The Books I Read In December

This year I read 60 books. In 2024 I read 59 and in 2023, 53 books, but I am getting a feel for the quantity I will get through, a little more than equivalent one book per week. This year the longest book I read was 851 pages. In fact it and the next two longest at 764 pages and 682 pages, were all non-fiction and about British politics. The shortest book I read was only 111 pages long but there were three others under 150 pages, one of which I read in a day.

Fiction

'Til Death Do Us Part' by John Dickson Carr

Published under Dickson Carr's real name in 1944, this novel, another in the British Library Classic Crime series, is actually set in an archetypal English village before the war had broken out. Though an American it is clear that Dickson Carr adored rural England. His at times almost poetic descriptions of the sights of the village at different times of the day add a richness to the novel not found in all detective stories of the time. As with 'She Died A Lady' (1943) which I read in October: https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2025/10/the-books-i-read-in-october.html the village he conjures up, in this case Six Ashes (perhaps influenced by Sevenoaks?) is an idealised - though feasible - English setting, not only in terms of its geography but also of the local characters, such as the squire at the manor, the doctor, the banker, etc. The only American perspective which stands out is when through a character he has to lecture Britons in general about how practical window screens to keep out insects are, despite their absence in most British houses.

There is a good psychological element to this story. The protagonist is a playwright, Richard Markham,who writes popular mystery plays. He has fallen in love with a newcomer to the village, Lesley Grant and becomes engaged to her. However, at the village fete held in the grounds of Ashe Manor, a fortune teller, apparently in fact criminologist Sir Harvey Gilman reveals to Markham that Grant has killed three men she was in relationships via a locked-room approach employing cyanide. Clearly Markham is torn in considering whether his fiancée is a murderess. Modern readers are likely to fall into thinking we are into 'Black Widow' (1987) movie territory, especially when Cynthia Drew a close friend of Markham's also appears to be antagonistic towards Grant and appears in apparently suspicious locations.

Cleverly Dickson Carr uses our expectations of how different types of individual in such a setting will behave to mislead us. I have to be careful with spoilers, but eventually it becomes apparent that Grant may not be the only one concealing a very different past. This book is the 15th in Dickson Carr's Dr. Gideon Fell series of novels and Fell does turn up quite late in the book. He is obese and you tend to think he is modelled on Ernst Gennat (1880-1939), the prominent (and overweight) Berlin detective active 1925-39. In addition, he seems quite superfluous. We already have Superintendent David Hadley on the scene. The tension between the two and with other professionals perhaps is realistic but at times feels laboured as if the various running around between various houses especially at nighttime. At the end you feel Fell has held back intentionally on providing the solution until the time was right for him to be able to be seen to trump both Markham and Hadley and gain the most kudos.

Overall, for at times challenging expectations, adding the psychological element of a protagonist in love with a perhaps murderer and a beautiful portrayal of an inter-war English village, this is worth a read, but be patient towards the end when things seem to begin to lag unnecessarily. Since reading this novel I have found a copy of Dickson Carr's first crime novel which I aim to read early in the new year.

'What Could Possibly Go Wrong?' by Jodi Taylor

This is the sixth book in the Chronicles of St. Mary's and follows pretty much the same formula as the previous ones. The heroine Max, now married to the Leon Farrell, due to her injuries in previous novels has a job swap to 'lighter duties' training up five new recruits to the institute. It is also revealed that when she was transferred into an alternate timeline from her original one in 'A Second Chance' (2014) https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2024/04/the-books-i-read-in-april.html and officially renamed 'Lucy' she has come to a world where the USA suddenly became an authoritarian dictatorship and Britons trapped there had to be smuggled out to safety.

The incessant mistakes and tragedies that the staff of St. Mary's suffer does become rather tiresome. As one character increasingly points out, they are actually pretty useless at their jobs and regularly put themselves unnecessarily in harm's way which does lead to deaths. In turn the deaths bring in a jarring element to the 'jolly hockey sticks' tone that otherwise is prominent in the novels, rather the way the torture scenes jar with the overall tone of the Flashman books (1969-2005). The strongest parts are Taylor's portrayals of the historic locations that the crews visit. In this one they go to the Valley of the Kings in 18th dynasty Egypt;  a site of Homo Sapiens - Neanderthal interaction in stone age times; to meet with Ancient Greek historian Herodotus - very different from what is expected - and have a new run-in with the Time Police; to witness the execution of Joan of Arc and the Battle of Bosworth Field. In each location damaging mistakes are made and in one this leads as usually happens in these books, to the death of a crew member, in fact in this one there is an extra death. 

As in other recent books there is also a mystery around who has betrayed the Institute to their antagonists. This again proves to be two people, one very unexpected and the other you might work out early on. This sub-plot and what it reveals about people suspected of treachery, adds an interesting element to the novel. I have two more books in the main series to read and then two short story anthologies. I do hope these move away from the set pattern of the books so far which has never really fully settled down into what it feels it should be doing.

'Sharpe's Escape' by Bernard Cornwell

About 20 years ago I read all of Cornwell's Sharpe books that had been published up until 2003 - 'Sharpe's Havoc' (2003). I read them in chronological order rather than the order in which they had been published, starting in 1981. Recently, however, I realised that I had missed out this one published in 2007. In terms of history, this book is set in 1810 and comes between 'Sharpe's Gold' (1981) and 'Sharpe's Fury' (2007) - one which I have not yet got a copy of. 

Despite publishing the books over what is now a 44-year period ('Sharpe's Storm' is imminently due for publication), Cornwell has been very adept at keeping his character correct for the time period the book is set in. In this one there are callbacks to a grim scene in 'Sharpe's Prey' (2001) set in Copenhagen in 1807. Captain Sharpe and his usual band of riflemen with additional redcoat musketeers are part of the British retreat down Portugal to the refuge behind the Lines of the Torres Vedras, the vast defensive structure Wellington set up to defend Lisbon which led to the defeat of the French in Portugal and the slow progress of British and allied forces towards France.

This novel moves along briskly, with all the usual elements you would expect in a Sharpe novel. His very common background leads to friction with upper class officers, but he benefits from Major Hogan and behind him Wellington himself, who ensure that he can weather the behaviour of these men, notably in this novel, the commander of Sharpe's battalion Lieutenant Colonel William Lawford who is trying to bring on his young brother-in-law by effectively putting him into Sharpe's place in command of the Light Company. As it is following a well-told account of the Battle of Bussaco, Sharpe and Sergeant Harper set with the task of finding billets and destroying supplies in Coimbra so they cannot be used by the advancing French. 

There is, as usual, personal tension between Sharpe and a treacherous Portuguese major and his explicitly criminal brother. As the British march on, Sharpe has to escape Coimbra along with Harper, an English governess - who develops greatly in the escape and a Portuguese captain Sharpe has met before when were both were lieutenants taking part in the British retreat from Oporto in 1809 ('Sharpe's Havoc' (2003)). 

Despite the formulaic nature of many of the Sharpe scenarios, Cornwell is successful in making the stories different. Though we know already that Sharpe is alive still in 1821, there is an effective sense of jeopardy as they get clear of Coimbra through ancient sewers and seek a boat to take them downstream to the Lines of Torres Vedras, then to avoid being killed as they come up to them, themselves. I have a couple of other post-2003 Sharpe novels to read but am coming at them in chronological order.

'Sharpe's Command' by Bernard Cornwell

Following a break after 2007, in 2021 Cornwell began publishing a few more Sharpe novels. As with many authors with series these days, these were 'fill-in' books in between books in the series that had been published earlier. This is one of those books being set in May 1812 around the Bridge at Almaraz across the River Tagus in Spain. It sits between 'Sharpe's Company' (1982) at the Siege of Badajoz 'Sharpe's Sword' (1983) set during the Salamanca Campaign.

The error around his rank in this novel has been picked up. In 'Sharpe's Company' he was restored to the rank of captain after being refused that rank permanently in January 1812, earlier in that novel, due to a lack of a captain's vacancy. This was despite him being promoted to the rank locally back in July 1809 ('Sharpe's Eagle' (1981)). He is raised only to brevet major late in 1812 ('Sharpe's Enemy' (1984)) and then only due to the intervention of the Prince Regent. Despite these details and me previously complimenting Cornwell's success at continuity, there is confusion even just within this novel about Sharpe's rank with some calling him captain and some calling him major. At first I thought that was intentional to reflect how other officers saw him but now it seems to have been an error.

The attack on the bridge at Almaraz was an actual raid carried out behind French lines. The novel naturally involves actual people notably General Rowland Hill who commanded it, but also Lieutenant Love an artillery officer who with a team were able to shell the small French fort on the northern bank after the pontoon bridge across it had been broken. The sergeant of the 50th Regiment who killed a French officer with his half-pike also features. Other fictional characters are woven in to make it a Sharpe book. There is a treacherous Spanish partisan who is killed in a brutal duel by Sharpe's second wife, Spanish partisan leader, Teresa Moreno 'La Aguja' who features quite extensively in this novel. The riflemen under Sharpe's command play a leading part not only in the main battle but also in skirmishes leading up to it when they are carrying out correspondence.

