Escape From Camp 14 is the story of Shin Dong-hyuk, a man born in a North Korean gulag, and the first such prisoner ever to escape.  Across three sections, journalist Blaine Harden tells Shin’s story for the first time in English, from his existence in Camp 14, to his harrowing journey across North Korea into China, and his troubled and incomplete adjustment to life in the free world.  Through its pages, Escape From Camp 14 paints a picture of a state which is indistinguishable from Hell.

Camp 14, visible on satellite photos, is a “complete control district.”  It is a no-exit prison, where life expectancy is below fifty, with inmates being worked brutally to death.  Industrial injuries and fatalities are frequent, and unfathomable cruelty is the norm, not just between guards and inmates, but amongst inmates themselves.  Denunciation is encouraged, even mandatory, enforced like all other camp rules under threat of torture and execution.  Beatings are incessant, merciless, and inflicted for minor and even fictitious infractions.   Camp 14 is, according to Shin’s account, a place devoid of any semblance of humanity.   As a youth, ignorant of anything resembling civilised morality, Shin watched the executions of his mother and brother, and believed their punishments to be deserved.  Nor is this even the most shocking detail of Shin’s relationship with his family.

While the most shocking, visceral segments are those referring directly to Shin, this is not exclusively his story.  Drawing upon both research and upon his own time in North Korea, Harden puts Shin’s experiences firmly within their historical and political context.  When he fled to China for example, Shin benefited from extraordinary good fortune – escaping at a time when suicidal economic policies left border guards ripe for bribery.
Whether by North Korea’s design or by the West’s cynical indifference, very little of the information contained in Escape From Camp 14 will be common knowledge to Harden’s readership.  North Korea is not a Communist state on any meaningful level, for example.  Instead, it is a feudal society, based on one of the most inflexible caste-systems in the world.  Escape From Camp 14 manages to fuse an urgent personal tale with a rigorously journalistic discussion of the region as a whole.  Moreover, it does so in accessible prose.  Harden’s bald, uncomplicated style draws the full horror from the subject matter, sparing no detail but adding no unnecessary flourish.

Lest it need be said, this is not a redemptive tale of triumph against the odds.  As Harden points out, Shin has escaped the camp physically but not mentally.  He is still plagued by a most extreme form of PTSD, addled by nightmares and survivor guilt, and filled with self-loathing.  Given the quarter century of horrors he endured, it would be absurd to suggest Shin’s trauma could end neatly once he passed beyond the high voltage wire of Camp 14.  Furthermore, for Shin and for humanity, there can be no possible happy ending while hundreds of thousands still live in the most diabolical captivity.

Therein lies the only problem with Escape From Camp 14.  There is a very real sense that, as citizens of the world, it is morally incumbent on all of us to read the book, but to what end?  What succour will the world’s mere knowledge of their plight bring to North Korean prisoners, when both the United States and China have shown no desire to come to their aid?  Aside from shock, horror, pity and revulsion, Escape From Camp 14 also provokes a profound sensation of impotence.

Make no mistake though, this is a vitally important book that demands an audience.  It is blackly fascinating, and sheds sunlight on one of the darkest corners of the world.  Whether or not that sunlight will prove to be the best disinfectant, however, remains to be seen.

Irvine has done a tremendous job creating a new world in his latest trilogy the Tainted Realm, which captures the essential good against evil battle mixed with some magical phenomena. At over 600 pages you get a great word count for your money too.

It starts 12 years previous to the main story, when Tali a young slave witnesses the gruesome murder of her mother, which involved removing something  peculiar from within her head. Made of a strength and resilience that belies her small vulnerable frame, Tali on that day vows to avenge the murder of her mother.

Set on the remote island nation of Cythe, brutally colonised two thousand years ago by the Hightspallers, and of a realm forever tainted by the means they used to take the land. Cythe’s history, art and culture were erased and its clever native people were reduced to despicable degradoes, on the verge of extinction when, without warning, they vanished.

For fifteen hundred years they have lived underground in Cython, served by their Pale slaves, the descendants of noble Hightspaller children once given as hostages to Cython but never ransomed. For all this time, the Cythonians’ lives have been shaped by the alchymical books called the Solaces, sorcerously bestowed upon them by an unknown benefactor.

