Karl's Reading List

Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC: New York, NY, 2016. I made it! This is the 26th and final book in my Alphabet Soup reading challenge. I finished the first book in this challenge on the 11th of August last year, having started it a week earlier. So, finishing in May means it took me 9 months to finish this challenge. I suppose I could have done it quicker if I only read Alphabet Soup books, but where would be the fun in that! Anyway, Judenstaat is a strange book. It falls into the 'alternate history' category of fiction, with this world having a slightly different outcome for the Jewish people post-World War 2. Instead of being granted a state of their own in Palestine (aka, the modern nation of Israel), they are instead granted a state of their own within the borders of Germany. This is justified both as a sort of punishment for Germany's acts of atrocity, and also as a statement of resilience from the Jewish people - that the place where they have faced their w...

Published by Random House New Zealand: Auckland, NZ, 2002. I'm starting to get a taste for non-fiction Alphabet Soup books; who knows what I'll pick for Z! With a little extra time on my hands while Elise and I recover from Covid, I've been able to get through this 10 person biography about prominent New Zealanders - or at very least, people with some connection to New Zealand. I say prominent, but there were a few individuals covered in this work that I had never heard of, and that is coming from a New Zealander with an interest in history. Not a full-on passion I guess. I mean, if I was full-on passionate about history I'm sure I would have heard of these people before, right? What makes this different from a regular biography is that the majority of the chapters were originally written as New Zealand Geographic articles. This results in an unusual feel; each chapter tells us the story of the individual in question (or at least part of it) while also describing the...

Published by Chatto & Windus: London, England, 2002. Translated by Esther Tyldesley. When I started the Alphabet Soup challenge, I knew that some letters would have a few less options to choose from, and felt that X would probably be the hardest. As I approached this letter I did occasionally glance ahead, and would see one or two books at most on display at any one time. In the end, when I went to get a book out for X there was only one fiction book currently in the library by an X author. Skimming through it I was unimpressed, so I browsed through non-fiction for only the third time in this challenge.  The Good Women of China is a collection of biographical stories told by Xinran, who for eight years ran a radio programme in China called Words on the Night Breeze dedicated to telling the stories of Chinese women. Fifteen such stories, including Xinran's own upbringing, are presented here, including some so traumatic that she was never able to share them on air.  The f...

Published by Arrow Books: London, 2018 (2008). First published 1925. After the last few Alphabet Soup books it seemed time to read something a little bit lighter. I've have Wodehouse recommended to me before, so decided this was the perfect opportunity to find out a bit more about him. Wodehouse wrote in the genre of comedy, and if the quotations from various famous comedians within the cover are anything to go by, he is one of the better comedy writers to have written comedy! Carry On, Jeeves is a collection of 'Jeeves' stories released by Wodehouse. I thought it was the first collection to be released (as the first story tells of Jeeves being hired), but apparently it is not. Each chapter is its own self-contained story, telling of some problem arising for Wooster (Jeeves' employer) which Jeeves invariably helps solve. Jeeves is Wooster's personal man-servant, who is not above showing his disapproval of Wooster's poor dress sense, nor even of undermining his ...

Published by Pushkin Press: London, 2016. Originally published in French as Tristesse de la terre in 2014. Translated by Ann Jefferson. This is an odd book. A non-fiction text, telling the story of Buffalo Bill's forays into show business, including the end of the life of Sitting Bull and the Massacre at Wounded Knee, the book shies away from going too in-depth into the facts of any of these moments, instead choosing to 're-imagine' the events, focussing more on the little moments, the feelings, the thoughts that may have crossed the mind of those involved in the events. As one example of this prose, after the massacre of Indians has happened at Wounded Knee, Vuillard starts a new section with:  "A violent storm blew up. Snow fell from the sky like a divine ordinance. The snowflakes whirled around the dead Indians, light and untroubled. They landed on hair and lips. Every eyelid was spangled with hoar frost. What a delicate thing a snowflake is! It's like a weary l...