The story of this action is complicated even historically with an assortment of forts on both sides of the Tagus to be taken into consideration. Cornwell does his best but it is at times a little bewildering about where everyone is going and in which direction they are firing. There is a map of the region at the start but a closer-in one of the pontoon bridge and the forts defending it would have been really useful. While Cornwell does describe the battles successfully and really keeps up the tension, the fact that twice Sharpe and his band are only saved by mounted charges by partisans suggests he was beginning to run out of ideas. Lieutenant Love's character seems to change sharply from when he first appears in the book to when he reappears at the end, calling on St. Barbara at every possible occasion whereas earlier he had been much more passive. It is always a challenge for authors to fictionalise genuine historical characters that we actually do not know much about, but it is a shame that Cornwell could not maintain consistency with Love.

I have 'Sharpe's Assassin' (2021) to read and given it was published two years before this one, though set three years later, I hope it still shows the complete skill that Cornwell once had or at least he used an editor to call out when he made mistakes or when what he was writing had lost its 'edge'.

'The Voice of the Violin' by Andrea Camilleri

This is the fourth book in the Montabalno series and is a brisk, straight forward detective novel. A woman, Michela Licalzi is found naked following both vaginal and anal sexual intercourse at a remote farmhouse she is having done up. There is no trace of her belongings beside a bath towel and her car which one of Montalbano's staff crashed into. The story follows solid detection work going through Licalzi's husband and her lovers. Ironically the prime clue to the motive is in the title rather than anything sexual. It is to reach this that Montalbano does solid detection, though at times bending the law such as breaking into the dead woman's house before her death has even been reported.

As before, Montalbano is regularly at odds with his colleagues notably his deputy Mimi Augello who in fact is more honorable than much online commentary suggests. The police switchboard operator Officer Catarella is portrayed as a buffoon added to by the translator, Stephen Sartarelli rendering his speech like a comic version of a New York Italian. There are fortunately signs towards the end of the novel, that Catarella is maturing, which is a relief. At times these points of friction seem really laboured so the interactions grate. It feels there is a lack of reason for Montalbano's behaviour especially when he can be charming to others, notably the old woman, Signora Clementina who has featured before and is becoming a kind of civilian assistant to Montalbano, for example, telephoning in tip-offs to the police that the inspector cannot be associated with.

There are the usual regular references to Sicilian food specialities. The inspector never seems to eat anything very plain and if it was not for his regular swimming you could imagine him becoming very overweight. The changes in his personal relationship with Livia from the previous novel 'The Snack Thief' (1996) are not followed up and indeed the 'happy family' expectation of that novel is terminated by François insisting he remains with the family he was fostered with for his own security especially in seeing the boys he is fostered with as his own brothers. I had thought that story line to be an unlikely one, but it also seems very brusque to abandon it this way. There are hints that Montalbano is going to have an affair with Anna, a friend of Michela's living nearby. It does not develop far in this novel and it will have to be seen if it is taken further or not. Montalbano has proven in earlier novels that he can have a platonic relationship even with a beautiful woman. 

Overall, despite this difficulties, the novel is one of the better ones in the series through keeping to a proper detective story rather than going off down more outré paths.

'Science Fiction,The Great Years' ed. by Carol and Frederik Polk

This is a collection published originally in 1973 (my edition is from 1977) which collected together seven US 'pulp' science fiction stories published 1934-53. As you progress through it you see that much of the criteria for selection has been due to the Polks knowing the authors personally and in one case one, 'Wings of the Lightning Land' was written by James MacCreigh, a pseudonym of Frederik Polk himself. With this collection I did note as I did with 'The World of Null-A' (1940) by A.E. Vogt which I read in October https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2025/10/the-books-i-read-in-october.html things that to a science fiction reader in the mid-20th Century would have seemed exciting or thought provoking, now can have a tendency to seem old hat as the points they revolved around have become so assimilated into Western culture in the meantime.

I first started reading this book in 1983 but abandoned it part way through the first story. This is '... And Then There Were None' published in 1951 by Eric Frank Russell is the longest in the book and I can see why I soon tired of it. It is very off-putting, because at 72 pages it is too long, but above all it is painfully smug. A diplomatic spaceship from Earth's extensive empire lands on a colonised planet which has had no visits from the rest of human space in 300 years. They try to find a leader even at a local level to talk to about the planet but keep running up against smug non-compliance from the population. It slowly and painfully transpires after a lot of these irritating encounters that the people feel they follow the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi and thus keep harping on 'I won't' and 'mind your own business', which they believe is an essence of Gandhi's viewpoint. This seems a typically American perspective. 

They settlers have also adopted what we now call a 'gift economy' and as it is used at some local levels nowadays it is not as unusual to the reader as it would in 1951. The American angle comes through them being called 'obs' from 'obligations' which can be 'put' on to people and then shifted from person to person before someone 'kills' them. The self-righteousness of the settlers gets tedious very quickly and the apparent 'twist' of many of the crew deserting the ship to remain on the planet is no surprise. All of this is laid on so heavily, you can see how poorly Russell thought of his readers.

'The Liberation of Earth' (1953) by William Tenn, a pseudonym for an academic of the time, is much crisper and I feel better shows what good science fiction short stories can do. It is narrated by a survivor living on an Earth whose very shape has been distorted by repeated invasions by two warring sides in an alien war. They have used Earth as a base for this conflict with no concern for the impact on the humans (and presumably animals and plants) that live on it, harmed by the constructions and the by-products of their weapons. As well as distorting Earth a lot of its air and water are used up or contaminated. As the Polks comment in the introduction, in the early 1970s it would have been seen as a critique of the Vietnam War but it is easy to see how Tenn thought it up in the context of the legacy of colonialism which was very apparent in the mid-1950s. The portrayal of the alien invasions as different 'liberations', even from the humans' perspective, is a nice touch.

'Old Faithful' (1934) by Raymond Z. Gallun is primarily written from the perspective of an inhabitant of Mars, 774, looking down on Earth and developing signalling with an astronomer there. Condemned to have his life ended to conserve resources on Mars 774 boldly piggy backs on a comet passing close to both Mars and Earth to reach his correspondent. It is nice to see aliens not bent on invasion and colonisation, but like many humans, having an interest in knowing more about their solar system. Gallun does very well in envisaging an alien life form which, for example, does not hear but simply feels vibrations. It is also unlike much on Earth except large worms and this does seem to be a bit of a trend of portraying the alien in science fiction of the time. I guess a worm is also seen as inherently non-threatening. It is a sweet story about the character's endeavours and its hope for its own single offspring. Ironically exploration on Mars in the 21st Century suggests Gallun's portrayal of water on the planet might not have been far from the truth though back many millions of years before humans appeared on Earth.

'Placet is a Crazy Place' (1946) by Frederic Brown has an interesting context. It features a planet that loops around in a binary star system. Light slows down as a result to on the passage people on the planet can see a spectral projection of the planet effectively coming towards them which naturally causes concern. It is also a romance in that the protagonist resigns from his post only to find that a woman he has long been attracted to is just arriving at the base. It is quite a light story but interesting for the astronomical situation it explores.

'Wings of the Lightning Land' (1941) by James MacCreigh [Frederik Polk] is quite a straight forward space adventure when two explorers from a base on the Moon are transported across the universe to an alien planet where they manage to sort out what is going wrong with the deserted city they find there. The jeopardy seems genuine because we have no sense of whether either of them will survive. Added to that the female narrator suffers from hypothyroidism, known as 'cretinism' at the time the story was written which if unmedicated leads to severe decline in the sufferer's mental condition so that they become unable to cope with complex thinking and communication. Perhaps many light years from her medication, the narrator has a deadline to try to get home before her condition overwhelms her. It is still not that common to see disabled people in science fiction and as a Type 1 diabetic reliant on late 20th Century medication to keep me from suffering a painful death as a matter of course, it is something that always come to mind when I read time travel stories or indeed being stranded somewhere remote whether on Earth or elsewhere. The story is pretty good if rather disjointed at times.

'The Little Black Bag' (1950) by C.M. Kornbluth is a time travel story but only a medical kit from the future is sent back to mid-20th Century USA and helps out an alcoholic doctor due to its easy-to-use very advanced equipment. While it allows him to get back into practice and help out numerous people with a variety of conditions, this being the US health system he is soon pushed into doing cosmetic surgery in order to secure large fees to keep his assistant who is blackmailing him, happy. In that way it reminded me of something like an episode from 'The Twilight Zone' (broadcast 1959-64) or 'Tales of the Unexpected' (broadcast 1979-88). Like the best short stories it handily explores a moral issue bisecting with human nature and has a decent twist.

'A Matter of Form' (1938) by H.L. Gold is a bit of a body shock story. It is set in New York of the time where three bodies of catatonic tramps have been found with signs of recent surgery on them. While at times we see from the point of view of a journalist working on this story and his editor, the main protagonist is a down-and-out college graduate called Wood. He is inveigled into a scheme which turns out to be producing the catatonic men as a result of exchanging consciousnesses between animals and humans with the goal of moving those of ailing wealthy people into younger human bodies. Wood soon finds himself in the body of a collie. Much of the story is an adventure about how he escapes the vivisectionists and with his limited canine abilities draws the attention of the newspapermen to the scandal. Naturally we now think of 'Fluke' (1977) by James Herbert or scenes in 'Mars Attacks' (1996). Perhaps we can also see it in line with 'The Monster of Lake LaMetrie' (1899) by Wardon Allan Curtis which features a full brain transplant or .'The Metamorphosis' (1915) by Franz Kafka which looks at such a situation more from psychological rather surgical aspect. Overall, 'A Matter of Form' is an engaging story on topics of how we might communicate as a dog as well as an adventure of Wood being shot at and chased across New York by the surgeon's gangster associates.

