Category: Reading Challenges

My Week in Books – 27th May ’18

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MyWeekinBooks

New arrivals  

The Silence of the GirlsThe Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker (eARC, NetGalley)

From the Booker Prize-winning author of Regeneration and one of our greatest contemporary writers on war comes a reimagining of the most famous conflict in literature – the legendary Trojan War.

When her city falls to the Greeks, Briseis’s old life is shattered. She is transformed from queen to captive, from free woman to slave, awarded to the god-like warrior Achilles as a prize of war. And she’s not alone. On the same day, and on many others in the course of a long and bitter war, innumerable women have been wrested from their homes and flung to the fighters. The Trojan War is known as a man’s story: a quarrel between men over a woman, stolen from her home and spirited across the sea. But what of the other women in this story, silenced by history? What words did they speak when alone with each other, in the laundry, at the loom, when laying out the dead? In this magnificent historical novel, Pat Barker charts one woman’s journey through the chaos of the most famous war in history, as she struggles to free herself and to become the author of her own story.

A Long Island StoryA Long Island Story by Rick Geloski (eARC, NetGalley)

It is 1953, a heat wave is sweeping across America and the Grossmans – Ben, Addie and their two children – are moving their lives from the political heart of Washington DC to suburban Long Island. Benny was a successful lawyer in the Department of Justice, but all that has come tumbling down. With the McCarthy era of paranoia, persecution, and propaganda at its height, his past has come back to haunt him, forcing him to pack up his family and leave the capital behind.

With their future uncertain, life in Long Island starts to open old wounds for Ben and Addie, both start to wonder if they were meant for more, whether their future might look different than they planned, and whether their marriage – their family – is worth fighting for . . .

A Long Island Story is a portrait of a marriage in crisis, of a unique and fascinating period in US history and of a seemingly perfect family fighting their demons behind closed doors.

SongSong by Michelle Jana Chan (hardcover, review copy courtesy of Unbound and Random Things Tours)

Opening in the mid-nineteenth-century, this dazzling debut novel traces the voyage of Song, a boy who leaves his impoverished family in rural China to seek his fortune. Song may have survived the perilous journey to the colony of British Guiana in the Caribbean, but once there he discovers riches are hard to come by, as he finds himself working as an indentured plantation worker.

Between places, between peoples, and increasingly aware that circumstances of birth carry more weight than accomplishments or good deeds, Song fears he may live as an outsider forever. This is a far-reaching and atmospheric story spanning nearly half a century and half the globe, and though it is set in the past, Song’s story of emigration and the quest for opportunity is, in many ways, a very contemporary tale.

The TeacherThe Teacher (DS Imogen Grey #1) by Katerina Diamond (ebook, NetGalley)

You think you know who to trust? You think you know the difference between good and evil? You’re wrong…

The body of the head teacher of an exclusive Devon school is found hanging from the rafters in the assembly hall.  Hours earlier he’d received a package, and only he could understand the silent message it conveyed. It meant the end.

As Exeter suffers a rising count of gruesome deaths, troubled DS Imogen Grey and DS Adrian Miles must solve the case and make their city safe again.  But as they’re drawn into a network of corruption, lies and exploitation, every step brings them closer to grim secrets hidden at the heart of their community.

And once they learn what’s motivating this killer, will they truly want to stop him?

The Artist and the SoldierThe Artist and the Soldier by Angelle Petta (ebook, review copy courtesy of the author)

Two young men come of age and fall in love, set against the backdrop of true events during World War II.

It’s 1938. Bastian Fisher and Max Amsel meet at an American-Nazi camp, Siegfried. Neither have any idea what to do with their blooming, confusing feelings for one another. Before they can begin to understand, the pair is yanked apart and forced in opposite directions.

Five years later, during the heart of World War II, Bastian’s American army platoon lands in Salerno, Italy. Max is in Nazi-occupied Rome where he has negotiated a plan to hire Jews on as ‘extras’ in a movie—an elaborate ruse to escape the Nazis. Brought together by circumstance and war, Bastian and Max find one another again in Rome.

Exploring the true stories of Camp Siegfried and the making of the film, La Porta del Cielo, The Artist and the Soldier sheds light on largely untouched stories in American and Italian history.

