Tiny Library

I should start by saying that I was a bit hesitant to read Interview With The Vampire as the film is one of my all-time favourite films. Which is weird, as I don't like Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise that much, but I've loved the film for years now and was worried the book wouldn't live up to my expectations.The book opens with a vampire, Louie, telling his story to a young journalist in New Orleans. It covers him becoming a vampire and his life after, focusing on the moral dilemmas of killing humans and the relationships and power struggles within the vampire community.Whilst reading it I suffered from that problem you always get when you've seen the film or TV show first - I couldn't picture the characters in my mind as any different from the film. Louie was Brad Pitt in my head, and Lestat was Tom Cruise. Which was fine for me, as the film adaptation in this regard did seem faithful to the book, but perhaps I missed some parts of their characters because of this.The actual story itself was wonderful. I've read quite a few books with vampires in them and I think Anne Rice strikes the right balance between human and monster; her vampires aren't sparkly and even though they have human emotions they are still vicious killers. Claudia, who was made a vampire as a little girl, is a truly fascinating character and it's interesting to wonder what it must be like for your mind to become adult but not your body.The main problem I had with this book was that it was waffly. A character couldn't take an action without deliberating over it for several pages and then explaining him or herself to everyone in the vicinity over and over again. Louie was especially guilty of this. You know that bit at the end of the film where Lestat pops up and is listening to the recording of Louie's interview and he says "for centuries I've listened to this whining!" - that's the way I felt at the end of this book! Some parts are essentially nothing more than an extended monologue on morality and self-pity, which got very repetitive and boring to read. Louie wasn't great as the main character.I think I will read the next one in the series, as Lestat is a much more interesting character than Louie. I hope it has less whining.

In Definitely Dead Sookie has to travel to New Orleans to put her vampire cousin Hadley's estate in order. There are of course life-or-death moments and sinister plots and most of the book revolves around the werewolf rather than vampire community. For me personally, this isn't as interesting but the book was still lively and pacey and simply fun. Can't wait to read the next one!

Bill goes missing whilst on a secret assignment and Sookie must team up with a werewolf to help find him. Like the other two, easy to read and fun. Sookie gets more and more likeable with each book in the series. As always, I wished there was more about the secondary characters.

In this, the seventh book of the series, Sookie attends a vampire conference and becomes once again involved in all kinds of sinister plots. There are also, as always, many men fighting over her.I was glad this book returned to vampires as the main supernatural creatures, as I don't think that werewolves or shape-shifters or fairies are half as interesting. Having said that, there was a lot of characters for the casual reader to keep up with and I did find myself thinking 'who?' every now and again. Harris does a good job of introducing everyone, it's just because I haven't read the series very quickly and have left long gaps between books. I also missed some of the regular Bon Temps characters.As always, the book was lively, engagingly written, and really easy to read. One thing that Harris does deserve a lot of credit for is how Sookie has changed and developed as the books have gone along. Character development isn't always the easiest thing to convey, and I liked how events had changed her.My major complaint is actually with the cover. I have a UK box set that came out as a tie-in to the True Blood series, and it seems like the person who designed the covers hasn't read the books at all. Jason isn't even in this book! It's same for all the others too - Tara even gets a cover of her own, despite not being given more than a few lines in the whole series.

Harvard Professor Robert Langdon is called to the CERN scientific research facility when a scientist is murdered in a gruesome way linked to the Illuminati. He uncovers a plot against the Vatican and must work against time to stop the worst from happening.I very much enjoyed this book. It was easy to read, and although I guessed who the 'bad guy' was about half way through, there were so many twists and turns that there were still surprises. It was obviously well researched and quite complex things were explained clearly (especially to do with CERN). While Langdon was a bit bland, lots of the more minor characters just leapt off the page and were both interesting and well written.As with The Da Vinci Code, I thought it got a bit silly/unbelievable towards the end, but that's OK because I was enjoying the book. The plot was better than the writing style, which was a bit corny at times (my favourite was: "Langdon didn't need to be a symbologist to interpret the signs Vittoria was giving him" - smooth!). My only real issue with the book was the main female character, Vittoria. She was just too perfect to be believable - beautiful, best physicist in the world, randomly knows lots about the Vatican & the Illuminati, tough, never gets tired etc. I thought that about the Da Vinci Code too, that the female characters Dan Brown writes are just too amazing to exist and despite of all Vittoria's intelligence, she's still just a side-kick.