Non-Fiction

'The Secret State. Whitehall and the Cold War' by Peter Hennessy

This book published in 2002 has what I am now seeing as the classic Hennessy style. It is very rhetorical as you would expect from a lecture or a radio programme of the kind Hennessy is well known for. There are personal reminiscences mixed in with numerous asides and quotes from people who were at the heart of the matter being covered. While this also went for 'Whitehall' (1988) and 'Never Again' (1993) both of which I read this year, the rhetorical style is probably more the case with this one as it was founded on four lectures that Hennessy gave. It covers the period that Hennessy refers to as the 'high' Cold War which he sees running 1947-69. In part this is to do with when government documents became available.

The UK adopted the 20-year rule in 2013, so from 1968 when the rule was shortened from 50 years, historians had to wait 30 years to see official documents in the archives. Consequently, in 2002 only those from before 1971 would be available. As it is certain documents are kept closed for longer, up to a maximum of 100 years, including ones concerning atomic and nuclear issues. However, a sub-theme of this book is how Hennessy, his assistants and a set of his students were able to reconstruct a lot of discussions and policies from the documents which were available. Some of these are replicated at length in the book.

The four main themes. First how the British assessed the risk of incidents, perhaps even war, with the USSR in the post-war period. Second the difficult development of a British nuclear deterrent and keeping it up to date as nuclear weaponry quickly evolved going from single aircraft dropped atomic bombs in 1945 to inter-continental ballistic missiles carrying thermonuclear warheads by 1957. Third how especially in the wake of the detection of Fuchs in 1950 and the defections of Burgess and Maclean the following year, steps were taken to filter out traitors from becoming part of the Whitehall 'machine'.

The fourth theme builds on the second and looks at assessments of what the impact would be on the UK if a nuclear war broke out and preparations that could be made. This leads into the final section focused on 'Turnstile' the secret underground base in the Cotswolds to which the rump of UK central government would have retreated. Another coup of Hennessy's was that he and two assistants were permitted to visit the base and take some photos. The book ends with a philosophical discussion of unleashing a nuclear holocaust and the revelation that the continued existence of the UK is indicated officially by the broadcasting of the 'Today' programme on Radio 4 at least once in a week.

This is a brisk but well informed book which, as I have noted before, is perhaps best for a general reader wanting to engage with these topics rather than a scholarly one. It is a shame given that in 2013 official documents dating from 1992 and before were opened, so covering the end of the Cold War, that a follow-up book has not been produced showing how the UK government dealt with things like detente, the invasion of Afghanistan, Reagan's alternating 'evil empire' and then peace talks phases plus the collapse of the Soviet Union. Maybe somewhere one of Hennessy's assistants or former students is working on it, given how infirm Lord Hennessy is now.

The Books I Read In November

 Fiction

'No Time Like The Past' by Jodi Taylor

This is the fifth book in the main Chronicles of St. Mary's. After the literal battle for the institution in the previous book 'A Trail Through Time' (2019) https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2025/09/the-books-i-read-in-september.html the ongoing story settles down a little to the normal pattern. Funding issues means that the historians go back to the Great Fire of London in 1666 to loot valuables that can then be fortunately be 'discovered' by their employers, Thirsk University. However, as is typical in these stories things go wrong. There is always a jarring of tone in these books between the light and jolly and the grave outcomes. This time sees the murder of one of the historians and the finding of this in a gruesome way plus the ending of the only lesbian couple so far featured. There is also a visit to the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BCE which almost leads to history being altered significantly. In contrast there is an open day at the institute, again aimed at raising money and despite the humour it is undercut by the grim turn of events. However, at the end of the book, Max marries her long term boyfriend (or at least a version of the one she first dated), Chief Technician Leon Farrell.

In many ways I enjoy these books. The portrayal of all the different times and places they visit is very well done and shows a lot of research that is to be admired. While Taylor feels obliged to make things go wrong this sometimes lead to a light tone but then one that is whacked by the tragedy which she seems compelled to bring in. I guess it is good that we can feel a genuine sense of jeopardy for the regular characters, after all the heroine and her lover have already both been killed in the first four books, but it does mean as a reader you have to be ready for abrupt tonal shifts. After a tragedy it is quickly 'business as usual'. At least by this book, Max, who has a doctorate, is shown clearly a mature adult rather than at times in the first couple of books in which at times she came over as a teenager. I have more of these books to read and feel I am now girded sufficiently to cope with the sharp highs and lows of them while enjoying the trips into the past which are the best rendered elements of the series.

'Jerusalem: Kingdom of Heaven' by Richard Foreman

This is the final book of Foreman's First Crusade trilogy and it is a bit better than the preceding two. I cannot remember spotting the kind of anachronistic howlers of those books. There is still a lot of abrupt jumping around in terms of the point of view, though perhaps somewhat less than earlier too. Foreman is a writer in a hurry and whereas he could have explored what happened to the crusade between Antioch and Jerusalem we only get this reported in a letter from Thomas the interpreter, now rather ineffectual knight. In some ways Foreman plays to his strengths and the siege and especially the assault of the city are where his writing is best. The main protagonist, Edward Kemp, also has a mission to 'recover' or effectively loot treasures which had been taken from a wealthy Jewish man who wants them restored, though this is mainly seen as Kemp and his friends setting themselves up to return home after the crusade is finished.

Overall, Foreman gives a fair portrayal of the warfare of the time and of 11th Century Jerusalem. However, all these books needed some serious editing especially in terms of anachronism and points of view. In addition, the whole trilogy has felt terribly rushed. The three books could have been a single volume and more time could have been taken in exploring the setting. The characters are acceptable and we can comprehend their motives, but at the end, aside from descriptions of battles you are rather left dissatisfied. I now do wonder if these were three short stories that he decided to work up into (short) book length. What I have read in this series, though not the worst novels set in the First Crusade, do not encourage me to buy other books by Foreman.

If you are interested in a story set in this time and place, I would recommend 'Knight with Armour' (1959) by Alfred Duggan. While, given when it was published, it does not have the sexual content of Foreman's books, it provides a better written and more rounded out story of the First Crusade's progress.

'The Snack Thief' by Andrea Camilleri

This is the third book in the Montalbano series and it works better than the preceding one, 'The Terracotta Dog' (1996) which I read last month https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2025/10/the-books-i-read-in-october.html Whereas that went off into a kind of archaeological mystery this one sticks more closely to a standard police procedural story and is better for it. There are two cases, the shooting dead of a Tunisian working on a Sicilian fishing boat and the stabbing to death in a lift of a retired businessman. Naturally it turns out that in fact the two murders are connected. First of all Montalbano must track down the lover of the businessman, Kamira, who has disappeared with her son François. Steadily he uncovers that she had been prostituting herself to a number of middle aged businessmen especially those with sexual peccadilloes as well as acting as their cleaner.

Once he has uncovered the identity of the dead Tunisian sailor, he is drawn into the affairs of the secret services of both Italy and Tunisia. Camilleri works well in constantly shifting both the protagonist's and the reader's views on what is happening as satisfyingly Montalbano peels through the layers while also seeking to protect the innocent. In contrast his rebarbative manner means he acts as a bully putting witnesses whose behaviour he dislikes into difficult position as some kind of revenge. He does get called out for this. At times, the fractiousness with his colleagues seems rather forced but I suppose it is so we do not see him as an uncomplicated 'good guy' but at times this feels rather forced and rather counterbalances when he cleverly uses what resources he has to advance the case.

The other traits we have already seen in the inspector, his love of Sicilian specialities, his regular swimming, but also his consumption of cigarettes all come back here, the little elements that for so many fictional detectives are there to round out the character. At times his repeated eating of very particular meal after meal feels a little overdone and it is unsurprising that he is not more unhealthy than he portrayed. 

The snack thief by the way as I imagine readers will quickly identify, is François once he is left to fend for himself on the streets. The fact that Montalbano mundanely decrees his girlfriend from northern Italy, Livia should marry him and they adopt the boy seemed very artificial and might have been handled better than it seeming very much a plot device to end the very single lifestyle the detective has been living with Livia hundreds of miles away for much of the time. Still, I have more of these books to read and as yet, these aspects have not entirely put me off doing so.

'The Taexali Game' by Nancy Jardine

My next alternate history novel is set among Celtic tribes in the late 3rd Century CE, so when, aptly in an Aberdeen charity shop I saw this book, even though it is aimed at children, I thought it a good idea to pick it up. The Taexali were the Celtic tribe which lived along the coast of what is nowadays Aberdeenshire, with the better-known Caledonians occupying the mountains to the west of them. While attacked in 84 CE and 210 CE (as shown in this novel) and signing treaties with the Romans, being north of both Hadrian's Wall and then the Antonine Wall they largely were able to exist untroubled for much of the Roman period in Britain.

In this novel three 13-14 year olds, Aran and his friends, twins Brian and Fianna are sent back to 210 CE by the twins' biological father, Callum, under the pretence that they are testing out a new highly interactive VR game. In fact he and his colleagues have created a time machine. The children are connected to it by sophisticated metal armbands which allow them to be equipped with appropriate clothing and can translate the Brittonic and later Latin that they hear. It takes them quite a while to realise, largely due to the country smells, that they are not in a game. Saving the daughter of a local chief (the hierarchy between local chiefs and their overlords because important as the story progresses) they are quickly drawn into the life of the tribe based at the village of Balbath close to modern day Kintore.