Based in the subterranean empire of Cython, the Pale, a specific race are kept enslaved and treated with brutality and cruelty. Tali, a Pale seeks to be the first slave to escape Cython. As she matures and comes of age,  it becomes more apparent that she has magery powers, but such powers are illegal in Cython and attract the death penalty. Tali doesn’t know how to tap into her powers and neither can she ask anyone. However Wil the mad seer, calls her The One, so there is something special about her.

Tali against all the odds manages to escape, but faces greater danger. She embarks on a death-defying adventure, hunted, yet special and unable to trust anyone – but is it truly possible to do this? She has to make decisions on instinct and learn as much as possible about the land of Highspallt, its history and what she can do to face the supernatural, her enemies and sustain the will to stay alive against the odds.

Irvine, originally a marine scientist, has written 28 previous novels, including previous best-selling Three Worlds fantasy trilogies. This novel drew me in from the first page. It’s easy to follow, intriguing and full of twists. The pace overall is good, slowing and picking up according to the point in the story, be it delving into the thoughts and learning more about the characters or faster during the more action-packed scenes. The age of the heroine, has the scope to make this a story that could appeal to younger readers – so this could prove to be a cross over read. The first book has certainly left me wondering what’s coming next and wanting to learn more about Tali and whether she will find and be able to control her magic. I really enjoyed the story and look forward to the 2nd book in the trilogy, Rebellion, due out next year.

Beginning with a quiet prelude, after the fact of Ruth’s terrible loss, the rawness of Susan Hill’s prose is immediately arresting. She writes the opening lines as she means to go on, avoiding any unnecessary melodrama and excessive feelings, somehow skirting the pitfalls of manipulation its all too easy to drop into in a desperate effort to make the audience feel the character’s pain. Which isn’t to say In the springtime of the year is devoid of emotion. Its painful and sad, and you come away affected, but there is a quiet, unhurried pace which is, incongruously, a lovely and fitting touch.

‘She closed the door behind her, and then it was quite silent, quite dark. She stood and then she could smell very faintly the dry smell of the bracken, coming over the common. Everything was dry now, for three weeks the sun had shone. It tired her. But throughout April and May, it had rained, and that, too, had been tiring…..’ goes the first page. After this brief taster, dropping in on the numb, emotionally exhausted Ruth Bryce, the book flashbacks to just prior to her husband’s death, and unspools from there.

Ben’s death, understandably, shocks and horrifies the community with its pointless, random nature. Nobody was at fault, nobody can be assigned blame. Sometimes people just die. It’s a blunt, simple statement which is, painfully for the reader, repeated twice more throughout the book. Despite the heaviness of the suffering and anguish of the book it still bowls you in the gut every time, perhaps because Susan Hill is so unassuming, so underplayed with the narrative.

The tragedy briefly brings the community together, but, in the cold-hearted way of life being for the living, the close-knit feelings soon proves short-lived. Ruth is isolated in her cottage, alone except for a sad donkey and some hens. And Jo, Ben’s younger, worldly teenage brother, who proves a godsend for Ruth. In the turbulence of those days, amidst Ruth’s see sawing waves of tears, the numbness and shock, the jealousy and selfishness of solely wanting to claim Ben’s memory as her own, Jo is her life line to her in-laws and a wider world.

The book moves to the strictures of Ruth’s, and occasionally others, grief. If it seems casual and languorous, so internalised you’ll be surprised how quickly, ironically, you settle down to the slower pace. One particularly memorable scene has Ruth and Jo leave their secluded, wooded valley, to visit the coast and walk the beach. It makes a needed counterpoint to the bitterness, and hysteria surrounding Ben Bryce’s family, outside of Jo, who feel estranged from Ruth herself.

With its emphasis on inner feelings, on the inability of characters to share in their individual grief, the book can sometimes get overwhelming. Encouraging her audience to empathise with her characters is necessary, and is something Susan Hill pulls off effortlessly. For your emotional wellbeing, it probably works too well.

Fortunately for the reader the elegant, vivid prose grounds itself, and no pun intended here, in the earthiness and permanence of the natural world. The book is full of such descriptions as, ‘the mist had folded back and back upon itself like a long pillow at the bottom of Low Field. She found mushrooms, more than a dozen of them, with their delicate pink-brown grilles and tops of white suede, she put some in her pockets and carried the rest between cupped hands….’

Rather than boring the reader the many descriptions of various birds and trees are enticing, sweetly worded and refreshing. And you’re grateful for them.

