minsidaavtangentbordet

Titta vilket tjusigt bokomslag. Satt och tittade på det lite då och då när jag läste, bara för att det var så fint med de där valven och det lila blommönstret längst ned.

I några dagar vandrade jag i alla fall runt i Kate Atkisons universum, närmare bestämt i hennes senaste roman i deckarform (för det är en deckare som egentligen är mer av en roman). Hon är lite grann en sådan där författare som skapar sin egna, speciell atmosfär, och, tja, värld.
Jag tror att det är vad som skulle kallas för en fristående fortsättning på hennes tidigare deckare, men blir nog bättre om man satsar på att läsa de tidigare böckerna först, i rätt ordning.

Nåväl, alla Kate Atkinsons böcker har vissa särskilda ingredienser, som t.ex. hennes humor, som är av den torra och samtidigt lite underfundiga engelska sorten. Sedan är det också beskrivningen av engelskt liv, karaktärer som växt upp i efterkrigstidens england, och hoppandet mellan tre eller fyra olika karaktärers berättelser, som sedan knyts ihop i slutet av boken.

I deckarna finns det såklart också en detektiv, som i Kate Atkinsons fall är en ex-soldat, ex-polis och numera alltså detektiv vid namn Jackson Brodie. Med ett behov av att skipa rättvisa och hitta försvunna människor som sägs komma sig av att hans äldre syster gick en ond bråd död till mötes i unga år. Jackson är av typen, tyskt, stark, envis som en gammal get och dålig på sina egna känslor, men snäll mot folk i allmänhet och noll skelett i garderoben.

Ingen miss Marple direkt, alltså, och kanske inget självutnämnt geni som Sherlock heller. Parallellt med själva deckargåtan så får man följa hans förhållanden med olika fruar (serial monogamist) som alla på något vis är lite fel för honom.
Ibland undrar jag om Kate Atkinson hittat på honom som en ursäkt till resten av storyn, ibland om hon hittat på en detektiv så som hon föreställer sig en sådan, eller om hon bara vill djävlas med alla kvinnliga läsare genom att sälla sig till skaran av författare som skapar mr Darcy-liknande karaktärer.

Ett vanligt tema i deckarna är folk som försvunnit, barn eller mödrar. I den här deckaren är Jackson anlitad för att spåra de biologiska föräldrarna till en kvinna som blev tagen från dessa när hon var liten, och nu inte har något minne av dem. Under sina efterforskningar blir han dessutom vittne till hur ett annat barn, 4-åriga Courtney, skiljs från sin mamma utanför en snabbmatsaffär. Hennes värsting (prostituerad, beroende av olika substanser, snattar i affären etc) till mamma säljer henne nämligen till en kvinnlig pensionerad, barnlös ex-kommissarie, som plötsligt fått en ingivelse och vill rädda ungen från en jobbig uppväxt.

Vittne till denna transaktion är också en gammal dam, skådespelerskan Tilly. I och för sig är alltså Jackson där på ett annat uppdrag och tar inte direkt upp jakten på Courtney, utan han lyckas istället göra något nästan liknande, nämligen skaffa sig en hund som han tar från den aggressiva, biffiga hussen som var i full färd med att misshandla det arma djuret.

Resten av storyn tänkte jag inte avslöja, förutom att man sedan parallellt får följa Jackson, Tilly, den kvinnliga ex-kommissarien och även en polis vid namn Barry, och att deras öden visar sig hänga ihop på slutet.

Eftersom den faller precis mellan deckare och roman så kan det vara svårt att inte hasta för att få reda på hur det går, men kanske är det här en bok som förtjänar att läsas lite långsammare.
Det här är för övrigt en ganska mörk story, som fortsätter lite på temat utsatta barn, och kvinnor. Även en annan grej som återkommer lite här och där i hennes böcker är mödrar som är frånvarande på något sätt, fysiskt eller psykiskt. Finns i och för sig mer i hennes romaner, då.

Helt orelaterat till bokrecensionen är att jag precis ändrat designen på bloggen, nytt år och omväxling förnöjer, osv.