On What Cathy Read Next last week

Blog posts

Monday – I took part in the blog tour for I Will Find You by Daniela Sacerdoti sharing my review of this emotional dual time romance set in Scotland.  I also published my reviews of The Magpie Tree by Katherine Stansfield and Mr Peacock’s Possessions by Lydia Syson, both great historical fiction novels.

Tuesday – I was pleased to mark publication day by publishing my review of The Biographies of Ordinary People, Vol. 2 by Nicole Dieker, described as a ‘millennial Little Women’.   This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic was Best Character Names and I decided to give my list a John Buchan theme.

Wednesday – WWW Wednesday is the opportunity to share what I’ve just finished reading, what I’m reading now and what I’ll be reading next.   I also participated in the blog tour for That Summer in Puglia by Valeria Vescina, sharing my review of this compelling story of love, loss and regret.

Thursday –My Throwback Thursday book was The Scribe’s Daughter by Stephanie Churchill.  The follow-up book, The King’s Daughter, is in my review pile and I was pleased to learn the author is working on a third book in the series.  I also shared a fabulous guest post by Jim Kelly about his research for historical crime mystery, The Great Darkness, which I read recently and loved.

Friday – It was time for another of my Fact in Fiction features where I pick out interesting things I’ve learned through reading novels.  This week my list included training cormorants to catch fish, Cornish dialect and an Italian liqueur.

Saturday – I published a write-up of an evening spent listening to local authors, Claire Dyer and Amanda Jennings, talk about their current books, The Last Day and The Cliff House.

Challenge updates

  • Goodreads 2018 Reading Challenge – 79 out of 156 books read, 3 more than last week
  • Classics Club Challenge – 14 out of 50 books read, same as last week
  • NetGalley/Edelweiss Reading Challenge 2018 (Gold) – 29 ARCs read and reviewed out of 50, 4 more than last week
  • From Page to Screen– 10 book/film comparisons out of 15 completed, same as last week
  • 2018 TBR Pile Challenge – 5 out of 12 books read, same as last week
  • Historical Fiction Reading Challenge 2018 – 37 books out of 50 read, same as last week
  • When Are You Reading? Challenge 2018 – 7 out of 12 books read, same as last week
  • What’s In A Name Reading Challenge – 1 out of 6 books read, same as last week
  • Buchan of the Month – 4 out of 12 books read, same as last week

On What Cathy Read Next this week

Currently reading

Planned posts

  • Book Review: The Last Day by Claire Dyer
  • Book Review: War Girl Ursula (War Girl #1) by Marion Kummerow
  • Book Review: A Lost Lady of Old Years by John Buchan
  • Book Review: The Concubine’s Child by Carol Jones

Book Review: Mr Peacock’s Possessions by Lydia Syson

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Mr Peacock's PossessionsAbout the Book

Oceania 1879. A family of settlers from New Zealand are the sole inhabitants of a remote volcanic island.

For two years they have struggled with the harsh reality of trying to make this unforgiving place a paradise they can call their own. At last, a ship appears. The six Pacific Islanders on board have travelled eight hundred miles across the ocean in search of work and new horizons. Hopes are high for all, until a vulnerable boy vanishes. In their search for the lost child, settlers and newcomers together uncover far more than they were looking for. The island’s secrets force them all to question their deepest convictions.

Format: ebook, hardcover (432 pp.)    Publisher: Bonnier Zaffre
Published: 17th May 2018                      Genre: Historical Fiction

Purchase Links*
Amazon.co.uk ǀ  Hive.co.uk (supporting UK bookshops)
*links provided for convenience, not as part of any affiliate programme

Find Mr Peacock’s Possessions on Goodreads

My Review

Joseph Peacock, the Mr Peacock of the title, is a patriarchal figure, presiding over what he views as his own ‘Garden of Eden.  His wife and family have trailed behind him from island to island, leaving behind a legacy of failed ventures and catastrophes, as he searches for land he can call his own.  ‘Plenty proved not enough for Mr Peacock.  It wasn’t his, you see.’  Arriving on the remote Monday Island (also known as Blackbird Island), not visited by passing ships from one year to the next, they find it is definitely not the Paradise they had been promised.  Cheated by those they had trusted for supplies, for a long time they lead a hand to mouth existence, at near starvation point and relying only on their survival skills and what they can forage from the island.