The trio have to prove their value to the Celts who are suspicious of them as potential Roman spies, as Roman forces under Emperor Severus and his two vicious sons have been ravaging much of eastern 'Scotland' in an effort to subdue all the tribes living there as had already happened with Celtic tribes farther south. Having the three characters means we can see how the invasion and battles play out. Though I knew there was a sequel intended, there did seem to be jeopardy not simply for the protagonists but for the friends they have made, notably Seonagh the chief's daughter who is sent into slavery as part of the peace deal. It was nice to see teenagers drawing on skills that involve more than swiping on the phone and their lessons in Sooyang Do, a very popular martial art around Aberdeen and Brian's musical abilities help them out.

At times I was concerned that we were going to get an 'info dump' but some of this is in fact as the children themselves need to be brought up to speed. They are more assiduous in their studies than many their age, but I guess if they were bumbling around clueless as to what was going on and where they were it would be much tougher and slow up what is a fast moving novel even at 315 pages long. I certainly learnt stuff about the Celts that I did not know, which I suppose was one reason for me buying the book in the first place. While I do not know Kintore, I do know the mouths of the Rivers Dee and Don so it was interesting to have a book so linked to a specific area and how it was in the past.

'Gallows Thief' by Bernard Cornwell

I find the quality of Cornwell's books varies quite a bit, though I was optimistic about his as it is a stand-alone one and I had enjoyed 'Fools and Mortals' (2017) https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2022/04/books-i-read-in-april.html That book was effectively a detective story set around the theatre of Shakespeare's time. This book has a similar approach. Cornwell uses the story of detection to show us details of a particular time and activity. In this case it is around the criminal 'justice' system of England in 1817. The book opens with four executions in front of Newgate Prison where they had been moved from Tyburn, but they remained a public spectacle. The hanging was very inefficient with the convicted slowly strangled at the end of a rope, much to the entertainment of the crowd.

The protagonist is former Captain in the 52nd Foot, Rider Sandman. The fact that he fought at the Battle of Waterloo - he has subsequently sold his commission - and was a skilled cricket batsman opens a number of doors for him. His father was bankrupted by a scam investment leading to him committing suicide. This has left Sandman, let alone his mother and sister, in financial difficulties and having fallen through the social classes. That led to the breaking off of the engagement by his fiancée, Eleanor Forrest, though it is clear she still has affection for him, provides useful information and considers eloping with him.

Sandman scratches out a meagre living by playing cricket, but is increasingly alienated by the corruption in the game. He lives in an inn on Drury Lane, infamous for its criminal residents, though he is aided by a fellow resident Sally Hood, a part-time actress and sister to a highwayman. For a decent payment Sandman takes up a job as an Investigator for the Home Secretary who has been pressured to investigate a case against a young painter accused of raping and murdering the Countess of Avebury, because of a request from one of Queen Charlotte. This is a rare occurrence as it is felt throughout that anyone convicted in court must be guilty and any evidence to the contrary is seen as questioning the wisdom of judges. Cornwell is making a point about the legal system of England at the time when 200 offences, including simple theft, carried the death penalty, though as he makes clear in the notes at the end only around 10% of the condemned were executed, with the rest transported to Australia if someone notable petitioned on their behalf.

The book is very much a romp. It does remind us that the Regency period looked back to the 18th Century more than it looked forward to the later 19th Century. Cornwell does rather over-indulge in Austenesque/Hogarthian tropes. The book is jammed with 'flash' slang, i.e. the cant of the criminal classes, as if the author felt obliged to get in every term that he had come across. Every other character is a lord. There is a sordid club for well-to-do gentlemen, the Seraphim Club and a web of blackmail and scapegoating. In classic detective style Sandman has only 1 week to spare the accused, the young (closeted homosexual) Charles Corday from execution and hares not simply around London but off into Wiltshire and Kent leading to a charge to the gallows which is clichéd.

The book is fascinating in all its historical detail of English society and its behaviours, including cricket, of the time. It does move at a pace which I think helps it avoid feeling like a history text book. The characters are interesting, if at times a bit stereotyped, especially Sally and the loyal Sergeant Sam Berrigan. Perhaps I have seen the tropes too often and to another reader this will come over as a very different detective story, which does not spare the cruelty of post-Napoleonic Wars England and uses it effectively to create a knotty investigation and action story.

Non-Fiction

'Never Again: Britain 1945-51' by Peter Hennessy

I guess I had expected a bit different style for this more clearly history book than Hennessy used for 'Whitehall' (1989). However, it had a similar raconteur style, often very personal in nature, we learn quite a lot about Hennessy's home district of Walthamstow in this period. He goes between this very much 'people's history' approach often quoting from people who lived it to the world of high politics with a focus on ministers and leading civil servants and what they were doing so the story is seen from the two ends of society. In theory the book actually starts in 1938, but especially in terms of the development of the welfare state, Hennessy goes back well before the 20th Century to trace all the roots which led to what the Labour governments were able to introduce in this period.

Perhaps most effective are the chapters on the beginning of decolonisation and the Cold War. The one on sport and culture is interesting as it moves briskly through various facets and once more brings in personal recollections from the author about cricketers. The final chapter, assessment of mid-century Britain, could be read as a stand alone essay in its own right and very successfully brings together multiple threads in an analytical way which does contrast with the raconteur style of much of the book. As I said with 'Whitehall' this is book is actually presented in a way which would appeal very much to a general reader wanting a clear but welcoming guide to the period, rather than an academic text. I have three other, slightly newer books by Hennessy lined up to read and I wonder if that approach continues throughout as his career moved further from journalism deeper into academia.

'Discovering Heraldry' by R.H. Wilmott

This book is in the same series of non-fiction books for children that 'Discovering Castles'  (1953?/1960) which I read in 2018 is in: https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2018/08/books-i-listened-toread-in-august.html?m=0 This one was first published in 1964 and has that straight forward line drawing illustrated text that I find very nostalgic. I got this one in the 1980s from a school library sale. It is a handy introduction to the rules of heraldry, with, given the time it was published, a nice enthusiasm for the municipal and commercial heraldry of the era. Its illustrations do well in a monochrome book to show the colours used in the various coats of arms. It builds up all the different elements so that by the end you can describe a whole series of arms in the proper technical language. Perhaps for me the most fascinating is the arms of Sir Isaac Newton, two crossed human bones, I think thigh bones, making him look a little like a pirate rather than a scientist and Bible analyst. Jane Austen rather strangely had three single lion's legs on her crest.

While the author did not seem to know that the heraldic term for a gold disc perhaps resembling a gold coin, i.e. 'bezant' actually comes from a genuine medieval gold coin. Bezants, perhaps unsurprisingly were minted in the Byzantine Empire, but the term spread more widely for gold coins of different origins especially in the Eastern Mediterranean region. I did learn what an 'enfield' is. It is one of the lesser-known mythical creatures which feature in heraldry, having the head of a fox, the chest of an elephant, the mane of a horse, front legs from an eagle, rear legs from a greyhound and the tail of a lion! It does sound rather like something produced by Frankenstein or Dr. Moreau and I can understand why it is not pictured. However, overall this is a nice gentler book without the horros of 'Discovering Castles' with a suggestion of activities you might do connected with heraldry, many of which apply today, though I imagine most churches would not allow you to brass rub now.

The Books I Read In October

Fiction

'The Terracotta Dog' by Andrea Camilleri

Rather like the Rebus books of Ian Rankin, with these Inspector Salvo Montalbano novels, you do feel as if the life of the main character is trundling on when a book is not looking at it and what we get is a kind of 'slice of life' of the character. This is only the second book in the Montalbano series, but his background and connections are so extensive that you feel as if you have come late to his story. As I noted with the 'Shape of Water' (1994) which I read in August https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2025/08/the-books-i-read-in-august.html it is difficult to know where Camilleri is going to go next with his novel. In some ways that is refreshing but at times it is rather bewildering.

This novel opens with Montalbano being asked to fake a raid to arrest a mafia leader who wants to retire from the crime business. This leads to the uncovering of a cave used for the storing of weaponry and then a conspiracy involving supermarket deliveries in order to move these weapons. You would think that this provides sufficient 'meat' for a detective novel. However, even with the mounting murders the ending of this business results in, he goes off down a very different part. At the rear of the cave proves a second previously sealed cave in which are the skeletons of a man and a woman, dating back to the mid-1940s, a collection of coins, a jug which held water and a terracotta dog. Much of the novel is about Montalbano working with elderly people in his area and further afield to find out who this young couple were and the circumstances of their killing. This he does, but it means that the novel is more a historical mystery story rather than a crime novel.

I suppose Camilleri was concerned that his books would simply become about mafia murders. Anyone who has read books by Leonardo Sciascia (another Sicilian author) and Michael Dibdin, knows that even in fiction these crimes are largely insoluble. Thus instead, given his focus on the Sicilian locale he features elements from its modern history in which the murders are apparently as commonplace as rainfall. It does allow him to poke at both the media and the lingering Fascist sympathisers which in his context seem to be surprisingly active, though divided and whinging. This is not a bad story but I felt that the connection from a clearly crime aspect to the historical one made it feel rather strung out and as if the protagonist is so reconciled to murder that current crimes feature little in his mind compared to a mystery from the past.