Boomerang, av Tatiana de Rosnay

Läser just nu en fransk bok, Boomerang, av Tatiana de Rosnay. Fast hon är halvengelska. Hennes språk är väldigt behagligt. Undrar om hon skriver mer "engelskt" än franskt, trots att hon växt upp i Frankrike?

Boomerang handlar om två vuxna syskon, vars mor dog av en aneurysm när de var små. Huvudpersonen är Antonio, som är i 40-årsåldern, nyskild och saknar sin fru. Han tar med sig sin syster på en överraskningssemester för att fira hennes födelsedag. De åker till turistorten där de brukade tillbringa sina barndomssomrar. Där har de inte varit sedan deras mamma dog, en död som förutom att det berövade dem en mor också på sätt och vis en far, eftersom deras pappa blev sluten och kall mot dem efter sin frus död.

De har det trevligt tillsammans. De pratar om sina liv, men också om sin barndom. Tillsammans försöker de minnas sin mamma. Minnena kommer också tillbaka till dem när de är där på hotellet, där mycket är sig likt, och hotellpersonalen fortfarande kommer ihåg dem (och t.o.m. förväxlar Melanie - så heter systern - med deras mamma).

Under bilresan hem, då systern kör, vänder hon sig om för att säga något till Antonio. Det är någonting som har med deras mammas död att göra. Men innan hon hinner säga det kör hon av vägen.
Hon blir svårt skadad och får ligga länge på sjukhus, medan Antonio klarar sig bättre.
Antonio tampas med livet som nyskild och försöker att komma över sin fru, samtidigt som historien om deras barndom sakta rullas upp. Vad var det egentligen som hade hänt den där sommaren?

Anledningen till att jag hittade boken var att den precis blivit översatt till svenska av bokförlaget Sekwa, som är ett jättebra förlag, och jag har länkat till dem till höger i bloggen. Så de som hellre läser den på svenska kan alltså göra det.

Fri - Kirino Natsuo

Började läsa boken Fri lite smått för någon vecka sedan. Bara några sidor in fastnade jag riktigt ordentligt, och resten sträcklästes under mer eller mindre sömnlösa nätter. Mot slutet var jag tvungen att skumma igenom vissa partier för att det blev så spännande.

Hade höga förväntningar innan jag började läsa, eftersom boken länge legat bland topp tio mest sålda hos Pocket Shop, och fått det japanska Grand Prix for Crime Fiction. Fri motsvarade lyckligtvis mina förväntningar.

Den visade sig vara en sådan där bok som inte riktigt tillhör en viss genre. Om den kan kategoriseras som något så skulle det väl i så fall vara "psykologisk deckare". Boken har också några inslag av minst sagt hårresande skräck. Den innehåller också kritik av det hårda samhällsklimatet i Japan, och japanska kvinnors levnadsvillkor.

Kirino säger själv om sitt skrivande:

My main motivation to write is to “observe the fabric of human relationships.” Sometimes the threads that connect people are strong, or warped, or weak, or twisted by the encounters. Isn’t that what a story telling is really all about?

Eftersom jag ofta blir intresserad av författaren bakom boken, kollade jag upp Kirino på Wikipedia. Det visade sig vara en pseudonym för Hashioka Mariko, som även publicerat romaner under namnet Nobara Noemi. Nederst på sidan fanns en länk till Kirinos officiella hemsida, som innehöll en kort biografi.

Där stod bland annat att hon växte upp som enda syster till två bröder, och tog examen i juridik innan hon satsade på skrivandet. Det här tycker jag märks på hennes språk i Fri, som är sparsmakat och rakt på sak. Hennes resonemang är på sina ställen lika kyliga och rakbladsvassa som man förväntar sig att en jurists ska vara.

Nåväl, här kommer en kort sammanfattning av handlingen:

I Fri är det, till skillnad från i vanliga deckare, förövarna som är huvudpersoner.
Boken utspelar sig som sagt i Japan, och handlar om fyra kvinnor som arbetar nattskiftet på en livsmedelsfabrik tillsammans. Deras vardag består av hårt slit och monotont arbete. De tyngs dessutom ned av ekonomiska prolbem och av relationer som knakar i fogarna.