This book was actually more substantial than I was expecting. I found the characters to be well rounded, and all of the main characters had some good character development throughout the course of the novel. The novel covered a large span of time, but it didn't feel rushed or unbelieveable, as the characters matured as the book progressed.What I liked most about the book was that the author left everything Anne had done very ambiguous, you could make your mind up as to how far she had gone in order to get what she wanted. There were no moral judgements either, and you could sympathise very much with Anne near the end of the book, even though she was horrible and quite unlikeable. There was no black and white, it was all shades of grey. I liked how the author managed to pull off writing from the perspective of Mary, but also giving us a deeper insight into Mary than she herself had - she wasn't as good as she thought she was.Some of the minor characters were less well written - Mary's second husband was too perfect and understanding, with very modern viewpoints, and Uncle Howard only had one personality trait - evil. However, the pace and plot made up for this, and it was one of those books where time just flew as I was reading it. Recommeded.

My journey into Russian literature continues with Anna Karenina. I have owned this book for a long time but have always been put off reading it because of its size and the fact that it's Russian and therefore to me, intimidating. After reading it, I really wish I had gotten around to it much sooner.The only word that can truly describe this book is epic. In some ways it reminded me a lot of Gone with the Wind in this sense - it was epic but not at all stodgy and quite fast paced. The story centres around two sets of characters and their quest for happy family lives. Anna leaves a passionless marriage for a romance with Count Vronsky, losing her social status and access to her son. But her sacrifice soon starts to put pressure on her new relationship. Levin, a romantic idealist wants an idyllic life in the country with new wife Kitty. In fact, the opening statement sums up what the story is about well: "All happy families are alike but an unhappy family is unhappy after its own fashion." What I absolutely loved about this book was how perceptive Tolstoy was about life in general. His observations about character feelings and society were very profound in places and I found myself underlining a lot of key passages in the book. I especially liked the way he wrote the stream of consciousness' of the main characters when they were going through a crisis as it made it easy to relate to them; for example when Levin was suffering with low self-esteem after being rejected:"No, you're not going to be different. You're going to be the same as you have always been - with your doubts, your perpetual dissatisfaction with yourself and vain attempts to amend, your failures and everlasting expectation of a happiness you won't get and which isn't possible for you."The characters in general were so vivid and complex and real that they just jumped off the page. Over the course of the book I felt like I had really got to know Anna, Vronsky, Levin, Kitty, Dolly and Oblonsky so when it got near the end and dramatic events started to happen I was glued to each page. I was definitely emotionally involved, even if I didn't quite understand why Anna would ever go for Vronsky as he seemed like such a shallow player at the beginning. The only slight criticism I could make is that there were too many minor characters for me - I didn't really care about Levin's brother (the writer one, not the drug addict one) or the self-sacrificing Varenka enough to read whole chapters about them. But it is a minor criticism, I really enjoyed reading this one.

