Inferno

Author: Dan Brown

Series:  Robert Langdon, book 4

Year published: 2013

Pages: 480

Time It Took To Read: A day

Ah, Robert Langdon! A man whose life has been threatened far more times than is decent for a professor! A man who, despite confirmed bacherlorhood, finds himself regularly in the company of bendy, strong, intelligent women (/plot devices) who are invariably attracted to the older, distinguished Langdon! A man who remembers virtually everything he's ever read or seen regarding key pieces of art, historical documentation or architecture! A man with no budget! A man who knows everyone who can possibly be of use! A man whose primary function is solving a web of clues to find some deadly and advanced weapon of mass destruction!
But wait. Despite constantly saving the world, Langdon never recognises the villain, or villain's accomplice, among his acquaintances. He assumes everyone is exactly who they say they are and has pure motives. He is an ass, whose main function is the exposition of the author's collection of research.
I have read all Dan Brown's books. I enjoy the cultural references far more than the story, and Inferno certainly made me want to visit Florence (though not as much as Hannibal did). Unfortunately, Dan Brown only knows one plot - villain threatens world, hero+female accomplice thwarts him, realising at last moment that the villain is a previously mentioned friend. His two non-Langdon books are the same. This book does slightly deviate from the One Plot towards the end, but it's still almost identical most of the way through, to the point where you know perfectly well Dr Brookes will be his accomplice when she's described as 'willowy' on page five.
The premise is that Langdon's in Florence, with a brain injury and amnesia, chasing down a maniac who wants to decimate humanity. The maniac is (naturally) obsessed with Dante's Divine Comedy, specifically the Inferno, which is the masterpiece from where most modern inferences of hell are taken. Obviously, Langdon knows all about Dante and related art, and has taught endless knowing courses on it, and is a celebrated Dante expert among experts (ahem) but he can't actually remember what he's in Florence for.
Chaos ensues.
It does attempt to raise a few ethical questions about overpopulation, but has such a simplistic and unsatisfactory ending (which I won't give away), that I felt quite cheated. But that is Dan Brown - a holiday read in the finest tradition, but don't expect to be blown away by depth.
 

Book count: 39/50

A Dangerous Inheritance

Author: Alison Weir

Year published: 2012

Pages: 528

Time It Took To Read: A day

 

Alison Weir is a historian who has been publishing rather dry books about the Tudors and Plantagenets for over twenty years. A few years ago, she started publishing fictional accounts from this era and they are FAR better than her nonfiction works. She is much better than Philippa Gregory, in my opinion, though they both write Tudor/Plantagenet era work focusing on royal women.

Anyway, it is my (potentially libelous) belief that Weir wrote this book in reaction to Gregory's Cousins' War saga (see here and here). It sems obvious that Gregory is going to attempt to pin the death of the Princes in the Tower on Henry VII, so Weir is attempting to get her version (both historical and fictional) across before Gregory gets the chance. Weir wrote a historical account, firmly pinning the blame on Richard III way back in 1992. 

 

This book concerns Katherine Plantagenet, the bastard daughter of Richard III, and Katherine Grey, sister of Lady Jane Grey.  Lady Jane Grey is the subject of an earlier Weir book - Innocent Traitor. She briefly seized the throne after the death of Edward VI, to try and prevent Catholic Queen Mary taking over. It all went awry, she reigned for nine days and then Mary cut her head off. Katherine Grey then switched allegiance to Queen Mary, as her cousin, and later secretly married Edward Seymour after her first marriage was annulled. Queen Elizabeth I didn't take the news well and locked them up.Katherine gave birth to two children in the Tower of London and her marriage and children weren't legitimised until the reign of James I, by which time Katherine had been dead for years.

The story Weir chooses to tell switches between the two Katherines. Katherine P is a very shadowy historical figure. Literally nothing is known of her, except that she was raised in her father's household, so the majority of the story is conjecture. It is based around her quest to stop her father being accused of regicide. Katherine G finds Katherine P's papers in the future, complete with haunting, and follows the story herself. The conclusion is basically "Yes, Richard III did it." 

The whole book feels a bit pointless. There isn't enough historical information about Katherine Plantagenet or her stepmother Anne (The Kingmaker's Daughter) to give them real resonance. There is AMPLE information about Katherine Grey, to the point where the whole book could have been written about her alone. The constant switching of viewpoint is a device Weir uses often in her books, but it is aggravating and confusing that the dual heroines have the same name. The 'dangerous inheritance' seems to refer to the knowledge about the Princes, but that sort of gets ignored til the very end. I think, in short, that the focus for the book is all wrong.