Published by MacLehose Press: London, 2012. First published by McClelland & Stewart: Canada, 2010. This is a very well-written and melancholic book which at times reminded me of The Sea , a Booker-Prize-winning novel by John Banville that I read five years ago! Both are narrated by an older protagonist looking back upon their life as a child, both cover love and loss (with the loss happening in fairly dramatic fashion), both jump around to different time periods, both have a small cast of characters based in a small area, both have the adult in question having returned to the house where the childhood events have taken place, and both have occasional moments that cross the line into uncomfortable reading.  In this book Liz Crane recalls her summers visiting the farm of her uncle and aunt on the northern shores of Lake Erie. She and her cousins are made to play with Teo, the son of one of the Mexican seasonal workers, and over time Liz and Teo begin to form a connection. Meanwh...

Published by Pan Books/Pan Macmillan: London, 2017. An abridged version of A.A. Milne: His Life, first published by Faber & Faber in 1990. I don't normally read abridged versions of things. I always want to read the full version of a work in order to get the full perspective of the work in question. This one tricked me. It is a 'full version' of Goodbye Christopher Robin, but the text is taken from the longer work, A.A.Milne: His Life, by the same author. I didn't really enjoy the book. And I think the biggest reason is that it was not what the title made me expect.  So, although I haven't seen it, I am aware that Goodbye Christopher Robin is a book about the relationship between Alan Alexander Milne and his son, Christopher Robin Milne. The younger Milne became immortalised in fiction when his father used his name for one of the main characters in the Winnie-the-Pooh stories, and Christopher at times resented the intrusion that becoming one of the 'most fam...

Published by Allison & Busby Limited: London, 2015. This was an 'accidental' book, in that I was intending to select another ' Alphabet Soup ' book for my list but ended up picking this book, which was from a letter I had already completed ! Nothing had really jumped out at my in the 'T' section of fiction, so I had returned to the start of the section, saw this, took it home, and only then re-checked the author's name... Nevertheless, I'm glad I read this. It is a quite fast-paced story, yet very detailed - the whole plot takes place over five days in June 1815, with most taking place on June the 18th. As the title suggests, it is focused around the battle of Waterloo, and particularly around one man, Colonel James Macdonell, who is tasked by the Duke of Wellington to hold the chateau of Hougoumont against the French troops of Napoleon. Against all odds, Macdonell and his men manage to do so.  This is historical fiction, yet is also very factual, wi...

Published by Fabbri Publishing Ltd: Barcelona, Spain: 1991. First published 1886. This is one of Stevenson's more well-known stories, yet unlike Treasure Island is not one I had much of an idea of the plot of. I was also unaware, until after completing this novel, that Stevenson was Scottish, but it does make sense considering just how Scottish both the setting and characters in Kidnapped are. The story follows young David Balfour, whose parents have died, as he delivers a sealed letter from his father to his up-to-now unknown uncle at a rundown manor called 'The Shaws.' Very quickly David learns that his uncle intends ill towards his nephew, and this escalates into David being (surprise) kidnapped and put on board a ship bound for the Carolinas, where he will be sold as a "white slave". He never arrives in America, however, as, when the ship strikes and sinks a boat, David befriends the sole survivor, Alan Breck, and together the two manage to get the ship diver...

Published by Obsidian/Penguin Group: New York, 2015. Having discovered the animal detective subgenre with my last Alphabet Soup book, I found this one for my next letter. However, this book is so different to the last that it shows how far a single genre can stretch. Instead of being told from the animal's perspective, Buy a Whisker is told from the perspective of the animal's owner, in this case Sarah Grayson, who runs a second-hand/repurposed items store in a little town in Maine. The animal in question is a cat named Elvis, whom Sarah has learned (somehow - this, like the last book I read, happens to be the second in a series for which the first was already on loan) can detect someone telling lies. Elvis will curl up on the lap of someone, and if they are lying will give some sort of visible cue. If that sounds a little vague, it is because in this particular book in the series, Elvis detects no liars - all people are telling the truth to Sarah when Elvis is in place. So...

