Orange 2012: Round-up

I'm still waiting for my copy of The night circus to arrive, but I've read the other 19 longlisted titles and as we're off for a little break (more on that later), it seems like a good time to round up my reading. I was hoping that The night circus would arrive in time, but it was not to be!

So firstly, here is the list of the 19 books that I have read, with links to my thoughts on them, ranked in order of how much I liked them.

Island of wings
State of wonder
Painter of silence
Gillespie and I
There but for the
Foreign Bodies
The sealed letter
Translation of the bones
The forgotten waltz
The flying man
Song of Achilles
On the floor
Grief of others
The submission
The pink hotel
Tides of war
Lord of Misrule
The Blue Book

And then this is the 5 that I think will make the shortlist, not sure about the 6th, maybe it will be the elusive Night Circus?
The Blue Book
Gillespie and I
There but for the
The forgotten waltz
State of wonder

I have to admit that I have been a bit disappointed by the Orange longlist this year, there have been less enjoyable books that the last couple of years. I wondered whether it is because I have been in a bit of a reading lull, but no, over the last couple of weeks I have encountered some fantastic books which would have fitted the criteria. So if you don't read Island of wings, then please read The roundabout man, The snow child or The lifeboat (I have yet to read the last but am very excited about it as the reports I have been given are very promising). I've been given more recommendations of books which people hoped would make the list and didn't to pursue too over the next couple of weeks.

Orange 2012: Painter of silence (Georgina Harding)

So, I haven't posted any pictures of the book covers from the Orange List mainly because I'm being lazy and getting on with reading and making sure that the reviews go up, but I will post the cover of Painter of silence because I love it. Befitting a book about a painter I suppose is the need to have a nice cover and I like the sense of atmosphere and period it evokes.

I found Painter of silence an extremely lyrical read which I enjoyed. It's a story told in two strands. In the 1950s a frail man is found in a state of collapse outside the hospital in Iasi, in Romania. There is nothing to identify him, and he does not communicate, after a few days one of the nurses realises that he is mute. Safta, one of the nurses recognises the patient, and although she does not want this to be known amongst the rest of the nursing staff she makes an effort to bring in drawing materials to try to communicate with him via sketching and to try to help him remember shared childhood memories. Interleaved with these events is the story of the patient, Augustin's childhood. He was the son of a cook at the house where Safta grew up. Safta's mother benevolently tried to provide him with education but with no hearing it was difficult for him to communicate and he preferred to draw rather than learn to read or write. Safta grew up, fell in love, and moved away whilst Augustin stayed behind during the Second World War. And the book continues with the filling in of the gaps in their stories when the only way that they can communicate is through pictures.

It reminded me a little in style of other books about artists and art, I would suggest that if you enjoyed for example The quickening maze by Adam Foulds then you would also like to read this. For me it went a little bit off the boil the more I read, I continued to enjoy the style of writing but felt less interested in how it worked out.

Orange 2012: Song of Achilles (Madeleine Miller)

Song of Achilles was one of the Orange titles that I was dreading having to read most. The world of classical mythology is something that I have glimmers of knowledge about, but reading stories based on this world is something that doesn't really appeal. I'm not a great fan of historical fiction unless it's a period that I know reasonably well (i.e. twentieth century Britain), I think because I struggle to envisage the setting properly. But to my suprise, I coped with the setting of Song of Achilles and even found myself enjoying the book.

Set in Greece and following the epic Trojan War, it tells the story of two young boys as they grow into young men and go into battle together. Patroclus is an awkward young prince "I was not fast, I was not strong, I could not sing", a disappointment to his father, a king and "son of kings", and unlikely to follow in his father's footsteps. At the age of ten he is exiled to the court of King Peleus, where he meets Achilles, who seems to be everything that he is not. To Patroclus' surprise, Achilles befriends him - it seems that despite having everything going for him, he is lonely.

After the kidnap of Helen from Sparta, the Trojan War develops and Achilles is the one to lead the men of Greece in their battles and Patroclus has to follow.

If you like novels based on Greek mythology then you should certainly pick this one up. If you don't, or are undecided, I think it's still worth giving this one a go. Even if you don't know the story, that's not necessary to get something out of this novel that manages to evoke the period even for those with little knowledge of it.

Orange 2012: The sealed letter (Emma Donaghue)

I'll come straight out and say it, The sealed letter by Emma Donaghue has definitely been the book that I've enjoyed most so far on the longlist since it was announced (I'm not sure about saying longlist overall since two of the books I'd read already Gillespie and I, and There but for the, were also rather good). Good story, tick, interesting characters, tick, readable, tick, and it's also based on a real story which often adds an extra element of interest if it's something that you don't know about.

In some ways it's a bit like an early Sarah Waters book - hugely evocative of Victorian atmosphere and with twists and turns along the way. Set in 1864, it's based on the Codrington Divorce case. This is not something I knew about, but it was a famous divorce whereby Admiral Sir Henry Codrington alleged that his wife Helen had committed adultery, with other men and by being overly involved with her female friend Emily. Emily Faithful is in fact a tireless campaigner for women's rights, so there is a good strong dose of feminism in the novel, who had initially inadvertently and then reluctantly assisted Helen in having an affair with Colonel Anderson. What comes across so well in the novel is the way that Emily is trapped between her friend and desire to make her happy (is there something more to their relationship maybe?) and her morals and desire to uphold the status of women.

