Tiny Library

Everyone knows that, after the Holocaust, the world swore 'never again'. Countries came together to form the United Nations, an institution with one of it's founding principles the prevention of another genocide. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was signed and ratified by member states. But things didn't exactly work out to plan - three genocides later (Bosnia, Rwanda, Darfur), Adam Lebor asks in his book what exactly went wrong. Why did the UN fail to act, despite knowing exactly what was going on?This is a well researched yet still easy to follow book. Lebor has interviewed all of the major players in the UN at the time of all three genocides and followed the exhaustive paper trails.The central argument is whether people can be guilty of all the deaths through inaction. If someone knows a genocide is occuring, has the power to stop it and does not, are those deaths on their conscience? Lebor gives the following reasons as to why the genocides were not prevented:*The UN is overly obsessed with neutrality, and this prevents it from acting when it needs to. For example, when Bosnian Muslims were being slaughtered in Srebrenica, some in the UN argued against striking against the Bosnian Serbs (the perpetrators of the genocide) as the Muslims had once been involved in a civil war. During the Rwandan genocide, Rwanda actually had a seat on the security council and could therefore derail any interventions! In a genocide, the UN should not be neutral.*Bureaucracy - It takes so many people to make and authorise a decision that often it was too late. Bureaucracy was taken to ridiculous measures too; a request to bomb approaching Serbs in Srebrenica, saving the lives of thousands of Muslims, was rejected because it was filled in on the wrong form! It wasn't even passed up to the relevant superiors.*The permanent members of the security council do not make things easy. Russia and China often threaten to veto any intervention and the US, UK and France are hard to win round.*UN peacekeepers should automatically be authorised to intervene if they witness genocidal acts or human rights violations, rather than submitting a report and waiting for agreement (which often comes too late).Lebor also makes a good case against isolationism. I know lots of people thought and think 'It's going on in another country, what has it got to do with me? Let them sort their own problems out.' But that's just not possible in the world today. Some of the Bosnian Muslims who experienced the western world looking away as they were raped and slaughtered, turned to Al Qaeda. Three of the September 11th hijackers were Bosnian Muslims radicalised after the genocide. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in power politics, or the UN in particular. Samantha Power's A Problem From Hell is a better general introduction to the three genocides.

I enjoyed this book and it was very well written, making it hard to put down. Quite simply, lots of interesting things have happened to him. It was interesting to read about making friends with baby orangutans, meeting tribal people and handling horrible insects. The book had a good structure, with chapters about his journeys/adventures alternated with chapters about broadcasting (David was once controller of BBC2).It was also interesting to track the changing views towards animals and conservation/zoos. When he was making his first shows in the 1950s, it was common that the aim was simply to capture as many animals as possible and bring them back to the studio without worrying too much about their well-being or the environment they were taking them from. But as the book progressed, David became more and more interested in conservation and captivity.As I was expecting, it wasn't really a personal biography. Don't expect details about his love life or blazing arguments. Normally that irritates me a little bit in a biography, but he had so many interesting things to write about that I didn't really notice until I had finished the book.

Fluctuations in solar radiation mean that the ice-caps have melted and temperatures reach up to 150C. Most of the cities of the Northern Hemisphere are submerged in tropical lagoons populated with prehistoric animals and massive bugs of all kinds. The main character, Kerans, is a scientist sent to study the animal life forms but soon gets caught up with all kinds of people.I liked the premise of this book, and indeed the initial third or so of it was amazing. I liked the scenario of the increase in temperature leading to all of these prehistoric animals in a kind of de-evolution and thought I was in for a fantastic adventure story, in the style of Conan Doyle's 'Lost World'. I wanted battles with giant iguanas and crocodiles as enormous as blue whales!But there wasn't actually much of a story at all. The main character was very passive (intentionally) and the book just kind of drifted with no purpose. I get that this was because humanity and the world as a whole were drifting with no purpose, but it didn't make for fun reading. The sections on what happens to humanity when civilisation is stripped away were interesting, and all the looting and plundering seemed applicable to life now.The main problem for me that this book appears to have been written in a psycho-analytic time. Don't get me wrong, I did a psychology degree, but I have no time for the "collective unconscious" or "regressing to the womb" or other such Freudian arguments. Ballard seemed to be arguing that the heat was activating some kind of genetic memory we all have of the time of our ancestors, and this was captivating and entrapping the main characters, making them seek out hotter lagoons. It made no sense! If I was Kerans I wouldn't be thinking "Hmm, 150C is a little mild, I'm going to leave this nice air-conditioned scientific facility with all the food provided and venture south where it is even hotter and I will have no resources whatsoever!" Despite the shortness of the book, there was a lot of waffle about this. A bit disappointing, really.To summarise: I liked the idea, but not enough pace or story.

