Love Over Scotland - Alexander McCall Smith

The author of 'The Number 1 Ladies' Detective Agency' series, also does other books. Some are less successful than others. I rather enjoy the series (of which this is one) set in Scotland Street Edinburgh. This is the third in the series. It is a very episodic book, as you expect as (like Armistead Maupin's 'Tales of the City' books) it originated in articles written as a newspaper serial. This has plenty of advantages, each chapter is short, but full of incident, the writing is spare and uncluttered. Alexander McCall Smith has this genre down to a tee, and you really care about what happens to the central characters, whether it be Bertie and his impossible mother, the fate of Big Lou the cafe owner, the anthropologist with the pirates of Malacca, the artist (who rarely paints) or the gallery owner (who never sells any paintings). Light, enjoyable, rather like having coffe and cake at a genteel tea shop - and that kind of life suits me down to the ground. Rating: 8/10

Agatha Raisin and the Vicious Vet - MC Beaton

I heard the 'Agatha Raisin' series being dramatised on Radio 4 with Penelope Keith as the

eponymous heroine. These are in many ways spoof detective stories, as Ms Raisin is something of a battleaxe - a lady of a certain age who believes herself to be incredibly attrative to men - but in fact she appears both needy & desperate, and they find her 'come ons' to be definit 'turnoffs'! Agatha has taken early retirement from work in PR and has moved to a deadly village in the Cotswolds. Deadly because there seem to be an extrordinary number of suspicious deaths. In this volume a particularly nasty vet (who doesn't like small animals like cats & dogs - but is happy to work on farm animals) dies in a bizarre 'accident'. Agatha sets off to solve the mystery with her neighbour (who scared to death almost that Agatha may have him earmarked as her next husband). The story is suitably complicated, as whodunnits should be, it is light and amusing - funny in places, and an easy read. It deserves 7/10

Atonement - Ian McEwan

Should I have read the book before I saw the film? It probably severely influenced my view of the book. This is a book in three parts - not only in terms of plot, but in terms of the style (and in my view the quality) of the author's writing. Now I have a problem with Ian McEwan - especially in terms of his writing style. In the second part of this book Briony (one of the principal characters) has her first novel returned with some constructive criticisms attached. Probably intentionally (and somewhat ironically) these comments encapsulate the difficulty I often experience with McEwan's books. They are generally over written, too minutely descriptive, as though the author has spent several hours over the choice of each word in a sentence. The concentration of detail muddies my appreciation of the plot - and Ian McEwan can be a wonderful storyteller. So this book's first part is overwritten and over detailed, the second is a magnificent story, pacy, well written, and drawing the reader in to the central character of this part, Robbie. The third part is light and almost superficial. It is almost as though the author cannot make up his mind about what he's supposed to be doing. Is it an experiment? Is every book an experiment?
The plot is fairly straightforward. The first section is set around the events of one day in a country house a few years before World War II. On that day when the youngest daughter of the house, Briony, is attempting to stage a play she has scripted in honour of the return of her brother. Her cousins are to take part (reluctantly). Briony observes an event taking place in the gardens involving her sister Cecilia and Robbie, son of the house's charwoman, and Briony's father's protege (despite the boy's lowly background he has been financed through Cambridge). Briony totally misinterprets the incident, and when she intercepts a letter mistakenly sent by Robbie to Cecilia, and interrupts the couple in the library, a chain of events is unleashed placing Robbie in jeopardy. The second part is the most wonderful description of the lives of Robbie and two other soldiers in the days leading to the Dunkrk evacuation, Cecilia and Briony's work as nurses in London at that time, and the realisation by Briony of the magnitude of the wrong she has done. The third part reveals Briony as a bestselling author trying to right the wrong of her youth by publishing a true account of the lives of Robbie and Cecilia. There is a twist in the tail (or tale) but does this make the book or marr it - is it true atonement?
There are plenty of excellent books about World War I, but comparatively fewer about World War II - and it is for this reason, alone, that I would applaud Ian McEwan for writing this excellent account. Rating 8/10

The Prince of Tides - Pat Conroy

What an incredibly long book! Or at least so it seemed. I remember seeing the film starring Barbra Streisand, and was curious to discover the book that lay behind it. The film was really pretty excellent, but this book is just far too long. The style is too over elaborate, the author seems to be more concerned about words rather than plot. The story is about the lives of two brothers and a sister growing up on an island in a remote part of South Carolina. Theirs is hardly an idyllic childhood. As the story opens the younger brother (whose marriage is on the rocks) is summoned to New York because his sister has made another suicide attempt. As the brother sits down with his sister's psychiatrist (Lowenstein) the true history of their joint horrific youth gradually unfolds. Naturally he also becomes sexually involved with Lowenstein, sorts out her son, breaks up her marriage, re-connects with his own wife and children. It is over long, and the stories, layering one terrible incident upon another become almost too much to bear, a bit like being blugeoned by a cosh, emotionally. In the end the final (and in the author's mind the worst) situation is just one slap round the head too much - and it seems so pale in comparison. The other irritation is the obsession with food and eating that pervades this novel - every restaurant and meal is described in so much detail. Rating 6/10