“Fear of the dark is natural, we all have it, but fear in the sunlight, where it is so unexpected – that is interesting” Alfred Hitchcock

London 1954, and Chief Inspector Archie Penrose, about to retire from Scotland Yard, is visited by an American investigator who wants to know about events that took place in the summer of 1936 when Josephine Tey celebrated her 40th birthday in Portmeirion with Penrose and other close friends. Remembering is hard for Archie. Josephine has since died and having to look back means facing the pain of losing his close friend full on again. But the American has come with a surprising revelation about the events that took place during their stay there, and the curiosity that always made him such a good investigator takes Archie back to that shocking holiday in the beautiful surroundings in North Wales.

In 1936 celebrating her birthday with friends wasn’t Josephine’s only reason for staying in Portmeirion. She was also meeting Alfred Hitchcock and his wife Alma, to talk about selling the rights to her novel “A Shilling for Candles” to the already famous director. During a dinner party Hitchcock decides to play a rather cruel game with his guests. A game that leaves a nasty taste in the mouth of those involved as well as those witnessing it and a game which will have horrible consequences.

The next day the bodies of two women, a leading actress and a local girl working in the resort, are found. Both have been murdered in horrible, although different, ways. When shortly after the discovery a third person dies, it appears that the case may have already solved itself. However Archie can’t help having niggling doubts about the solution and also has strong reservations about the way in which the case has been, barely, investigated. But since this is neither his case nor his jurisdiction, there is nothing he can do about it.

It is only in 1954 with the arrival of the mysterious American investigator that all the threads of what exactly was going on in 1936 come together and Archie at last finds the answers to all the questions. Answers that will lead him back to Portmeirion and to him making a decision he didn’t think he would ever be able to make.

This is the fourth book in a series featuring Josephine Tey and it is, once again, a wonderful book. Yes, it is a murder mystery, but it is so much more. In fact, we are almost 200 pages into the story when the first murder occurs. This is first and foremost a book about Josephine Tey and her life. We see her struggle with the decision whether or not to sell the rights to her book. And we are witness to her dilemma when it comes to her love life.
This is also a story about the relationships between people and the tangled webs those create. About the ways in which people hurt and fail each other, hide parts of themselves as well as the lengths people will go to in order to protect someone they are close to, despite knowing better.

This author has a way with words. Her sentences flow, her conversations are natural and her descriptions are vivid. She takes her time describing surroundings, moods and thoughts and yet she maintains the suspense that keeps the reader turning the pages. While Upson obviously likes and admires her main character, she doesn’t idolise her. Tey, as described in this book is a human and rounded character. She’s is mostly a very likeable person to read about, but she has her less beautiful sides and there are moments that the reader would like to shake her and tell her exactly what she should be doing. All of this makes her very real and leaves me willing to believe that the Josephine Tey described on this pages is as close to the real thing as anyone could come. In fact, there were times when I had to remind myself that I was reading a work of fiction featuring real historical figures. There is such detail in the descriptions in this story that it is quite possible to believe that all of it really happened.

The fact that the author has part of this book set after Josephine’s death worries me a bit. Does this mean Upson does not intend to write anymore books in this series? I certainly hope that is not the case. On the other hand, the mystery in this book is set in 1936 when Tey still had years to live, which should leave room for several other instalments. Books that will be fictional while also giving the reader an inside into Josephine Tey’s life. Books that I very much look forward to reading.

Chris Mooney

Are you a bookgeek?

Sure, absolutely. I wouldn’t be who I am today if I hadn’t devoured books growing up. They taught me how to think, and also how to write myself.

What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever been given (and do you follow it)?

The piece of advice about writing that influenced me the most was contained in George Orwell’s essay “Why I Write.” Orwell admitted very frankly that writers are driven by their egos, their desire to make a mark on things–and there’s nothing wrong with that. Nor, he added, is there anything wrong with writing out of political motives. There is an aesthetic aspect that gets layered on top of it all, but the other factors can’t be ignored, and shouldn’t be apologized for.

Which authors do you find most inspiring as a writer?

My favorite writer in high school and college was Charles Dickens. I also read science fiction and fantasy to decompress. Lately, like everybody else in the world, I’ve been reading Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire. I know I’m supposed to give a much more erudite answer than that, and show that I devour political books, but, well….I learned frankness and honesty from Orwell.

Do you have an audience in mind when writing, or do you just write for yourself?

