[Oldmanmatt]

The Broken Earth trilogy, by N K Jemisin, an epic and absorbing set, that is better viewed as three volumes, since they don’t stand well alone. Not entirely sure if it’s Sci-fi or Fantasy, it often has a palpable “Lord of the Rings” vibe, as the characters trek the “Stillness” a far future super continent of Earth.
All three books won the Hugo on release, making her the first author to win over three consecutive years. She has four Hugos to date…
The depth of the characters and the detail of the world and “history” she weaves, is incredible. Quite the Asimov/Tolkien heir.

[andy popp]

The Year of the Locust I don't think I posted about this before, so apologies if I did. Enormous fun; it's really silly, but I enjoyed it in a similar way to a trashy movie (author is a Hollywood screenwriter, of Cliffhanger amongst others).

For a moment, I was wait, there's no way Nathanael West wrote Cliffhanger, he died in 1940. Then I spotted the subtle difference in the title. West wrote The Day of the Locust, which is in fact about a Hollywood screenwriter (which is what West was) and is a rather brilliant, slightly pulpy minor classic. One of the characters also provided the name for a certain famous cartoon dad.

[Fiend]

The Broken Earth trilogy, by N K Jemisin, an epic and absorbing set, that is better viewed as three volumes, since they don’t stand well alone. Not entirely sure if it’s Sci-fi or Fantasy, it often has a palpable “Lord of the Rings” vibe, as the characters trek the “Stillness” a far future super continent of Earth.
All three books won the Hugo on release, making her the first author to win over three consecutive years. She has four Hugos to date…
The depth of the characters and the detail of the world and “history” she weaves, is incredible. Quite the Asimov/Tolkien heir.

Sounds good. Then I remembered reading it a few years ago, it was kinda good but also, hmmm, something, maybe a bit over-the-top? I dunno. Anyway I did read it!

[Duma]

Well I've got the first one on the kobo so will report back.

[Rocksteady]

The Broken Earth trilogy, by N K Jemisin, an epic and absorbing set, that is better viewed as three volumes, since they don’t stand well alone. Not entirely sure if it’s Sci-fi or Fantasy, it often has a palpable “Lord of the Rings” vibe, as the characters trek the “Stillness” a far future super continent of Earth.
All three books won the Hugo on release, making her the first author to win over three consecutive years. She has four Hugos to date…
The depth of the characters and the detail of the world and “history” she weaves, is incredible. Quite the Asimov/Tolkien heir.

I read the first book and thought 'meh'. Maybe part of the problem was all the Hugos and the hype so I was expecting it to be amazing. I thought it was pretty average middle of the road fantasy with some fashionable tropes.
Maybe I should try again a few years later - at University I didn't enjoy Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea books which have later become some of my favourites.

[TobyD]

we solve murders Richard Osman; I've read one or two of his previous novels, but I felt that this was considerably better. It's recognisably the same author, but wittier and with characters that I felt were more appealing. A recommended relaxingly easy read.

[Davo]

The Sleepwalkers - How Europe Went To War In 1914 by Christopher Clark

I've been going through a bit of a history reading phase and this is the second of two books about the beginning of WW1 that I have read recently with the first being Barbara Tuchman's The Guns of August. This one is probably more niche than the Guns of August and I think you would need a reasonable level of interest in the detail of why Europe ended up in a state of war in 1914 to enjoy it. I read this after hearing it recommended on the Rest is History Podcast about the origins of WW1 where they quoted from it a great deal but also made the point that Clark has been criticised for being too soft on Germany.

Overall, I thought it was a brilliant study in depth of the origins of WW1, it is enormously detailed and gives a superb overview of the countries involved, the decision makers and how power is devolved to each of them. Clark is explicit at the start that he is not going to allocate blame and that he thinks this is a false premise from the start and that instead he wants to look at the structures and the ways in which alliances influenced how each country behaved. On this basis it is brilliant and after reading it I feel I have improved my limited grasp of the origins of WW1. I found the beginning 1/3rd of the book hard going and possibly I didn't need to know in detail so much Serbian history but if you already know a lot about WW1 then it is probably good for you. The last half of the book is amazing and really leads the reader through the run up to war.

