Tag: British settings

Book Review: The Salt Path by Raynor Winn – an inspiring memoir about the healing power of nature

~ Judith ~ 1 Comment

I don’t read a lot of non-fiction but every so often a book comes along that just captures my interest. I’d had this one on my reading list for some time, but what gave me the kick-start I needed was that one of the challenges in our library’s Turn Up the Heat reading programme asks you to read a biography or memoir.

The Salt Path is the story of a couple in middle age who are at a period in their lives when everything has just turned to custard. They’ve lost their home of twenty years which as a farm and accommodation business was also their income. Around the same time Moth, the author’s husband, is diagnosed with a debilitating terminal illness.

With few options and nowhere to live, other than the kind of emergency housing that could be utterly soul destroying, the pair buy a tent on E-bay, load up a couple of backpacks (rucksacks if you’re British) and set off on the Salt Path. This is a six hundred and thirty miles coastal walk around the south west corner of England from Minehead to Pool. You can’t be homeless if you’re hiking, can you?

But from the outset, Moth and Raynor are doing it tough. They have only a few hundred pounds to their name, and by the time they are walking the path, rely on a small dribble of cash turning up in their bank account from welfare. This barely pays for their food, often noodles and chocolate, or tuna and rice when they feel flush. They scrounge hot water at cafés for tea. You would think that the strain of the walk and lack of good nutrition might make Moth sicker, but it doesn’t. In fact he gets fitter and becomes almost pain-free.

In the pink half-light of dawn, the holes were everywhere. Fresh droppings piled up under the flysheet of the tent and as I undid the zip tens of rabbits hopped only feet away. I could have just reached out and taken one to put straight in the pot. Instead we made tea. Moth found a hairy wine gum in his pocket, so we cut that in half.

Raynor Winn chronicles the people they meet: the other walkers, often with much better equipment, but usually friendly; the people who turn up their noses at their unwashed shabbiness; and the other homeless people, not usually walking but eking out an existence in the towns. It’s quite an insightful look at the homeless problem in UK – how easy it is to drop out of the system, the difficulty of finding affordable accommodation, especially in rural communities where holiday lets drive up the rent astronomically.

The other thing Winn does really well is describe the wild environment of the coastal path. Not just the wildlife she encounters, the plants and the sea, but what it’s like to be amongst it all. Her writing is amazing. You’d think she’d been writing all her life but this would seem to be her first book. Winn’s story is heartfelt, immediate and real. Not surprisingly, The Salt Path was short-listed for the Costa Biography Award and a Wainwright Prize.

“It’s touched you, it’s written all over you: you’ve felt the hand of nature. It won’t ever leave you now; you’re salted…”

But more than that, The Salt Path is also the story of a marriage, of a couple’s devotion to each other and their determination to find a way forward. I found it both an emotional read and an inspiring one. Maybe it’s time to dust off the backpack and the hiking boots once more to remind myself why walking in the wilderness, for all the sore feet, the ache of the pack on your shoulders and the slogs uphill on uneven terrain can be so uplifting. Or maybe I’ll just read Winn’s sequel, The Wild Silence. The Salt Path gets a four and a half out of five from me.

Crime Fiction Catch-Up – some cosy and not-so-cosy Brit-crime reads

~ Judith ~ 2 Comments

I always seem to like a bit of crime fiction during the winter. Here’s a look at a few of the mysteries I’ve enjoyed over recent weeks.

A Game of Fear by Charles Todd
This is the latest Inspector Rutledge novel where our haunted, war-veteran is sent to Essex in search of a case that looks quite hopeless. A murder is reported but there’s no body and the man recognised as the murderer has been dead for years. Nobody at Scotland Yard expects Rutledge to find anything worth investigating, but the witness, Lady Benton, has connections. What he finds is a twisty crime plus a brutal killer on the loose. We have another terrific setting – the salt flats of Walmer, and a manor house built around the ruins of old abbey. There’s the remains of an old airfield from the WWI and somehow everything ties in with the men who served there, many of whom didn’t come back. If you think the Air Force in World War Two was a dangerous lark, then imagine the era of bi-planes and the Red Baron. It’s another cracking read from Charles Todd, loaded with atmosphere and interesting historical background.