För en av dem, den vackra Yayoi, knakar det så mycket i fogarna att hon tillslut får nog och stryper sin spelande, alkoholiserade man (han har då precis kommit hem berusad och talat om att han spelat bort deras gemensamma besparingar.) Förfärad över vad hon gjort ringer hon sin kollega Masako och ber om hjälp. Den intelligenta Masako, som är av betydligt hårdare virke än Yayoi, tar på sig ansvaret för att röja undan alla spår av kroppen. Även de två andra kvinnorna Kuniko och Yoshie blir inblandade i det hela. 

Mordet på Yayois make är den utlösande faktorn som gör att problem i vardagen ställs på sin spets, och även obehagliga saker från deras förflutna kommer upp till ytan igen. Trots att polisen inte lyckas få tag i mörderskan, är det alltså långt ifrån slut på historien. Yayois brott markerar istället starten på en lång kedja av händelser, som på ett ödesdigert sätt förändrar livet för de fyra kvinnorna.

En del partier i boken är riktigt ruskiga, men av någon anledning läser man dem ändå med viss behållning. Jag blev påmind om hur det är att stå inne på labb och dissekera under en biologilektion när jag läste dem. Något som jag faktiskt inte tyckte var helt oävet.
Kirino är en skruvad dam, och själv är man tydligen inte mycket bättre. De som gillar skräck tror jag garanterat kan få sitt lystmäte här.

Unseen Academicals

That last few days have been spent in a sort of half coma. It has been very rainy, and so I've been devoting myself entirely to reading the fantasy novel Unseen Academicals by the british author Terry Pratchett. Had you been spying on me you would have seen me sitting in the sofa in the living room and reading, by the computer, in my room, in the kitchen and... yeah, pretty much all over the house.

It was a very long time (for me, at least ) since I last read anything by this author, and so when I'd started I had a hard time putting the book down. I reacted the way I would probably react if I kept off sweets for a few months, and then somebody came and put a bowl of candy in front of me.

Unseen Academicals can be read "alone" if you want to, but it is also part of a series of fantasy novels that all take place in a universe called Discworld. It's very imaginative and enormously funny, and there are, I think 38 books about Discworld right now. Terry Pratchett has been knighted, so I think that means that what he writes transcends genres, it's the kind of fantasy you can appreciate even if you don't normally read any fantasy.

More than being fantasy, it's satire, because Discworld is in many aspects similar to our own world, and the reason why the characters are so funny and also likeable is because they are so familiar and behave in all the weird ways that humans generally do.

There are several characters in Discworld, so one book might be about only some of them and the other characters might not be present at all, but in other books they might have a smaller part to play or they are sort of in the background, and in yet another book these minor characters will be the main characters.

A few of these characters are the three witches who live in a small village in the mountains, who have their own mini series within the series with something like four or five books being about their adventures. Then there is the grim reaper, Death, who is rather nice and philosophical but a bit at a loss when it comes to understanding humans, though he really tries his best. There is also Ank-Morpork, the greatest city of Discworld, that is almost a character in itself. Apart from its large population, it harbours som of the main characters such as the city guard, the dictatorial patrician, and most importantly, all the wizards of the great Unseen University (the university of magic ). Normally, there are also a few new characters introduced in each book, some of them who are only part of that book and some of them who come back in other books.

The book I've just read takes place in Ank-Morpork, and centers around the wizards at Unseen University. It's probably a lot more enjoyable if you've read all the books in the right order. Anyway, Unseen Academicals is the name of a team put together by the wizards. In this book, they are required to play a game of football in order to keep getting money from a trustfund they need to finance their economy. None of the wizards like sports very much, so they aren't keen on it, but they decide that they have to because otherwise they won't be able to afford eating nine meals a day, and they'll only have three different kinds of cheese to choose from.

Some of the main characters in this book are not wizards, but are part of the staff who work at the university, namely two of the staff employed to light the candles and make them dribbly, and two of the maids working in the kitchen. One of the candle lighters is a goblin and arfaid he won't fit in among the people of Ank-Morpork. There is a lot of prejudices about how evil goblins are supposed to be, and although there are both dwarves and trolls living among the humans of the city, there hasn't been any goblins around. The other candle dribbler is his friend, a young boy with a talent for kicking a tin can.