Fourteen year old Lily is growing up in 1960s South Carolina during the struggle for civil rights. With her mother dead and her father abusive, the only person Lily feels close to is her black maid, Rosaleen. When Rosaleen is arrested after a tense altercation about race in town, Lily and Rosaleen go on the run. They end up staying with a beekeeper and her two sisters, who might have a connection to her mother. A coming of age story set during one summer, The Secret Life of Bees is a whimsical novel with lots of dreamy qualities.I wanted to love this book. I thought the topic was interesting, and the real strength of the book was the way that I got such a sense of time and place. Sue Monk Kidd really bought alive the South of the time; the suffocating heat and tense atmosphere. Maybe it's because I read it whilst being in the South myself (now in Atlanta!), but I felt as though I was right there with Lily. Lily was a good protagonist too - her mood swings and rushes of emotion were consistent with what I can remember of being a teenager.But I couldn't love this book. The main problem was that it was too sweet and saccharine. I know it's written to be 'dreamy', and maybe it's my stiff-upper-lip Britishness coming out, but there was too much sentimentality for me. There was too much discussion of empowering your spirit and being a strong woman for me. I agree with all of the sentiments, and thought August was a wonderful character, it was just a bit much for me. I also found it hard to believe that everything would have worked out as well as it did, especially the resolution with Lily's father at the end.I did enjoy the book and it was hard to put down, but it's not one I would pick up again.

Quincey Harker, the son of Mina and Jonathan, starts working on a production of Bram Stoker's Dracula at the Lyceum Theatre. There he starts to discover the secrets of his family as one by one the heroes from the original novel are destroyed.This may sound brutal, but here it is: there is nothing to like about this book. Please don't read it. It is a blatant attempt on cashing in through the use of a famous surname and should never have been an authorised sequel to what is a classic and much-loved book. What offends me the most about it is how the original characters have been twisted and 'developed' into something completely beyond what Bram Stoker had imagined them to be. Mina has become a sex-crazed vampire affecionado, Jonathan a sad drunk who likes prostitutes, Jack a crazy morphine addict, Van Helsing a sell out and Arthur a sad and lonely old man. And Dracula, an undeniable villain, has become a tragic romantic hero, 'God's crusader' who was merely misunderstood. He doesn't even drink human blood anymore! And Bram Stoker even appears in it as a plagerist! It all seems a bit disrespectful to me.There was also a high proportion of silliness in the plot. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind a bit of tackiness or suspending belief - but Jack the Ripper really being the Countess Elizabeth Bathory? When the authors of a book take so much liberty with both the original story and the timeline of history that they have to provide an afterword to explain themselves away, you do start to wonder.To sum up, I am sure Bram Stoker would have been appalled to have learned of this treatment of his novel if he was alive to witness it. If you like the original, steer well clear of this one.

Cold Lonely Courage tells the story of Madeline, a young French woman who becomes desperate for revenge during WW2 after her brother is killed and she is raped. Along with a cast of supporting characters, we follow her as she is trained to be a British Special Op spy and then becomes involved in the war effort against Germany.Petrek is a good writer. The first few chapters did feel a bit stilted but it soon picked up and was an enjoyable read. I didn't feel obliged to pick it up and read it; I enjoyed it. The chapters were short, but this fit with the thriller genre and made reading easy. The story idea was good too, and I could tell that lots of historical research had gone into writing the novel.However, the problem I had with this book was the characters. Apart from the German police officers Willi and Stenger, everyone was either good or evil, with not much in between. I found it hard to believe that Madeline could ever go back to being a normal person, that she wouldn't have been deeply affected by what she was doing. The romance part felt a bit like an uncessary add-on, as the thriller sections were much more enjoyable. Things tied together a bit too neatly, especially compared to the gritty realism I was expecting.

