[rating=4]
256 pages • Bloomsbury • July 6th, 2009 [PB]

The author of Snow Falling on Cedars is the story of the life and death of reclusive John William Barry, as told by his loyal friend and confidant, Neil Countryman.

Their story forms a meditation on modern urban life in the West – hamburger world as John William scathingly describes it – with its loss of contact with, and profit-driven destruction of, the natural world.

[rating=4]
408 pages • Vintage • September 4th, 2008 [HB]

Peter Ackroyd’s imagined life of Victor Frankenstein fascinates Tim Bennett-Goodman.

“Reason? What has reason to do with this? The pact between us is of fire and blood.”

[rating=4]
186 pages • Serpent’s Tail • May 7th, 2009 [PB]

An intelligent, thought-provoking novel about the exhibitionism of screwing outside in front of strangers, i.e. dogging.

“‘This is human law: if people want to do something, it’s impossible to stop them doing it.”

[rating=5]
544 pages • Faber & Faber • April 3rd, 2008 [HB]

Tim Bennett-Goodman is delighted by the exceptional Adam Mars-Jones.

While a bald outline of the plot would hardly be calculated to send one rushing out to buy the book, to describe the memoir of a bed-ridden disabled boy growing up in the 1950s and ‘60s as a gripping read might seem hyperbolic, if not actually a breach of the Trade Descriptions Act.

[rating=4]
224 pages • Bloomsbury • January 19th, 2009 [PB]

From the pre-World War II era to the 1960s, this distinctively European novel tells the story of the amoral Jakob.

“His way of moving, speaking, and daydreaming – to Erneste, everything about him seemed utterly superlative. There was nothing to prevent him becoming the perfect waiter.”.