Published by Allen & Unwin/Arena Books: Australia, 2010. Book 2 of the 'A Chet & Bernie Mystery' series. The limitations of the Alphabet Soup challenge were a little more prominent with this pick, as there are not all that many 'Q' authors in the Tasman District Library (and it looks as though 'X' will be even more restrictive). Also, Book 1 of the series was on loan, so I leapt straight into this one, Book 2, for my first taste of the series. However, this was a fun little read to discover despite all that. A detective story with a twist, Thereby Hangs a Tail is told from the perspective of Chet, the dog of Private Investigator Bernie Little. Chet is not some super-intelligent sleuth or wonder-dog - he is just a regular dog that believes his human to be the 'smartest man in the room' at all times, and tries to support Bernie as the duo solve the case Bernie has been assigned. The mystery in this book regards a threat made against a prize show-d...

Published by Thomas Nelson/HarperCollins Publishers: Nashville, Tennessee, 2017. Looking for a letter 'P' for the Alphabet Soup Challenge , I picked this book up in the library having no idea what it was about at all or who the author was. Learning from the cover that it had something to do with a terrorist attack that happened in France as well as some letters written by a Huguenot during the Reformation, I decided to give it a go. As I was walking to the counter I browsed the front and started seeing quotes that implied this might be a Christian book. It's quite unique. The main character Jessica and one of her two flatmates in Paris, Vonda, decide to attend a concert and are caught up in the mass shootings that took place in the Bataclan theatre in November 2015 . A third flatmate, Patrick, visits Jessica in the hospital when she is recovering from her wounds and tries to convince her to continue on with a planned trip to various antique stores around France rather than ...

Published by W. W. Norton & Company Ltd: New York, London, 1990. First published in 1970 by William Collins Sons & Co Ltd.  This is the first book in a series starring Captain Jack Aubrey and Surgeon Stephen Maturin and their adventures during the Napoleonic era (the series is the inspiration for the movie Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World ). At the start of the novel Aubrey is promoted to Captain of the Sophie , a smaller boat than most, and makes the acquaintance of Maturin, inviting him aboard as the ship's physician after they work through some early offences with each other. For the rest of the novel we follow the voyages of the Sophie , focusing mostly on Aubrey and Maturin but also on the rest of the crew, including James Dillon - the Irish first lieutenant - who has his own complicated relationship with Aubrey. This is an interesting, but not an easy book. It is very slow (I have been busier lately than in the past, but 20 days is a long time for me to...

Published by Bloomsbury Publishing: USA, 2014. As I make my way through the Alphabet Soup Challenge from my local library, I sometimes find myself in the library skimming various books to find something that looks interesting (and hopefully is not too unpleasant in content). 'N' was not one of the biggest sections on display (though I was pleased to see a few 'Nicholls'... maybe someday I'll join them), and so I skimmed a few books that seemed a little more random than I usually would. When I skimmed this one, something in the way it was written jumped out at me, and made me curious enough to commit to the whole book... The Wives of Los Alamos is told in a first-person-plural voice. That is to say, the narrator's voice throughout the book is "we", and at no point is the voice identified as belonging to any one character. Rather, the book is being told simultaneously from the perspective of all the wives of Los Alamos. This is a fascinating choice of s...

Published by Fourth Estate: London, 2013 (2012). Book Two of the Wolf Hall Trilogy: ' Wolf Hall '; ' Bring Up The Bodies '; 'The Mirror and the Light'. The second novel in a series charting the life of Thomas Cromwell, Bring Up The Bodies follows the template set down by Wolf Hall : Cromwell is such a central figure to the book that almost any use of the word 'he' refers to Cromwell himself, yet he is such a closed figure that his true motivations are only revealed occasionally. We see Cromwell maneuvering and manipulating, but whether he is serving his own motivations or those of his liege, Henry VIII, remain mostly concealed. Even the 'side' of various debates can remain murky, with Cromwell happy to befriend even those he means to bring down in order to fully take advantage of the situation. Bring Up The Bodies, like its predecessor, won the Booker prize, and in both cases I feel that this award was earned. The books are both very well written...