On Chesil Beach is more of a novella than a novel and tells the story of Florence and Edward on their wedding night in 1962. Despite being very much in love, they have never broached the subject of sex and both are anxious for different reasons - Edward has performance anxiety and Florence is repulsed by the idea of sexual contact. As the night goes on, the effects of their lack of communication become clear.I loved this little book. It was one of those books where not much happens and the characters are very ordinary, but McEwan has a real gift for observing emotions and human relations. Whilst reading I felt as though I was inside the heads of both Edward and Florence, but especially Florence. Weighed down by concern about how she 'should' act and behave, Florence can't help but make things worse for herself;"She seized his hand and led him towards the bed. It was perverse of her, insane even, when she wanted to run from the room, across the gardens and down the lane, onto the beach to sit alone. But her sense of duty was painfully strong and she could not resist it. She could not bear to let Edward down." p33"Sex with Edward could not be the summation of her joy, but was the price she must pay for it." p9McEwan wrote simply, but somehow managed to pack more emotional impact into this short book than some authors manage in much longer works. I found myself rooting for Florence and Edward, and wanting to reach into the book and shake them when they were failing to communicate. It wasn't a happy book, and McEwan seemed to highlight how easily happiness can be dispersed and how emotions (especially pride) and events can get in the way. I could feel the awkwardness and emotions radiating from the characters. It was also nice to read a book in which sex was treated realistically, rather than over the top and always perfect.

Blessing is twelve when her comfortable life in Lagos, the capital of Nigeria, is destroyed by the separation of her parents. She moves with her mother and older brother Ezikiel to a rural compound just outside Warri, in the oil-rich Niger Delta. Aside from getting used to the lack of running water, electricity and hygiene, Blessing has to learn to live in a violent community where the population is increasingly politicised by the actions of the oil companies. Her mother works night and day in an attempt to pay school fees, leaving Blessing in the care of her grandmother, a traditional midwife and her grandfather, a recent convert to Islam. Once top of the class, Ezikiel starts to fall behind in his studies after a gun attack and becomes seduced by the Sibeye Boys, a group of local boys arming themselves with guns and trying to be 'big men'. Tiny Sunbirds Far Away is a coming of age story set against a violent backdrop. I thoroughly enjoyed Tiny Sunbirds Far Away, mainly due the charismatic narrative voice of Blessing herself. I think it's hard for adult writers to write in a child's voice successfully in a book intended for adult readers, but Watson manages it perfectly. Blessing starts the book relatively naive, shocked at the separation of her parents and worried most about how she will go to the toilet in a school without running water. As the novel goes on, she increasingly becomes more aware of the situation around her and comes to the realisation that the adults in her family are humans, as flawed as she is. Her coming of age was believable and very well written. Throughout the whole story, Blessing's voice is upbeat enough to off-set some of the tragedies and violence (gun crime, death, female genital mutilation). She's incredibly easy to identify with and it's her voice that set this novel 'alight' for me.Tone is another challenge in a book with so many issues. Watson is helped in this by her choice of a teenage narrator; Blessing simply relays what is going on without judgement. Female genital mutilation is tackled in quite a bit of detail (Blessing is training to be a birth attendant with her grandmother) and the different perspectives and arguments are simply presented. Through Ezikiel we also get to see the different perspectives around gun crime and Western oil companies. Despite some of the heavy subject matter, the book doesn't get bogged down; Blessing keeps the pace swift and the tone just light enough.The only criticism I have of this book is that at times, it was too sentimental. There's a lot of romanticism of Nigeria and of traditional African life; a grandmother telling folk stories with children gathered around, traditional cooking, African dance etc. Although this was necessary to balance the more heavy parts of the book, it felt a bit sentimental and stereotypical. But it's a minor criticism really; Tiny Sunbirds Far Away is compelling, expertly written and full of memorable characters. I couldn't put it down and finished it in just under two days.

