Valley of the Dolls - Jacqueline Susann

I had wanted to read Valley of the Dolls since seeing it on my gran’s bookshelf as an adolescent. The candy coloured cover fascinated me. I knew it was an adult book and that I would not be allowed to read it – yet. Somehow there’s been a gap of many years before I picked up this cult classic and actually did read it. I am extremely glad I did. This is Sex and the City in 50s America with the hard edge of drugs thrown in for good measure. There’s Hollywood glamour, now with a wonderful retro feel. It’s also a clever commentary on celeb culture as relevant today as at the time of the Hollywood starlet. Anne, Neely and Jennifer appear to have it all but underneath the pursuit of perfectionism means a dependence on the brightly coloured ‘dolls’; the uppers and downers which they feel enable them to cope with the ambitions which drive them. Loved it.   

Game Control - Lionel Shriver

I am a huge fan of Lionel Shriver. I consider ‘We need to talk about Kevin’ an incredible novel and have had the privilege of hearing Shriver read the short story A Convalescent Ego by Richard Yates at a Literary Festival a couple of years back. All in all a good start to enjoying this novel. Game Control was first published in 1994, then republished in 2009, and had minimal commercial success. Howwever I feel that’s quite surprising. It has a unique subject matter – demography and population control - with AIDS thrown in for good measure. There’s intellectual sparring and brilliantly flawed characters. However, I felt the ending didn’t quite match the edge contained within the rest of the novel. Shriver always offers a hefty dose of harsh reality and that’s what makes her work so strong. Game Control provides some great themes and writing but just falls short of Shriver’s best.

Dust to Dust - Ken McClure

Dust to Dust is the eighth Steven Dunbar thriller by Ken McClure. A research biologist turns violent and becomes seriously ill after entering an excavation at Dryburgh Abbey to examine some preserved bodies identified as having died of the Black Death. Our hero, Steven Dunbar, is called in to investigate. An ex-special forces medic, Steven has to attempt to answer the question of whether this has been caused by bubonic plague or a deadly new virus. His investigations identify individuals and organisations all with their own secrets to protect. In aiming to uncover the truth Steven is forced to truly fight for his life.

A thriller is meant to have you desperately continuing reading and Dust to Dust delivers. The plot is taut and exciting, revealing just enough as Steven picks up the pieces of this puzzle. The writing is skilled. The main characters are solid and distinctive enough to avoid being stereotypes. McClure’s talent is always noted as taking medical possibilities and making them into strong factual fiction. In Dust to Dust he does this successfully yet again.

Perfume - Patrick Suskind

Perfume - Patrick Suskind
Smells are important. Smell can evoke long forgotten memories, make you hungry, make you retch. Grenouille is born in stinking eighteenth century Paris. He has a talent for identifying and dissecting every odour around him but does not emanate any smell himself. This original tale follows Grenouille as he learns the trade of a perfumer and then travels to the olfactory mecca of Grasse. His obsession leads to deadly consequences.


A fascinating and absorbing novel.

One Day David Nicholls

One Day – David Nicholls
One Day by David Nicholls is a wonderful story full of chance, circumstance and communication. Emma and Dexter meet in 1998 as they graduate from Edinburgh University. The story covers the following 20 years, the events and changes in their lives. At times they are tightly intertwined, at other times only lightly touching.
The novel is full of ‘what if’ scenarios and how even the seemingly small decisions we make influence every aspect of our lives. It demonstrates in an incredible human way how people change as they mature and also how they remain the same. Emma and Dexter are very real characters with self doubt, flaws and total truth.
One Day is also a love story. This is a love which shifts and transforms over time but is strong and resolute throughout.
Very rarely do you discover a story you never want to end. I was engrossed with One Day from the beginning and could not put it aside. The writing is so skilful and the characters so well developed as to be perfect this novel definitely gets a 5 star rating.

The Host Stephenie Meyer

The Host - Stephenie Meyer

Stephenie Meyer is the woman responsible for the resurgence of interest in Vampires and Werewolves and consolidating Robert Pattison’s place as a romantic teen icon. In The Host she offers a book for adults. Unfortunately this novel is not quite grown up enough. There is not the distance between this book and the Twilight series to offer satisfaction beyond the teen/young adult audience.
The Host is not bad it just doesn’t deliver on good writing or full exploration of the theme. This is a science fiction tale of a soul (Wanderer) who has been implanted into a host body, a young woman (Melanie). There is so much potential in the premise of the addition of an alien soul into a human which is not explored.
Melanie was travelling with her boyfriend and brother when she was taken by a Seeker and her body used as a host for Wanderer’s soul. Somehow Melanie fights against this invasion and we are given a soul having to cope with her host responding to her thoughts and actions. They decide it is better for survival to work together. They end up searching and finding both boyfriend and brother within a group of humans in hiding who are free of souls. Confusion and angst ensue as Wanderer joins the humans. Melanie and Melanie’s body react to being close to her boyfriend. Wanderer has her own feelings to contend with. These are all strong emotions the soul has never experienced before. At the same time the humans distrust her. How do we resolve all this? Stephenie resolves in a way which suits the teen genre but does not work as well as adult fiction.
The exploration of Wanderer’s character is very straightforward. Souls apparently are straightforward. They use ‘No Pain’ as their analgesic and ‘Heal’ to ... well ... heal. Although Wanderer is torn, as she develops an understanding of the humans, she never really fully appreciates how she is perceived. Tentative relationships are made however these are categorised as ‘friend’ and even a fledgling romance never extends further than a kiss.
There is so much promise in the concept of an alien soul taking over a physical body. The questions it raises are fascinating. Consciousness. Morals. Responsibility for one’s actions. On top of this there is a whole fantasy world of alien souls to create. Stephenie does not take this further than a few stories Wanderer tells of planets of ‘See-Weeds’ and ‘Claw-Bears’ and the capsules the souls use to transport themselves to colonise a new planet.
The pace of the first half of the hefty 600+ pages is incredibly slow. The story does pick up once Wanderer reaches the group of humans living in the caves. At times the style of writing annoyed me. Too many sentences had words in italics as if we were too stupid to understand the emphasis ourselves and needed to be told. Angry dialogue is followed by ‘he said angrily’ just to reiterate the point.
Overall Twilight fans will enjoy The Host but their parents may need to accept there’s not enough substance for them. Fantastic opportunity unfortunately not realised in full.

Coming Next - The Host

Review of Stephenie Meyer's 'The Host'