Be Mine by Richard Ford
****
This is supposed to be Ford’s last novel in the Frank Bascombe series. And it certainly has an elegiac feel to it with the ageing and infirm protagonist taking his dying son on a road trip to Mount Rushmore. Doesn’t sound like much fun but it’s Ford’s usual blend of acute observation and reflections on Middle America - and there is much humour in his rueful account of the difficult journey and the parade of characters they encounter as they traverse parts of America that rarely appear in popular fiction. Even though he’s a cranky old bollocks I would strongly recommend it.
A Thread of Violence by Mark O’Connell
*****
Probably one of the two most engrossing books I’ve read this year. It sound unpromising - revisiting the much trodden path around Malcolm MacArthur and his two brutal murders. However, it focuses less on the murders and more on the slippery MacArthur, his family background and his current post-jail circumstances. O’Connell explores his psychology and fails to reach a conclusion. MacArthur’s inability to accept his deeds as anything more than a momentary aberration and his complete absence of remorse and empathy certainly suggest sociopathy. He sees himself as above the common herd and the only motive we can ascribe to his deeds is his quaint notion that gentlemen should not be burdened with the need to work. It all makes for a riveting read.
Prophet Song by Paul Lynch
****
My tip for this year’s Booker Prize. It’s set in the near future where an authoritarian government, complete with Stasi-type intelligence services, began to sort out their supporters from the dissidents. The resulting violence and turmoil create a very modern state of disruption and deprivation in our own Fair City and beyond. It’s told through the experiences of a particular family as they go from cosy middle-class comfort to dislocated refugees. A convincing and timely warning of how fragile our world is and how we must guard our freedoms. Lynch writes well and draws us into this highly credible dystopia.
Bee Sting by Paul Murray
***
Another tale of the cosy certitudes of a middle-class family being smashed but this time it’s economic recession rather than a fascist government. Murray focuses on the gradual diminishing of a family’s material well-being and the consequent effect it has on the individuals in the family: mother selling her clothes on eBay, daughter hiding their alarming fall from riches from her friends etc. This is also a Booker nomination but I found it somewhat lighter and less absorbing than Lynch’s book. Mildly entertaining at best.
Old God’s Time by Sebastian Barry
**
I must confess that I’ve never really warmed to Sebastian Barry as a novelist although I remember enjoying very much his play The Steward of Christendom. Perhaps the fact that I saw the version with Donal McCann in the lead role (at The Gate) helped. There is a certain straining for effect, trying too hard for the literary flourish in his writing, that I find grating. This novel got such good reviews I thought I’d try him again - the fact that it was set down the road (in Killiney) also encouraged me. But no, it just didn’t work for me. There was a decent story in there somewhere but I found the journey to get there tiresome. I finished it but it was a struggle.
The Wager by David Grann
*****
This was the second of the two most enjoyable books I’ve read this year. But a very different sort of book to Mark O’Connell’s. This is a ripping yarn. There are few psychological musings - just a highly readable account of of the privations suffered by the shipwrecked crew of a Royal Navy ship on an inhospitable island off Cape Horn. This was the 18th Century with strict hierarchies on board ship which slowly break down as those best equipped for survival come from the lower ranks. Hints of Lord of the Flies in there and Mutiny on the Bounty. The sources for Grann’s work included the detailed diaries kept by two of the survivors - one of whom was an ancestor of the poet Byron. So we got a couple of perspectives on all the main events and loads of attendant detail. There is even the added bonus of a very surprising ending.
The Singularities by John Banville
****
Banville just can’t let Malcolm MacArthur go - this is the fourth novel in which his doppelgänger Freddie Montgomery features. As always with Banville you can luxuriate in the fine writing and the waxing and waning of the narrative is unimportant as usual. There are many sly references to characters and places from his earlier novels - even as far back as his books on the cosmologists. Those familiar with Banville will nod knowingly, but it can be enjoyed without having consumed his back catalogue. The characters are well rendered and the setting lovingly depicted. He story kind of peters out when Freddie moves into the background but we don’t read Banville for a neat conclusion. The particularly ugly cover features an irregular black sphere and when I queried Banville about it at the Dalkey Book Festival he maintained that it represented a full-stop - so maybe this is his last go at MacArthur.