'The World of Null-A' by A.E. Vogt

It is not unusual to find mid-20th Century science fiction having a real philosophical element to it. This book published in 1940 to great success goes fully onboard with that, envisaging a world society some 500 years into the future which has adopted a totally non-Aristotlean approach to life, the Null-A of the title. This leads it, especially in its colony on terraformed Venus, to have a peaceful society, but one which in this novel is under threat from a wider galactic federation especially those belonging to the eponymous Greatest Empire. The protagonist Gilbert Gosseyn turns out to have two brains though one has not yet been fully activated. It is later revealed that he has been cloned more than once and this explains some of the inconsistencies in his memories, an aspect which reminded me of  'Voice of the Whirlwind' (1987) by Walter Jon Williams who I can easily imagine had read this book. 

Gosseyn becomes wrapped up in a conspiracy to invade Venus and to overthrow the government of Earth. The trouble is, he flicks back and forth between Earth and Venus so much and the small cast of characters are never what they seemed five minutes ago, the whole book gets rather in a knot. The final element about who is the 'puppetmaster' behind either the plot or trying to prevent it, is better handled. However, between the philosophising and the constant twists, after a while despite it being a short book (221 pages in my edition) you are glad when it comes to an end. I have read quite a lot of science fiction from the era, but this one tries rather too hard.

'Besieged' by Richard Foreman

This book leads straight on from 'Siege' (2019) which I read last month: https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2025/09/the-books-i-read-in-september.html It is only 146 pages long and you feel that these two books could have been combined into a single novel, indeed the who trilogy might have been better off that way. Foreman gallops along in his writing and while the pace is appreciated, taking time on a number of occasions would have benefited the novel.

The forces of the First Crusade have captured the Syrian (now Turkish) city of Antioch but find themselves in turn besieged by the armies of Atabeg Kerbogha of Mosul. The story features many of the same characters from the previous novel and unsurprisingly our two English protagonists Edward Kemp the knight and Thomas the interpreter are at the heart of the various incidents as the siege leads to suffering, the head of the Holy Lance is discovered and the Crusaders successfully sally out.

There are good bits to this novel. Foreman portrays the final battle well. He is also decent in terms of the different leaders of the Crusade, notably Bishop Adhemar. He is not as good in portraying the Turkish side even though as with the Crusaders, the forces were a confederation with different commanders working together under what turns out to be the nominal leadership of Kerboga, an important element in the final battle. Foreman could have done a really interesting 'balancing act' showing that despite their differences the two forces actually faced very similar challenges in particular that they were confederations holding in a range of large egos.

As with the previous book, you feel that with just a little more effort this could have been a good book. A decent editor would certainly have helped. We can excuse the odd typo, even the greatest authors suffer them. However, there are two flaws in the fibre of the book. The first is the jumping in point of view. It is a challenge when writing books with sprawling events, but it can be handled. Yet on some pages we actually have the point of view going through the eyes of multiple characters in the length of a single page. There could have been an all-seeing narrator, but Foreman has instead chosen to keep a more intimate perspective via the characters, yet the way he leaps from one to the other so quickly leaves the reader's head spinning and a sense that engagement with the characters is superficial. 

There is also some inconsistency with Kerbogha, he is portrayed as a skilled chess player but then abruptly as a foolish, reckless commander. The extended references to chess make this dichotomy come out very sharply. A chance is missed. Kerbogha had a victory 'on a plate' but poor judgement as earlier at Edessa throws it away and this could have been a real point of dramatic tension but the chance is wasted.

Foreman continues to use anachronistic metaphors. Twice someone's expression 'sets like concrete'. I know the Romans had concrete but it was long gone by the 11th Century. Saying that someone looks like 'death warmed up' really jars when at other times he goes to so much effort to conjure up the culture and lifestyles of the time. These things could easily have been corrected and would have really strengthened the book. I will read the third book in the series, but do feel this trilogy was a wasted opportunity.

'She Died A Lady' by Carter Dickson [John Dickson Carr]

Though my edition of this book is not from the British Library Classic Crime collection, I do have another by Carr in that set. In a number of ways this book, published in 1943 reminded me of 'The Cornish Coast Murder' (1935) by John Bude which I read in December: https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2024/12/the-books-i-read-in-december.html This novel is set in 1940 on the North coast of Devon - which borders Cornwall - close to the genuine towns of Lynton and Lynmouth. This mystery also involves death on a cliff top. There are good descriptions of the locale and use is made of abandoned properties around the village as is typical of English moor regions.

Though in theory this is a Sir Henry Merrivale investigation, the narrator for much of the book is Dr. Luke Croxley, who with his son, Tom, act as GPs to the village and residents of nearby Exmoor. However, in tone this book is very different. That tone is very erratic as I explain later.

Rita Wainwright at 38 is married to an older husband, Alec in his 60s but has fallen for a young American part-time actor, Barry Sullivan. While Croxley is with Alec, listening to the radio, it appears Rita and Barry have thrown themselves off the cliff in a suicide pact. Of course, as if common with such cases in fact it is a murder and it is down to an assortment of characters, including Merrivale to work out what actually happened. 

In contrast to the typical set-up in these novels, however, the leading police officer, Superintendent Craft will not give way on the suicide theory. Indeed he believes that Croxley removed a pistol from the cliff edge and later that he sunk a car in quicksand on the edge of Exmoor. Craft is so committed to this perspective that he threatens Croxley with a charge of perjury unless her 'admits' to his interfering with the investigation at the forthcoming inquest. This brings a rather Kafkaesque element to the novel.

Ultimately Croxley is unable to attend the inquest, but the finding of suicide and his interference in the case are upheld. Thus, though the reader knows the truth of what happened and who the murderer actually was, officially Craft's story is the one which stands. The subsequent events may be seen as some kind of 'natural' justice, though one reason Croxley's account of the affair is unfinished is that he was killed in a bombing raid, dying still with Craft's black mark against his character unchallenged.

The actual murder has all the classic 'impossible' elements typical of these stories of how the the couple ended up being shot even though there is only a single set of footprints on the cliff edge. Their bodies are later recovered and then some of their luggage, muddying the waters around whether they intended to kill themselves or run away. Further complications arise when the wealth of diamonds are found at the Wainwrights' house rather than having been removed. These are handled cleverly and pretty feasibly which then is even more riling when the 'truth' does not come to light. 

Then we have Sir Henry Merrivale. As some reviewers have commented is a very irritating character, at times a buffoon. In this story for much he is confined to a motorised wheelchair which at various stages he crashes through a pub and almost off the edge of the same cliff. At stages he is dressed as a Roman senator for a portrait being painted by a local artist he is staying with, Paul Ferrars who is accused of the murders himself. Merrivale's slapstick behaviour, his bizarre 'chummy' language really jar with what is a stark crime story with unco-operative authorities set against the background of war. In addition, though he actually solves the mystery he contributes his views far too late to be of any real benefit. It also turns out that unlike Croxley, he has been interfering with the evidence for his own reasons.

Overall, this book is an oddity. The elements while interesting do not really fit together very well. The dogmatism of the police, far beyond what is typical, to the extent of distorting the investigation is a distinctive element as is the fact that the truth of the case is not revealed until after it no longer matters. Dickson Carr clearly loved the Merrivale character and may have seen his presence as a counter-balance to what is in fact a bleak rather than 'cosy' crime novel. He may have felt it necessary in wartime to have an element to lighten the tone at times. However, this does not really work and in fact weakens the novel which could have been much stronger in looking at the challenges of dealing with dogmatic authority especially when its opinions mean concealing rather than revealing the truth.

Non-Fiction

'Whitehall' by Peter Hennessy

This is one of these non-fiction books I have had sitting around for years which I should have read closer to when they were published, in this case 1989. At 851 pages in my edition (including references) it is an extensive book on the British civil service. In fact it is like a sequence of books as the sections are quite different from each other. There is a history of the (English then British) civil service from the 12th Century up until 1979 when Margaret Thatcher became prime minister and initiated a period of notable change, though the ultimate outcome, the Next Steps agencies, though hinted at in her time, were to come subsequently. 

Before becoming an academic Hennessy was a journalist and that experience really shapes especially the first part of the book. It is told very much through the people involved rather than the actual machinery, though that does feature. The history is not strictly chronological and especially in the period when Hennessy was active in newspapers (he was born in 1947) there is a lot of personal reminiscences from him. Throughout the book, indeed, much material is derived from his personal interviews with leading civil servants. The journalist protecting his sources is also very apparent with the references to 'private information', something unusual for an academic history book. 

While the section on the various departments as they stood in the late 1980s does have a reference book feel to it, when he then returns to what Thatcher began and the future, as with many other sections, they are more like having a chat with Hennessy as he recalls incidents he or his interviewees witnessed, so it is better to read it the way I did for leisure, rather than rely on it as a book to refer to for academic study as you will often have to unthread lengthy recounting to get a particular date or fact you are seeking. Hennessy's prescriptions for an effective civil service are quite apparent throughout. I guess this very knowledgeable but personal touch is why his Radio 4 political retrospective programme (broadcast 2013-19), 'Reflections with Peter Hennessy'  https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04fd8md/episodes/player?page=3 worked so well.

This book is ideal for anyone with a general interest in the British civil service, 1853-1989, especially in the people both on the official and ministerial sides, and the challenges they faced. It is challenging to use as a reference book, but is an engaging general non-fiction read.

