Books Reviews
GRAPHIC NOVEL JOSHUA DYSART & CLIFF CHIANG Neil Young’s Greendale (Vertigo) ●●●●●
Originally a concept album in 2003, then a film, a live DVD and an off- Broadway musical, this anti-war, pro-ecology tale by Neil Young & Crazy Horse continues its march across media formats with an attractive hard- bound graphic novel version from DC’s Vertigo imprint. Writer Joshua Dysart (The Unknown Soldier) and artist Cliff Chiang (Human Target) have created a book which is expansive, detailed, uncluttered and naturalistic, in the same manner that Young or Springsteen found epic musical stories in the relative minutiae of small-town America. The story of Sun Green, a girl from the fictional Southern Californian town
of Greendale whose female relatives all seem to possess strange powers and an uncanny ability to disappear into the woods and never be seen again, is a confidently-told tale. References to Sun’s powers are a little too on-the-nose, perhaps played up in the hope of enticing Vertigo’s core audience (Dysart also wrote Swamp Thing for a couple of years), but attempts are made to defuse the usual clichés. Perhaps the most compelling subplot is the duality between Sun’s father Earl, a struggling artist, and the brazen, materialistic, supernatural Stranger. Both look like Young at various stages of his career, and the former’s denunciation of the latter as ‘a man who knows how to take pure bullshit and turn it into gold’ feels like the singer’s own commentary on the conflicting nature of fame. (David Pollock)
FAMILY DRAMA EMMA DONOGHUE Room (Picador) ●●●●● Inspired by the notorious Fritzl family case, Room is the story of a young boy and his mother, both held
captive in a fortified shed. Their kidnapper, Old Nick, frequently rapes Jack’s mother while he hides in the wardrobe where he sleeps, counting the squeaks of the bed. On Jack’s fifth birthday, his mother decides they must escape, eventually succeeding when she tells Old Nick that Jack has died and wraps him in a rug for disposal. Jack escapes and is taken in by the police who locate the house and rescue his mother. Amidst a medical and media barrage, their lives stumble towards normality. Narrated by the boy,
the closeness of the mother-son relationship is touching, but the book is claustrophobic and unrelentingly bleak. As a study of the psychological impact of imprisonment, it’s interesting, but will certainly not brighten your day. (Kate Gould) HISTORICAL META-FICTION FRANCIS SPUFFORD Red Plenty (Faber) ●●●●●
Talk about a revolution. Francis Spufford’s reimagining of the mid- 20th century utopian Soviet dream is a refreshingly audacious
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concept of embracing your own destiny and how your actions, or more significantly inaction, can affect the world around you. In a neatly plotted
series of events, eleven characters tumble domino-like towards the conclusion, a result initially sparked by a single happening one snowy winter’s day. Watson’s prose displays a delicate touch and, unsurprising given his stand-up roots, there are plenty of perceptive observations. In addition, he peppers the narrative with occasional tantalising glimpses into a future that waits for certain characters way beyond the close of the novel, reminding us of the all- knowing godlike presence of the narrator. (Marissa Burgess)
CRIME THRILLER ROB SCOTT 15 Miles (Gollancz) ●●●●●
In this highly-strung debut, Virginian author Rob Scott takes the customary jaded-cop- with-a-drink-problem, and cranks him up a few notches. Samuel ‘Sailor’ Doyle has a supplementary mistress and dependency on powerful prescription drugs, with Scott walking the line between crime thriller and what could feasibly pan out to be supernatural horror, societal disaster or political drama.
Locked firmly within the minutiae of modern police procedure, much of the action unfolds over one ungodly holiday weekend as our anti-hero follows a call to investigate two mysterious deaths on a farm overrun by feral cats. Weaving a tight and credible plot that is delivered with heart and not inconsiderable flair
ALSO PUBLISHED 5 UNIT- SHIFTING MEMOIRS Tony Blair A Journey Probably the most controversial autobiography of this or any other year, much has been made of the donation from the author to the British Legion. Time will shortly tell whether the content has justified the pre- publication clamour. Hutchinson. Michael Caine The Elephant to Hollywood Almost 20 years after his first autobiography, Caine now mainly covers the period he spent in Tinseltown with comparisons being made to David Niven’s memoir. Hodder. Stephen Fry Memoir Another second memoir here, this time coming 13 years after Moab Was My Washpot, and features the beloved comic and broadcaster’s more turbulent recent times. Michael Joseph. Ingrid Betancourt Even Silence Has an End A Colombian presidential candidate and anti- corruption campaigner, Betancourt was held captive for six years by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. Rescued in 2008, this is her story. Virago. Alan Sugar What You See is What You Get The straight-talking Apprentice honcho recalls his childhood in Hackney, his schoolboy enterprises plus the Amstrad and Tottenham years. Macmillan.
Scott exhibits an exemplary talent for character and dialogue, keeping the pages turning through personal back-story, cultural commentary and technical procedures alike, and impelling the reader to race for the finish. (Mark Edmundson)
melding of historical fact into presumed fiction. Red Plenty puts Communist leader Khrushchev and American president Eisenhower in the same milieu as a roll-call of model workers and revolting peasants while a sleek sci-fi future based on misguided optimism gradually caves in on itself. If the planned
economy sounds like a dry subject for such a sprawl, think again. Spufford’s approach may be exhaustively detailed, but it’s also a self-consciously playful piece of meta-fiction that comes complete with more than 50 pages of notes and a full bibliography. Yet, beyond such archness is an epic re-reading of a much misunderstood and often romanticised era that casts a serious eye on its subject beyond its comic style, creating a glorious myth out of a past gone mad that never quite found its future. (Neil Cooper)
SOCIAL DRAMA MARK WATSON Eleven (Simon & Schuster) ●●●●●
He only turned thirty in February, yet stand-up comic, radio and TV star Mark Watson is already onto his third novel. Fortunately, such prolific outpourings haven’t dimmed his ideas. With this latest narrative, Watson explores the