Bones of the Hills, by Conn Iggulden

3 stars

The last part of Genghis' story, I'm kind of glad that he died when he did as I'd continued to find this series a wee bit samey. So many sieges, so many arrows, and so many massacres meant that regardless of who was on the receiving end, I'd started to feel that I'd read it all before.

In this, Genghis continues to kick the shit out of any nation that so much as looks at him funny, while still finding time to be a dick to his kids. He also meets a new enemy that might just be as formidable as he is, while also realising that simply leaving a place once you've annihilated it doesn't mean it stays annihilated, and that he might just have to fight them again on his next trip through. Sadly, there's no time for a second beating before karma stabs him right in the gut. It couldn't have happened to a nicer bloke.

I see now that this isn't actually a trilogy and that the story continues - this time presumably with Genghis' grandson, Kublai, in the lead. I'm not going to be rushing out to read it, as I imagine that it's just more of the same, only with Genghis' name tippexed out and Kublai's name scribbled in the margin.

Genghis: Lords of the Bow, by Conn Iggulden

3.5 stars

…Or, as I like to call it, Genghis 2: Empire-Building Boogaloo, in which Genghis – you guessed it – further builds his empire having united the tribes into one vast and terrible army. With the tribes now all under his control, Genghis isn’t content to sit back and count the rancid mutton and has instead settled his sights on an old enemy of his people: The Chin. First taking Xi Xia (and one of their princesses for a second wife), Genghis shows that his people aren’t just good at annihilating their enemies from atop their ponies, but are masters of the siege and – more importantly – propaganda too.

Learning from every enemy he comes across, and being more than a little sneaky when he needs to, it’s easy to see why Genghis (at least how he’s characterised here) made such a stunning impact on world history. He wasn’t just hard as nails (here surviving not just many battles but also assassins with poisoned blades), but fabulously cunning too. Although, having no idea about how this all went in real life, I have a funny feeling that his one blind spot (his alienation of his eldest son, Jochi) is going to come back to bite him in the ass.)

The battles that spatter these pages are more than a little pulse-pounding, and I’m still struck with awe at what terrifying warriors the Mongolians must have been, but having read the first two back to back I’ll be taking a wee break from the series for a bit as my time in this world was starting to feel ever so slightly samey towards the end.

Genghis: Birth of an Empire, by Conn Iggulden

5 stars

Everything I know about Genghis Khan, I learnt from Bill and Ted. He may not totally ravage any sporting goods stores in this, and I have nothing but the afterword to go by regarding its accuracy, but it's one hell of a compelling and already blood-soaked book, and we're only at the beginning of the story.

The sons of Yesugei, khan of the wolf tribe, have been brought up hard. The life of the tribe is a harsh one - constantly at war with other tribes (as well as the Tartars) and eking out their existence in an unforgiving land (where something you have to soften under your saddle for days is a culinary treat, while fast food means drinking straight from your mare's veins). Following Temujin - our Genghis - from birth through his father's death and his family's cruel abandonment by the tribe, through his getting a wife and beginning to gather the tribes to him as one, I loved every moment of this and have been sucked entirely into the world that Iggulden has built. 

Having already had a lifetime's worth of action as I've torn through this opener, I'm now kind of glad that Bill and Ted didn't burden me with too much knowledge as I can just sit back and let me eager fingers tear through the pages, blissfully unaware of what's to come. Bring it on!

The Owl Killers, by Karen Maitland

4 stars

1321 turned out to be a pretty cruddy year for the village of Ulewic.

Times are tough – crops are failing and the meagre harvests are blighted with mould, while the livestock is falling foul of disease, and what passes for the local power is too busy preying on the populace to be of much help.

Ruled over by a lord obsessed with chastity whose nephew is obsessed with relieving people of theirs – consensually or not - their priest is also too busy fornicating, and then worrying about getting caught, to attract any to his flock. Instead, the villagers turn to the beguinage on its doorstep for help and charity, or to the older gods and the Owl Masters that apparently serve them for justice and revenge.

