Five Star Billionaire by Tash Aw

  Shanghai, megacity, late first decade 21st century.  Here we are introduced to the diverse characters of this novel.  Phoebe - young country woman, she just wants to better herself; Yinghui - ex-activist come businesswoman; Gary - mega pop-star in Taiwan; and Justin - seemingly conservative, family spokesman and deal-maker.  Everyone seems to teeter on the edge of extreme success - or failure.

  Last, in his own voice, appears the Five Star Billionaire. As the story progresses, more and more of each person's past and present is uncovered, but we see how he is the link which eventually ties everyone together.

  The story unfolded tantalisingly, gradually.  From early on I sensed the subtle interweaving of a slim connecting thread between the characters, who felt like puppets of the master narrator Five Star Billionaire.  His grand plan was ultimately revealed in the final chapters, but on the way, the story depicted the hard-ness of getting on in a massive big and competitive city - the struggle to succeed; and the fragility of fortunes.

  This book kept me turning the pages just to see what turn people's lives would take next, and how the Five Star Billionaire would leave them all.  Because, although it wasn't really rational, I could not get rid of the sense that he controlled them.  Finally, I was left with a sense of relief - it could have been very depressing for everybody, but it wasn't.

Title: Five Star Billionaire
Author: Tash Aw
ISBN: 9780007494156
Published: 2013
Publisher: Fourth Estate, London

The Blind Man's Garden by Nadeem Aslam

  Pakistan, Afghanistan, in the months following 9/11: there is no simple path to follow; no simple choice is possible.  The effects of Al Qaeda and American retaliation and war reach deeply into a family, which is battered and torn by the actions of others that they cannot control.

  I had this book for a long time, reading sometimes only a paragraph at a sitting, because I was frightened to glimpse around the corner at what was ahead.   I was afraid!  I didn’t want people to whom I’d formed attachments to be hurt or die!  I could not imagine how impossible and painful situations could be resolved!

 Young men join a cause that betrays them; a struggling woman seeks a decent life for her daughter; people are torn between human decency and loyalty to conflicting religious dictates; an imperfect man is blinded by a jewel as he tries to keep his family intact; a couple hide their forbidden love. 
  

    Many tragedies told amongst passages of beautiful prose.  The garden that gives the book its title is also the books fragrant central setting, a constant backdrop into which the mad happenings of the surroundings sometimes intrude.

  I had no idea how they would manage, but they did.

 “ And the stars,” he says, “the twinkling of them.  I will remember them by holding the palm of my hand in the rain.”

Title: The Blind Man's Garden

Author: Nadeem Aslam

Published: 2013, Faber & Faber

ISBN: 9780571287918

Soon, by Charlotte Grimshaw [Emma. Birkenhead Library]

"Soon is a fierce dwarf who lives under the house"...

  Not fantasy.  Be ready to enter a setting which will make you think you are on holiday with a Prime Minister and cronies.   Oh, please tell me we are talking fantasy after all!

   In this book, one character in this story is certainly closely modelled on our own dear PM.  Fortunately however, he is not the main character - that would be too obvious and boring.  Instead we follow a "friend" of his, Simon, a wealthy doctor.  We are led into a subtle story of a good man maintaining a fragile equilibrium, but making bad decisions, leading to political fandangaling and manipulation of public processes, and more importantly, an evil jealous woman who tells small boys complicated fairy stories with real life parallels.

  While my closest personal experience of John Key is holding the opener to the Grey Lynn Library toilet, (and I am happy to keep it that way), I really enjoyed this novel.  I felt sure while reading that Grimshaw knows JK personally (or had infiltrated his social circle), and has merely changed some names to (ineffectually) try and protect identities.  The holiday home set up with friends and hangers-on was realistic enough to me.  This almost-familiarity is one of the things I like about Grimshaw's novels - the settings are close to known experience, very New Zealand, and you can just imagine events happening so easily.

The dwarf Soon is in a story within a story - look for clues as to what the real characters are thinking, and enjoy!

The Sly Company of People Who Care by Rahul Bhattacharya

Guyana is in mainland South America, bordered by Venezuela, Brazil and Surinam.   Guyana is beautiful and poor, it has a history of colonialism (Dutch, British), slavery (African) and indentured labour (Indian) which has led to racial-political tensions today, and a very interesting nation of people.  These are things I have learned since reading this book, and I am enriched. 

It's a novel, but it is a travel book too.  It is filled with gorgeous scenery, cricket talk and reggae music which made me think at first Guyana was in the Carribbean.  Rahul Bhattacharya has made a playlist of the ska, reggae, chutney, calypso, soca, steelpan, junkanoo, rake-n-scrape, dub, dancehall  which give atmosphere throughout this book.