Humbert Humbert has a preoccupation with "nympets", pre-teenage girls. After marrying her mother and a lot of plotting, he abducts and abuses his step-daughter Lolita. All told from Humbert's perspective.Given the subject matter, this could easily have been a sleazy read, one to make you uncomfortable. But part of Nabokov's talent is that it isn't. He treads a fine line between making Humbert seem human and making his crimes excusable, which must have been tricky. Although his crimes are at no point glorified or made to seem acceptable, Nabokov slowly makes you relate to Humbert so that in the end, you catch yourself feeling almost sympathetic to him and then feel horrible for it. Humbert's excuses that Lolita was not innocent and that she seduced him go through the whole book and are almost believable until you catch the glimpses of Lolita that the writer allows to slip through whilst Humbert is asleep or unwell - Lolita crying herself to sleep every night, Lolita desperately trying to catch the attention of others and escape.The book was well written and easy to read. You would never have guessed that Nabokov was not a native English speaker. There are lots of allusions to classics and the language is rich and poetic without being stuffy. The sentences are long and winding, so although I found it easy to read it's one to read slowly rather than rush through.I did feel that the book lost steam about two thirds of the way in though. I found it hard to keep up with Humbert's paranoia (which took up a lot of lines) and found the part about who helped Lolita finally escape long and a bit tiresome. I did enjoy the ending though, where Lolita was finally able to confront Humbert many years later.

In nineteenth-century China, women in the Hunan province developed a secret code, nu shu, for communicating with each other. Kept away from work and politics, forced to spend their lives in the women's chamber with bound feet, they used nu shu to talk honestly about their lives. After her own feet are bound, Lily forms a latong relationship with Snow Flower, a girl born on the same day as her, a friendship that is supposed to last until death. But as their fortunes and lives change, Lily finds that her friendship contradicts what her new family would want.Snow Flower and the Secret Fan transported me back in time completely and utterly. I could hear the sounds of the paladins coming down the street, see the wonderful sights and smell the food. Lisa See didn't overuse description or adjectives, but managed to evoke the time period. She also captured how isolated and distinct from the rest of the world this part of China was, at times I felt as though I was reading about 15th or 16th century life, not 19th century life.She also did a good job describing the horrors of footbinding. Having already read Wild Swans, I thought I knew all about footbinding, but it is described in graphic detail in this novel. The descriptions were vivid and just reading them made me wince - feet broken intentionally? Blood and pus? Constant agony? It's hard for us in modern times and different cultures to appreciate exactly what about having bound feet would make a woman sexually appealing, but then I'm sure the same will be said in the future about many things we find attractive.I felt that the first half of the book was amazing, but that the pace trailed off as soon as Lily and Snow Flower settled down into their marriages. It was much more fun reading about them growing up, their family rituals and their negotiations for marriage. There were also one or two anachronisms that did jar a bit - at one point Lily 'swept up the trash' and after a novel full of 'bed business' she suddenly 'had sex', a word choice that didn't seem to fit with the Chinese reserve at all. I think I noticed these more because I'm a Brit reading the American version.

How I Live Now tells the story of fifteen year old Daisy, who is sent to England by her new Stepmother to live with her cousins in the countryside. Whilst she is there war breaks out and Daisy and her cousins must learn to survive and cope with all of the horror it brings.The best and worst thing about this book was that it was written in the style of a stream of consciousness. At first this took a lot of getting used to and Daisy came across as superficial and silly and I did have to push myself through the first few chapters. But as the book progressed, I was really sucked into Daisy's world and I started to appreciate how Meg Rosoff has created one of the most realistic and touching portrayals of being a teenager I have ever read. Like most teenagers, Daisy is a bundle of contradictions; weak and strong, silly and serious and shallow but also capable of very profound insights in a no-nonsense kind of way. She matures massively throughout the book and feels almost like a real person by the end.Even though we never get to find out much about the war and it's all a bit dystopian, Rosoff does a good job in a short number of pages of describing the reality and horror of war. There was one passage in particular where I could almost feel the emotion humming off of the page.The one weak point for me was the love story. Not because Daisy and Edmond are cousins, but because this book was Daisy's book and we never really understood Edmond or the attraction between them. I much preferred the way Rosoff wrote about Daisy's relationship with her younger cousin, Piper, and how this sisterly relationship helped her work things out.