It’s with the women of the beguinage – a community of religious women of the kind that apparently flourished across Europe at the time – that this story is chiefly concerned. Already suspicious due to being foreigners, and attracting the ire of what passes for the church due to being women and for not doing exactly as the priest says, when the daughter of the local lord becomes one of their number events are set in motion to sorely test their faith.

Breathing life into an age that was dogged by superstition, bullied by the church, where the less fortunate were the playthings of the powerful and where being a woman is one of the biggest sins anyone could commit, The Owl Killers told its tale slowly and effectively, with multiple narrators showing us multiple viewpoints and letting us question what we’d seen or been told (although not all of the narrators were as effective as others and the slowness sometimes felt a little too slow) but the end result was largely an atmospheric and intelligent take on the lives of women in medieval England.

Read it when the nights are drawing in, the wind is blowing and the rain is dripping from the trees and you'll soon be nervously eyeing every bird (and man, especially religious ones) that crosses your path.

The Surgeon's Mate, by Patrick O'Brian

4 stars

Another fabulous instalment in the continued adventures of Captain Jack Aubrey and his BFF Dr Stephen Maturin that I hugely enjoyed, even if it was sadly interrupted by too much work and a new downstairs neighbour who likes to scream things that make no sense at regular intervals.

Having long been at sea, on landing in Nova Scotia Captain Aubrey has found himself having an ill-advised fling with a young flibbertigibbet who, as soon as he finally gets himself home again, is writing copious notes full of declarations of love and pregnancy, along with pleas for cash. He’s also up to the neck in legal business thanks to the sorry decision of becoming involved with a dodgy businessman. Meanwhile, Stephen is giving lectures to the Institut in Paris and finding a place there for the knocked up Diana Villiers – now considered an enemy alien thanks to her dalliance with the American Johnson. It’s just as well then that orders have arrived for Captain Aubrey to sail with Stephen on a most important mission – repatriating some Catalan soldiers who have been hitherto working for the French. Which is made especially difficult by bad weather, a missing chronometer, deadly bays, French ships eager to capture them, French captains eager to torture Stephen, and incarceration in imposing French prisons.

Of course, Jack and my beloved Stephen aren’t the sort to let that sort of thing get them down, and the book is as much of a riot as its predecessors. Once again, their friendship is the glue that holds this all together and I got a good deal of entertainment over Jack’s fretting for Stephen, whether he be on a dangerous spying mission or ill-advisedly clambering among the crosstrees with an equally clumsy lubber (and Jack’s reaction to Stephen and Jagiello’s little jaunt made me snort so hard that my cats scarpered).

I’m now seven books in to this wonderful series and the quality is as high as ever – and it now seems that I’m even becoming comfortable with the naval language that previously flummoxed me (check me out, knowing what a crosstree is! I never thought that would happen). These books are my treat to myself whenever I need picking up a bit – so if my neighbour continues to scream nonsense at me whenever she sees me, prepare to see much more of these popping up on my feed.

Ivanhoe, by Sir Walter Scott

2.5 stars

Hmmm, Ivanhoe - what did I make of thee? Of thine own self, not much, as it turns out that the titular character actually spends most of the book off-page recovering from injury. Instead, this was more concerned with the many crimes of Bad Prince (and later King) John and his cronies, the interventions of Robin Hood and the wanderings of Good (haha!) King Richard the Lionheart.

With Richard absent from his kingdom thanks to his disastrous Crusade and then imprisonment, Prince John rules in his stead, backed by a bunch of dicks including Norman noblemen and a Knight Templar. While John plots to keep Richard's throne, the disguised King (having returned unnoticed to our shores) pisses about entering tournaments, befriending Robin Hood and aiding distressed damsels who've been kidnapped by John's mates for their own foul ends. 

As well as the adventure element, Ivanhoe also depicts the bigoted divisions of 12th century England - the Saxons and the Normans can't stand one another, Christians despise Jewish people, and everyone hates women - and lampoons the hypocrisy of this age of chivalry, where Knights are usually anything but honourable and the nobility couldn't behave nobly if their lives depended on it. It mostly does this fairly well, and never more so than with Rebecca (a skilled healer whose kidnap by one of the Knights Templar sees her put on trial by the head of his Order - him wanting to rape her is all her own fault for which she must die, what with her being guilty of the crimes of being a woman and Jewish).