My audience—at present, anyway–is basically the set of liberals and scientists who are frustrated by the irrationality of the world, and trying to figure out a way to make things a little bit better. Their frustration knows no end, and I do think I can help a little to ease their sorrows. Or at least to make it all make a little more sense.

But yeah, you bet I write to satisfy myself as well. There’s nothing more sublime than the moment when you’ve been working on a book for about 6 months, and suddenly, it’s like you step out of your body and have a vision of how all the parts fit together. Parts that you didn’t know existed yet, and parts that you didn’t know where to place. Suddenly, the puzzle pieces up and move themselves into place. I have to admit that I crave that moment.

Where do you write, and why?

I take it you mean physically. I do my best writing in a coffee shop in Washington, D.C., in the early morning. It’s called Tryst. I’ve thanked them in my books.

I wrote these very words in Tryst, actually.

Tell us the book you most wish you had written.

Wuthering Heights. Weird, right? But it’s true. I don’t know of a more perfect book.

Or maybe Tristram Shandy. That really captures my sense of humor.

The American left is traditionally considered to be more right-wing than the European left.  Would you say the socialist brain is a different beast again, or is it simply a variation on the liberal brain?

No, just a variation of the liberal brain. There are large cultural and regional variations in ideology that are probably not influenced by psychology, so much as by “nurture” or the environment. I think U.S. liberals would, in Europe, often be called socialists. In fact, there is research, discussed in the book, showing that moderate socialists in the U.K. looked a lot like U.S. liberals in their “integrative complexity,” which means their willingness to consider other sides of an argument and find the common ground between different perspectives.

You mention that a more personal appeal to common ground and positive emotion may be the key to conciliation between rival factions. To what extent is that possible when releasing information in books and journals? Does science have a PR problem in that regard?

Science has a gigantic PR problem, and it is at last beginning to recognize it. Scientists like start with the facts in communication–and even, sometimes, with the facts that you have to know in order to even begin to understand the facts.

Yeah.

This means scientists have communication precisely backwards. When communicating with homo sapiens, you want to start with the overarching point, not with the details. Moreover, if you want to really connect with somebody, you have to start with the values and emotions—preferably, those that the two of you share.

So the whole scientific process is built to be, essentially, anti-communicative, and turning that around is a big, big challenge. But, it’s starting to happen.

European conservatives have generally been able to accommodate the theory of evolution. Why do you think American conservatives are so resistant to it?

Simply put, and for historical as well as psychological reasons, American conservatism has activated a religiously fundamentalist and psychologically authoritarian strain that is not matched in Europe. Authoritarianism leads to a much more extreme sort of reality denial, as well as bellicosity and prejudice. So American conservatives—Christian conservatives in particular–have fixated on the idea that evolution is a threat to their values (although it shouldn’t be), and they’re also the sort of people who double down and defend their beliefs against challenge and outsiders.

In closing The Republican Brain, you mention your willingness to be wrong bolsters the likelihood of you being right. Is it reasonable to draw a parallel between this thinking and the religious assertion that doubt strengthens faith?

Yikes. I hope not.

Recent research suggests that people who engage in more second stage reasoning—more measured, less automatic and instinctive reactions–tend towards less religiosity. So I am not sure that doubt actually does strengthen faith in all cases.

In truth, when you talk about the sort of faith that is strengthened by doubt, what you’re really talking about is psychologically liberal religiosity. Psychologically conservative religiosity, or fundamentalism, is not at all strengthened by doubt. It craves certainty, and latches on to what it considers absolute truths to stave off doubt’s corrosion.

My view is that in religion as in politics, there are psychologically liberal approaches and psychologically conservative approaches—and the latter tend to be the problem, because they’re wedded to certainty and frequently become intolerant. This separates me, incidentally, from the so-called New Atheists, who think religion in all its forms is the problem. No way, I say. You need to worry about conservatism, in religion or anywhere else.

Is it ever possible to be neutral when reporting politics?

People try it, but inevitably, they reach a bridge where either they’ve got to call a fact a fact—whereupon, one side will get angry—or, they’ve got to be spineless. This is especially the case in U.S. politics today, incidentally, where the distribution of unreality is vastly unequal. This leaves fact-checkers, in particular, in quite the quandary. Conservative lies are far worse than liberal lies, so are they really going to split the difference? If so, that will make them a laughingstock—and of course, we’ve seen that happen.

In view of your findings, do we need a new Enlightenment? And if so, what form would it take?