However, even though I'm not a professional historian nor expert on WW1, I did really begin to struggle with the way in which he treats Germany and especially in the last few weeks of the crisis and the run up to war. It is almost as if he treats Germany's decision to mobilise and then immediately to invade Belgium as being out of their hands and solely being due to the Russian mobilisation and that Germany and its leaders had no responsibility for their actions. To say the least Barbara Tuchman has a very different view of this and points out in her book that Germany and its leaders (military and political) used the doctrine of “military necessity” to justify declaring war and their subsequent invasion of Belgium, Luxembourg and then France. Clark never engages with this idea and ends the book before really addressing it.
Hopefully this epic review helps anyone thinking of reading The Sleepwalkers.

Cheers Dave

[T Loughlin]

There's a good podcast from Christopher Clark, which abridges this book below - I agree his interpretation is a little kind to Germany albeit his reasoning is sound i.e. the 'test' of seeing if Russia would mobilise was not necessarily intended to start a war. Margaret MacMillan's 'Paris:1919 ' is worth a read on the post-war conference and treaties.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/series/b03t7p27

[Davo]

Thanks for this, I shall listen to that podcast this week. Strangely enough I was tossing up between Paris 1919 by Margaret MacMillan or her book on the origins of the First World War. I shall go with your suggestion.

Cheers Dave

[andy popp]

Thanks for the great review of Sleepwalkers Dave. Good to hear that you enjoyed it. Obviously, aspects of Clarke's interpretation are controversial but as a non-specialist that didn't worry me too much. I don't have to accept it wholesale. But as a historian, I was just in awe of his ability to marshal and keep under control such a complex, multi-stranded narrative. It's hands down one of the best pieces of sustained historical narrative writing I've read. I just picked up a copy of a collection of his essays, Prisoners of Time, that I'm really looking forward. His most recent book on the revolutions of 1848 has also been very well reviewed.

I'm currently reading Richard Wright's Native Son, one of the classics of Black American literature. It's really good, but dear god is it brutal. More later perhaps, when I've finished it.

[jwi]

About WWI, France lost more than a quarter of their men 18--30 year old, and many many more got invalidating injuires defending themselves from German agression. Although a minority view, there is still a real and widespread resentment over this, more than 100 years later. Much more than the 2nd world war in my estimation. France is the only country where I loudly, quickly and completely unprovoked tell everyone I meet where I'm from, because otherwise they assume I'm German (looks + foreign accent).

[Davo]

Hi Andy

Thanks for the reply. Completely agree about his book, I did find it mind boggling how he could hold all of that information in his mind and bring it together to form a coherent narrative. I’m no historian, so it’s hard to relate but it is a very impressive book. Apart from the Germany issue my only other qualm would be that even for someone like me with an interest and reasonable background knowledge of the origins of WW1, his first third of the book is hard going and I’m not sure I needed such a detailed history of Serbia.
I will check out your recommendations .

Thanks Dave

[andy popp]

About WWI, France lost more than a quarter of their men 18--30 year old, and many many more got invalidating injuires defending themselves from German agression. Although a minority view, there is still a real and widespread resentment over this, more than 100 years later.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think this would be true in Britain. Obviously there is a some kind of "folk" memory of WWI, even though it has passed from living memory, and films still get made and books written, but I don't sense any lingering antipathy against the "Boche", not from WWI at least. It must feel very, very distant to most people now. When I was growing it was still very firmly in living memory. I'm 60 and both my grandfathers served in the British army during WWI, including on the Somme. Very few people, even of my age, can have that kind of connection now I would imagine? Interestingly, my dad's dad, whom I never met, was the son of a German immigrant (aside from the Irish, still then British, Germans were the largest immigrant community in Britain in 1914).

Anyway, for anyone interested in the French experience of the war I strongly recommend Your Death Would be Mine: Paul and Marie Pireaud in the Great War by Martha Hanna. Paul and Marie were a young peasant couple from Southwest France when war broke out and Paul served throughout, eventually being demobbed in 1919. Remarkably both sides of their correspondence survive and form the source material for this really superb piece of social history. Though published by an academic press I see it's available on Kindle for 20 quid.