Twenty-one Days by Anne Perry
Anne Perry is best known for her William Monk and Thomas Pitt series set in Victorian England which have been going for a few decades now. They’re good meaty crime reads with a Dickensian feel in the way she recreates the period. This first in a series introduces Thomas Pitt’s barrister son Daniel as the new sleuth, here attempting to save a man from the gallows who’s been found guilty of murdering his wife. He’s hard to defend being an unpleasant character and a scandal-mongering biographer. His latest book looks set to stir up trouble for the secret service, including Daniel’s father, Sir Thomas Pitt. Some interesting points raised about the difference between justice and the law, while the setting of 1910 gives Daniel a chance to take an interest in forensic science, with the help of his head-of-chambers’ daughter. She’d studied at university, but women at that time couldn’t receive a degree, even if they had done all the work. Typical. The story has plenty of twists and introduces some terrific characters we can enjoy getting to know in the subsequent books. There’s already another four.

The Shadows of Men by Abir Mukherjee
This series set in 1920s Calcutta just keeps getting better. The new book is told from alternating points of view between policeman Sam Wyndham and his Sergeant Banerjee. The story begins when Banerjee is tasked with a secret mission that lands him on a murder charge. He’s been arrested over the death of a Hindu theologian, when all he was doing was trying to make it look like an accident so that a religious feud doesn’t erupt. With Banerjee on the run, Wyndham must help clear his name and find the killer while religious factions from both Hindu and Muslim groups threaten to throw the country into a permanent state of riot. There’s lots of action and nail-biting moments, but in the background the tinder-box politics of life in India under the British is a fascinating setting. The characters are complex and interesting and the storytelling witty and perceptive. More, please.

The Darkest Evening by Ann Cleeves
This recent Vera Stanhope mystery is set in the dark days of winter when Vera, driving home in the snow, finds she has missed her turning only to discover a car with an unattended baby. She takes the child to the nearest house, which just happens to be the Stanhope family mansion and while she’s there, trying to discover what’s happened, a body is discovered. Of course. There’s a dinner party in full swing and Vera has to rub shoulders with the family she’s fallen out with while looking scruffy as always. But she gets to prove her worth, solving the crime and not taking any nonsense from anyone. I love the way she attempts to jolly along Holly, her ambitious DC, and make allowances for Joe, whose family make demands. There’s a nail-biting finish where the killer nearly takes Vera out of action, but happily there’s another book on the way with her name on the cover. The Rising Tide is out shortly.

Hot to Trot by M C Beaton
When M C Beaton died a short while ago, we might have thought that would be it for Agatha Raisin. But no, a good friend of Beaton (R W Green) has been entrusted with her story ideas and so Agatha is back again. Here she makes a spectacle of herself at the wedding of her old flame and lord of the manor, Charles Fraith. He’s marrying horsey socialite Mary Brown-Field, but after a fight with Agatha at a masked ball, Mary is found murdered. Agatha has to work hard to convince the police she had nothing to do with it, as well as trying to clear Charles’s name. It’s just as well she’s got other fish to fry romantically and that she and Charles are just good friends. This means he can cough up with her fee, as her private detective agency is buzzing with cases and she’s got staff to pay. The story takes us into the high-stakes world of show-jumping and dressage comps where Mary had rubbed a few people up the wrong way. I particularly enjoyed the audio-book version of this novel, read by the incomparable Penelope Keith. Magic!

Book Review: Three Women and a Boat by Anne Youngson – a warm-hearted novel about turning points and second chances

~ Judith ~ 1 Comment

Youngson’s first novel, Meet Me at the Museum, was a thoughtful, enlightening and romantic story told in letters between its two main characters. It was a big hit and I’ve been looking forward to this second book, set on the canals of England between London and Chester. Three Women and a Boat (US edition: The Narrowboat Summer) follows Eve, Sally and Anastasia who band together when each is at a turning point in their lives. They are complete strangers to begin with, when Anastasia needs somewhere to stay in London for cancer treatment. Sally and Eve, each independently and suddenly adrift from their normal lives, chip in and offer to help.