But while Rebecca emerged as the true hero of this story, it fell down somewhat when it came to her father, Isaac. While being quick to decry the awful bigotry of the age and its institutions (especially the Church, who seem to think that their God loves mass murder above all else), Scott deflated his success by being far too quick to stoop to racist caricature whenever it came to Isaac. While I could overlook some of this as his depicting a less enlightened age, more often than not it left a nasty taste in the mouth whenever I came across one of these scenes. This, along with Scott's habit of including way too many songs and conversations that halted the action and made my attention wander, led the scales that had been weighing in favour of the adventure tip slightly too far the other way for me to say that I truly enjoyed this.

Heretic's Daughter, by Kathleen Kent

3.5 stars

Heretic's Daughter is a slow moving yet effective portrayal of a family's life in 17th century America, and how that family was ripped apart by religious extremism and ignorance in one of the more shameful episodes of American history - the Salem witch trials.

Young Sarah Carrier's family is a typical one of its time, their days governed by the back-breaking work needing to be performed daily to ensure the family's survival, the monotony of which is only broken by outbreaks of disease, fear of Indian raids and visits to the town meeting-house to bask in the spite and ill-feeling of their neighbours who are already eager to lay the blame for an outbreak of smallpox at the Carrier's door. Sarah's mother, Martha, has already made a few enemies thanks to her strong will and sharp tongue, but black looks and malicious gossip are a kiss compared to what's to come as the hysteria over and persecution of so-called witches spreads from Salem Town, and the Carrier family find themselves just one of the many victims fallen prey to the townsfolk using religious doctrine to settle vendettas, jealousies and grudges by casting accusing fingers at their neighbours, and even members of their own families. Imprisoned in appalling conditions and executed if they protested their innocence, many would 'confess' and so be set free (in an example of the sort of insane troll logic that seemed to govern the time), while many others (most of them women) would lose their lives before reason could prevail.

The Salem witch trials are a potent example of some of the evils perpetrated by those claiming to do God's work, and Heretic's Daughter does a good job of depicting the plights of those accused. How the towns concerned recovered from this appalling episode isn't explored, and I had to wonder how one would forgive and move on from such terrible crimes. But then I'm not a particularly forgiving sort, and would hope that those responsible had their lives ruined by guilt (although I'm sure they simply cherry-picked some other piece of doctrine that absolved them of any wrong-doing, before quickly returning to using their religion as a stick to beat other people with).

If you're after something fact-filled you're probably better off looking in the non-fiction aisle but if you want something that brings the people of the time to real life, you could certainly do a lot worse than by picking this up.

The Fortune of War, by Patrick O'Brian

4.5 stars

At this point, reading the Aubrey/Maturin series has become more pleasurable than slipping into a hot bath on a cold night, although the predicaments they've lately found themselves facing are much less pleasant.

Having survived the disasters of Desolation Island, the long-presumed dead crew of the Leopard have limped into safe harbour and are now bound for home (and a better ship). But they've got to get there first - something that won't be happening for a while if the events of this book are anything to go by. First, the ship that's sailing them to their new command burns to cinders leaving the men to take to the cutters in the hopes of rescue...rescue which is a long time coming and, when it finally appears, takes the form of an American ship. 

Which is unfortunate, as war has been declared between the United Kingdom and the States, and some of Maturin's previous activities are making life extremely difficult for my favourite BFFF's who are now suspected of being spies. Nor is the war going so well for the entire Royal Navy, who are getting their teeth repeatedly kicked in by a foe they'd assumed they could easily vanquish. 

Not that that's going to keep my boys down for long...

Filled with intrigue, intelligence, astonishing sea battles and hints of the changes to come to seafaring - the men are already muttering darkly and wholeheartedly dissaproving of rumoured steam-powered boats - this entry was as perfect as all those that have preceded it. I can hardly wait for my next trip to sea with them.

