CRIME NOVEL IAN RANKIN
Doors Open (Orion) no.
After 18 novels, John Rebus retired in his last outing, Exit Music. Whether the detective inspector will return is unclear, but in the meantime Ian Rankin is having some fun spreading his authorial wings. This heist story was first published as a serial in the New York Times and while the fleshed- out version here is not a million miles away from Rebus’ world, thus keeping Rankin’s traditional fanbase happy, it has plenty original charm of its own too.
The backdrop is contemporary Edinburgh, where Mike Mackenzie is a bored, thirtysomething software millionaire with an interest in fine art. A conversation with an art professor and an employee of The First Caledonian Bank plants the seed of an idea to steal priceless works from the National Galleries’ warehouse on the city’s Doors Open Day, when private buildings are open to members of the public. The triumvirate realise they need experienced help and turn to Chib Calloway, local nutjob gangster and old school friend of Mackenzie, which is where things start to go pear-shaped.
Rankin is enjoying himself here examining the flipside of Rebus’ world: the mindset of the criminal attempting the perfect crime. The plotting and suspense are impeccable as ever, and his ear for dialogue and insight into his home city remain perfectly honed. Freed from his Rebus back-story, Rankin sets a rattling pace, and as the threads of the heist unravel, Doors Open is an untrammelled joy to read. Consummate in its execution, this is another fine addition to Ian Rankin’s career, Rebus or not. (Doug Johnstone)
so expansive and
; magically realised that it
; is heart-rending to return to the real one.
Contemporary diagnoses of mental illness vie with fairytale to create a postmodern gothic
; romance. His
: meticulously researched f and abundantly
emotional tome is a patient by the mysterious I momentous debut that gargoyle sculptor I can't go on too long and Marianne Engel. who holds an acrostic
claims to have loved him ' surprise for the eagle-
in previous centuries. ! eyed. (Suzanne Black)
(Canongate) mo
Over 468 pages. DAVIDSON a 1' H I.- Canadian author Andrew The Gargoyle i C; A RX) 0 V 1.. {I I Davidson spins a world
With so many books on all our to-read lists, brevity is a virtue. The Gargoyle flouts this with great success. Framed by the sceptical voice of .
\ II V. i' v \\ a severely burned car . , . crash victim, events ‘ swing from medieval times to the present. from frigid Iceland to the fiery pits of hell. In a nested story form similar to Cloud Atlas. stories are told to the disfigured
32 THE LIST 18 Sop—2 Oct 2008
GHOST STORY JAMES BUCHAN The Gate of Air (Quercus) 000 James Buchan's most recent main protagonist isn't the most likeable of chaps. Jim Smith — an emotionally closed. ex— London business entrepreneur with a love of complete solitude — moves to the Brackshire countryside, taking early retirement from the world of software, only to be greeted by a frosty reception from his hyper-critical, upper class neighbours and a haunted new home. Indeed not one of the characters in this award-winning author's third work ever really charms us, and instead it is left to the poetic prose and intense love story running beneath to captivate the reader.
[AMI-ZS BUCHA .\'
'i‘ilt‘ titll~ til. ;\i‘:'
A (than Slory
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Which, for the most part, it does. and despite slight souring by the odd cliche. overly complex allegory and confusingly contradictOry description, The Gate of Air is ultimately a moving and otherwise elegantly written novel. You certainly won't read another ghost story quite like it. (Camilla Pia)
FAMILY DRAMA MARILYNNE ROBINSON
Home (Virago) 00
With its groaningly slow pace and scriptural debate-heavy prose. labouring through Marilynne Robinson's thick-set third novel — a companion piece of sorts to 2005’s Pulitzer Prize winning Gilead — is an experience recommended only to the most sleep— deprived of readers. A reworking of the parable of the prodigal son, Home revisits the same rural Iowa town in
his public persona with
which Robinson's last book was set, focusing on the household of Gilead character John Ames' friend, Presbyterian Minister Robert Boughton. Boughton's troubled. alcoholic son Jack returns from 20 years of estrangement to make peace with his dad on his deathbed, only to rediscover his alienation from the family home and its values, before falling into bad habits again. Robinson only rarely reveals what really makes her characters tick, while her telling the story largely through the eyes I of glum, pious daughter Glory has the effect of narrating with a soporific voice from start to finish. (Malcolm Jack)
KIDS STORY
HARRY HILL I Tim the Tiny Horse , at Large (Faber) m ' ‘ You can virtually smell I Harry Hill at his I keyboard, big collar I tickling his neck, I tongue flicking in and out (‘hmm, hmm, yeah, I hmm?'), eyes blinking l maniacally as the ideas ' bristle through his cranium. There is a chance. of course. that he doesn't act or dress the way he has done on small screens and stages ever since plunging into our psyches around 1992, but there’s something comforting in the daft illusion.
If ever a comic was born to write kids books, it has to be Dr Matthew Hall and here he fully flexes the slightly naive, wide- eyed innocent side of
the next in his Tim the Tiny Horse series. Here the less than gigantic gee-gee becomes best man to his friend Fly,
ALSO PUBLISHED
5 CELEBRITY MEMOIRS Roger Moon My Word is My Bond Seems like it's 007 memoir season as Alan Partridge's favourite Bond suavely knocks out his story. an all-true tale of a childhood in WW2 London and hanging out with the stars in Tinseltown. Michael O'Mara.
Jullo Walton That’s Another Story: The Autobiography How the Brummie girl who was educated in a convent broke out of her mum’s austere grip to become one of the country’s most beloved screen actresses. Weidenfeld & Nico/son.
"Ichael Parkinson Parky: MyAutobiography The chat show ‘king' from humble Yorkshire beginnings delivers his life to us. Meg Ryan has yet to pre-order a copy. Hodder 8 Stoughton. Dawn French Dear Fatty From her early years as an RAF child to her flat-sharing antics with Jen and on to Lenny Henry and The Vicar of Dibley, this is her no- holds—barred memoir. Century.
Alan can Look Who It Is! My Story The gloriously successful camp comic who came from a stridently macho background tells it like it must have been. HarpeiCollins.
tin t;
it:
L
bl
at: Le. e
discovers he's not great with babies. (maggots) and suffers a sad loss. Delightful, silly and moving in its own quirky way.
(Brian Donaldson)