Clare West

Is this the funniest novel ever written? Yes.[return][return]Oh, I know, I know, you have an opinion. I'll admit, there's strong competition: anything by P.G. Wodehouse. Evelyn Waugh. (I have been scarred by my loathing of the TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited, and I really must overcome that, and read either Scoop or Vile Bodies, and get back to you.) There's Douglas Adams, of course, but Hitchhiker's Guide started its life as a radio program and -- as delightful as it is -- the novel show more remains, in my heart, a novelisation of that original transcendent experience. Diary of Nobody, Three Men in a Boat. The Third Policeman. There are contenders for genre tastes, like Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, or The Sisters Brothers, by Patrick deWitt. But, for me, Cold Comfort Farm wins hands-down because its humor manages to be both completely and perfectly of-its-time, and timeless, simultaneously. [return][return]Of its time, CCF is a charming little time capsule of 1930s characters and attitudes (some pretty offensive), poking fun at all sort of contemporary manners, mores and sacred cows: smug intellectuals, high-brow literature, low-brow Hollywood, fashion, religion, family .... Probably 9/10s of the jokes and references go over the head of the modern reader, and an annotated version, that explains some of Gibbon's targets, might be fun. But there are enough remaining that are perfectly clear (the Brontes, DH Lawrence, even Jane Austen, Clark Gable & Gary Cooper, Dr Freud, self-help books and international evangelical preachers .... I've almost certainly missed some.) Gibbons is spoofing a style and attitude and genre of writing -- bucolic gothic? --that now may be thoroughly out of fashion, but has lingered, and spawned enough copycats that it still resonates.[return][return]And her half-hearted effort to set the action 20 years in her future (Why? Dear God, why?) is all part of the fun: she anticipates video phones, airplanes as common as motor cars, post dropped on your doorstep by air, the gentrification of certain unlikely parts of London -- That happened!!! -- a brutal war in the late 1940s with Nicaragua (Nicaragua?) and wonderful advances in brassiere technology. But rather misses the fact that there's going to be a bit of bother with some funny-looking guy in Germany, at the end of the decade. It ought to be an embarrassing debacle -- but it's not.[return][return]And that's because her targets -- smug intellectuals, high-brow literature, low-brow Hollywood, fashion, religion and family, yes most of all FAMILY -- are completely timeless and seem almost unchanged, and her aim is true. The Mr. Mybug in your life may not argue that Branwell Bronte wrote the sister's novels -- but you will almost certainly have a Mr. Mybug somewhere in your life, who is constantly "sharing" his/her hare-brained ideas about life, the universe and everything. Your Adam Lambsbreath may not insist on clettering the dirty dishes with a thorn twig, instead of using a proper dishmop, as God intended. But just try to suggest that he/she could upgrade their phone, or move from VHS to dvd ... Your family, god love'em, may not be the Starkadders -- but just try to tell me that there aren't some Starkadder-ish tendencies there.[return][return]And Flora Poste is the most delightful creation: the tireless agent of restoring balance to the universe, who would be very exhausting to know in real life. And who, I suspect, we'd be happy to avoid like the plague -- but safely confined between the covers of a novel, we can delight in her setting everything and everyone straight, and just imagine her convincing our very own Aunt Ada Doom that, whatever it was that she saw in the woodshed -- just get over it ... show less

To set the stage: Africa, World War I. Rose is high spirited, a spunky woman despite being a strait-laced and virginal missionary's sister. She is out for revenge for the death of her brother; she wants to torpedo the Germans to strike a blow for England. Enter gin-swilling mechanic Charlie Allnut and his river boat, the African Queen. Rose is only too eager to learn all about the African Queen to determine its full usefulness to exact her revenge - torpedoing the German police boat, the show more Konigin Luise. Rose's patriotism and lust for adventure adds up to a woman Allnut has never seen the likes of before. She somehow convinces him to take on her quest and it is her feisty nature that gets her and Allnut through deadly rapids, thick mangroves, choking weeds, malaria infested swarms of mosquitoes and stifling heat down the Bora delta.
Typical and predictable, a relationship blooms between Rose and Charlie, but how could it not when confined on a river boat for days on end? As they say, misery loves company. Despite seeing the relationship a mile away Forester reissued his story so that he had the opportunity to present the end of the story as he originally intended. It's not what you expect. show less

This is the famous story of Gulliver who visits all kinds of strange islands: an island of giants, an island of tiny people and an island of talking horses. It is a type of fantasy story and I don't really like fantasy. But the book also makes you think about how stupid the world is sometimes, and I liked that part of it.

This is a collection of nine stories from India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan. I had three favourites. (1) The Stepmother: This is about a young boy's psychological battles with his new stepmother. The stepmother is very cool and very clever. (2) Missiya, the Wild One: In this story a man remembers his childhood and a woman who caused a scandal in his village. (3) The Inspector of Schools: This is about a tired and worn down schools inspector who one day visits a poor school in the country and show more gets inspired by the teacher there.
I also enjoyed most of the other stories. Carapace is about a young woman trying to decide whether she should follow her heart or follow her family's wishes about the man she shall marry. The Intelligence of Wild Things is about a family who have grown distant from each other. The Night Train at Deoli is a story about a romantic young man and a woman he sees one day on a train platform. And For a Horseshoe Nail is about a man who sells one of his kidneys.
But there were two stories I was disappointed with. The Kite-Maker is about a family who lose their son. It's actually quite a nice story, but is so short I didn't think there was enough time to feel involved with the story. A Devoted Son is about a father and son's relationship. The son becomes a great success which makes the father proud at first, but gradually the father and son become unable to understand each other.
I still recommend this book though. Together the stories give you a sense of what life in South Asia is like: about things like what is important to people, and how family members relate to each other. And there is a good mix of sad, serious stories and lighter, uplifting stories. show less