It’s simple—and I’m not the first to propose this, by the way. I’m following George Lakoff.

The new Enlightenment would not be built on idealism about the power of rationality to fix human ills. Rather, it would be built on the best available evidence about how human beings process information. In a sense, that would mean that it would be an Enlightenment that pretty much assumes all manner of human irrationality. It would recognize that reason can’t save us unless we recognize and study the very limited circumstances in which reason actually occurs—and act to privilege those circumstances.

In The Republican Brain, you mention Churchill as a leader whose conservative qualities were vital to the war effort.  Outside wartime, could there ever be a political reality in which you as a liberal would vote for a conservative party?

Sure. A psychologist reviewing the book at Amazon.com pointed out that I myself am actually a blended character in terms of left-right psychology. I have some conservative traits, but I also have a liberal “need for cognition.”

Conservative leaders have often appealed to me. People like the John McCain of the year 2000, for instance. However, I can’t hold truck with the sort of conservative irrationality and anti-empiricism that dominates today in the U.S. I’ll do everything I can to combat it.

You might say I’ll support conservatism when it gives me decisive and brave leaders who actually respect modern knowledge, rather than trample on it. Short of that, I’ll stay with liberals, even though they’re politically rather inept.

Finally, who do you expect to win in November?

President Obama. But such predictions at this stage of the game are, to my mind, just as meaningless as they are amusing.

Additional questions by Mike Stafford

The Wind Through the Keyhole

As they find refuge in the town of Gook, Roland is reminded of a time when he told the tale of Tim Stoutheart to a small, bereaved boy. The time he and his childhood friend, Jamie de Curry, faced the skin-man – a man who could change shape from that of a human to that of a wolf, an alligator, a bear… A man who tore a small mining community to shreds.

The story of Tim Stoutheart turns into a tale within a tale within a tale as the well-known travellers from Gilead, New York and Mid-World spend the harshest night of the starkblast listening to their dinh weave a story that is half childhood fairytale and half memory from once upon a bye, long before your grandfather’s grandfather was born. Another glimpse into the fascinating mind and past of Roland Deschain, that coldly loveable stranger we’ve all grown to know and love.

I had to pre-order The Wind Through the Keyhole as soon as it became available. The Dark Tower series is arguably my favourite book series in the world, and I needed to be among the first to read it. As it happened, I received my copy on Friday and finished the novel on Sunday afternoon despite many other duties taking up my precious time off.

Okay; I’ll admit it. It wasn’t the most amazing of the Dark Tower books. While it was enjoyable enough, it lacked the depth and focus, the intensity and the eminent credibility of the other seven books. I liked the story, but at no point in time did I feel myself transported through time and space to Mid-World that was. I was a comfortable person in a chair with a book I enjoyed. I suspect this is caused by the fact that the actual overarching story commanding the other books, the source of all that drive and focus, is now told and this book is a branch sticking out of the side rather than being part of the trunk.

That said, it was a fun read and I finished it quickly. I’d say die-hard fans will definitely want to get it, and those who don’t yet love that old universe in which the world is moving on can consider it an easy road in. Just don’t expect the old Dark Tower magic to be as strong as once it was.

The story is a fictionalisation of a horrific murder case known publicly as the ‘Penge Mystery’ that took place in 1877. In the novel, the title character is a lady named Harriet with what we would call today ‘learning difficulties’. She is thirty-two years of age and lives a perfectly happy and content life with her mother in London. Harriet has a caring mother and a fair amount of money of her own, left to her by family. Her mother has cultivated in her a love of clothes and finery and a strong sense of personal cleanliness and neat appearance.

Harriet takes regular trips to stay with family and on one of these occasions she is introduced to a man named Lewis Oman who is currently courting Harriet’s cousin Alice and whose brother Patrick is married to Alice’s sister Elizabeth. When Lewis learns of Harriet’s own wealth, he switches his courting tactics from Alice to Harriet and manages to convince her to marry him. This alarming premise leads the reader into the story of Harriet’s forced estrangement from her panicked mother and the manipulation by Lewis of his new wife into signing her money over to him. He then convinces her to go and stay with his brother and wife for which Lewis pays them a fee and then moves Alice into the marital house in Kent which is near to his brother and passes her off as his wife to outside parties.