Eve has been dumped from her job in engineering. Sally is walking away from her marriage. Neither knows what they want to do next when they meet up on a towpath and rescue a howling dog, trapped in a canal boat. Anastasia returns to her boat to find two strangers have smashed a window to free a dog that didn’t need freeing. Maybe it’s the lure of life on the canals, or perhaps it is Anastasia’s vivid personality, but the two younger women find themselves agreeing to do her a favour.

While Anastasia is in London staying in Eve’s flat, her houseboat, the Number One, needs to be ferried to Chester for repairs. Eve and Sally have to rapidly get up to speed on handling the boat and the tricky business of canal locks as well as get used to living together in a tight space.

A lot of the story is about the women on the boat, and you get heaps of detail about locks and tunnels and how to navigate them, which is interesting. The summery canal-side scenery gets a mention too and you’re soon drifting along with Eve and Sally as if you’re with them on the trip, having a nice break away from it all. It’s a slower pace but there’s lots to do. Then there are all the interesting characters Eve and Sally get to know – people who have made a life on the canals in one way or another.

The story is narrated by Eve and Sally in turn, as they evaluate their lives and think about their options. We get their points of view of other characters, in particular, Arthur a tweedy old friend of Anastasia’s who is also oddly secretive, as well as Billy and Trompette whose boat, the Grimm, is aptly named as Billy is a gifted storyteller. The women warm to Trompette who at only nineteen has a talent for creating wonderful knitted garments – surely she could study design and make something of her life.

You read on, wondering what decisions the main characters will make about what to do next. Eve and Sally change during the course of the book, enough to learn what really matters to them. If you’ve always had a hankering to ditch the treadmill of the nine-to-five job and the mortgage repayments this might well resonate with you. But just to keep the plot simmering Youngson throws in a few twists as well.

This is a very different book to what I was expecting in that it is quite philosophical, thoughtfully written and doesn’t follow too much the usual rules that seem to govern novel plotting. It’s a breath of fresh air in so many ways, and while it’s a fairly light read, like her previous book, it marks Youngson out as an interesting author with an original voice. I particularly loved the characters who seem very real, the kind of people you’d like to meet for a catch-up over coffee. All in all this is such an enjoyable read – a four out of five from me.

Book Review: Little Wing by Freya North – a heart tugging drama with an evocative Scottish Island setting

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I was quite likely drawn to this novel because of the setting – I think I might have mentioned my thing for Scottish Islands before. A big chunk of Little Wing is set on Harris, one of the Outer Hebrides. As the character of Dougie says ‘the Outer Hebrides are like this one-hundred-and-thirty-mile stone windbreak taking the brunt of all that the Atlantic is hurling. In winter the raindrops are like ‘bulls’ bollocks’. But there’s also a ‘wild, terrifying beauty.’ What’s not to like?

In 1969, Harris is where Florence is sent to have her baby. She is sixteen years old and her mother has disowned her. Luckily her step-father steps in and offers a solution. He has a brother on the island where she can escape all the tut-tutting and shame of her condition. We get briefly swept into Florence’s world of Jimi Hendrix and the Beatles, mini skirts and the psychedelic designs Florence creates in her room.

The story switches forwards to 2005 where we meet Nell, who has a lot on her plate. She co-runs a café where the staff are all special needs. Danny, AJ and co. are so lovingly drawn and what they lack as professional waitstaff is compensated for in charm and enthusiasm. I wish we had a café like this where I live. Nell also visits Frank, an elderly man who needs a hand with meals, but who is also a good friend. If only Nell’s mother still recognised her. Wendy suffers from early-onset dementia and lives in a care home. Single and in her mid-thirties, Nell’s life seems to be all work and caring for others.

Similarly struggling is Dougie, working hard in London as a photographer, not the creative portraiture he excelled at as a student, but catalogue shots for cheap clothing or gardening hardware. Between work and pounding a treadmill at the gym, he rarely has time to return his dad’s phone calls. Dougie’s dad, Gordon, is from Harris, so you know that’s where our lost and bewildered characters will venture next.

When Nell finds her mother’s wayward memory throws up doubts about her own provenance, the answers could be discovered in a remote part of Scotland. Dougie, in need of a break and long overdue for a visit home makes the trip to Harris too. And although Dougie and Nell see each other over the days that follow, it is a while before any sparks ignite. There is however a strong romantic thread to the story, as well as tragedy, both of which are enriched by the wild beauty of a Harris setting.