[Davo]

About WWI, France lost more than a quarter of their men 18--30 year old, and many many more got invalidating injuires defending themselves from German agression. Although a minority view, there is still a real and widespread resentment over this, more than 100 years later. Much more than the 2nd world war in my estimation. France is the only country where I loudly, quickly and completely unprovoked tell everyone I meet where I'm from, because otherwise they assume I'm German (looks + foreign accent).

Hi JWI

That is interesting and makes some sense given a large part of France was a battleground and France was the major combatant nation in WW1 in the trenches and at places like Verdun.

Dave

[Davo]

About WWI, France lost more than a quarter of their men 18--30 year old, and many many more got invalidating injuires defending themselves from German agression. Although a minority view, there is still a real and widespread resentment over this, more than 100 years later.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think this would be true in Britain. Obviously there is a some kind of "folk" memory of WWI, even though it has passed from living memory, and films still get made and books written, but I don't sense any lingering antipathy against the "Boche", not from WWI at least. It must feel very, very distant to most people now. When I was growing it was still very firmly in living memory. I'm 60 and both my grandfathers served in the British army during WWI, including on the Somme. Very few people, even of my age, can have that kind of connection now I would imagine? Interestingly, my dad's dad, whom I never met, was the son of a German immigrant (aside from the Irish, still then British, Germans were the largest immigrant community in Britain in 1914).

Anyway, for anyone interested in the French experience of the war I strongly recommend Your Death Would be Mine: Paul and Marie Pireaud in the Great War by Martha Hanna. Paul and Marie were a young peasant couple from Southwest France when war broke out and Paul served throughout, eventually being demobbed in 1919. Remarkably both sides of their correspondence survive and form the source material for this really superb piece of social history. Though published by an academic press I see it's available on Kindle for 20 quid.

Hi Andy

Your recollection would be correct, I think WW1 is too long ago for most people and also it is viewed in the UK (mostly) as a complicated war with enormous sacrifice but no clear evil enemy. We view (in general ) WW2 as the great conflict of the 20th Century where we (plucky British) stood up against an evil that threatened the World.
For France WW2 is likely to be viewed in a more complicated and mixed way whereas WW1 is very clearly (to most French) a war of defence and patriotic sacrifice.

I caveat all of the above with the fact that I am no professional historian or sociologist and that I have clearly simplified very complex topics!

Dave

[duncan]

Also read and very much enjoyed Sleepwalkers after Andy's recommendation and thought I'd previously mentioned it here. Searching only finds references to some boulder problem!

I've always been struck by the number of Monuments aux Morts in France, it seems not a village of any size is without one, a far more common sight than in the UK. All with a long list of the war dead from 1914-18 and, sometimes, a few more names from 1939-45. Sleepwalkers has been translated into German and was a popular success, it doesn't seem to have been translated into French. Will look out for The Guns of August as a counterbalance.

[Davo]

Hi Duncan

The Guns of August is much more about the first 30 days of the War and the initial war of movement than it is about the origins of the war. She covers the July crisis in her book but has a very different perspective to Clark.
I found her writing to be brilliant and her descriptions of the first 30 days till the end at the Marne are just amazing. She brings the generals and politicians to life and even though I knew what happened there was suspense and drama throughout.

Cheers Dave

[Johnny Brown]

a far more common sight than in the UK.

Really? I think you've just got your eyes more open to such things when abroad. Having photographed a few walking guides in various parts of England I would say 'it seems not a village of any size is without one'. I once went on a BMC walk with some MPs, one of whom made a point of seeking them out in every village he visited. There are thought to be only 53 'thankful villages' in England who didn't have any names to put on a great war memorial, with only 17 managing to get through both wars without a casualty. They do typically have some form of war memorials though, I recall one memorable case of nominative non-determinism in Upper Slaughter in the Costwolds.

Wiki does say that the 'human cost of war was higher' in France, with only 12 villages similarly avoiding a casualty from the Great war, so perhaps they are more obvious?

[jwi]

a far more common sight than in the UK.

Really? I think you've just got your eyes more open to such things when abroad.