Successfully blocking any attempts made by Harriet’s mother to contact her, Lewis buries the existence of his real wife in the Kent countryside and he and Alice enjoy themselves with her money. In the meantime, Elizabeth and Patrick grow weary of Harriet’s difficulties but still rely on the money being paid to them by Lewis. Patrick is fiercely loyal and protective of his brother and will willingly remove any blight on his new enjoyable life. The result is a descent into neglect and cruelty that ultimately results in the tragic death of their charge. This death is dealt with by the family in a way that is calm and expectant but in order to cover their tracks they take her to a doctor when they know it is too late as they assume this will show them to have tried to help Harriet.

This is obviously a harrowing story, more so because it is based on truth. It is interesting to read an early book that would be classed in the large genre today of ‘True Crime’. Elizabeth Jenkins has dealt with this story very well and very subtlety. It is obvious where her beliefs lie in terms of the truth of the case but she does not hammer it into her storyline. The change in the people involved in this horrible tale is slow and naturally written. The shifts in their attitudes and tolerance towards Harriet, their slow realisations in the way they are behaving and their justifications of it to themselves are cleverly woven together. Elizabeth Jenkins takes us inside the minds of these selfish and ignorant people but does not portray them as such, she gives us the space to decide that for ourselves whilst insinuating as much quietly in the background.

It is a fascinating read but I would recommend that you brace yourself first and bring a hardened sense of humanity and a lower sense of a shock factor than you normally would because it isn’t a pretty story.

If I were to write the plot (don’t worry – no spoilers here!) of The Seamstress down for you in a matter of fact way, it would sound bizarre. But it doesn’t feel at all bizarre when you read it. The way the story is woven with such care and detail means that the plot never becomes unbelievable. Every page of the book is written with exceptional care that is not over-done but just the right amount to really make it hard to put down. The storytelling draws you in and it is truly hard to escape.

The Seamstress takes you from the cobbled streets of Madrid to the warm climate of Africa, and Morocco to Lisbon. The novel, split into four parts, is an account of the long journey the main character, Sira Quiroga takes through the years. It begins with twelve-year-old Sira’s humble beginnings in Spain, sweeping the floors where her single mother works as a dressmaker. She admires and envies the rich and wealth citizens of Madrid, peering through shop windows to stare at the glittering chandeliers and expensive furniture. As she grows up, she learns the art of being a seamstress and finds happiness with a man ready to settle down. With her life mapped out for her, Sira is thrown into disarray when she falls passionately in love… but not with the man she is engaged to be married to. Sira abandons her soon-to-be husband to face an uncertain life in Morocco. This sounds like enough to fill a whole book, but it all takes place in only the first few chapters, and there is still plenty left for Sira to deal with. I think that the length of the book is a major plus point to the novel as a whole. The key is that The Seamstress is not rushed. Duenas is in no hurry to reach a certain point, and the reader is in no rush to finish the book – I know I wasn’t!

The narrative is first-person, told from the view-point of Sira, which really shows the depth of her character. She is a very likable characters, who is not unfeeling, for better or worse. It is easy to sympathise with Sira and to feel empathy towards her and the difficult situations she finds herself in.

The Seamstress has the advantage of many additional characters which are actually likable. This came as a surprise to me, after reading many books in which minor characters are used to simply fill a gap. In The Seamstress every character has their own various backgrounds, personalities and likable elements; they are handled well and always have a purpose, never becoming boring or annoying. And still the story doesn’t stray from Sira.
Among other things, war is a prominent theme towards the end book, which again changes the course of Sira’s life. She is taken to Nazi-friendly Spain, where she forges a new identity for herself becoming a popular designer for the socialite wives of the German Nazi officers. But her innocent work as a seamstress soon becomes her cover for another, far more serious job. It is with this hidden agenda that leads Sira to come into contact with people of vast significance in the political world; characters based on real-world people. I won’t say who and why but they do have a vital role to play in the book.

Despite all these good point, there is only one thing that holds whole novel together, and that is the consistently excellent writing. Originally written in Spanish, I also want to point out that the translation by Daniel Hahn is perfectly done.

Previously published as The Time in Between in the US, The Seamstress was a multi-million-copy international bestseller and I would be surprised if the reception isn’t the same in the UK. This is Spanish author Maria Duenas’ debut novel, and if it is anything to go by the future can only hold many good things for her. I will be sure to keep my eyes peeled for her next novel. The Seamstress is an absolutely superb novel and the best book I have read in a very long time. Even if you usually shy away from longer books, this is one I promise you won’t regret buying.