The Red Queen, by Philippa Gregory

4.5 stars

The White Queen was a decent book that gave us the War of the Roses from the perspective of Elizabeth Woodville, the beautiful former nobody who became the wife of Edward IV. The Red Queen is an excellent book from the Lancaster side, particularly that of Margaret Beaufort – cousin to the Lancastrian King Henry VI, child-bride of Edmund Tudor, possessor of saint’s knees and barely-even-teen-mum to the future King of England Henry Tudor (who was helped in large part to become King by the determination and conniving of his mother).

While not exactly someone I’d have ever wanted to spend any time with (I’d have spent most of my time being denounced for my vile whorish and ungodly ways), Margaret was a truly fascinating and formidable woman and made for a much more compelling central character than Elizabeth, supported by Gregory’s seeming to have far more of a grasp on her voice. The circumstances of her life were also much more interesting (I may point some of the many people who have told me I’m bitter and cynical Margaret’s way, although she is probably near the top of the list of people who’ve ever had just cause for such feelings) and due to the lack of the privileges shown to Elizabeth as Queen was also a far more informative source on the harsh realities of life for the women of her time (whether it be regarding upbringing and expectations, marriage, childbirth, property law, or having your child taken from you for being a possible future threat to the current holder of the throne and still having to serve and obey the shits responsible).

Interestingly (to me), The Red Queen also made me consider what my own position and thoughts might have been at that time with regard to the monarchy. In our present society I’m staunchly anti-monarchy – having not truly ruled over our democratic country in a very long time, I see the Royal Family as a parasitic and unnecessarily expensive tourist attraction that has no more right to their unearned wealth and luxury than my nan does – but I’m also a stickler for rules and so, coupling the laws of succession** with an abhorrence of bloodthirsty shits who can’t even be trusted not to murder their own families let alone vulnerable prisoners...

...I think I’d have been firmly on the Lancastrian side.

While bearing in mind that it is fictionalised, I found The Red Queen brought a turbulent and sometimes confusing period of history to life for me, and I highly recommend it for people like myself who are interested in history but intimidated by more scholarly texts.

**Edited 7 Nov to add:

Having read further into the roots of the Wars of the Roses I now realise that, according to the laws of succession, it was actually the Lancasters that were the usurpers. And while the Yorks were indeed spectacularly stabby, King Henry VI was a particularly crap king who really ought not to have been ruling. So with regard to whose side I'd have been on - they're all as appalling as each other and so I'm declaring myself firmly on the side of the peasants.

The White Queen, by Philippa Gregory

3 stars

An imagining of the journey of Elizabeth Woodville from widowed mother of two to Queen of England as the wife of Edward IV, to being a widow once more and the mother of the two princes in the tower. As this is the first I've read about this period in our history I can't speak to whether this is an accurate depiction, but I found it a compelling one that finally enabled me to make sense of and differentiate between many of the famous names of the time (which was a feat, as it seems our royal families have always had a lack of imagination when it comes to naming their children and so they're all Edward's, Henry's, Richard's and Williams, with the occasional George thrown in for good measure).

With the events of the War of the Roses being as bloody, backstabby and intense as they were, it would be very hard to make a book with that as its setting boring and Elizabeth Woodville - beautiful, ambitious, vengeful and dogged by rumours of witchcraft - is also a very interesting character. I loved the fact that this was a version of history as seen by the woman at its centre when history books have mostly focused on the men and their wars, although I will admit that I thought the book was stronger when we slipped out of Elizabeth's voice and into that of the historian, putting us at the edges of the battles between Edward and his many foes, particularly in the case of the Battle of Barnet where we got a flavour of the carnage and confusion with men fighting their own armies in the mist.

More than anything, this book really brought home to me once again what a shitty deal women had, being mostly slaves to the whims of their husbands or fathers, and that our rulers have pretty much been whoever was the best and most bloodthirsty killer of their day. Alison Weir's Eleanor of Aquitaine made me boggle at the viciousness of the children of Henry II (Richard the Lionheart and Bad King John), but it seems that the Yorks were worse again, constantly laying waste to their own families to further their ambitions for the crown. Their family motto was most definitely not this:

Gregory's isn't the most powerful writing when it comes to placing you inside the heart of the matter - there's a little too much reliance on foreshadowing, and the love of Elizabeth and Edward felt a little Meyer-esque up until they started speaking dispassionately of all of Edward's extra-curricular bonking - but it was good enough for me to pick up The Red Queen next to start learning about how things went down on the Lancastrian side.