The story of Henry VIII's divorce in order to marry Anne Boleyn is the back-drop to the life story of Thomas Cromwell, a commoner who managed to persuade and manipulate his way into becoming one of the most powerful men in England.This book had many strengths, the major one being Mantel's ability to make this much written about period of English history somehow seem fresh and modern. It didn't seem like a Phillipa Gregory style period romance, or even a period book at all - the characters all jumped off the page and events seemed immediate and compelling, even though everyone knows how it was going to turn out.The character of Cromwell was a masterpiece, he was so complex and I loved how Mantel showed the distinction between what he was thinking and what he was saying as he slowly manipulated people and got his revenge. Although there was plenty of historical happenings and legal proceedings, these were interspersed with personal events from Cromwell's life, which gave the book a balance and broke things up a bit.But there were definitely things I didn't like so much about the book. It was a hard slog - whilst I didn't have trouble keeping track of who was talking as others seemed to (the 'he' pronoun causing difficulties), it's the kind of book you have to concentrate on and be fully awake to read. I know a fair amount about this period of history but sometimes it was hard to follow all of the minor characters and the legal proceedings.And one of the book's strengths was also it's biggest weakness - writing as Cromwell gave the book immediacy and something fresh, but it also meant there was no room for the back story of other characters. People going into a meeting don't spend twenty minutes reviewing the life stories of all the participants in their head beforehand, and if Mantel did so the book would have seemed a bit stuffy. Consequently, not at lot was explained and Mantel was relying on you knowing your history. I knew a bit about Cranmer and More, but not enough.Now that I've finished it, I'm glad I read it, but it was hard going at times. It's like spring cleaning your house - you may find it boring at times and tough, but you love having everything sparkly clean once it's all done. There's a sequel on the way, not sure if I will pick it up or not.

Wherever You Go is a beautifully complex novel about three Americans in Israel. Yona wants to reconnect with her sister, a settler involved in extremist politics. Greenglass is an orthodox teacher but having problems with his faith. Aaron is a college drop-out with family problems who is looking for a way to prove himself or something he can belong to. Leegant weaves these three very separate lives together throughout the course of the novel and builds up to a dramatic finale. I found the most interesting character to be Dena, Yona's sister, who had completely devoted her life to one interpretation of her faith and for most of the book was unable to see anything else, including the person she had once been. I am non-religious so it was fascinating to be given a glimpse of life so led by religion and the different reasons people turn to religion.For me, the best thing about this novel was how Leegant managed to portray such a broad spectrum of opinion about religion and politics in Israel, and by doing so demonstrated how complex the country is. I'm not Jewish or Israeli or even American and perhaps have been guilty of oversimplifying Israel and the Middle East in general, thinking things such as "Israelis think that...." or "Israelis are..." and Leegant's book reminded how just how complicated the situation is.Leegant's book would be a great pick for a book group because it gave me so much to think about and so many questions to ask myself - At what point does religion become fundamentalist? Why do people turn to religion in bad times rather than good? Can people with opposing ideologies ever live together in peace? Can you ever redeem yourself from certain acts? What issues or causes would you devote your life to?But I don't want you all to think this was just a stuffy, 'issues' book as it was also a story that was enjoyable to read with characters I came to care about. I would recommend it.

The novel tells the story of a group of people all living in flats in the same building. Maeve and Matt are a married couple coping with a traumatic event, Katie is finding it hard to see where her life is going, Lydia is a female taxi driver who cares for her Mum (who has dementia) and Jemima is coming to the end of her life.Well, my sister was right - it's not really chick lit. In fact, Marian Keyes' writing style reminded me a bit of Nick Hornby's and there was no way the book could be described as superficial. Marian was very good at writing about everyday life in a way that didn't sugarcoat it or make it overly depressing. It was just like real life, lived by people everywhere.With such a large cast of characters, it was hard to relate to and root for every one. I found Maeve's story the most affecting and guessed the twist before it was revealed. On the other hand I didn't really get behind Katie's relationship struggles. Those sections weren't boring, but I didn't really care which character Katie chose.The writing style was simple and easy to read - all of the strength of the book was in the characters and plot developments. I didn't care for the supernatural element of this novel but would definitely read more by Marian Keyes.