Jacob Marlowe is the last living werewolf. For two hundred years he has wandered the world, amassing a fortune and murdering humans every full moon. Now, as the last of his kind, he is a target for WOCOP (World Organisation for the Control of Occult Phenomenon). Initially, he is willing to be hunted, fed up of a life without attachment and worn down by the mundane routine of everyday life. But when Jacob realises that he may not be the last living werewolf at all, his eagerness to live returns, even as he is slowly drawn into a trap.I'm going to be upfront and state that I did not like this book at all. I thought there was a gem of a story in there but unfortunately it was hidden in the most unnecessarily pretentious writing I've come across in quite some time. Duncan writes as though he has just ingested a thesaurus and we end up with sentences like this:"It was getting the primary admission, that we knew what we were, that we had both felt the peace that passeth understanding, that this, now, sex in human form, was the imperfect forerunner, the babbling prophet, mere Baptist to the coming Christ."That was just a random sentence from a randomly opened page. They are all like this! Duncan never writes one word if he can write ten, and each sentence has so many subordinate clauses and commas that reading it becomes quite difficult at times. And I don't mind challenging writing (I like classics after all), but it seemed so unncessary in this case. Some of the metaphors Duncan uses are bizarre and there's many pages of Jacob complaining about how bored of life he is, full of overly descriptive prose.It's frustrating as I like the general idea of taking a horror concept and making it more mainstream. It worked for Elizabeth Kostova in The Historian and Matt Haig in The Radleys and the concept here was a good one. The execution was just lacking. I didn't mind the violent sex or the strangeness of the ending but the writing was just too big of an obstacle for me to get over. Too much description and too much philosophy.On the whole a disappointment. I don't think I've written a review as negative as this one for quite some time!

Most of us tend to think of slavery as something that happened in the past. We imagine Africans at slave markets, on overcrowded ships or working on plantations. In Enslaved, Jesse Sage and Liora Kasten, the directors of the American Anti-Slavery Group, hope to enlighten people to the fact that slavery still exists in the modern world in a number of forms, from the traditional to sex slavery to labour camps. Inspired by the slave narratives of the nineteenth century, each chapter is the narrative of a person who has been a modern day slave, in a variety of different contexts.Enslaved was certainly eye-opening. Whilst I was aware that modern day slavery existed, I had no idea of the extent and scope of it. To pick just a few narratives, in this book we meet: Micheline, a Haitian woman trafficked to the USA; Abuk, captured in a raid in Sudan; Jill, kept as a sex slave in suburban America; Beatrice, who thought she had got a job as a maid only to be enslaved and Harry, a victim of Chinese labour camps. There's also a narrative of a slave owner in Mauritiana, that still operates what we would think of as a traditional slavery system. Taken together, the chapters definitely raise awareness and they opened my mind to the suffering of millions of people around the world.The more I read, the more the connection between slavery and poverty became clear. People who are living in extreme poverty are the ones that will apply for au-pair or maid positions abroad, without knowing enough about the situation to know if they are safe. They are the women driven to work as prostitutes, vulnerable to sex trafficking. The final chapter in the collection is about what we can do as readers and abolitionists, but it didn't really address this connection. Whilst I agree that there's much Western citizens can do about slavery (raising awareness being the least of them), until poverty as a whole is tackled it will continue. Corrupt governments and failing states have much to do with modern day poverty.I think Enslaved is an important book, one to pass one and discuss with the people you see regularly. Modern slavery is an invisible thing, suffered by people that generally aren't educated or literate enough to raise awareness or push for change. It's not an easy read but it will make you think.