Desolation Island, by Patrick O'Brian

5 stars

We've now reached the fifth book in Patrick O'Brian's fantastic Aubrey/Maturin series and I'll admit that, by this point, I am no longer a regular reader but have lost all objectivity and become a squealing fangirl.

Desolation Island finds lucky Jack Aubrey installed once more in Ashgrove Cottage. He's not so lucky on land however, and is being bilked out of his rapidly dwindling Mauritius Command prize-money by grasping tradesmen and card sharps who see him coming. Things are turning so badly that even his loving wife, Sophie, is starting to wish he was at sea again. Meanwhile, my beloved Stephen isn't faring so well either. That bloody Villiers woman is back in town and tormenting him once more, the laudanum monkey that's on his back has got bigger and meaner, he's lost a bunch of intelligence papers in the back of a cab and a patient on the operating table and, to top it all off, has even had a pop at an Admiral. Thankfully, Jack soon accepts a new command - the Leopard, a huge ship with a bad reputation - and a new mission: to rescue Captain Bligh (yes, that Captain Bligh) who's on the other side of the world with another possible mutiny on his hands. Before you get too excited though, remember that the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry and before we can meet any infamous historical persons we've got a whole heap of ocean to get through, on a boat transporting convicts (including women, Heavens above! One of whom, Mrs Wogan, is a suspected spy) and stuffed with indifferent officers who think nothing of trying to undermine Jack's authority at every turn.

Before long the convicts' appalling conditions mean gaol-fever is sweeping the ship and corpses shrouded in sails are soon slipping over the side. And that's even before 'Firebox' Peggy Barnes, one of the infernal women on board, has opened her legs and given most of the sailors a venereal disease. A brilliantly tense and thrilling sea chase over the course of a number of stormy days, in which the undermanned Leopard is pursued by the much bigger and better manned Dutch warship Warkhaamzeid, sees several large holes punched in the ship before an iceberg finishes the job, ripping a hole in the hull and snatching away the rudder, leaving the few left aboard after abandonment by the many who'd rather take their chances in a dinghy to bail like hell and hope for land. And through it all, the delightfully sneaky Stephen is quietly intercepting Mrs Wogan's letters and filling them with falsehoods before sending them on their merry way.

Every second of these books is a delight to me - whether it's learning about the many harsh realities of life in the Age of the Sail, Stephen's passion for the creatures they come across, or the snarky asides at boozy dinners - I could even roll around in giddy ecstacy at the sentences that make my eyes cross ('A burton-tackle to the chess-tree,' he called, loud and clear. 'Lead aft to a snatch-block fast to the aftermost ring-bolts and forward free.')

I could easily read nothing but these books for the rest of my life and die satisfied, but at the age of 35 I've only got fifteen left to go (sniff!) and so I'm probably best off eking them out a little.

The Mauritius Command, by Patrick O'Brian

5 stars

Running off to sea again with Lucky Jack Aubrey and his BFFF (and my imaginary boyfriend) Dr Stephen Maturin has been long overdue, and so it was with an eager hand that I opened The Mauritius Command. I wasn't disappointed as it turned out to be as rollicking good fun as its predecessors, even if I still don't know my mizen from my masthead.

Having married his sweetheart, Sophie, and settled in a long-dreamed for cottage, The Mauritius Command finds Jack Aubrey on land and on half pay. His dreams didn't quite match reality, however, and the cottage is not only pokey but also contains his domineering mother-in-law and two hairless twins who, to make matters worse, aren't even boys. His cabbages are being munched by caterpillars, and even the bees that were Dr Maturin's gift have died (not the bees!). Thank heavens then, for the timely reappearance of Stephen and a set of secret orders to sail the frigate Boadicea to the Cape and onto Mauritius, where Jack is to harry the French while flying a Commodore's pendant.

A step-up in command brings its own problems, however, and Jack is soon striving for success while managing the difficult personalities of the Captains under him - the showy and insecure Clonfert, the capable but cruel Corbett who takes better care of his brass than his men, and Pym, the numpty whose incompetence nearly spells disaster - while Stephen spreads subversive literature and schools the crews in an early bit of Hearts and Minds - no thieving and raping, please, gentlemen! 