The two maids are Glenda and Juliet (gack, why couldn't Shakespeare have chosen another name, I hate all the romanticism attached to it ). Glenda is one of the maids, or rather, the cook of the Night Kitchen of the University. She's very good at working hard, feeling sorry for people, telling other people what to do and keeping them out of trouble, eating too much and reading sappy novels. Her best friend Juliet is also working in the kitchen, and is a pretty but airheaded girl.

These four all become important to the wizards and their football for different reasons, and the story is as much about what happens to them as about what happens to the wizards. This is rather typical of Terry Pratchett. He'll often have two or three different stories going on at the same time, and often being woven together somewhere along the way.

Football is very dangerous in Ank-Morpork (possibly it's more like the american version ). When the wizards discover this they manage to re-write the rules together with the dictator of the town, and make it more like the kind of football we call football.

I enjoyed the book very much, especially the part where you got a summary of the wizards first attempt at playing football. They were not very good at it at all, some ran away from the ball instead of towards it, some stood still leaning agains the goal and smoking a pipe, and some of them kicked the ball into their own goal.

Book cover, showing the whole team:



Terry Pratchett himself, sporting a wizard hat and a very cool beard:


The very first book by Terry Pratchett that I read was not about Discworld, but set in England. Though it was still fantasy, because the main characters happened to find a way to travel in time with a shopping cart. It was called Johnny and the bomb, and was part of a triology about a young boy named Johnny and his group of friends. It was a friend of my mother, my mothers' secretary at the time, who told my mother about the book. She was one of the younger secretaries there, close to my mother in age, and very kind with a good sense of humour. And fond of cats.

Halfway through "the Housekeeper + the Professor"

I've started to read a new book called the Housekeeper + the Professor. It is written by a Japanese novelist called Yoko Ogawa. It is very beautiful and poetic in its language, so reading it goes very smoothly, you just float onwards. It's a low-key story, but captivating and I'm impatient to know how it will end. It is a very thin book (180 pages) with a pretty cover:



the writer, Yoko Ogawa:


The writing style is perhaps a bit reminiscent of that of Haruki Murakami, but he can get a bit tedious and boring sometimes, and this one isn't boring at all.

Anyway, the novel tells the story of a young housekeeper who comes to work for an old retired mathematics professor. The old professor has had nine houskeepers before her, and they've all quit because of one pecuilarity about the professor - his memory goes only 80 minutes back in time. After 80 minutes has passed, he no longer remembers anything that has happened after 1975, when he was hit in the head by a car and lost his ability to remember.

So every new day when the houskeeper comes, she is a total stranger to him and has to reintroduce herself.

During the day, the professor sits at his desk and solves math problems while the houskeeper cleans and cooks for him. On his jacket he has pinned several small notes with things he wants to remember written on them.

The houskeeper one day tells the professor that she has a son, and he asks her to bring him with her the next time she comes to work. It turns out that the professor likes children very much, and he and the houskeepers' son become friends. He begins to slowly teach him math and gives him mathematic riddles to solve. They also talk about baseball.

I've almost read the whole book now, and I think it is a beautiful and sweet story, but not at all sugary.

"the Gargoyle"

The last two books that I have read have both been fantasy novels, or at least the first one was very close to fantasy while the second one definitely crossed over. Here's my review of the first one, "the Gargoyle".

Ok, so.

"the Gargoyle" is a novel written by the canadian author Andrew Davidson. Davidson has a degree in English litterature, has lived and worked in Japan, and "the Gargoyle" was his first novel. It has been translated to several languages, and been something of a success, apparently.

The Gargoyle is essentially a love story, it's very romantic in its belief of love as a curing or healing power or whatever you want to call it. It's the "love conquers all" kind of story. Also, it's a bit on the Twilight, Bella & Edward romance with a dark twist side, only clearly it is they guy who is being saved by this otherwordly fantastic amazing woman, here. Which is fine, of course.