I really enjoyed Little Wing, named for one of Florence’s favourite Jimi Hendrix’s songs; it’s a light read but full of feeling. You can’t help warming towards the characters: brave and idealistic young Florence, kind-hearted but also kind of fun Nell and Dougie with his quiet sensitivity and Heathcliffe hair. But the true hero of the story is the island of Harris itself with its history, traditions, wild open spaces, birdlife and weather. Not to mention the friendly islanders. You’ll be trawling the Internet for pictures like I did and dreaming about booking a holiday.

I haven’t read anything by Freya North before, but have since discovered she was at the vanguard of the chick lit genre when her first book came out in 1996 – this novel is her fifteenth. I recommend Little Wing for when you want a cosy, light, warm-hearted read. This one gets a four out of five from me.

Book Review: The Beloved Girls by Harriet Evans – an atmospheric and twisty page-turner

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I really like books where there’s an atmospheric house in the country and a dark family secret or two. Harriet Evans delivers all of this in The Beloved Girls, but throws in a pagan ritual dating back to the 1700s. What more could you wish for?

The story takes us to London where we meet Catherine Christophe who in her late forties has an enviable life. She’s done well in her career as a barrister, has two well-adjusted teenage children and a happy marriage to Davide, who she met in Toulouse on her gap year. Life had been going swimmingly but lately Catherine has felt uneasy about losing a murder case, where a boy around her daughter’s age has been convicted for killing another boy at his school. He’s not a very nice kid, that’s obvious, but he’s still a kid and he was bullied mercilessly. And then she starts seeing a figure from her past, someone who should be dead.

Switching back a few decades, there’s the story of Jane L’estrange. Jane dearly loves her father, a charismatic but complex man with PTSD from the war and difficulties holding down a job. When her mother leaves them, Jane is sent to visit the Hunters at the Vanes, a quirky country mansion. Jane soon bonds with Kitty Hunter and would love to stay longer, but there are some awkward family dynamics – a very unpleasant father, Charles, knowns as PT for pater familias, the product of the worst kind of public school, and his much younger wife, Sylvia, who has a mysterious connection to Jane’s father.

When she’s eighteen, Jane returns to the Vanes for the summer after the sudden death of her father, her mother having returned from Spain to sell up and arrange Jane’s future. Kitty’s aloof, her brother Joss is smarmy, while Charles is planning for Jane to take part in the yearly honey gathering ritual. She’s to be one of the Beloved Girls, dressed in green, part of a procession that will harvest honey from bees who have built hives in the derelict chapel on the Hunters’ property. The ritual was begun centuries before by the vicar of the day, a sinister man whose flock avoided church. This is a wild coast, where shipwrecks were frequent and the locals enjoyed the spoils of wrecking and scavenging.

Slowly the puzzle pieces come together as the story switches backwards in time, but it’s that particular summer, when Jane’s eighteen, that is the centre of the action. Of course there’s a heatwave to make everything seem more menacing and even the bees seem to be swarming angrily. You can tell things aren’t going to end well. Surely it’s time for some characters to get their comeuppance. The misogyny endured by Kitty and her mother from both Charles and Joss and his friends, who attend the same awful public school, is ever present.

Meanwhile Catherine Christophe isn’t faring too well and you can’t help wondering if her perfect world isn’t going to crumble down around her. So there’s plenty to keep you turning the pages as the past catches up with the present. But there’s a lot to think about too. Evans has a fair bit to say about the privileged classes that hold sway, keeping things the same, generation after generation. They depend upon a world where women know their place and money talks.

All in all, this is a fairly satisfying read, somewhat escapist but not as frivolous as it might be. The characters are interesting and flawed, very flawed often, but then they they are victims too. The ending is somewhat open to interpretation which works well here. Perhaps the middle sagged a little as one hot day bleeds into the next, but in a way this adds to the simmering tension. All the same, I found myself skimming a little. The Beloved Girls is a three and a half out of five read from me.