Everything that I've come to love about this series is still present and correct - the fantastic characterisation, the astounding amounts of food that Jack puts away, the wonderful insights into life at sea and the throwaway asides that make me snort ("...the surviving swine struck down into the hold together with the goat, which, in the general silence, could be heard bleating angrily for its long overdue tobacco") and most of all, the relationship between Jack and Stephen ("Jack loved him, and had not the least objection to granting him all the erudition in the world, while remaining inwardly convinced that in all practical matters other than physic and surgery Stephen should never be allowed out alone.")

Ahhhh, Stephen. Skilled surgeon, dedicated naturalist, super-spy, the man I'd most want on my side in an argument and an all round colossus of a character, Stephen has wormed his way into being my favourite character of all time, and made it look as easy as kiss my hand. Wibble.

I was going to give this a four as its not even the best that I've read in this series so far, but sod it. I loved every minute of it so much, it's getting a five.

Company of Liars, Karen Maitland

4.5 stars

Giving me back my reading mojo after a run of books that I’ve really not enjoyed is Company of Liars, a brilliantly atmospheric and compelling journey across the England of 1348 – oozing with mud, drowning in rain and festering with plague – a book I picked up at the beginning of my day off and was unable to put down again until I’d finished it just after midnight on the same day.

As the plague takes hold of the coast and starts to make its steady way across the land, nine strangers band together to try and outrun the death that is snapping at their heels, only to find that the secrets each of them harbour may just be even deadlier.

Maitland proves to be more than adept at bringing to Medieval England to gruesome life with the sounds, sights, smells and suspicions that permeated the land all in starring roles, alongside the vivid characters.

I’m very happy to see that Company of Liars is just one of many historical fictions to Maitland’s name, and I will definitely be picking up more.

Helen of Troy, by Margaret George

1 star

I love Greek mythology and think the fall of Troy is easily one of the most powerful myths around. Prior to reading this I would never have believed that anyone could tell it in such a way as to make it utterly boring, but sadly Margaret George has proved me wrong.

Telling the story of Helen of Troy, the face that started it all, it's clear that Ms George put in rather a lot of research. It's just a shame that, while remembering to add in details like what sort of cups people might have drunk from, she didn't bring any real storytelling talent to the table. A tale that should have been pulsing with passion, instead I felt nothing. Even during the parts that would normally have me weeping like a bereaved child (the death of Hector, and Priam's pleas for his son's body to be returned) or cursing furiously (anything to do with that shit Achilles) I found it all strangely lacking.

As for Helen, considering this is all told through her eyes, it seems that even though she's the main character she's not much more than an insipid, passive nincompoop, hardly the sort of person that thousands of men would give up their lives and bring ruin to kingdoms over, and the 600 odd-pages in her company were a slow torture.

If you're after something that really brings the story of Troy to life you could do much better - I'd recommend David Gemmell'sTroy series instead.

The Luminaries, by Eleanor Catton

2.5 stars

Show me a book that clocks in at over 800 pages, has a historical setting along with a vivid sense of character and place, reads like a 19th century novel and stars prostitutes, politicians and prospectors, a thirst for gold and opium and a mystery involving murder, missing fortunes and false identities, and I go all round-eyed in anticipation.

This, then, really ought to have been my kind of book crack as it features all of the above and more, with a cleverly convoluted plot that's revealed to us in flashes over the course of the book as the many people on the periphery put their heads together to get to the bottom of the vanishing of a wealthy man, the apparent attempted suicide of a prostitute and the death of a reclusive drunk (posthumously found to have a hoard of gold in his hovel), to which they all seem to be connected.

Turns out though that this sometimes struggled to keep my attention and that the much talked about cleverness - to do with the astrological charts and whatnots that adorned the beginnings of each chapter and that apparently had a bearing on the text - was entirely lost on me. My knowledge of astrology runs no deeper than knowing I'm a Taurus, and I'm not particularly interested in broadening that knowledge either (as I'm of the mind that it's hokum) and so I'm quite sure that I've missed something in this reading.