I suspect so to. Many, if not most, villages and towns in the south (maybe in the north as well, I wouldn't know) have a memorial to fallen locals in the central town square. Often with a plaque for each dead. The names from WW1 usually takes up quite a lot of space, considering a large proportion of the young men in the village died. The WW2 part is usually just one or a few names.

[Will Hunt]

I drove past this one for years before noticing it, and it's not even that innocuous.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.8606896,-1.8108913,3a,75y,89.42h,75.48t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1swjhN34o8Ei9F5MkU3xMR0Q!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D14.517519194221848%26panoid%3DwjhN34o8Ei9F5MkU3xMR0Q%26yaw%3D89.4222442795978!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI0MTEwNi4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D


The odd positioning at the arse end of the village makes more sense when you look at the historic map.
https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/side-by-side/#zoom=14.9&lat=53.86201&lon=-1.81231&layers=220&right=ESRIWorld

[andy popp]

Appropriately, it is Armistice Day today.

I'm not in a position to make a comparison to France but I would say that war memorials are extremely common in England (presumably also in Wales and Scotland); not only dedicated crosses and statues in public spaces such as squares and village greens but also in as plaques in churches and schools but also in many businesses and organisations. Here's a an article about the Bank of England's war memorials, for example:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17449359.2018.1534596

[duncan]

There are many memorials in the UK. I started looking for data before the previous post but, as Will and jwi suggest, perhaps its is more their prominence in small-town France than simple numbers that I was trying to express.

Compared to Bingley's memorial this is harder to miss. I chose Dourdan for no other reason than because I spent 5 weeks there in the 1970s. Population was around 3000 in the 1920s when Bingley's was 16000. 

RIP.

[Will Hunt]

On a point of order, the one I linked to is Eldwick. This is the Bingley cenotaph and surrounding flower beds (central position in Bingley's main park).

[Will Hunt]

Back to books, I recently read House of Leaves, a horror/mystery about a family who move into a house and discover that it is bigger on the inside than on the outside. I wouldn't actually recommend this book personally, though there are lots and lots of people who absolutely love it, but thought it was worth a mention for being so strange and innovative: clever and riddled with secrets.

The book is the manuscript of a recently-deceased elderly blind man called Zampano. It documents, in an academic sort of way, a film called "The Navidson Record", a fly-on-the-wall/worn bodycam film made by the family about their impossibly big house. It is permeated with citations to other work on the film, though it's never clear whether the entire thing is an invention. The manuscript is found by Johnny Truant who attempts to bring the manuscript to publication and is driven mad by it. So we have Zampano's commentary and footnotes, Johnny's footnotes, and The Editors' footnotes.

The book mirrors the experiences of the characters. When they are lost in the labyrinth of the house, you too are lost, wending your way through footnotes within footnotes within footnotes within footnotes, back and forth between the numerous appendices and exhibits. For this reason it is not an easy page-turner. When it's good it's really good; when it's crap it's very boring - in fact I've seen one reviewer say that they think the bad bits are written badly on purpose as a satire of academic writing.

So if that piques your interest then venture in. You're going to need two bookmarks.

[MischaHY]

Anyone managed to finish ‘The Long Earth’ series? I got through the first book but stalled out on the second now.

If I’m honest I’m sorely disappointed that my last port of call for something with Pratchetts name attached to it has so little of him and frankly so little literary quality overall. The characters are boring/one dimensional and the dialogue is mostly just blatant exposition or clumsy setups of mysterious plot elements with low eventual payoff. Baxter takes a series of fascinating ideas and succeeds in making me not care about them, mainly because his characters don’t care about them.

Also there’s a very blatant and weird sexualisation/objectification of a teenage girl who then somehow ends up marrying the main character who is far older. Any women who are independent or driven are portrayed varyingly as weird, bitchy or ridiculous.

Pratchett’s influence can be detected in details such as the AI being (or acting like) a reincarnated Tibetan, the fact that the transport device is powered by a potato, and the impression that every Australian person mentioned is the very same that makes up all the non-rincewind characters in ‘the last continent’. 

If someone fancies convincing me it’s somehow worth sticking with then fire away!