Book Review: A Woman Made of Snow by Elisabeth Gifford – a dual-narrative of family secrets and Arctic adventure

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Here’s a new novel from an author with a knack for dramatic Scottish settings. A Woman Made of Snow weaves together two stories, the first set just after World War Two. Caro has a history degree from Cambridge and a new baby. She had envisaged a new life with hubby Alasdair in London, both of them with university posts, but little Felicity came too soon. Now she’s stuck near Dundee with an interfering mother-in-law who keeps dropping in with well-meaning advice. Caro feels she has to have things tidy all the time just in case Martha appears.

Rents in town are expensive so the young family have a cottage on the family estate. When a pipe bursts and the cottage is flooded, there’s nothing for it but to move in with Martha who’s rattling around on her own in a picturesque castle. A skeleton uncovered by builders after the flood sends shockwaves, and Caro and Martha can’t help wondering if it isn’t Alasdair’s great-grandmother whose name has been scratched out of all family records. Caro uses her skills as a researcher to uncover the story of the woman and speculates who the skeleton might be.

Meanwhile the story switches back to the late 1880s and we meet Charlotte who is in love with childhood friend, Oliver. Only Oliver is in love with Charlotte’s sister. A night on the tiles to soothe an aching heart leads Oliver to sign up as ship’s surgeon on the Narhwal, a whaling ship setting off for the Arctic. How the two plot threads are connected to the missing great-grandmother and the skeleton in the garden make for a pacy plot unravelling to a dramatic climax.

While this all adds up to an enthralling story, Gifford takes time to develop a number of themes, including the awkwardness that often arises between a devoted mother and her daughter-in-law. There’s some class snobbery – Alasdair’s sister Pippa describes Caro as ‘suburban’ as if that’s one of the worst things imaginable. You really feel for Caro, missing her career, managing a baby in a chilly castle, and not fitting in. Other issues such as colonisation and racism get a look in, revealed gently through the story.

But mostly I raced through the book to find out what happened. There’s tragedy of course, not surprising since there’s a body in the garden, and my heart-strings were well and truly tugged. However I couldn’t help feel that this might have been a more powerful novel if the two malefactors in it – one for each timeframe – weren’t quite so obviously twisted, and the ending a little less all tied up and perfect. It’s just a small complaint, as overall this is a solid, entertaining novel, but I feel a little disappointed. So it’s a three and a half out of five from me.

Book Review: The Visitors by Caroline Scott – The Enchanted April meets Birdsong with a smidgeon of du Maurier

~ Judith ~ 1 Comment

Sometimes you just pick up a book for no particular reason and it’s a very pleasant surprise. The Visitors has a gorgeous cover, so that was probably what attracted me, and luckily it turned out to be quite a find. Don’t judge a book by the cover – how often have we heard that maxim, but the truth is that we often do.

This book is Esme’s story. It’s the early 1920s and Esme’s a war widow and housekeeper to fussy, but kindly, Mrs Pickering in Yorkshire. Mrs P sends Esme off to Cornwall – her doctor’s recommended rest and recovery after Mrs P had a bout of flu. Esme is to make sure the house belonging to her brother is suitable for an extended stay over summer. Gilbert, himself a war veteran, has set up a kind of seaside retreat for himself and several other men from his unit, all in need of healing. They throw themselves into art and gardening and it’s all a bit too Bohemian for Mrs P’s tastes.

Esme doesn’t hit it off with Sebastian, sent to the station to fetch her – he thinks she’s been sent to snoop – but the others soon charm her. There’s Clarrie who makes delicious meals from the garden’s bounty; Hal who doesn’t speak but who puts together miniature ships in bottles; and then there’s Rory, somewhat wild and unkempt looking, in whom Esme discovers a fellow nature lover. Esme herself writes a weekly nature diary for the Huddersfield Courier, so there are plenty of descriptions of birdlife, flowers and the variations of the weather.

Soon we’re swept into a gorgeous setting, and this in itself would be a pleasant place to be as a reader, but there’s the war and its legacy to be dealt with. Esme is still grieving for her husband Alec, killed in 1916, and as he was from Penzance is hoping a visit to his childhood home will fill in a few gaps. She’d hardly got a chance to get to know him before the war began and off he went.