Ah yes, the island. At times nurturing, at other times sinister and threatening.  ‘In fact, everything here grew a sight too much for Ma’s liking.  It didn’t seem right, all this unearned fecundity.  Flowers that unfurled their perfume unbidden, petals and even leaves so brightly-coloured they seemed brazen.  Vines carelessly floating their seeds any which way and honeyed fruit that flaunted itself, then rotted, reeking, where it softly fell.’   At times, the island almost seems a living being. ‘The air itself feels violent, as though the island is gathering itself for something.  She imagines it breathing, heaving, maybe shifting.’ Furthermore, it turns out the island has hidden dangers and harbours terrible secrets.

I really liked the distinctive, almost poetic, narrative voice the author creates for Kalala, one of the six Pacific Islanders who arrive on the island to work for the Peacocks, and through whose eyes the reader witnesses some of the events.  For example, this description of their voyage to Monday Island.  ‘Esperanza pitch and roll, still in deep water plenty lengths from land, and beyond her monstrous roaring.’

I loved the way the author explored the idea of possession in all its myriad meanings. For example, it becomes clear that Joseph Peacock considers his family, and the Pacific Islanders contracted to work for him, as ‘possessions’ he owns.  However, his most prized possession is the island itself.  Greeting Kalala for the first time as he struggles ashore, Peacock says, ‘Welcome to my island.’ – note the ‘my’ there.  But the islanders too covet the tangible rewards they will receive in return for their work. ‘For have we not come here, we six, we islanders in hope of great possessions.’

Through the course of the book, the reader begins to understand just how crucial it is to Mr Peacock to possess land, not just as something to claim ownership of in the present – although that’s important – but to be able to pass on to his eldest son, Albert. ‘All this work has always been for Albert.  It’s all Pa cared about.  Not him, exactly.  But his name.  Securing the future for the Peacock family, a tiny empire nobody could ever take away because it belonged to no one, where nobody else could give orders.  Peacock land for generations.’

This desire to pass on land, as a testament to everything he has worked for and the obstacles he has overcome, is at the root of Peacock’s troubled relationship with Albert.  Because Albert doesn’t seem to share his father’s burning desire for ownership of land; in fact, Albert hates the island as he hated the voyage there.  For Peacock, Albert is a disappointment, branding him ‘weak’, ‘a shirker’, physically chastising him and viewing him as someone who constantly falls short of his expectations, particularly in comparison with his daughter, Lizzie.

It transpires that the relationship between Peacock and his daughter, Lizzie, is equally complex.   Courageous, strong and adventurous, she shares a similar temperament to her father.  ‘For Lizzie was her father’s daughter, a moth to the flame of new hopes and possibilities.’ For a long time Lizzie is blind to her father’s faults and his true nature, even though the other children see it only too clearly.  Eventually Lizzie finds herself facing an awful choice.  Because she too has ‘possessions’ – her family – she feels bound to protect.

Of course, the term ‘possessed’ may also be used to describe being taken over by strong emotions and, at times, we get glimpses of Joseph Peacock as a man possessed by a sort of  madness.  Here is a portrait of a monster, someone possessed by a desire for control, manipulative and violent.  Before the end of the book the reader will be witness to the disastrous and tragic consequences of his desire for possession and the lengths to which he will go.

Mr Peacock’s Possessions is like the strange but wonderful lovechild of Swiss Family Robinson, Lord of the Flies and The Tempest. It will appeal to readers who like their historical fiction full of atmosphere and compelling characters…and an undertone of menace.  Highly recommended.  I can see this novel making some literary prize shortlists.

I received an advance review copy courtesy of publishers, Bonnier Zaffre, and NetGalley in return for an honest and unbiased review.

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In three words: Atmospheric, compelling, intense

Try something similar…Things Bright and Beautiful by Anbara Salam (click here to read my review)

Lydia SysonAbout the Author

Lydia Syson is a fifth-generation North Londoner who now lives south of the river with her partner and four children. After an early career as a BBC World Service Radio producer, she turned from the spoken to the written word, and developed an enduring obsession with history. Her PhD about poets, explorers and Timbuktu was followed by a biography of Britain’s first fertility guru, Doctor of Love: James Graham and His Celestial Bed, and then two YA novels for Hot Key Books set in the Spanish Civil War (A World Between Us) and World War Two (That Burning Summer). Liberty’s Fire, a passionate tale of the Paris Commune of 1871, is the third of her novels to be inspired, very loosely, by family history: Lydia’s anarchist great-great-grandmother moved in Communard circles in late nineteenth-century London.

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