Lies, damned lies and heuristics

Week 7: The Lies of Locke Lamora – Scott Lynch
Recommended by: Phil Boor

"Probably the best fantasy novel I've read in the last ten years." As recommendations go, that's high praise indeed, especially for a genre fiction fan not prone to hyperbole. Based on that, and other nods I'd seen given to it elsewhere, it's fair to say my expectations were high. And I always worry a bit because when I'm expecting a lot, even if whatever it is ultimately delivers, it isn't always as good as I hope it's going to be.

Fortunately my fears were entirely unjustified in this instance. From the word go I was sucked in to this deceptively simple world, its clothes as lightly worn as the numerous silent blades hidden by any of the assorted rogues, thieves, ne'er-do-wells and bastards inhabiting the city of Camorr. It's definitely more Lankhmar or King's Landing than Middle-earth and the world building succeeds because of its sharp focus on a single city but with plenty of lore woven in to create the sense of a deeper history and wider geography than we experience here.

Ultimately though, this is a character driven novel and it's hard not to fall for the Gentlemen Bastards. Solid, dependable Jean; the wise-cracking box of fireworks that is the Sanzas; green, talented and slightly crazy Bug. And then there's Locke. Smart, charismatic and dashing, yet also proud, physically unimposing and able to talk himself into only marginally fewer situations than he can talk himself out of. They're a tight-knit team, well developed, and let's face it, a lot of fun to boot.

As is the plot. It's a crime caper! It's gritty urban fantasy! It's Robin Hood and the Count of Monte Cristo and the Scarlet Pimpernel all rolled into one! And yet while Locke enjoys the game for its own sake, not everyone does and he soon gets sucked in over his head and decisions have to take on far more of a practical note than the perfection for which he strives. Shades of grey, moral dilemmas, dashing (anti)heroes and dastardly villains, this ticks all the boxes. 

If there's one minor gripe, it's something I've expressed before and that's a general genre trait than specific to this. Sci fi, fantasy, young adult –- could we, just for once, get a stand alone novel without the inevitable sequel, trilogy, or never-ending series? I understand things from both a publisher and fan perspective – they're lucrative and people buy into them so giving them more of what they like is clearly a smart move. Yet it so often seems to be hard to maintain the drive, the pace and the very things that made the original so good over a long period, with the books becoming more bloated while increasingly little happens. On the evidence presented here though, I'm more than happy to believe Scott Lynch can maintain this and I hope he does. Right now, do believe the hype.

A reminder

Week 6: If This is a Man and The Truce – Primo Levi

Recommended by: Rebecca Ward

This is, for fairly obvious reasons, not an easy book to write about. Or to read. No writing on the Holocaust ever is, or should be. These two books are Levi's personal record of his time as a Jewish prisoner at Auschwitz, in the first book, and the follow up is the story of his return home.

If This is a Man is about what it is to no longer be one. As Levi notes, "no human condition is more miserable than this, nor could it conceivably be so." As much as everybody knows something of the horrors of the death camps, this sober account is as well-crafted a narrative as you could hope for. The account is all the more powerful for the objective tone; despite the clear yet descriptive prose, there is no hatred towards the Nazis, nor self-pity for the victims. As Levi has since explained, he was simply the witness to the atrocities, the judges are the readers. 

Although nowhere near as brutal or formidable, in other ways The Truce is the more interesting book, at least in the sense of shedding light on something I knew nothing about. I suppose I had never given much thought to the logistics of relocation after the end of the war, or indeed the strange last months of the war in Eastern Europe. The camps had been abandoned as the Red Army continued on its relentless march towards Berlin, leaving the survivors homeless and rudderless and the journey back to Italy long-winded, surprising and memorable.

I'm not sure whether the seven basic plots can be applied outside of fiction but this is about as definitive a voyage and return as you can imagine, all the more so for its chilling reality. It is almost literally unbelievable in the sense that it is so sickening and saddening that humanity could plumb such depths. To record such crimes is an absolute necessity because some things simply have to be remembered: "[I]f I could enclose all the evil of our time in one image, I would choose this image which is familiar to me: an emaciated man, with head dropped and shoulders curved, on whose face and in whose eyes not a trace of a thought is to be seen."

Race and relationships

Week 5: Americanah – Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Recommended by: Hannah Fox

This book shouldn’t really have been on the list. It’s so far the only book in almost six years of bookclubbing that I’ve not read when I was supposed to, regardless of whether I could attend or not. Equally, having really liked all of Adichie’s existing work, it was something I always expected to get round to reading anyway.