But the war has its secrets and there are a few big surprises that make the story much more than a charming summery read. I found myself tugged emotionally here and there as scenes from the war – Rory also puts pen to paper – are woven through the plot. Meanwhile Esme’s own personal discoveries create a shift in her feelings and open her up to new possibilities. The plight of the women left behind with the loss of so many young men, hovers in the background. It all comes together beautifully, with some great characters in Esme and Rory, but also Mrs P and Gilbert and even Sebastian, all of whom are interesting company.

And yet it’s probably the setting of Cornwall that was most memorable for me, not just the pretty scenery, the weather, the flowers and the sea. There’s the history and folklore as well. Reading The Visitors, it’s hard to imagine who wouldn’t want to up-stakes and move there. It reminded me a little of The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim with its characters similarly finding an idyllic place to heal. All in all the book was a pleasant surprise and I shall be hunting out more from Caroline Scott. This one’s a four out of five read from me.

Book Review: Trio by William Boyd

~ Judith ~ 2 Comments

I didn’t know quite what to expect when I stepped into the world of Boyd’s latest novel, Trio. One thing I might have guessed is that its three main characters will be put to the test. Set in Brighton in 1968, the story centres on the making of a film with a ridiculous title. There’s remarkably little glamour as we’re taken behind the scenes – Brighton isn’t exactly Hollywood. The narrative switches between each of three main characters who are connected with the film.

Talbot Kidd, in his sixties, is the reserved, genial film producer who following the recent law reform decriminalising homosexual relations, is wondering about his own sexuality. But everyone keeps coming to him with their problems – film stock is going missing, the leading actress won’t work with the couple of acting hacks hired to play her mother and father and could it be true that his business partner is fleecing him? And then there’s that blasted song he hears everywhere he goes about the park with the cake left out in the rain, the sweet green icing flowing down … you know the one.

The leading actress, lovely Anny Viklund, is an up-and-coming American star with a poor taste in men. Her current boyfriend is a French freedom-fighter philosopher but before that she was married to an anarchist-terrorist and now the FBI want to talk to her. Luckily her co-star Troy offers easy, uncomplicated sex, and she’s got a stash of uppers and downers to keep her on an even keel. But she can’t help wondering why she has no control over her own life.

The third narrator, Elfrida Wing, is married to Talbot’s director, Reggie Tipton, a serial philanderer suddenly requesting everyone to call him Rodrigo. Elfrida is a famous novelist who hasn’t written a book for ten years, and passes her days as an accomplished secret alcoholic. It doesn’t help that the literary world described her as the new Virginia Woolf, an author she feels she has little in common with. When she comes up with the idea of writing a novel about the last day in Virginia Woolf’s life, she’s suddenly on fire again. But can she get on top of her drinking?

…and she soon stood on the high embankment looking down on the slow-moving stream, wondering if this were perhaps the actual point where Virginia had filled her coat pocket with a heavy stone and then waded in. Where had she learned that fact about the stone? She searched her memory. That’s right: Enid Bagnold had told her at a party years ago.

Boyd explores each of these characters’ flaws, foibles and secrets, yet I found each of them oddly likeable. He captures them at a time of crisis in their lives and keeps pouring on the pressure. This makes the story gallop along together with the lengths each of them go to maintain their secrets. Bubbling underneath is a gentle wry humour, particularly with Talbot and Elfrida, a kind of world-weariness English characters sometimes have, as if they are on the outside of themselves looking in.

Of course, Boyd is happy to throw barbs at the self-important figures that people the film and literary worlds. There’s also the frivolity of life in Britain in 1968 while across the channel the student riots were on the go and political change in the air. Name dropping of well-known writers and entertainers adds to the fun. But there are serious issues that each character has to struggle with, making this an amusing but also a very satisfying novel. But with William Boyd I wouldn’t have expected anything less. A four and a half out of five read from me.

Book Review: On Hampstead Heath by Marika Cobbold

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Marika Cobbald’s new book On Hampstead Heath is a witty comment on our times, a kind of comedy of errors, with an unlikely heroine at its heart. Thorn Marsh is a news editor, a passionate believer in the role of the news media to uncover the truth and to keep the public well-informed. At forty-four, her career is everything, but when her paper is taken over by a media conglomerate she is shifted from the news desk to the midweek supplement to write The Bright Side. A prickly, curmudgeonly individual, she is the last person to write happy, inspiring stories.