Published by Coronet Books/Hodder and Stoughton/Hemisphere Publishers Ltd: Great Britain, 1983 (1982). What a book to end the year with! Schindler's Ark is the book that inspired the movie Schindler's List (and is known by the latter name in some countries). It is also a Booker book, which meant I really had no idea what I was in for. The book (and the movie) tells the true story of Oskar Schindler, a German factory owner living in the Polish city of Crakow during World War 2, relating how he saved the lives of about 1200 Jews by labelling them as 'essential workers'. Stating it that way makes it sound as though Schindler did very little 'heroic', yet throughout the book he continually takes big risks to achieve his goal, both in terms of his own safety, and also in financial terms. The book, being about Jews in WW2, is obviously not a 'light' book, yet Keneally tells it in a way that really 'works'. His style here is an interesting one; he tells...

Published by Alfred A Knopf Canada: Toronto, Canada, 2011. P. D. James is a mystery and crime writer, and I have never read any of her books until now. Though, having read Death Comes to Pemberley, I find myself wondering if I may need to read another of her books at some point to get a clearer understanding of her style...  ...because this book is written as if it was a sequel to Pride and Prejudice. In a style that, at some moments more than others, purposefully imitates the style of Jane Austen and her era. It is six years since Elizabeth and Mr Darcy have married. Jane and her husband Mr Bingley have moved to be nearer Pemberley, and often visit. Lydia and Wickham, however, are not welcome at Pemberley - understandable when the events of Pride and Prejudice are taken into account. On the evening before the annual Lady Anne's Ball, the Wickhams have planned for Lydia to arrive unannounced and impose herself on the Darcys. However, tragedy strikes on the way to Pemberley.  I...

Published by Headline Publishing Group: London, 2012. Jack and Mabel are a childless couple now a little beyond childbearing age, living in Alaska in the early 20th century. They have drifted apart, partially due to the grief over the stillbirth that they experienced ten years earlier, and partially due to their own brokenness that keeps Jack silent and Mabel suicidal. They are also struggling to turn their part of the country into a farm, and are low on food and income. On the evening of the first snowfall of winter, they manage to briefly connect with one another, building a child out of snow, and, as the winter continues, begin to believe that this snow child has come alive. Glimpses of a young girl are seen in the woods, usually accompanied by an equally mysterious fox. Yet only Jack and Mabel seem to ever see the girl. This reads like a fairy tale, and is actually inspired by a Russian fairy tale, in which a similarly childless older couple magically bring a snow child to life. Wh...

Published by Collector's Library: London, 2013. Originally published 1930. I picked this up to be 'H' in the Alphabet Soup reading challenge, and, as a fan of the 1941 film version starring Humphrey Bogart , was curious to see how similar the screenplay of that film reflected the original novel.  The answer to that question turns out to be: extremely similar. Like, way more similar than any other book-to-movie adaptation I can think of. Even the dialogue of the book seems to have been replicated word-for-word throughout the film (at least from what I could remember), which makes reading the book a strange experience for someone who has come to it as their second exposure to this story. Because, with the book and movie being so similar, I'm put in an interesting position of actually finding myself preferring the film version to the book version.  That's not a common feeling. To unpack my feelings a bit: Sam Spade is a very closed character, by design. We, as the audi...

Published by Penguin Books: North Shore, NZ, 2004. This book tells the story of three Maori brothers, Pita, Rangi and Tu, who one by one join the Maori battalion and end up fighting in Egypt and Italy during World War 2. Tu, our narrator, is the youngest of the three, and the vast majority of the book is presented as his journal entries from the war, with an additional framing device being that he is handing these journal pages on to his niece and nephew in order for them to understand their father, Pita, more. While Tu's journal entries are obviously mostly focussed on his own experiences, other chapters are interspersed with the 'journal entries', telling Pita's story in a third-person narrative. It is a little confusing as to how these may or may not be being presented to Tu's nephew and niece, as if we are to take the narrative at face value all of these chapters should be Tu's journal, but obviously are not. However, putting that aside we get a good idea of...