What I'm reading ...

I have started Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman - a very popular book that is riding high in the charts right now and has been recommended to me. Here’s the blurb:

Eleanor Oliphant leads a simple life. She wears the same clothes to work every day, eats the same meal deal for lunch every day and buys the same two bottles of vodka to drink every weekend.
Eleanor Oliphant is happy. Nothing is missing from her carefully timetabled life. Except, sometimes, everything.
One simple act of kindness is about to shatter the walls Eleanor has built around herself. Now she must learn how to navigate the world that everyone else seems to take for granted – while searching for the courage to face the dark corners she’s avoided all her life.
Change can be good. Change can be bad. But surely any change is better than… fine?

The Black Echo - by Michael Connelly

I enjoyed this book. It is a reasonably complex murder mystery, with various back-stories. For me, the complexity and the detail was just about right. Some of the language is very odd [to me] - I assume it is LAPD-speak. For example, if you “make” someone, it means that you recognize or identify them. This did not impair my understanding - at added to the atmosphere. The book is set a quarter of a century ago. There are frequent references to pagers and  much rushing off to find pay-phones. It made me happier to be living in 2018.

Overall, I found the story to be well paced and easy to read and I was always happy to get back to it. I may well read more in the Harry Bosch series at some point.

What I'm reading ...

I have started The Black Echo by Michael Connelly, my next book club book. Just a little daunted by 500 pages! Here’s the blurb:

LAPD detective Harry Bosch is a loner and a nighthawk. One Sunday he gets a call-out on his pager. A body has been found in a drainage tunnel off Mulholland Drive, Hollywood. At first sight, it looks like a routine drugs overdose case, but the one new puncture wound amid the scars of old tracks leaves Bosch unconvinced.
To make matters worse, Harry Bosch recognises the victim. Billy Meadows was a fellow 'tunnel rat' in Vietnam, running against the VC and the fear they all used to call the Black Echo. Bosch believes he let down Billy Meadows once before, so now he is determined to bring the killer to justice.

A Normal Family: Everyday adventures with our autistic son - by Henry Normal

Having encountered the author in person, I had expectations of this book. I anticipated a straightforward, honest account of what it is like to live with a parent an autistic child. And that is what I got. I feel that I have gained interesting insights into a world of which I am never likely to have very direct experience. In some ways, I think the book is squarely aimed at readers who are in a similar situation to the author. However, even if I fall outside of the intended audience, I hope that I may be just a little better at interacting with any autistic people that I might meet and appreciate the challenges of their carers. IMHO, it is a worthwhile read for the “lay reader”.

What I'm reading ...

I have started A Normal Family: Everyday adventures with our autistic son by Henry Normal. We saw the author, who was giving a talk at a local poetry festival and he unashamedly plugged his book. We immediately purchased a copy and I am assured that it is a good read. It is certainly a subject that interests me.  Here’s the blurb:

Johnny is nineteen. He likes music, art and going to the beach. He is also autistic - in his case that means he will probably never get a job, never have a girlfriend, never leave home. And over the last nineteen years this is what his father, TV producer and comedy writer Henry Normal and his wife Angela have been trying to come to terms with.
This is a book for anyone whose life has been touched by autism - it's about the hope, the despair, and the messy, honest sometimes comical day-to-day world of autism, as well as a wonderful, warm book about the unconditional, unconventional love between a father, a mother and a son.

Notes from an Exhibition - by Patrick Gale

I found this book riveting; always looking forward to the next spell of reading it. The structure is similar to A Perfectly Good Man insofar as it is non-linear. Each chapter is introduced by the exhibition notes to a picture and the text appertains to that time period. Reading the book is like completing a jigsaw - the total picture gradually emerges. But there are pieces missing, where the reader is left to imagine what is in the gaps. It is all I can do to read something other than another of Gale’s books, but I will be back for more soon!