The Picture of Dorian Gray follows the life of Mr. Dorian Gray, a young, handsome man who is loved by all. When Basil Hallward paints a wonderful picture of the young man – capturing his beauty and elegance – people are astounded by the wonder before them. As Basil is infatuated with Dorian, Dorian meets Henry Wotton and becomes fascinated with his world view. As Lord Henry speaks of art and says the only thing worth pursuing in life is beauty, Dorian decides to sell his soul to ensure the picture ages rather than he.

What stands out most about the novel is not the genre and context but more Wilde’s style of writing. When people hear the word ‘classic’ they are turned away because they believe it to be hard reading. In fact Wilde’s writing is easy and yet poetic at the same time. Wilde weaves sentences together with apparent ease and it’s shocking to realise that this is his only novel. The question, therefore, comes forward – what other grand sentences could he have produced?

Suddenly from a lumpy tussock of old grass, some twenty yards in front of them, with black-tipped ears, erect, and long hinder limbs throwing it forward, started a hare. It bolted for a thicket of alders. Sir Geoffrey put his gun to his shoulder, but there was something in the animal’s grace of movement that strangely charmed Dorian Gray, and he cried out at once, ‘Don’t shoot it, Geoffrey. Let it live.’

What lets the novel down is the battle of Wilde’s ideas. Overall we have a dark, Gothic novel about a young man selling his soul to keep his beauty and youth. Beyond that we have a novel about ideas of art. “Art for art’s sake,” as it is said. The preface, in fact, shows that this is what the novel is about. Using both of these plot-lines the novel becomes two books rather than one. We are thrown into ten-page long conversations about art and debates on human emotion and purpose and the next we hear Dorian has been doing horrific things and indulged in unsavory activities. The many ideas that seep through Wilde’s novel become its downfall – what could have been a novel about ideas or, alternatively, a novel about corruption, the Devil and selling ones soul is in fact split and muffled.

In addition, Dorian’s character is hard to fully appreciate as we, as readers, are kept in the dark about his activities. He is our main character and never fully explored. Not that all main characters need to be explained but main characters, among other enclosed characters, need to be explored more. In the end there is no sympathy for Dorian and throughout he remains a mystery, making it frustrating for readers to never fully receive answers in a novel that tries to present them. Once again Wilde’s other purpose in the novel is shadowed by his desire.

The Picture of Dorian Gray is not a perfect novel but not a bad one. Although the temptation to skip sections and ignore whole passages is seductive the other scenes keep the novel afloat. Wilde’s novel is, like most ‘classics’, interesting to explore and argue about but, when it comes to reading, the enjoyment is elsewhere. Dorian Gray is hard to enjoy because of its constant battle with its ideas but remains interesting in terms of writing and as a piece of literature.

Nowadays at the first twinge of a toothache its off to that nice dentist for a rapid fix of anesthetic and some not quite painless drilling and filling. Not so in the 1890’s, when denial was followed by hope that the pain would go away all by itself and then more denial. More hoping followed and then a variety of homespun pain relief recipes until finally, when all hope finally failed, a visit to the torture chamber where the offending molar would be examined, tapped, examined more and then ruthlessly extracted. Guts of blood and pus might well have ensued but the pain would, finally, be over. Unless an abscess had formed and eaten away at the underlying jawbone. Luckily for Murdoch when he finally braved the dentist’s chair he was gassed with nitrous oxide and was away with the fairies when his tooth came out.

The inconvenient Peg suffered rather more than Murdoch from the medical practices of the day. The last thing her stepson wanted was for her to produce any offspring who might dilute his inheritance when his elderly father died. So her committal to a lunatic asylum had to be arranged. It’s not hard, with Maureen Jennings’ writing, to imagine the sheer helplessness someone like Peg must have felt in that situation.

Constable second-class Oliver Wicken went missing on that same cold, wet November night. Sergeant Hales, out checking on his minions didn’t see him, did his trick with pebbles and doorknobs to no avail and arrived back at the station just after Murdoch’s toothache drove him there. Murdoch set out to search for Wicken, and not long after found his body in an empty house. Suicide, or murder?

This is another fine work, the, it turns out, relatively straightforward plot hidden amongst abundant red-herrings and subtly enhanced by evocative nineteenth century backgrounds and a rich cast of characters. Maureen Jennings is a star.