Book #3/2018 Tell Me the Truth about Love

Tell Me the Truth about Love by W.H. Auden
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Perhaps noticeable by my absence for a while. Saturday 6th January I was rushed to hospital; severe back pain turned out to be caused by a massive aortic artery aneurysm. Five hours later I was on the operating table - for 4.5 hours - on bypass, for a repair to the aorta. Six days of ICU and high dependency care. Discharged nine days ago and now on the long road to recovery. It has knocked me sideways and has (only temporarily I hope) ruined my love of reading. My enthusiasm is lost.

Tell Me the Truth about Love - fifteen poems by W.H.Auden - I had finished on 5th January. It is a small joy and contains one of his best known works: Funeral Blues. Fortunately I have avoided this becoming more appropriate....

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Book #2/2018 The Controller

The Controller by Linda Coles
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

My thanks to Linda Cole for a Kindle pdf of The Controller - a novella, easy to read in one sitting.

Pete uses a drone to spy on owners walking their dogs. Establish where they live and leave it to his cohorts to nap the dog and hold for ransom. Pam is a delightful lady, ready for retirement, when her dog is stolen. Like any pet owner she is totally bereft until she receives the 'phone call demanding money for her dogs safe return. Pam pays up. But the crime takes a much nastier turn when the gang see a way to make more money...

The Controller introduces Detective Sergeant Amanda Lacey and her sidekick DC Jack Rutherford. He has spent many years as a Detective Constable and is happy with his lot. These are two very likeable coppers and get stuck into this dastardly crime.

Well written, likeable characters (well, the good ones!) and a very satisfying read.

I loved it.

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Book #1/2018 Larchfield

Larchfield by Polly Clark
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I completed reading Larchfield on New Year's Day. It is an unusual book, weaving the lives of historical characters with Dora Fielding, a young poet, who moves with her husband to Helensborough on the west coast of Scotland. This is small town life at its most excrutiating and it starts to smother Dora, who is looking to find her true self. What to do?

When Dora discovers that the poet Wystan H. Auden lived in Helensborough in the 30s Dora finds a way to escape reality. This is handled by Polly Clark with great imagination. Auden taught at Larchfield school where he is mocked for his Englishness. He is rightly suspected of homosexuality and spends his holidays with Christopher Isherwood in Germany. Dora and Auden 'find each other' and Dora's imagination becomes all consuming. These are vulnerable people and Larchfield is beautifully written; a haunting novel about heroism and repression - a story that draws you in with a compelling sense of danger.

This is an ambitious story, which Polly Clark handles perfectly. Highly recommended.

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