Hello St Marks

'The Little Coffee Shop of Kabul' is a bit of a mongrel—part "perfect summer read" and part feminist commentary on life in Afghanistan in the early 2000s. Oddly enough, it works, and the social, cultural and logistical details captured my attention, which might otherwise have been snoozing through the "one little cafe, five extraordinary women" beach read conventions. Rodrigues' actually lived the world she describes so next step is straight to the source: her bestselling memoir, 'Kabul Beauty School'. 

'The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle' is a wildly commercially successful book, translated into 28 languages and with a Netflix series in the works. When published in 2018 it made everyone's lists and won some impressive swag. But I suspect it's one of those books that everyone bought but many didn't finish; like 'A Brief History of Time' for crime buffs. Stuart Turton has written a "time-travelling, body-hopping murder mystery" (his words), so tricky and twisty it's near impossible to follow. The narrator wakes up each day in a new body, damned to repeat the same day over and over until he identifies Evelyn's murderer. Of course, it's not that simple. Compounding the complexity, Turton has named three of his key characters Davies, Derby and Dance—an author's conceit which demanded more attention than I was willing to spare.

The reading gods delivered 'Love, Greg & Lauren' to Hello St Marks in the week before the 20th anniversary of 9/11, which was spooky. Greg Manning's wife Lauren was entering the lobby of the World Trade Centre on the morning of 11 September 2001—running a little late—when she was engulfed in a fireball; minutes later, with burns to 82% of her body, she was in an ambulance and not expected to live. She remained in hospital for 90 days, emerging triumphant and thanking God, in December. Greg started writing detailed daily email updates on Lauren's condition on 19 September, and had a publishing deal by late October. This is a moving story, and a worthy book; a story of resilience and love and grit. It can't help also being a story about money and class, and the glorious healing power of wealth.

The night the Titanic sunk, SS Californian was within sight. Second Officer Herbert Stone saw the distress rockets fired by the Titanic and told his Captain, who—irritated and arrogant—did nothing. By morning, 1,500 people were dead. 'The Midnight Watch' is a novel which manages the grey between fact and fabrication beautifully. Author David Dyer brings both empathy and a keen, intellectual curiosity (embodied in the flawed journalist narrator) to the story of these men, their families and the political and cultural response to the greatest maritime tragedy the world had ever seen. 'The Midnight Watch' is a cracking read with all the voyeuristic appeal of this infamous tragedy, and yet—the perfect combination—is reflective, emotionally engaging and beautifully crafted.  Dyer is Australian, a former ship's officer and Titanic obsessive, currently an English teacher with a Doctorate in Creative Arts from UTS; lucky, lucky students. 

I didn't expect to be drawn into this book, and yet I was. It opens at Peterborough Railway Station; a man throws himself in front of a train, and was not the first to do so. We don't know the man but we feel for the staff. Then, a shift of gears, and it's a subtle suburban whodunit, narrated by a ghost. Louise Doughty's 'Platform Seven'—her ninth novel—was much more than I expected; complex, reflective and moving. 

Yet another apocalypse novel, which makes me impatient and a poor judge of Alex Adams' 'White Horse'. It's good, probably quite good, but I've had my fill of the end of the world and found the constant switching between now (genetic plague causing death or mutation; cue monsters) and then (whiny Zoe, hard to love) required more effort than I was prepared to give. 

"The best novel about movie making ever written" says Sunday Express on the cover, and I'm not arguing. 'Shadows on a Wall' by Ray Connolly is terrific. It's a fat page-turner with a rowdy cast of characters set in the surrealist la la land of film studios, screenwriters, producers and actors, as a little play about Napoleon morphs into the most expensive movie ever made. Connolly is a screenwriter, so I imagine that's why this novel rings true and—first published in 1994—holds up wonderfully well. The perfect companion piece to this novel is journalist Julie Salamon's 'The Devil's Candy'—her brilliant and biting account of the making of 'Bonfire of the Vanities', released in 1992.

'The Devil Wears Prada' was a fun book and a great movie. 'Where the Grass is Green' is mildly fun, period. Beautiful rich white Americans and their problems is fertile ground for satire but Lauren Weisberger pulls her punches and settles for a predictable beach read. The saving grace is the sparkling relationship between insomniac sisters Peyton (glamorous news anchor) and Skye (suburban uber-mom), but even so, I now declare an end to my recent run of bubble-headed chick lit. 

In 'This Has Been Absolutely Lovely' all the familiar ingredients are in the mix: someone's pregnant, someone's addicted, someone's sad, someone's dead. The mum was a pop star. The daughter's a hippy. The neighbour's a spunk. The son is selfish. His wife is German. Set in a Sydney summer, it's light but tart and absolutely lovely. "Oh, it's a thing all right. I've seen enough things in my time to know a thing when it's right in front of me." That's Jane, my favourite. 

I can't remember if I've read 'The Shining' (published in 1977) but 'Doctor Sleep' (the sequel, published in 2013) was a bloody good read. It's so interesting watching a wildly successful author, fabulously skilled, play out a multi-generational career. 'Doctor Sleep' has some of the Stephen King tropes—a motley crew of friends standing against monstrous evil, and alcoholism. King is really interested in friendship and recovery, and 'Doctor Sleep' is hinged on the addiction and redemptive recovery of its hero. Plus child-killing, steam sucking, near-immortal bad guys and actual ghosties familiar to readers of 'The Shining' (or its movie), otherwise there's no story. Super fun.