Having neither loved nor loathed this, I'm probably not destined to remember much about it either.

Gone With The Wind, by Margaret Mitchell

1.5 star

(read in 2012)

About halfway through this book, I started to believe that I had done something to annoy the gods so they'd chosen to punish me a la Prometheus, and I would be stuck reading it for the rest of my life. Epic barely touches it - dealing with the South pre, during and post Civil War this sometimes felt as if it was taking place in real time and, much like I feel when wolfing a massive meal after starving for a while, I started off devouring it but soon passed into feeling completely over-full, uncomfortable and a little bit sick.

With a fabulous grasp on her characters (even if virtually all of them are hateful), undeniable writing talent and an appalling ideology, I don't believe I've ever had such a wildly contradictory and infuriating reading experience.

Scarlett O'Hara is the pampered daughter of a plantation owning family and the belle of the county. Spoilt, selfish, spiteful, shallow, callous, ruthless and possessing a low cunning if not actually very bright, she's also about as subtle as a sledgehammer, regardless of how she rates her own arts. About the only good thing anyone could say about her is that she's a looker, and it's quite a brave move on the part of Mitchell to have her heroine be so truly appalling (quite why anyone would want to identify with her is beyond me) and yet still manage to make you read on. To Scarlett, all the talk of imminent war is nothing but a dull obstacle to flirting and balls, though even she can't avoid her life being touched by events in the aftermath of the South's defeat. Initially this worked really well for me - by the time Scarlett starts being affected things have all gone to hell and the horrors faced by those living through such times were almost more resonant as they were so shocking to Scarlett's previously unseeing eyes. Unscrupulous to begin with, as the book progressed Scarlett didn't so much grow but rather descend ever downwards in her conduct and character - a development which was rather interesting to me.

However...whilst I tried so very hard to simply see the sentiments and views in the book as a depiction of things as they were at that time I really struggled with the incredibly pro-South outlook of the novel, where Mitchell presents the relationship between slaves and their masters as so loving and tender that slaves were virtually dandled on their masters' knees. 

As the book went on, and particularly during Part 4, I felt like I was reading Klan propaganda as Mitchell amplified the views via the narrative voice as well as those of her characters, with no opposing voices, and showed more and more clearly where her own sympathies lay. I cannot find any sympathy for the South's "Glorious Cause", fighting for the right to keep their slaves and mind their own affairs, then nursing their wounded pride when they got their asses kicked in the war they started, and could not join in the author's lamentation at the loss of the old way of life and all of the wealth, luxury, ease and gentility that went with as I see no beauty but rather ugliness, built as it was on the backs of such an abhorrent practice. Bend over, Mitchell, and I'll show you where you can shove that 'gentility'.

It soon got to be that the only bright spots in the book came through the interactions of Scarlett and Rhett Butler (who is a fabulous character, and if forced to choose between he and the wet and weak Ashley, Rhett wouldn't even need to show up to win easily) whose verbal sparring crackled with chemistry, and the fact that the last part of the book brought them to the fore as they tore one another apart almost started to make up for my struggles...but not quite.

If I was rating the book solely on the basis of the story of Scarlett (with the brilliant characterisation and writing talent, although a more ruthless editor would have been welcome) I would have rated it a lot higher but I really couldn't make it past the ideology and attitudes that underpinned it, so I'm giving it 1.5 stars (with that extra half star won through Rhett) and leaving my final thought on Mitchell's "Glorious Cause":

H.M.S. Surprise, by Patrick O'Brian

4.5 stars

The more time I spend in the company of Aubrey and Maturin, the more enamoured I become - it's rapidly become one of my biggest pleasures to run off to sea with them whenever life is a little trying. I've still no idea what in the gibbering flip is being said whenever we start in with the mizens and stuns'ls, but somehow I'm still managing to follow what's happening in those brilliant storms, chases and sea battles, and loving every second of it.