It's the early nineteenth century in Louisiana and Manon Gaudet is unhappily married to the owner of a sugar plantation. Cut off from her friends and family, Manon increasingly begins to realise that she doesn't know or like the man she married. The slave girl she received as a wedding gift is a constant source of tension between husband and wife and the atmosphere Manon lives in is oppressive. There are rumours of a slave rebellion and as violence in the area increases, Manon's way of life is challenged.I picked up Property mainly because it had won the Orange Prize in 2003 and I've yet to be disappointed by the winners. The good news is that Property isn't destined to be the first disappointment; I loved it. It's told in a bare, simplistic style but there's so much emotion and feeling in the story that each word is powerful. Martin doesn't take the easy route of demonising slave owners, rather she attempts to paint a realistic picture of what slave owners at that time would have thought. At times Manon can be almost kind to the slaves, but at others she dismisses them completely, as objects not worthy of human consideration. I appreciated the ambiguity in the writing as a mark of a good writer.The 'property' in the book doesn't just refer to the ownership of slaves, it also alludes to the ownership of Manon by her husband. On their wedding day, Manon knows next to nothing about him, but her life is in his hands from that moment on. Even when she inherits a property of her own from a relative, Manon isn't free to live in it to escape her domestic situation as legally the property belongs to her husband. In some ways, she is property as much as the slaves are. This extra angle made the book more interesting.Property isn't a book to pick up if you are after happiness. There's misery in the story from the very first scene and marital abuse and the misuse of slaves are constant parts of the narrative. Even when it seems like things might be looking up for Manon, something else happens to add more misery. But what the story lacks in happy endings, it makes up for in authenticity. The whole thing felt very believable for nineteenth century Louisiana and the characters are so ambiguously written that as a reader, you aren't sure whether you even want them to be happy.I'm glad I picked up Property. It's a powerfully written and subtle book that I carried on thinking about long after putting it down. Recommended.

Mirror Earth is about one of the most exciting research topics in astrophysics at the moment, planets that exist beyond our solar system (exoplanets). It was only in the 1990s that scientists were able to detect such planets, and they've been overturning our expectations about the universe ever since. Before exoplanets, scientists assumed that planets near their stars must be small and rocky, with large gaseous planets further away (such as Jupiter and Saturn). But the first exoplanets discovered were many times larger than Jupiter and many times closer to their stars than Mercury is to our sun. Many have strange orbits and don't behave in the way that we expect planets to at all. Theoretically, these planets just shouldn't exist. But they do.Of course, discovering exoplanets (and there are many known ones now) is only the first step for scientists who hope to find a 'mirror' earth, one that could meet all the conditions for life. This is really the meat of the book, as Lemonick discusses attempts to isolate and study planets that could possibly be habitable. He takes a Bill Bryson-like approach of mixing the science with information about the scientists and the process of discovery, and this is largely successful. I spent the first half of the book in awe of the perseverance and ingenuity of scientists who have been able to identify invisible planets around stars that are mere sparkling dots in the sky. It's not simply a case of looking into the sky with a telescope, it's about the slightest movement of a star due to the planet's gravity and the tiniest possible blurring. It's technical stuff.Things get even more interesting as the discussion moves on to questioning our assumptions about life. Most of the book and indeed, most of recent scientific history, is taken up with the quest to find planets like our own because scientists have assumed that life can only exist in similar conditions. But in the final chapter, Lemonick considers other possible planetary systems from the realm of theoretical physics. It's possible there are carbon-based planets with cores of pure diamond and "diamond continents sloping down to seas of tar." What kind of life might such a planet harbour? It seems physicists are questioning their basic ideas about life and I can't wait to see what research comes out of this in the future.I really enjoyed Mirror Earth, but it wasn't perfect. Whilst it was interesting to read about the actual scientists and their quests to discover planets (especially their funding issues), some of these sections went on for too long. Had I not studied astrophysics at an introductory level, I would have struggled to understand the techniques the physicists used, although I could have kept up with the theories and discoveries easily. But for an "awe and wonder" book, it's hard to beat. The universe is more strange and diverse than we ever thought, and we're only scratching the surface of all the different possibilities.