Along with Thorn, there’s a bunch of quirky characters to enjoy. Nancy, Thorn’s mother who never loved but she has her reasons; Mira, Thorn’s new editor, who gives Thorn a good run for her money when it comes to dry one-liners; Lottie, Thorn’s neighbour, a Holocaust survivor and secret dope smoker and who is more like a mother figure than Nancy; Lottie’s niece, Jemima, disapproving and disappointed.

She turned an accusing eye on me. ‘The media have a great deal to answer for in all of this, affording celebrity status to people whose main contribution to society is putting their heads in a tank of maggots. My Year Fives thought Florence Nightingale was a contestant on Love Island.’

‘I only recently found out that a Kardashian isn’t a rifle,’ Lottie said, and finished her gin.

Desperation and alcohol lead Thorn to make up a story using a photo snapped on Hampstead Heath curtesy of her still friendly ex-husband, Nick.  Suddenly the world is sharing and retweeting her story about The Angel of the Heath, a flame haired apparition on the Viaduct Bridge, who had recently turned Thorn’s head rescuing her neighbour’s dog.

Lies pile up on top of lies as Thorn digs a hole from which it seems impossible to extricate herself. She has only herself to blame, and pours out her story to Nick and Lottie. She learns the hard way that getting the best story isn’t the only thing in life.

While there’s a good deal of desperation, Thorn is such a likeably difficult character and a dry, dark humour bubbles through every sentence. Thorn grows from someone who only lived for her job to someone who learns to love not only others but herself. But it’s never treacly or too serious and the ending is superb.

I loved On Hampstead Heath, but then I’ve always really enjoyed Cobbold’s books. But it has been a long stretch between the new book and her last one – ten years in fact. Hopefully we won’t have to wait as long for her next novel. On Hampstead Heath gets a four and a half out of five from me.

Book Review: The Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley

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Book connections can be puzzling. What led me to seek out this novel was probably a recommendation in connection with another book I enjoyed, but what it was escapes me. This story similarly connects random characters, one leading onto the next.

It begins when elderly Julian leaves an exercise book in Monica’s café, with the title The Authenticity Project carefully lettered on the cover. Inside Julian describes his loneliness since his wife died, and how he lost friends and relationships, now going days without talking to anyone. He closes with the challenge to whoever picks up the book to ‘tell your truth’.

Monica does. She writes about her longing for a family, in particular, a husband and a baby. She’s in her late thirties and fears she’s left it too late. But Monica doesn’t just tell her truth, she decides to help Julian. She’s looked him up online and discovered he’s a once famous artist, and a minor celebrity in his day. Her plan is to weasel him out of his cave by advertising for an artist to teach drawing at her café. He regularly stops by for coffee, so is sure to see it. She leaves the exercise book in a bar where it is picked up by Hazard, a stock broker with addiction issues and so the story goes on.

Hazard is an interesting character in that he’s a really obnoxious on the one hand, but has the self-awareness to take himself off on a retreat to Thailand to detox. Perhaps a new Hazard hides beneath all that drug and alcohol fuelled brashness. The exercise book is just the trigger he needs. He’s read both Julian’s and Monica’s ‘truths’ and decides to help Monica from his tropical hideaway.

More characters join the chain. Happy-go-lucky, live-for-the-moment Riley, an Australian gardener, who doesn’t understand the English with all their hangups. New mother, Alice, who has a social media addiction, as well as the husband and baby Monica craves. But they don’t make her happy. They’re all interesting and entertaining in their way, although it’s Monica and Hazard who are the most engaging and complex, the ones who can’t make up their mind what they want or how to get it.

The Authenticity Project is a light and entertaining novel. The changing viewpoints work well because everyone is trying to fix things for others, creating dramatic tension, and a community of sorts emerges. It made me wish Monica’s café was just up the road so I could pop in, join an art class or curl up on a sofa with a book. The references to famous people of the eighties Julian used to hang out with, his designer wardrobe and old LP collection, add plenty of colour and I loved the Fulham setting. It’s a a feel-good kind of read, maybe just the thing for the holidays with an original, well-executed storyline. I’m giving this one a three and a half out of five.