'Portraits of Power' collated by Jeremy Murray-Brown

This is another book I have had lying around for many years. It was given to me as a present in 1979. It is a collection of biographies written by journalists for 'The New York Times' about famous men (and Elizabeth II) of the mid-20th Century with a particular focus on the ways in which they wielded power. It does have a very US perspective even from the timeframe which they feel defines the era, i.e. from 1914 to 1975 as they see the end of US involvement in Vietnam as marking a significant break, not something I think people in other countries would agree with. In addition, 4 of the 19 people featured are US Presidents: Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy, though it is welcome that they acknowledge the short period Kennedy was in office, puncture some of the myths around him and show how he was unlikely to have done much different to Lyndon Johnson, except with less speed and with a diffidence.

The focus on power is an interesting one and makes the sections refreshing compared to typical short biographies. Details are really only included when they allow a reflection on the power aspect rather than slogging through year by year. There are men featured who while important in their time and still with that lingering in some cases through the 1970s would generally be forgotten about these days, notably, Konrad Adenauer, long-time Chancellor of West Germany; Josip Tito leader of Yugoslavia from the 1940s to 1980; Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser, leader of Egypt, short-lived but with global impact; David Ben-Gurion one of the founders of Israel and Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran. 

The others featured are Hitler, Churchill, Mohandras 'Mahatma' Gandhi, Stalin, Emperor Hirohito, General Franco, General Charles De Gaulle, Nikita Khrushchev and Mao Zedong. I am rather surprised Fidel Castro is not included, given his impact was at least as great as Nasser's. In addition there is a real lack of women. I would have expected a chapter on Indira Gandhi, if not Sirimavo Bandaranaike as well; perhaps both Eva and Colonel Juan Perón in terms of how each wielded power. However, these gaps and the apparent need to include Elizabeth II may reflect the US perspective and the fact that Cuba remained a sensitive issue there.

There are interesting nuggets in this book and photographs that I was not familiar with. The focus on the different ways power is wielded is an engaging, refreshing one and does lead to portrayals of some of these people which differ from the 'mainstream' potted biographies that you find online or in typical TV programmes.

The Books I Read In September

 Fiction

'The Secret of High Eldersham' by Miles Burton [Cecil Street]

Being published 1916 onwards, Street wrote over 140 novels in his career (he lived until he was 80) and apparently so that it did not look like he was flooding the market, he used a range of pseudonyms, one of which was Miles Burton. This novel, another in the British Library Crime Classics series, his second featuring Inspector Young of Scotland Yard and an amateur detective, Desmond Merrion. This combination of professional and amateur reminded me of the John Bude novels I have read recently, to the extent that, unprompted, Google's AI told me that it was written by Bude, even though it was published in 1930 and Street was far more prolific than Ernest Elmore. Burton also features a stoic manservant for both Merrion and one for his old friend too, reminiscent of Magersfontein Lugg in the Campion novels (1929-68).

The story is set around High Eldersham a remote village on the Norfolk coastline which is well portrayed. It reminded me, perhaps unsurprisingly, of Ronald Blythe's oral history book, 'Akenfield' (1969) which I read last year:  https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2024/09/the-books-i-read-in-september.html These days the context fora crime novel of a small village where there are crimes and folk horror - witchcraft rituals are involved in this story - has almost become a cliche, but was probably fresher when the book was written, almost a century ago. The pub landlord, a former police sergeant, is found stabbed efficiently to death in his pub and Young is sent to investigate and uncovers occult practices. Finding it difficult to penetrate the closed community of High Eldersham he calls on the services of his friend Merrion, who seems typical of amateur detectives of the time, in being free to gallivant around with little need for employment.

I think the modern reader would see what is going on sooner than perhaps one from the 1930s would. We are more familiar with drug smuggling and dealing perhaps than they would be. This does tend to make the two protagonists seem a little slow on the uptake. However, the two intertwined threads are well handled. There is good use of the locale and much activity on the river and shoreline, that at times reminded me of 'The Riddle of the Sands' (1903) by Erskine Childers. Burton is good at making it hard to determine the reliability of the people Merrion interacts with and this is what lifts it from what nowadays might seem a rather overly-familiar set-up. It was an enjoyable read, though as a reader in the 2020s, perhaps a bit more predictable than for readers of its time.

'A Trail Through Time' by Jodi Taylor

This is the fourth book in the St. Mary's Chronicles series, though that has rather been muddied by subsequent 0.5 and 2.5 books in the series which I do not have. This one picks up very shortly after the preceding one, 'A Second Chance' (2014) https://rooksmoor.blogspot.com/2024/04/the-books-i-read-in-april.html In that the protagonist Dr. Madeleine Maxwell's lover, Chief Technician Leon Farrell was killed. She travelled back to the Battle of Agincourt in 1415 where she received a fatal chest wound. However in an explicit dea ex machina, Clio the Muse of History, in the form of Mrs. Partridge shifts her into an alternate reality where it was Maxwell who died rather than Farrell. At the start of this book they are dealing with this change when the Time Police from a different series of Taylor's novels, burst in, presumably because switching timelines is an anomaly. They then pursue Maxwell and Farrell to various times and locations. Ultimately they are caught at this world's version of St. Mary's College, where some things are the same but some are different, and people find it hard to accept Maxwell's 'resurrection'. There is then a bloody battle with the Time Police.

Taylor's books certainly 'jump the shark' on occasion and I did feel that she felt she had backed herself into a corner with the previous book, so almost had to sweep the board clean and start again in this parallel universe. It is also a bit confusing because you can now read books by Taylor seen through the eyes of the Time Police as I did back in April 2024, with 'Doing Time' (2019) which portrays them more sympathetically than the fascistic, violent portrayal in this book written five years earlier.

I have previously commented how there is a degree of ambivalence in Taylor's books, though in some ways I feel this gives a 'tweeness' which probably helps explain their popularity. Though St. Mary's has time machines a lot of its equipment, and indeed the behaviour of the staff, seem stuck in a nebulous mid-20th Century situation. In this way it is reminiscent of the Harry Potter books in making supposedly contemporary Britain actually look more like something from the 1950s-70s and with that kind of upper middle class perspective seen in boarding school books rather than reflecting broader British society even in that time period. This ambivalence has extended to Maxwell herself, who though having a doctorate, comes across almost like someone in their late teens. This is addressed a bit better in this novel notably between the passionate sex between Madeleine and Leon at the end.

I do not know the motivation behind this kind of ambivalence, I do wonder if it is to take the 'edge' off some of the horrors that the characters witness. Leading characters are killed but the places and times they visit also have their bleakness. A brief trip to 14th Century London leaves Maxwell having to treat a colleague who has almost immediately been mugged and caught the Black Death. Taylor does not hold back in the details of the disease or the treatment. I know she sets the St. Mary's characters as generally lovable, bumbling 'disaster magnets', but after a while just how often things go wrong becomes tiresome. There is enough jeopardy in where they travel let alone oppression in their own time, without adding all this on. It is particularly notable when Maxwell and Farrell are on the run through different times in the first half of the book. You feel like saying 'enough already'. The 'jauntiness' of the narration, combined with the tweeness of the contextualisation does knock hard against the grimness.

As before, the strength of the novels is in the portrayal of the different times and places in the past with all their bleakness. With this novel you do want the characters to stop for longer as Taylor is excellent at bringing out Ancient Egypt in the 1530s BCE, Pompeii at the eruption of Mount Vesuvius and the aforementioned Black Death London. I do wonder if she thinks readers will tire too much of these, and perhaps as someone who taught history I am more interested in these elements than others, but they are a real strength in Taylor's writing and it would be fascinating to see what she could do with a 'straight' historical novel. I still have a number of these St. Mary's books to get through. I did feel with this one, that despite some flaws, the storytelling is settling town a bit more in its 'tone'.

'Siege' by Richard Foreman

This seems to be, not the US playwright who died this year, but the Richard Foreman one who wrote historical series such as Sword of Empire, Sword of Rome and Spies of Rome but I cannot find reference to this The First Crusade trilogy on that author's websites. This book published in 2019 is 156 pages long in my edition so feels more like a novella than a full length novel. It follows two Englishmen, Edward Kemp, a man-at-arms, though with high status among the crusader nobles despite his humble background and sometimes godless attitude. There is also Thomas a priest and translator working for Prince Bohemond of Taranto.

It is set in 1098 outside the walls of Antioch in Syria where the First Crusade was held up for six months besieging the huge, well defended city until a traitor allowed them access just before an army led by Kerbogha of Mosul fell upon the besiegers. The protagonists get involved in the betrayal and then the storming of the city by the crusaders. 

Foreman is good at portraying the tension between the different factions in the crusader army especially between Bohemond and Count Raymond of Toulouse. However, the prime problem is how the book flits between different points of view, not only of the two main characters, but these nobles and others, Bishop Adhemar and even characters back in Constantinople, often jumping between different perspectives on a single page. This is something that beginning writers are warned against. It does not help with the clarity of the storytelling at all.

Yes 'touché' meaning 'touched' is a word in French from the 13th Century onwards coming into English. However, its use as Foreman shows it, like a response when a fencer is hit by the tip of their opponent's sword, especially when it is only a verbal 'joust' dates from the late 19th Century. So many cliches turn up in the book, sometimes two in a single sentence. You are constantly jarred by things which sound to come from our time rather than the 11th Century and this constantly weakens Foreman's portrayal of the time. At least unlike some authors of war stories set in the Middle Ages, Foreman does feature female characters. However, overall, the book really feels like it needed a decent developmental editor, to stop the almost random jumping between points of view and to encourage the author to find more effective terms than anachronistic ones or a string of cliches.