Bess is a writer living in a small, tight-knit community with her partner Halland. One morning she is woken by the sound of a gunshot and soon receives the news that Halland has been murdered. The police start to investigate whilst Bess starts to grieve. Throughout the process, Bess starts to see her neighbours, friends and family in a different light, and faces up the consequences of the decisions she has made throughout her life.I should start this review by confessing that I'm not a fan of crime/detective fiction. I've read a few popular crime books and some Sherlock Holmes, but I just can't get into it. I know I'm supposed to solve the puzzle of who committed the crime but that's not how I like to read. Sure enough, whilst reading The Murder of Halland, I didn't spend any time trying to work out who murdered Halland and consequently later events were a surprise to me. The crime aspect of the book was well written but didn't appeal to this particular reader. I also can't judge how much it 'dismantles the rules of an entire genre' (quote from the back cover), as I'm not familiar enough with the genre to tell.Luckily, The Murder of Halland is much more than crime-by-numbers, it's also about grief and coming to terms with the loss of a loved one. Many of the sections dealing with this rang very true to my own experiences. There's one chapter in the book where Bess is supposed to go to a library to give a talk (she's a writer) and checking her emails, she finds a confirmation. In the space of a few short sentences she goes from almost flippancy ("should I create an auto-reply saying my husband had been murdered?") to despair;"What had I written? I didn't want to think about work. Perhaps I would never want to think about writing again. That belonged to the past and it didn't matter any longer."Grief has been like that for me too; a roller-coaster of emotions and the constant worry of whether you are grieving properly or not, whether people will judge you for smiling or for leaving the house. I think Juul's writing will relate to the experience of most people ("If normal everyday life had resumed, the washing needed attention.") and I connected well with Bess.So a bit of a mixed bag. The crime sections didn't appeal but the writing was simple and heart-felt, honest about the grieving process. If you are a crime fan, you'll enjoy this book.

The Brothers is about Henrik and Erik, Finnish brothers in 1809 who fought on opposing sides of the war between Sweden and Russia, that made Finland a part of the Russian Empire. Although they share blood, there has long been conflict between them, and when Henrik finally returns home, it's to a broken house full of people that hide secrets of their own. In the wintery wilderness, Henrik and Erik must face up to each other and the revelations that are to come.I enjoyed The Brothers, mainly for the atmosphere. I read this novella in one go on New Year's Day, snuggled up in a blanket with the heating turned up. So it was wonderful to read about the icy Finnish winter, the rugged Farmhand, the distant wife and the frozen rivers. On the back cover, it states that The Brothers is a 'Shakespearean drama from icy Finland' and the atmosphere reminded me a cross between Hamlet and a Brothers Grimm fairy tale. I wanted to dive right into this book, the setting was that vivid.Despite the historical elements, The Brothers is mainly a story about what can happen to people when they live in isolation from larger communities. Some of the drama and secrets centre around Erik's wife, Anna, but in a way that's inevitable as she's the only woman we read about existing in the community of what seems to be only two houses. When you live so shut off, boundaries between relationships blur and people have to take on multiple roles in your life. That said, I didn't guess the big reveal near the end (although there are plenty of smaller reveals along the way) and I loved that Sahlberg was able to surprise me.Although I very much enjoyed this book, there was a distance from the characters that stopped me loving it. I don't mind less than perfect characters, so the flaws of Henrik didn't concern me, but it was written in a style that reflected the cold, icy Finnish winter. Whilst I admired the writing, this technique also stopped me from connecting with any of the characters properly, and it was this that made me only like the book, rather than love it. It is a wonderfully written book though, and well worth reading for the atmosphere alone.