The Radleys are a stereotypical, suburban, middle class British family. They listen to radio four, attend book clubs, discuss golf during dinner parties with their equally middle class neighbours and make lunch the evening before going to work. But they have some oddities - they can't go out in the sun without sunblock, a vegetarian diet makes them ill and son Rowan keeps getting a funny skin rash ...This darkly humorous book from Matt Haig is a new take on vampire novels. There's no romance, abstinence or glamour here, it's just normal people that happen to be vampires and are faintly embarrassed about it enough to hide it from their children. In fact, the vampire plot at times takes the back-seat to the more literary-type themes of unhappy marriages, self-denial, corruption in the police and isolation. The Radleys are vampires, but the book isn't just about that.When daughter Clara is attacked, her vampire impulses break through and this blows open the Radleys carefully constructed world. Clara and Rowan must deal with being completely different from who they thought they are and brother in law Will is drafted in to help deal with the aftermath of the attack. A 'practising' vampire, he causes many family tensions to surface and the marriage between Helen and Peter comes under pressure. Rowan also gets the chance to get his own back on the bullies that have been making his life miserable.I very much enjoyed reading this book and loved all of the satirical elements of it. The first half, where the Radley children realise they are vampires, was more enjoyable than the second, which became just a tad Jerry Springer like with Will and Helen. The Radleys was well written and had a fast pace, making it hard to put down.

I am a part of 'Blair's generation' in that I was 11 when he came to power in 1997 and 21 when he left power in 2007. I grew up in his schooling system, was one of the first to take the new AS-Levels and when I went to university, I had to pay the new top-up fees. I voted for Labour in my first election (2005) but also joined in the marches against the Iraq war. I was interested to read his autobiography for all of these reasons, and especially interested as he is such a divisive figure. People either love him or hate him (and most hate him), but no one seems to actually listen to what he has to say anymore.This was a long book. It wasn't just long in terms of the number of pages (just under 700), but it felt long due to the poor organisation of the book. The chapters were extended and seemed to ramble round a few different topics aside from the chapter heading in no particular order. I like that the book was organised thematically rather than chronologically, and I liked the informal, chatty writing style, but think the book would have been much improved by splitting it into many smaller chapters just restricted to one theme. The chapter on Iraq also had a few pages on university fees and Northern Ireland, for example. This made it hard to follow at times and hard to get an overall sense of the passing of time.That aside, I did enjoy reading the book. My favourite sections were the parts dealing with international issues and summits, which felt honestly told and full of fascinating characters and relationships. There was a sense that not much was held back and Blair had made a real effort to tell his side of the story. He wasn't apologetic or trying to covert you to his side of things, he was just telling it as he saw it.

The Sandalwood Tree tells two entwining stories of Western women in India at different times. The main story is that of American woman Evie, living in India in 1947 with her Fulbright scholar husband Martin and son Billy. A veteran of liberating the concentration camps in WW2, Martin is suffering from shell shock and their marriage is under strain. As India edges towards partition and the withdrawal of the British, the situation becomes increasingly volatile.The other story, told around the main one, is a gem of a story about two unconventional Victorian women who grew up reading biographies of intrepid female explorers. Born in India, Felicity Chadwick takes the unusual step of living on her own, speaking Hindi and becoming involved in charity work. Seeking escape from the prospect of marriage, her friend Adela soon joins her and the two women become estranged from their fellow British settlers.This was a book to read slowly and treasure. Both stories were fascinating, although I have to admit I preferred the Victorian story and would have liked to see a few more chapters about Felicity and Adela. Even though this was a historical fiction novel set in a different time and place, Newmark retained a strong focus on character and plot first. The book was really about love in all it's different forms, and the story of Martin and Evie trying to overcome his war experiences was touching.There was also a vivid sense of place. Newmark visited India twice whilst writing this book and her writing is full of the sights and smells of the different locations. I enjoyed being transported away whilst reading and the descriptions of all of the different foods made me crave a curry! In fact, there was nothing I didn't enjoy about this book and it's one of my top reads of the year so far.