Non-Fiction

'The Napoleonic Source Book' by Philip J. Haythornthwaite

This book does what it says on the title. It provides a general chronology of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, looks at the methods of fighting on land and sea, then goes through all the different states involved including down to the tiny Italian and German ones, providing details of their armies and notably their uniforms. There is then biographies of the leaders and key generals of the conflicts. There is an interesting section on sources about the wars available when the book was published in 1990, but also including visual sources which is something I have not seen before. There is also a glossary of terms. I imagine, especially given all the details about the uniforms that it was intended as something for wargamers to use and develop their model soldiers and scenarios for them to fight. It moves along briskly, though if you read it right through there are naturally points of repetition. However, it is good for drawing attention to 'forgotten' aspects of the conflict and notably for challenging accepted denigration or hagiography of those involved in the wars.

The Books I Read In August

 Fiction

'Beowulf: A Verse Translation' by Michael Alexander

There have been more recent translations including the prize-winning one by Seamus Heaney in 1999, this is the one from 1973 that was part of a collection of black-spined Penguin books that my father collected. The poetry generally works well, giving a feel of the original styling without really contorting the text or needing loads of footnotes. It also shows how close to the original the movie 'Beowulf' (2007) was. It is an 9th/10th Century  West Saxon story ostensibly set in 5th Century western Baltic, featuring the Danes and the Geats of southern 'Sweden'. However, its formation in this form is made apparent with overblown references to the Christian God even when it is clear that many of the characters featured in the story are not Christian.

The story is simple. It is effectively a superhero story. Beowulf, a Geat hero not only rips the arm out of the monster Grendel who has been slaughtering the entourage of  King Hrothgar of the Danes, but also goes on to kill Grendel's mother who comes to revenge herself on Hrothgar for the loss of her son. She lives beneath a lake and can only be killed by an ancient sword. Beowulf has incredible abilities when it comes to water, recounting other feats such as a swimming race which goes on for many hours. It seems he can fight underwater. His final encounter is set 50 years after the fights against Grendel and his mother when Beowulf faces a dragon and while he kills it, he is mortally wounded.

The story is important for being one of very few stories from the time. It is interesting that Saxons settled in the West of England held on to a story from centuries earlier back across the North Sea while bringing it 'up to date' with the Christian declarations. We will probably never know if there were other stories that were lost. However, this is a superheroic story which has a rather bombastic, strong character at the centre with powers that are beyond the 'normal' warrior hero. Perhaps audiences of a millennium ago were as enamoured with the larger-than-life characters as much as cinema audiences seem to be today.

'The Death of King Arthur' translated by James Cable

This was another book from my father's 1970s collection of what were then termed the 'Penguin Classics' though that term now has a different meaning. It is the third component of what we know as the Arthurian arc, showing events after the quest for the Holy Grail and as the title indicates leading to the death of King Arthur and indeed the whole set-up of Camelot and Knights of the Round Table, which are in decline anyway due to the losses during the Grail quest. The story was assembled in the early 1230s probably in now what is eastern France. 

The time period in which it is set is not clear. It is believed that the basis of King Arthur probably refers to a leader in Britain in the 5th or subsequent centuries following the departure of the Roman legions. There are references in this story to Arthur though just a king ruling over 12 kingdoms. Many are referred to in the story. He is king of Logres which may have been envisaged as overlapping what became Mercia and Wessex. Camelot is envisaged as being in Dorset or Devon. Other kingdoms referred to include Wales, North Wales, Scotland, Cornwall (where Arthur was born), the Distant Isles, the Strange Isles and outside the British Isles: Gaul, Benoic (between Brittany and Gaul, where Sir Lancelot was born), Gaunes (probably covering Normandy and Maine) and Saxony. The Roman Emperor turns up from Rome, towards the end, invading Burgundy and Champagne where he is killed by Arthur. 

Despite this very early medieval kind of political geography many of the details of the weaponry and armour, plus the way the knights fight are clearly drawn from the early 13th Century. The main armour is chainmail and the knights wear metal helmets and carried shields. The initial combat is always through charges with lances which often pierce shields and armour but also typically break, as in jousts. Thus, the knights are clearly using the couched lance approach which appeared in the late 11th Century and are distant from the platemail armour of the later medieval period.

King Arthur has a clearly feudal relationship with the 'kings' of the British Isles and is able to summon them because they hold fiefs from him. His bastard and ultimately treacherous son, Mordred, also enlists many nobles and has them swear fealty to him. We might thus see Arthur and then Mordred as more an emperor or view these other 'kings' more accurately as dukes and counts. There is also a lot of crossing back and forth across the English Channel and prompted by Sir Gawain, seeking revenge for the killing of his brothers, Arthur goes into Gaul and Gaunes after Sir Lancelot. He also owns a castle on the River Tweed right up the North of what would become Northumberland. Thus, this connection between 'England' and parts of 'France' is seen as natural, as would fit the world view of someone writing in the post-Norman Conquest era.

James Cable portrays the story as one of Lancelot's redemption. He does end up as a religious hermit shortly before his death. However, it is his sustained adultery with Arthur's wife, Queen Guinevere which drives on the action and indeed the violence which destroys the whole Camelot structure and leads to the death of almost every remaining knight of the Round Table. Thus, it is difficult for a modern reader to pick up the elements of Lancelot's redemption. Yes, Sir Gawain can be criticised for driving on the revenge by Arthur leading to a sequence of bloody battles but to some degree we can be surprised that Arthur was not pursuing such a path himself. Lancelot had sworn off adultery in the second, Grail section of the arc, but then actually continues with Guinevere even more openly than before, in part to counteract the intense jealousy Guinevere feels when she believes that Lancelot, severely wounded in a joust, is actually now residing with a young noblewoman who has so fallen in love with him she dies of heartbreak when he rejects her. 

We also need to remember that Mordred, who is given power but makes himself king while Arthur is in 'France' is an illegitimate son of Arthur, the result of Arthur's incestuous relationship with his half-sister, Morgause, Queen of Orkney (not to be confused with Morgan, another of Arthur's sisters who he stays with in this story and who reveals much of Lancelot's adultery). It is only towards the end of this story that Arthur admits his paternity. Thus despite all the regular protestations about who fine all these knights are, in fact often they are simply self-centred, lustful fighters.

While there are references to Christianity and to knights being 'fine' and 'noble', in fact if we look objectively at them and especially their behaviour, we see something which is much more akin to a Greek tragedy. For modern readers it might even seem rather like the soap operas of the Dynasty and Dallas era, or the more recent Succession series. There are occasional stretches when we might see what is deemed Christian or chivalric behaviour, notably when Lancelot and Gawain stopped their single combat when both are exhausted. However, most of the time everyone behaves in a vengeful and jealous way. Lancelot's adultery, like that of Paris of Troy, is done for personal lust and yet leads to the death of thousands of people as a result. Yes, Lancelot is praised as the finest of knights, and he is a skilled combatant, but it is difficult to see more than a meagre portion of chivalry in him. Ultimately his unwillingness to stop his love affair with Guinevere wrecks kingdoms and kills a whole generation of supposedly noble knights.

Cable commends the fact that there is minimal magic in this story, something which he feels is unnecessarily overdone in other medieval romances. The lady in the lake, or at least her arm up to the elbow appears at the very end of the story. However, there are regularly miraculous winds allowing rapid crossing of the sea. In addition, despite the fact that they are able to fight for entire days even when wounded, the story explicitly states that Arthur is 92, when the story is set, Sir Gawain is 76 and Sir Lancelot is 55. Queen Guinevere is reckoned to be around 50. Thus they are all elderly for the era when the story was assembled. In addition, Sir Gawain gets magically refreshed as the day approaches noon, allowing him to fight on with Lancelot through the afternoon. This is given a Christian explanation about when he was baptised, but certainly sounds like magic.

Overall, coming to this book means reading something actually very out-of-step with the chivalric portrayals that are commonplace. We see tropes, notably a leading character appearing at a tournament in disguise, which have gone on to be well established in stories set in medieval times. Still, it portrays characters in a way which would have been critically judged in the 13th Century and the repeated emphasis on how noble and fine they are really falls flat. It seems that 'noble' better translates as 'fights skillfully in battle' rather than what we might now attribute to noble. It is an interesting story with lots of bloody battle scenes which rather become repetitive. However, rather than what we might feel to be Arthurian traits, instead it is a story of very base soldiers whose prime motives are lust and seeking power rather than anything more 'worthy'.

'The Shape of Water' by Andrea Camilleri

This is the first book in the Inspector Salvo Montalbano series of police procedural novels which were published 1994-2020 and led to a TV series (broadcast 1999-2021) and a spin-off TV series (2012-15). It should not be confused with the fantastical movie 'The Shape of Water' (2017). You can understand why the books have been so successful. I was passed many of them by my parents who enjoyed both the books and the TV series. The writing is crisp and brisk. Some readers may dislike this feeling they want more 'weight' and to see more of the details of procedure. However, the case is no less engaging for that and actually manages to communicate a lot to the reader without a sense of info dumping. Readers familiar with the writings of Dibdin and Sciascia will feel at home in the context. The setting is in a fictional Sicilian town in a fictional province, but the context of the political situation and the power of various institutions in Italian society is well realised.