But there's plenty of intrigue, sex and romance for those that like that sort of thing. I'm interested to see how Gregory finishes off her Cousins' War series, and I hope Weir's next book is a bit less cobbled together.

Book count: 38/50

The Psychopath Test

Author: Jon Ronson

Year published: 2011

Pages: 304

Time It Took To Read: A few hours

 

I've been meaning to get this book for YEARS, and finally saw it on offer in Asda not long ago. I read it last weekend, largely at a wedding while waiting for my boyfriend to come to bed. A long wait. A good wedding!

Anyway, Jon Ronson is a journalist and this book is about various mental health conundrums. Ostensibly, the book is about the Hare Psychopathy checklist, and it's occasionally indiscriminate application. However, in his research, Ronson pings around all sorts of curiosities in the mental health sphere. From talking to the anti-psychiatry face of Scientology to the odd extremes of conspiracy theorists online, every chapter is a joy. Not a very cohesive joy, but a joy nonetheless.

I am fascinated by mental illness, and relatively anti-psychiatry myself (though not to Scientologist levels). I've recently finished a Coursera course on mental health and social contexts (see my other blog for more info), and now I'm wondering if I should think about doing a mental health module for my degree.

It demonstrates many of the problems with modern psychiatry in layman's terms.Will Self apparently found it hilarious. I can't say I was rolling off the bed laughing, but it was empathetic and gentle humour. Whatever your interest in psychiatry and psychology, this is good read. And if you just like rollicking journalism, this is a VERY good read.

Book count: 37/50

The Devil and Sherlock Holmes and Lost At Sea

Author: David Grann and Jon Ronson

Year published: 2010 and 2012

Pages: 352 and 471

Time It Took To Read: A couple of days each

This week, I've read two collections of journalism back to back. Both collections focus on mysteries and curious real life stories.
David Grann is an American journalist. His book claims to be about mysteries and intrigues, but not all of the stories are particularly mysterious in the traditional sense - for example, the mystery in one story is why people choose to work as sandhogs.I was hoping for more murder, but some of the stories are fascinating nonetheless. One explains how a prison gang took over most of the prisons in the US, and another looks at the life of a man who spent most of his life on the run from the police, another looks at the life of a man who spent years impersonating teenage runaways for the attention. The stories, however, are dry, factual and faintly dull at times.
Jon Ronson is a British journalist, who writes for Guardian and GQ. His collection also concentrates on mysterious people, but with a huge dollop of humour and sensitivity.  He explores a few savage murders, people giving away their kidneys altruistically for God, the suicide of a man driven into debt by mounting credit card bills, and most interestingly, into the sexual abuse trial against Jonathan King. This latter case is topical, considering Operation Yewtree. Although Jonathan King was prosecuted in 2000, some of the comments made by people around him are startling. "Poor Jonathan: we all did it." is a typical comment. Apparently, sexually exploiting children really was entirely acceptable in celebrity 70s culture. Tam Paton - who was successfully prosecuted in the early 80s - argues that they were only convicted because they abused boys, and it would have been allowed to pass if they'd abused girls. Alas, it seems there may be some truth in that.
I don't really recommend the David Grann book. It was good, but compared to Ronson, dull. Ronson sparkles by comparison and his writing is compelling.I plan to read his Psychopath Test next.

Book count: 36/50

Blood of Elves

Author: Andrzej Sapkowski 

Translator: Danusia Stok 

Series: The Witcher Saga, book 1

Year published: 1994 in Polish, 2008 in English

Pages: 314

Time It Took To Read: A day

I am really pissed off at Gollancz, who have the publishing rights to this series. I hate waiting, and after a three year delay, the second book of the series was published a few weeks ago. The next isn't due til next year. This is apparently because of legal difficulties. For gawd's sake, everyone ELSE in Europe has had translations. Get on it! Gollancz are also responsible for the fact that I have to wait A YEAR for the last True Blood book to be published in paperback. Who wants that many bloody books in hardback? They don't make you wait a year for the kindle edition!

Ahem.

Anyway, this book begins the Witcher Saga properly. The short story collections (The Last Wish, and The Sword of Destiny, which hasn't been officially translated yet) were written first, and this book refers to several incidents in these books. But it's not essential to have read the short stories first. 