Dinah is the daughter of Jacob and sister of Joseph, remembered in the Bible only for being the victim of a rape that leads to mass murder and devastation for her family. In The Red Tent, Diamant imagines what it would have been like to be a woman in biblical times and retells the story from the point of view of Dinah herself. Starting with the lives of her mother Leah and her three sisters and ending with Dinah's old age, Diamant draws on the pagan traditions of the time and the mythology around women and birth. Leah and her sisters all share the same husband, Jacob, and Dinah grows up as the only girl among eleven brothers. Every new moon, the women of the compound retreat to the red tent (this coincides with their menstrual cycles) and here Dinah learns the stories of the woman around her, including some of the skills of midwifery. When she comes of age and decides to choose a husband for herself without consulting her family, the insult is too much for some of her brothers to bear and a cycle of violence is started.The Red Tent is one of those books I've had sitting of my shelf for years; I kept meaning to read it but never got around to it. I went into it with high hopes as I love historical fiction set in ancient times, especially when the challenges the reader by adopting a female narrator. And on the whole, I was pleased with The Red Tent. It was engagingly written and hard to put down. The female characters were well imagined and distinct from each other. There's a powerful sense of emotion throughout the story; I especially felt for Rachel as she was unable to carry a child to term but had to watch her sisters repeatedly become pregnant and give birth. It's a book that I'm still thinking about days after finishing it, which is always a good sign.But unfortunately I didn't adore The Red Tent in the way I was hoping to, perhaps my expectations were too high. The biggest problem I had with it was the earth-mother tone and all the worship of periods and fertility. This is perhaps my own personal bias here, but I find it corny to read about women celebrating their periods as linking them to the earth and motherhood as the pinnacle of what it means to be a woman. Before you remind me, I know this is set in Biblical times and motherhood was what it meant to be a woman then, but I still felt as though Diamant was over the top with the female rituals and menstruation worship. It was though Diamant was also trying to make a point to women today (to celebrate our periods?), that she was claiming that the woman in The Red Tent had the right idea (look at all the sisterhood) and to be honest, it made me a bit uncomfortable. I think there is much more to being a woman than this and I didn't like Diamant's agenda. I'm not an earth-mother kind of girl.However, I did enjoy the sections on midwifery and birth. I'm not a mother myself but I still found it fascinating to read about the different techniques women of those times would have used to get a woman through birth. I think we in the West sometimes forget how inherently dangerous giving birth to a child is as death is always lurking for the women in the story.Although the female characters were well developed, I found the male characters a little one-dimensional. There is a deliberate distance adopted (men are not allowed in the red tent), but still they seemed either good (Shechem) or evil (Laban) with nothing in between. I didn't believe that any of the relationships between Jacob and his wives were emotionally fulfilling for the women in them. Strict Christians may also object to the liberty Diamant takes with some Biblical events, although this wasn't an issue for me.When I finished this book, I was intending to give it a low rating but it is a book that has stuck in my mind and the more I look back on it, the more I appreciate the story and female characters. It's just a shame it didn't live up to my expectations.

Next World Novella is the first book in the Peirene series on Male Dilemmas: The Quest for Intimacy (I have previously reviewed all of the novellas in the Female Voices series; Beside the Sea, Stone in a Landslide and Portrait of the Mother as a Young Woman). Hinrich Schepp is an ageing academic in a seemingly happy relationship with wife Doro. He enters their apartment to find her editing one of his manuscripts, a regular occurence. But things aren't as they always are - Doro has passed away and the manuscript she was editing was Hinrich's long abandoned attempt at a fiction novel. Using the disguise of story, Hinrich has revealed much about the past and he is shocked by Doro's alterations as they show she knows more than he ever realised. Sitting down next to her corpse to read, Hinrich has to face up to his past and the disintegration of his superficially happy marriage.I really enjoyed Next World Novella, more than I expected to. I loved the wry voice of the author, the black humour and the macabre tone that pervaded the whole book. There are many details of death included, giving the novella a gothic feel that appealed to me. Politycki is clever in that he guides you to judge and poke fun at Hinrich but at the same time you can't help but feel sorry for him. One moment you're judging him for fantasising about attractive waitresses within a few minutes of discovering his wife's corpse and the next you want to stop him from embarrassing himself with his clumsy attempts at an extramarital affair that have you cringing.Hinrich traces the decline of his marriage to an operation he had to improve his vision; "It was terrible to see the world in such detail, so sharply outlined, all of a sudden! It dazzled him with a confusingly large number of details". In a sense, this is a metaphor for the whole story. Hinrich and Doro's marriage looks happy if you only look at it quickly, or not thoroughly. As soon as you start to dig deeper, the misery becomes apparent. The majority of the novel is narrated from Hinrich's point of view and it's black comedy at it's best but doesn't elicit too much emotion. However, the final part is Doro's editorial opinion on the manuscript and this is the heart of the novel. I had been reading along, poking fun at Hinrich whilst secretly pitying him and I simply wasn't expecting the emotional punch of Doro's words. It's easy to forget the impact that one person's actions can have on another. Including Doro's voice at the end made the novella cohesive and more powerful than Hinrich's narration alone could have been.Putting aside the death and descriptions of the decay of Doro's corpse, Next World Novella will ring true for a lot of readers. It's easy to ignore slow but serious decline in our personal relationships and it's often only when you look back that you realise how far things have gone. Hinrich and Doro never found the relationships they were hoping for and both suffered with a lonlieness that must be very common. The mix of this serious theme and the hints of comedy really worked for me. It's one of my favourite Peirene novellas so far and will be hard to beat.