Another theme in the book is faith, or lack of faith. I don't know if it's religious faith, or just the kind of faith that makes people believe in working and fighting for something, daring to care about something. The main character doesn't believe in anything at the start of the book, but by the end of it he cares enough and has gotten his faith in life back. And no, I'm not spoiling anything for you by telling you this, because you sort of know from the start that's what's going to happen (otherwise there wouldn't be any real point to the story).

The main character (whom I suspect of having some personality traits in common with the author) has had a messed up childhood with two fosterparents who were constantly on drugs. Apart from having a boundless curiosity wich led him to spending a lot of time in the library and reading everything from novels to scientific litterature, and according to the author being as handsome as some ancient greek sculpture, he really didn't have much going for him during his childhood and teen years.

He eventually becomes addicted to drugs, and because of his particular talents, he also becomes a pornstar. Seriously. Why? Anyway, he seems to have led a pretty shitty life up to when the story stars, namely when he, high on drugs, drives his car off a cliff. The crash leads to the car catching fire and the main character being roasted alive, only escaping death by the car eventually falling into a nearby lake or pond.

Now he has to spend his days recovering at a hospital and undergoing very painful skin transplants and coming to grips with his new looks, which are perfectly monstrous. He also has no friends left, because his old ones turned out to only be interested in his money and anyway they weren't that close to begin with. It's all very tragic and his very cynical and despondent and planning to commit suicide as soon as he gets out of the hospital. The only good thing, as he sees it, is that he occasionally gets a dose of morphine during operations.

Until one day a woman whom he does not recognize, who isn't part of the hospital staff, comes into his room. She has long beautiful hair, stunning green-blue eyes and is dressed kind of like a hippie. She also has a tattoo on her back (something he discovers later) and she claims that she knows him and that they were lovers in another life, in Germany during the middle ages. Her name is Marianne Engel, and she is a sculptress, who carves gargoyles from stone blocks.

At first, he doesn't believe her and is convinced that she either suffers from bipolar disorder or schizophrenia, or both, and that she is completely delusional. But as she comes to visit him again, he grows fond of her and of her stories of their previous life together, and also of the other stories of love that she tells him.

The story of how his recovery at the hospital and about the treatment he has to go through is interwoven with Mariannes story about how she grew up at a monastery in Germany, and with three love stories that she tells him, the first one taking place in Italy during the plague, the second one in Asia and the third one among the Vikings in Norway.

Marianne is, however, one of the mental patients and the doctor who treats the main character is at first opposed to her coming there to visit him. But when she sees the effect that Marianne has on him, she allows it. As she puts it "I've never seen a person more in need of a friend than you". Marianne becomes something of his saviour, and he slowly becomes more hopeful and returns back to life, not to his old life but to a new kind of life. He begins to see the world and the people in it more positively, and hope for a life together with Marianne in her house. If he can only get off the morphine, and if Mariannes work doesn't completely wear her down...

Yup, this is a very, very classic love story. But it got drawn out, very long and uneven. I wasn't able to finish it, didn't have the patience. So I never got to know how they managed together.
I think the author could have killed his darlings a little more, because some parts of the story were a bit superflous. I mean, even if you have a great idea for a story and likable characters, that's not enough.
He does manage to draw you in at the beginning of the story, but the somehow I wasn't able to hold that interest for the story and stay interested in the characters and sometimes the story got completely unengaging.

I'm sorry. I did want to like it. I liked the cover. I sort of think I might have eventually "got" the main character and where he came from, despite having some issues with his whining and selfpity and questioning of his own manliness I still didn't mind him. I think other people wanted to like it too, because it has a very promising story and seems to have all the right ingredients.

I don't know what kind of conclusion I should come to, but I think it has something to do with suicidal tendencies, being overly religious (despite all his talk about not being religious) and lacking a sense of humour, and how these traits all came together in the main character. Hm, maybe just that suicidal people perhaps all lack a sense of humour, or if they don't it's still flawed at some fundamental level, since they take themselves seriously enough to commit suicide.




A photo of the author, who looks um, like you'd imagine him to. A bit concerned with his own appearance but probably very mushy, bearing a weak sememblence to Paul Auster, who also always looks a bit peculiar in his photos. Ah, whatever. If you're a fan of Dante's Inferno and Paul Auster, you might actually like this book. By the way.