The story revolves around Geralt, the witcher and his ward, Ciri. Ciri begins the story being trained as a witcher as well, but her magical ability needs a wizard's touch. This is recognised first by Triss Merigold, and later Ciri's care and training is given to Yennefer.  Meanwhile, everyone and his dog is after Ciri, for reasons that aren't completely clear in this book. 

If you've played the game, it's interesting to see Triss in a position of such weakness, and to see Yennefer at all as she's AWOL by the time the game starts. Dandilion, the bard, makes a welcome appearance as well. The descriptions of battle are among the best I've read, but this series has a gentler side as well. I really want to read the rest of the series. Would anyone like to teach me Polish? It'll probably be quicker than waiting for Gollancz to pull their finger out.

Book count: 34/50

The Magician's Apprentice

Author: Trudi Canavan

Year published: 2009

Pages: 752

Time It Took To Read: Two days

 

This book is a prequel to the Black Magician and Traitor Spy trilogies, also by Trudi Canavan, and I bought it because it looked like my sort of thing. I wanted to see if the trilogies were going to be worth my while.

It took me a couple of days to read, in the baking sun. The story starts in Kyralia, with Tessia, who wants to join the Healer's Guild with her father, but is effectively barred from joining as she's a woman. Meanwhile, Lord Dakon, the local leader, is entertaining a Sakachan lord who he neither likes nor trusts. When Tessia, Lord Dakon and the Sakachan meet, Tessia discovers she is a 'natural' magician. This is a world where magicians can train anyone who can afford it to be a magician, but are obligated by law to train 'naturals' up. Magicians rule the whole country, and also defend it from foreign magicians who are less scrupulous.

Underpinning all this is the idea that Magicians keep apprentices so they can draw power from them, and become stronger themselves. This 'higher magic' can be taken from anyone, but is considered part of the magician-apprentice bond. However, Sakachans keep countless slaves for the same purpose.

So far so interesting. The story is good, though it is written with the expectation that you've read the trilogies, even though this book is set hundreds of years prior to them. It is obvious from the way the book ends that Tessia, as well as a Sakachan woman whose story runs concurrently, becomes somehow important in the future.  I didn't feel overly invested in the characters. The Sakachan subplot, regarding a woman called Stara, comes from nowhere and seems to go nowhere, except to highlight how vile the Sakachan culture is to women in general.

There are strong feminist themes throughout.Despite it being the basis of much of the story, I felt like the magic was underdescribed. Apparently, this author writes to include a young adult audience, and I think this story would have been much better if written with more adult themes - there was no sex, and death was muted. Women are either virgins, or married to impotent/homosexual men, although promiscuity is implied. Tessia's parents are murdered and then rarely mentioned again.

I don't plan to buy anymore of Trudi Canavan's books based on this, though I do plan to get them from the library and see if they're better - certainly, reviews on Amazon suggest this is not her best work. Ultimately, I was hoping for more of a saga, especially after the brilliance of the last book I read!

Book count: 33/50

 

The Last Wish

Author: Andrzej Sapkowski 

Translator: Danusia Stok

Year published: 1993 in Polish, 2007 in English

Pages: 280

Time It Took To Read: A day

 

My boyfriend got The Witcher 2 for Christmas on Xbox. I borrowed it off him, after he said the combat system was a bit difficult, and completed it in a fairly sleepless week. It was my sort of game - swordy, some magic, traditional RPG elements and good characters. I bought this, the first collection of short stories which the games are based on, when I found out that they existed! Originally written in Polish, the books are slowly (painfully slowly) being translated into English. Only three of eight have been done so far. This is vexing. Get on it, publishers.
Geralt is a witcher and he kills monsters for money. Witchers are mutants, removed from their parents at birth and treated with hormones and poisons to make them superhuman. They use magic, but aren't exactly sorcerers. They have great alchemical skill, and a mastery of lore. Although they are mercenary, they have a strict code of honour. They are mistrusted by most of the regular population, and seen as a necessary evil by much of the elite.They are supposed to have their feelings destroyed in the process of becoming witchers, but this has not wholly happened to Geralt.

The Last Wish is a collection of loosely interlinked short stories about Geralt's adventures. There is a great deal of humour, life and warmth in the stories, as well as gore, horrendous monsters and fantastical elements. It has helped that I've played the game, and had an understanding of the subset of magic that's used in the book, but I found it a really good read regardless. If you enjoy playing RPGs in the Baldur's Gate/Elder Scrolls genre, or, indeed, have played The Witcher, I can't recommend it highly enough. It makes me wish I could read Polish so I could get them all now!

Book count: 32/50