I loved this instalment even more than previously, as we climb aboard the HMS Surprise and head off to India, but not before stopping off in a number of other places for the wonderful Dr Maturin to indulge in his passion - whether that be natural history, or that bloody Villiers woman. Quite a large part of the focus in this book is Stephen and I think it's all the better for it. I could spend entire chapters reading of nothing but him being brilliant and bitchy - though that isn't his only charm. By this point I have become a total Maturin fan-girl, and spend most of my time now reading like this:

I'm about one book away from doodling his name on my pencil case...

Elsewhere, we get some nicely contemplative and emotional moments in amongst the thunder of the waves and the guns, such as Jack's quiet unease at the efficient killing during a battle and his white-washing of it in his letter home, and the culmination of Stephen's friendship with little Dil. The small glimpses into how certain things were viewed and tolerated, or not, in society at that point are also always interesting, with the view of Diana Villiers by 'polite' society contrasting with the rampant racism and routine offers of young children to do with as you wish...

The end of each of these books always comes too soon for me, so I'm very glad to see it's such a long series, ensuring I have a reliable reading refuge for a very long time to come.

Aubrey/Maturin - Patrick O'Brian

Feeling a bit glum? Life a bit stressful lately? Then let me introduce your cure - the Aubrey/Maturin novels by Patrick O'Brian. Numbering something like 20 novels, while I've only read two (so far) they've been a great introduction to what promises to be a fun naval adventure series. I've so far spent most of my reading time looking like this:

If this sounds like it might float your boat, read on for my review of each...

Master & Commander - 4 stars 

(read Oct '12) 

A boisterous adventure set during the Napoleonic Wars in which our protagonist Captain Jack Aubrey dashes up and down the Med in the sloop The Sophie taking 'prizes' (basically, being a pirate with his Madge's blessing), ranting about papists, playing violin, getting roaring drunk, yelling indecorous things at posh parties and cuckolding his betters.

I know nothing about sailing other than that it's done in boats, on water, and so whole sections were rendered completely incomprehensible, but I couldn't help finding it all wildly enjoyable. This was all down to the style employed and the characters - particularly Jack and his BFF Dr Stephen Maturin who, despite the constant book obsession with denouncing buggery, gave me immense slashy fun. I also got a few unexpected prods back into the reality of things back then via a crew made up of young boys and pressed men along with the odd officer, dodgy medical treatments and questionable hygiene (need to cut up your roast beef, Doctor? Just wipe off the scalpel you used to dissect a dolphin), and what it might have been like on deck of a boat engaged in a battle.

Post Captain - 4 stars

(read May '13)

"There she is, sir, just under the sprits'l yard. Tops'ls: maybe mizen t'garns'ls. Close-hauled, I take it."

Me too, dude. But once again it really doesn't matter, and this is as ruddy good fun as its predecessor. 

Spending the first third of the book on land, the 'Jane Austen for blokes' tag has never fit more as Jack and Stephen become entangled in a love triangle (or rather, quadrangle) by the grasping Mrs Williams attempts to find husbands for her girls (personally, I still think the only people they should be considering settling down with are each other - and if Stephen wants me to stop imagining smutty happenings between them then he really needs to stop calling Jack 'my dear'.)  

Needing to escape his debtors Jack needs a ship, any ship, and is grudgingly given the Polychrest, a dog of a boat with the strange habit of going backwards when her sailors want her going forwards, as well as having a constantly shitfaced ape on board. Other highlights include Jack saving a sailor from a shark, which he's rather blase about (does it all the time, apparently), Stephen hitting the laudanum when his friendship with Jack is tested, and the bringing on board of thousands of bees.

By the time we reached Plymouth (which I take as a personal shout-out) I didn't think my smile could have been any broader, but having just cheered a mate on in the marathon taking place on "that sparse barren dismal grass-plat they call the Hoe", when Stephen "looked out of the cabin at the water of the Sound, oily, with the nameless filth of Plymouth floating on it" I was tickled pink by his assessment of my hometown:

"So much wretchedness, misery and squalor I do not believe I have ever seen collected together in one place, as in this town of Plymouth. All the naval ports I have visited have been cold smelly blackguardly places, but for pox-upon-pox this Plymouth bears the bell. Yet the suburb or parasite they call Dock goes even beyond Plymouth, as Sodom outran Gomorrah." 

I've never been so proud...