I loved all of the period detail such as characters reading Wilkie Collins books and the story was so readable that it had great pace.

I'm a little puzzled as to how this ended up on the longlist this year, it was first published in 2007 and predates "Room" for which Donaghue was shortlisted last year (and which was also shortlisted for the Booker). I think it was previously published in Canada, and then in the wake of the success of Room last year, her other novels have now been brought out in England. It still seems a little strange to include it on this year's list though!

It's certainly very different from Room though - this is much more of a standard historical novel, albeit one which has been well researched and carefully written, whereas Room was something quite different from anything I'd read before.

Orange 2012: The flying man (Roopa Farooki)

Roopa Farooki is one of the Orange Longlisted authors most familiar to me. I very much enjoyed her debut novel, Bitter Sweets which saw her nominated for the Orange new writers prize, and I absolutely loved The way things look to me, which was Orange longlisted either last year or the year before. Farooki specialises in writing about families in multi-cultural settings - her debut was about a man who was conned into his arranged marriage believing that his wife was more educated than she was, The way things look to me is about three siblings struggling in the wake of the death of their parents. It seems that she has had two more novels which I have somehow missed Corner Shop and Half Life, so once Orange season is over, it might be a good time to explore these.

This book tells the story of Malik. Again, it's a story of people and families. We meet Malik at the end of his life, we learn that he is dying, and we learn that he seems to be somewhat of a chancer and unpredictable character. The story is fleshed out through the rest of the novel in an extended flashback, which chapter by chapter deals with different times in his life, from his birth in 1931, where he was the only one of a pair of twins to survive the birth, through his school years and establishment of his ABC literary club, his deception of his second wife into pregnancy, time in prison and so on. It's episodic so at times one would like more of the in between times to be spelled out, but it's a good way of creating a picture of Malik and his life and how he has reached the point at which we are introduced to him.

And why the title? Well, Malik is a man who spends his life making "flying escapes". He continually plays games with his wives, his family, his business associates, and inevitably seems to come out on top, although towards the end it all starts to catch up with him.

I enjoyed this novel fairly so, but if you've not read Farooki before then I would recommend that you start with Bitter Sweets or The way things look to me since I found them more attention grabbing.

Orange 2012: The submission (Amy Waldman)

I wondered if The submission would be depressing, since it is a book about the process of memorialisation after 9/11 in New York. However, my conclusion after finishing the book was that it wasn't - it was far more about the healing process that is undergone in the aftermath.

The book centres around a competition to design some sort of memorial to the victims of the attack. A committee deliberate and eventually choose a plan for a garden memorial. Only after the choice is made do they find out that it has been designed by a Muslim, albeit a Muslim born in Virginia and with no connections to anything other than being American.

What is so well done in this novel is the large cast of characters who all seem to have different opinions and justifications for their actions. Claire was widowed by the atrocities, yet is untypical of some of the other victims in that she wants the process to be based on merit rather than religion; Paul the chairman of the committee wants the designer to step down in order to safeguard his own non-controversial reputation; a Muslim activist Malik who sees the episode as a way to further his own cause.

I was sufficiently interested in the variety of characters and in finding out what happened to keep reading. It was an interesting concept and certainly a rather timely one, but not a book I'd especially want to read again (which I think these days is probably the criteria by which I judge books, and so far I don't think that applies to any of the Orange Longlist books)

Orange 2012: The grief of others (Leah Cohen)

I started with The grief of others from my Orange Pile mainly because my Kindle-sampling colleague was keen to read the rest of it after reading the first chapter and there isn't a copy in the Oxfordshire library system yet. I have to say that two things put me off the book before I started reading it - the title, which didn't sound especially cheery - am really not in the mood for mis-lit at the moment - and the fact that it was an "Oprah Winfrey pick" - i.e. it was chosen for an American TV book club. Maybe I'm unduly snobbish about that but often the books chosen for the UK TV book clubs (e.g. Richard and Judy in the past) seem to conform to a certain type and I imagined that this might also fulfil a certain type.

Anyway, the book is as anticipated not terribly cheerful. It tells the story of Ricky, and John and their two children Paul and Biscuit (Elizabeth) in the aftermath of the third child of the family dying 57 hours after birth from anencephaly. Ricky had known about the condition of her unborn child since her 5 month scan but had not shared the knowledge with anyone. And the book is essentially a working out of how the family come to terms with their grief, about how it affects their relationships and how their current situation is influenced by past events.

It's certainly well written, and Cohen moves clever between the present and the past to build up the picture of events and personalities in a less obvious way than a linear narrative might have done.

I have to say that ultimately, my two preconceptions of this novel were right. It was not a happy book - and I just was not in the right place to read a book that was not a happy book. And I anticipated that an Oprah book would be mainly about relationships and families working their way through difficult times and I was right.

Need to read some more before I start making more predicitons!