And it’s fair to say that I enjoyed Americanah too. Adichie is clearly an excellent writer, and definitely one with something to say, and that was certainly the case here. The focus is strongly on race, particularly in America, less so in Britain, and essentially how it wasn’t even a concept in Nigeria. I’m happy enough to take her word for the latter part, though it’s hardly a homogeneous society given the civil war and genocide of the not-too-distant past, which the author has written about previously.

The focus on race at times veers towards the polemical, yet it’s hard to doubt the truth of what’s written because it’s so well observed, there are so many small, damning details that ring true, and that’s what creates the whole. There’s no doubt that race remains a problem in an increasingly globalised world, though it’s a complex one in the sense that so many individuals and groups have different ideas about what should (and can) be done and there are no easy solutions – nobody can click their heels together three times and chant ‘Don’t be racist’ and make everything better. “You can’t write an honest novel about race in [America]. If you write about how people are really affected by race, it’ll be too obvious,” opines one of the characters. Adichie must have had her tongue in her cheek at this point because that’s exactly what she has done and in terms of consciousness-raising she’s done that in no uncertain terms.

It’s also nice to see such a well-rounded female character as Ifemelu and it’s hard not to be sucked in by her story of being overwhelmed by America, through her struggles with assimilation, to come out as a strong personality on her own terms. It’s also fascinating to see her coming home to Nigeria to realise that she has been changed by her American experiences, not all for the worse, and that her home country has changed a lot in her absence and she sees it in a different light.

On the other hand, Obinze seemed far less complete a character. He was a little too perfect, albeit we’re often only seeing him through Ifemelu’s rose-tinted eyes. This, perhaps combined with the lack of otherness (to me), meant the sections in Britain were the least interesting. However, it was good to get a realistic account of immigrant life, both good and bad, without stirring up a tabloid frenzy and pouring more fuel on the UKIP fire.

Their relationship, developing throughout the novel, sometimes in the past, other times looking back, was as complex as all real relationships are and certainly seems to live up to the idea that you never forget your first love. A love story through a multicultural lens spanning three countries, a number of years, and with a healthy dose of political opinion piled on top is certainly ambitious and it does the author credit that she succeeds on many levels.

Rock stars

Week 4: Think Like a Freak: How to Think Smarter about almost Everything – Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

Recommended by: Ben Downton

"So there I am, in Sri Lanka, formerly Ceylon, at about 3 o'clock in the morning, looking for one thousand brown M&Ms to fill a brandy glass, or Ozzy wouldn't go on stage that night. So, Jeff Beck pops his head 'round the door, and mentions there's a little sweets shop on the edge of town. So - we go. And - it's closed. So there's me, and Keith Moon, and David Crosby, breaking into that little sweets shop, eh. Well, instead of a guard dog, they've got this bloody great big Bengal tiger. I managed to take out the tiger with a can of mace, but the shopowner and his son... that's a different story altogether. I had to beat them to death with their own shoes. Nasty business, really. But, sure enough, I got the M&Ms, and Ozzy went on stage and did a great show."

One of my all-time favourite films quotes (Wayne's World 2, for those heathens struggling here) and you're getting it in full because it's a) hilarious and b) it's my blog so if I want to pepper it with gratuitous hilarity that's my prerogative. It is meant to be parodying the worst excesses of rock and roll – ridiculous requests, temper tantrums, the works. What I didn't know is that not only does it have a basis in reality – Van Halen genuinely did ask specifically for brown M&M's on their rider – but it also served an important purpose. With a hugely complex stage show and lots of machinery, the sweets were part of a 50-odd page document. If they didn't get the M&M's as requested, it suggested that the crew may have been equally lax setting up the show, serving as a warning to check everything thoroughly.

Messrs Levitt and Dubner are the rock stars of the economics world following their massively successful Freakonomics books, of which this is the third. They are full of interesting stories, such as the one detailed above, and new ways of thinking. Particularly they make you question your assumptions about things and look for patterns that heretofore have not been spotted. And unquestionably they have a lot of fun doing it. This, combined with the fact that some of their findings challenge the consensus in ways that not everybody likes, means that they will perhaps never win a Nobel Prize, but I suspect that doesn't really bother them as long as some people buy into their ideas.

There's a lot to like here: it's very readable, interesting and full of anecdotes. I've really enjoyed their books so far but while this one has it's moments, I don't think it's as good as the previous offerings. Perhaps it's that the ideas aren't quite as surprising any more, or (less likely) I've got smarter because a lot of the concepts seemed more like common sense than anything revelatory. That said, common sense is pretty subjective, but I still feel it missed some of the wow factor. I'd certainly recommend it to anyone who's enjoyed their other titles; equally, I would say to start with them if you're new to Team Freak. Until the next instalment then.