World War Two is finally over. Millions all over the country are starting to wonder if peacetime really is much of an improvement on the War. Food shortages, endless queues, power cuts, rationing and freezing winters make it extremely difficult to make ends meet as husbands return from battlefields to families they hardly know. Yet some East Enders are living large...in a bombed out damp and squalid Hackney slum, one family are leading a life of luxury, a loadsamoney world funded by illegal betting, where virtually everything is available, thanks to a thriving black market. The Hyams family has a retinue of unofficial servants: a chauffeur, a cleaner and an army of delivery men. They take seaside holidays in posh hotels and dine on the finest foods and delicacies money can buy...but at the core of their daily life, an ever-growing nightmare lurks, threatening to wreck their luxurious existence. In this honest and sincere memoir, Jacky Hyams revisits the 'live for today' world of her childhood, a world where money was no object, growing up in a household underpinned by betting, booze and bribes. From stories of her parents partying with the Krays in the East End of old, to the optimistic swinging sixties of London's West End, this is the intimate story of a unique childhood, set against the backdrop of squalid, post-War Hackney.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - by Stieg Larsson

As I commented before, I felt under pressure to enjoy this book, as it has had such good press. I need not have worried. I was not far through before it got to the un-put-downable phase. It is quite a long book, with a complex story and lots of foreign names, but I never felt lost or confused. I think my reasonable familiarity of (and affection for) the country probably helped.

The characters are well drawn, but leave enough to the imagination to keep me interested - Salander, in particular, is full of surprises. I think it is important to consider the quality of the storytelling and the quality of the writing separately. The story is powerful and well thought through and this will drive me to read the following two books. It is slightly hard to assess the quality of writing, when a book is read in translation. But I did feel that there were quite a few examples of excessive, intricate detail - like Salander's old and new computers, where we get a detailed specification. I also wonder if there was more sex in the book than necessary. I am not being prudish - I just thought that some of the sexual references detracted from the main story, which already had a sexual theme.

Now, out of curiosity, I will watch the DVD of the movie.

What I'm reading

I have started The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. This book is very well known, so I will not include the blurb. I think I am the last person in the Western world to read this book and feel under some pressure to enjoy it, as everyone tells me that I will. My past experience with Swedish novels has been less than positive - all rather gloomy. But I should not condemn all Swedish writers on the basis of two books.

The Donor - by Helen FitzGerald

I was intrigued by the concept of this book - to the extent that I pre-ordered it ahead of publication on Amazon [getting the Kindle version of course]. There is a single Dad with twin daughters, both of whom have a congenital kidney condition which is killing them. What is he to do? There was obviously lots of scope for a dilemma for him.

The subject was handled very well and the book really delivered. I was hooked quite quickly and it soon became hard to put it down. Some of it is rather unpleasant, but not gratuitously so. I am not sure that I liked the main characters, but I am not sure that I was supposed to!

Early on in the book, I thought [feared] I'd spotted an example of the "Dan Brown effect" - i.e. badly researched technical inaccuracies. The main character is using a digital camera in the mid/late 1990s. I later concluded that it was credible that he was an early adopter and had no more "scares". Around the middle of the book, I realize that there would be a twist at the end. I do not think it is obvious - I think I just happened to pick up the clues. It did nothing to diminish my enthusiasm to keep turning the pages.

What I'm reading

I have started The Donor by Helen FitzGerald. It was time for fiction again and I though I thought this very recently published book was an interesting concept. Here is the blurb:

Will Marion has two perfect kidneys. His daughters aren't so lucky. Question is: which one should he save? Will's 47. His wife bailed out when the twins were in nappies and hasn't been seen since. He coped OK by himself at first, giving Georgie and Kay all the love he could, working in a boring admin job to support them. Just after the twins turn sixteen, Georgie suffers kidney failure and is placed on dialysis. Her type is rare, and Will immediately offers to donate an organ. Without a transplant, she would probably never see adulthood. So far so good. But then Kay gets sick. She's also sixteen. Just as precious. Her kidney type just as rare. Time is critical, and he has to make a decision. Should he buy a kidney - be an organ tourist? Should he save one child? If so, which one? Should he sacrifice himself? Or is there a fourth solution - one so terrible it has never even crossed his mind?

The World's Greatest Idea - by John Farndon

The idea behind this book was interesting. The author and a small team arrived at a proposed list of the 50 best ideas ever conceived by mankind. By means of a website, they got lots of people to vote on them to establish an order. The ideas, from #50 to #1 are presented in order, with a short chapter for each one. The breadth of topics is wide, as the ideas range from writing to sense of self and from use of fire to logic. I think the depth of coverage of each one was just right and I enjoyed learning loads of random (useless?) facts. I did not cheat and skip ahead to see what chapters/ideas were coming, which helped me keep turning the pages.