This first story is about an ageing politician found dead in a car on wasteland near an abandoned factory, which is called 'The Pasture' known for its use as a dogging and prostitution site. It soon transpires that the man died naturally so it is a question of why his death was made to look as if it was as the result of an encounter with a prostitute. It transpires that perhaps unsurprisingly it is about a political power play in local government and seeking to put the blame on to a foreigner.

The pace and style is refreshing and it is an engaging book. I think other detective authors could learn a lot (some probably already have given the duration of his publishing career) from Camilleri's approach. It is probably a good thing that I feel that way given that I have quite a few of these books lined up to read.

'On Stranger Tides' by Tim Powers

This novel was published in 1987. The Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland opened in 1967. The first 'Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl' was released in 2003. 'Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides' did not come until 2011. Its focus on seeking the Fountain of Youth was apparently inspired by this novel though it goes down very different paths. The term "on stranger tides" comes from the fictional poet William Ashbless, a character Powers and fellow author  James Blaylock invented in the 1970s.

This novel is very well written. It has a lot of tropes that we are now all highly familiar with from the Pirates of the Caribbean series of movies indeed many pirate novels/movies, though with this magical aspect that has come in lately. A lot of the story pivots around I suppose what we might call wizards, including the actual pirate Blackbeard himself, plus two other middle aged men from Britain come to the Caribbean to exercise voodoo magic to gain greater powers. There is a young man, a French puppeteer, John Chandagnac going to reclaim the inheritance he has been cheated out of by his uncle, and a young fellow traveller, Englishwoman Elizabeth Hurwood who is being prepared to be an element of her father's primary magic goal. 

Chandagnac soon rebranded Jack Shandy, and Elizabeth become wrapped up with pirates, initially a Captain Davies and later Blackbeard himself. The various battles with pirate and Royal Navy ships are well described. Powers at times includes as much detail on all the parts of an early 18th Century sailing ship as you would find in a technical manual, though fortunately he does not info dump either on these or the details of the voudou magic which almost all the pirates use. It features a journey to a mystical fountain in Florida, ghost ships, zombie crews and an immortal explorer. Yet, it handles these in a matter of fact way so that the supernatural does not become 'ordinary' but you are soon accepting it as a standard part of what is going on.

Overall the novel is fast paced and despite the fantastical elements, the characters are well developed and credible. The historical detail is blended in well with the supernatural and magic elements. Powers has not written any others in this setting, but certainly the quality of the writing would encourage me to pick up another book by him that I saw.

Non-Fiction

'Social Problems of Modern Britain: An Introductory Reader' edited by Eric Butterworth and David Weir

As the title suggests this is a book of articles and extracts covering broad themes such as housing, race, the elderly, health, etc. as perceived roughly 1959-71. My copy was the 1982 edition of this book originally published in the 1972, though it appears that nothing was brought up to date between those two years despite the fact that the first Thatcher government was in power and was already exacerbating many of the challenges that the book highlights from the 1960s. In particular the concerns about youth unemployment in 1972 seem paltry when set against the situation a decade later.

In addition, many of the writings were produced at a time when it was assumed that social, primarily, council housing was going to play an important part in housing the UK population indefinitely which means that poor quality privately rented accommodation was seen as part of the slum culture of the past or restricted to people in crisis at the very bottom of society. The 'right to buy' scheme in the 1980s was to almost totally destroy the social housing sector putting much more power into the hands of private landlords and an associated fall in housing quality and rise in rents, that the writers of 1972 had been unable to foresee. The same goes for poverty. There was a sense that it would always be around but not that the number of people, especially children would be in it or that steadily we would move towards the US model of the 'working poor'. In 1971, even if not in 1982, it was possible to believe that a family with a man in a job could afford a decent place to live, let alone pay the utilities (still nationally owned then) and buy food.

Some factors in the passages remain a concern today, e.g. graduate unemployment. The 1960s had seen a boom in higher education with the 'plate glass' universities opening up, but this was to be nothing compared to the huge expansion in numbers of young people attending universities after 1992 though also the steady fall in mature students from 2001 onwards. Interestingly there is an articled by T. Szasz which portrays mental illness as a 'myth', something that sociologists of the time would have dismissed as wrong. While acceptance of mental health has received a boost in the late 2010s and through the 2020s, especially coming out of the USA but also in UK work places we have seen a similar dismissal of mental health as not 'genuine'. The authors predictions of 8 billion global population by 2000 and it rising to 10-15 billion fortunately have proven to be out by coming up to three decades. In addition, contrary to the authors' beliefs there has been a fall in birth rates across industrialised countries and even a loss of interest in sexual activity which they thought highly unlikely. Naturally they did not foresee the natalist rhetoric which has appeared both in the USA and UK, as a result.

While there was not a clear awareness of global warming, there is certainly analysis of the challenges of air, water and noise pollution, that remain no less grave today as at the time the book was assembled. Indeed after a period of cleaner rivers and shores in the UK of the 1990s, with private water companies being so negligent, grave water pollution has hit the country again in a way the writers of forty years ago would have quite expected. Despite the slow rise of electric vehicles, noise and air pollution remain grave threats and the latter has been connected to climate change bringing challenges globally as well as the local impacts.

Overall the book does have the kind of 'The History Man' (1975) well-meaning, 'cool' sociologist vibe to it. It sees problems in UK society but retains a degree of optimism that with effort and sensible policies these challenges could be overcome. Of course, policies went in the opposite direction meaning that the social problems identified in this book were to be gravely exacerbated, notably in race relations, health, housing and education.

'The Obscured': A Magic Realism Novel

 The Obscured: A Magic Realism Novel

The Obscured: A Magic Realism Novel eBook : Rooksmoor, Alexander: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

I read 'The Glamour' (1984) by Christopher Priest in 1993, having bought it in a remaindered book store in London along with 'A Dream of Wessex' (1977) and 'The Quiet Woman' (1990) by the same author. Priest wrote straight contemporary set novels as well as science fiction and fantasy. 'The Glamour' straddled genres in that it is set in 1980s UK, but there is one element which is fantastical, i.e. that there are people who have the ability not to be seen by the general public. The term 'glamour' while having a contemporary meaning of glossy appearance in the media, had an older meaning as a kind of spell to cast an illusion of what people saw.

At the time magic realism a genre which had been recognised since the 1920s, was going through a popular phase for authors writing in English rather than translated from Spanish or Portuguese. Thus, this book fitted in quite well, though it differed from a lot of what else Priest wrote, it was a phase of 'quiet' novels by the author before he reached a new peak in his career with 'The Prestige' (1995; movie 2006). While I have read many of Priest's novels, admired his deftness in writing and enjoyed the breadth of topics that he covered, my opinion of him was soured by reading his 'Fugue for a Darkening Island'  (1972) which could be on the reading list for any aspiring Reform party member or apostle of Donald Trump in its racist view on human migration.

Still, in the years after I read 'The Glamour' I remained fascinated by the concept. I kept envisaging various scenes which have now gone on to feature in 'The Obscured'. Alongside 'Death in Amiens' (2018), this is probably the novel which features locations that I know personally. Scenes in West and East London, at Sandown racecourse and other locales in Surrey, plus those in Devon all came from places I had visited. Even some of the striking outfits that Peri wears were ones I had seen in southern England and Germany, worn by real women. Having read work by Carlos Ruiz Zafón and 'The Armageddon Rag' (1983) by George R.R. Martin, in 2024, I decided it was time to bring together the various scenes together into a novel.

I was determined in part to 'get back at' what I felt had been Priest's racist writing in  'Fugue for a Darkening Island' by taking his magic realist concept and placing it in the genuinely multi-cultural context of London, which was multi-cultural in his day as well. Apprehensive about cultural appropriation for some reason I had been drawn to Iranian mythology and in exploring this came across the ideal being to be the originator of the obscured. For the readers of Farsi, the language used in Iran, text on the front cover gives away a clue about how the story unfolds. The novel touches a little on the differences between pre- and post-revolutionary Iran, but primarily from the perspective of Westerners' engagement with the country.

This aspect also meant the novel explores issues around identity and families in the UK worrying about the colouring of their children's children, raised to prominence with questions asked of the Duchess of Sussex when she was pregnant, given her mixed-race background. This then began to connect with the British context, especially those families who had been involved with the oil industry especially living around the Weybridge and Walton areas of Surrey. Furthermore, between me first reading Priest's books and the mid-2020s I had become familiar with Dorset and Devon, the latter of which featured in 'The Glamour' and naturally in a particular form in  'A Dream of Wessex'.

The other prime challenge is how far technology has advanced since the mid-1980s. These days it is typical that you have to gurn at your smartphone to get it to open up for you. Facial recognition software is habitually used in many public spaces. Perhaps I could have gone into this a bit further, but I do look at the advantages and disadvantages of being 'obscured' when so much of our appearance and activity is being judged not by other people but by machines. Another challenge is the decline in the use of cash. This shifted the types of crimes that an obscured person would have to, might be able to, pull off. Simple pickpocketing is less fruitful in 2024 than it would have been in 1984. However, 'shoulder surfing' as people use electronic devices in public and the ability to take such devices, sometimes even just temporarily, can open up access to other opportunities to steal funds. These questions had been part of my mulling over these scenarios in the past few decades and I feel I explore them in this novel without it becoming an essay on identity and technology in our era.

While there is action and jeopardy in this novel, in contrast to many of my novels 'The Obscured' is more a character arc as Tara Houghton comes to learn more about herself and the condition she has had thrust upon her.