The narrator of Sly Company of People Who Care is from India, and has decided to "To be a slow ramblin' stranger" for a year - in Guyana.  Because he went there briefly once before and liked it.  He loves cricket, reggae, drinking rum, women, and having adventures.  He is good at hanging out and doing not much, and at speaking patois.  (Much of the conversation is in patois, which is at times hard to understand).  The narrator embraces life in Guyana and I thought he was almost becoming local himself yet his year is at times aimless, and he retains the security of a return ticket home.  This ultimately, shows he was a traveller all along.

White Girl Problems by Babe Walker

Babe Walker is how I imagine one of Paris Hilton's friends would be.  Really shallow, vapid, spoilt, brat-like.  Babe is in rehab, where she went after spending $246,893.50 in one afternoon of compulsive shopping.  When she has a fight with her therapist, she finally decides to get out all her problems - by writing these memoirs. 

What really drew me in was that Tori Spelling endorses this book.  On the cover.  Now ain't that something, maybe she identifies!

I am putting you off this book yet? No?  Good!

Because I reckon certainly if you like fashion, if you like reading celebrity gossip mags even a little, and if you can see the irony in all those celebs who strive so hard (think Posh Beckham, for e.g.) this book will be just the ticket for an awesomely relaxing read.  You know you're not like Babe (perhaps Tori does too, but Posh I think does not), and you know Babe is OTT with just about everything.  She is so self-centred, vain, unempathetic...but...somehow she avoids being too totally annoying.  By a whisker.  Maybe explained when her heritage is (finally) revealed in the final chapters.  Poor Babe.  No wonder she's like that with those problems.

Get a taster of Babe on her blog: http://www.babewalker.com/

Title: White Girl Problems
Author: Babe Walker
Publisher: Hyperion, New York
Year: 2012

Civilisation: Twenty Places on the Edge of the World, by Steve Braunias

  You know they say "don't leave home until you've seen your country".  This book might work either way for you, perhaps you'll want to get the hell out after reading it or maybe your curiosity will be piqued by somewhere close you have never heard of.  This is what happened to me.

  This is a (mostly) New Zealand travel book. The places described are not those on any conventional tourist trail.  Perhaps this is why this book really brings New Zealand alive. 

  It is always the people who make the place interesting, or best avoided.  While the scenery is often lovely and wonderfully described it is the people who give real life.  All kinds of people are here, those who you might call ordinary, or weird, those who write signs all over their houses and/or cars, mysterious people , nice people, and a very few mean-spirited folk.

  As well, you travel with the author.  I have found myself thinking about and appreciating his valuing of old habits and looking out for new habits to enjoy.  I noticed how he was truthful about people - such as the man in Winton, of whom he felt afraid - and began to hate.  But, he also noticed, this man listened, was generous and had a sense of humour.  Steve Braunias talked to all kinds of people and insulted none, even when you could tell he possibly didn't like them.  I found that very admirable.

  I've been to nine of the places. I couldn't wait to leave some of them. Some of the places I have never heard of and still have no intentions of visiting.

  And yet ... now I am going travelling in my own backyard.  I am going to start with a trip to Mount Roskill, to the King Tut Foodbar.  After I've done my groceries at Pak'n'Save.

 
Title: Civilisation: Twenty Places on the Edge of the World
Author: Steve Braunias
Published: Wellington, NZ, Awa Press, 2012
ISBN: 9781877551352

Queen Kat, Carmel & St Jude Get a Life by Maureen McCarthy [Teen retro read]

Set in Melbourne, in the early 1990s, what drew me to this book was the cover (coffee and muffin!) and recommendations from others.  It's described as a classic, but my daughter says it's not.
Whatever, it still was a great story about three very different country girls and their first year after school, sharing a house in Melbourne.  Kat, the rich snob, Jude the political activist, and Carmel the struggling musician.  This first year away from home is when they each find their own talents, strenghths, weaknesses.  They each have issues to deal with, and things which test them, but which also help them grow up more.  They begin as strangers and end as friends.
Other people's comments on the book cover show that this book has really resounded with some.  I thought the girls characters were a bit exaggerated.  For example, Kat was a super snob and very beautiful, Jude incredibly smart (A+s) and a full-on activist against human-rights abuses in Chile, and Carmel very shy but incredibly talented as a singer/musician.  Despite this, each girl had enough in them that you could identify with, and the things they get up feel like they could happen to any one.

Nemesis by Jo Nesbo

In the first pages of Nemesis Detective Harry Hole is beginning to investigate a bank robbery and murder. Not long after, his ex-girlfriend is found dead – apparently suicide – but Harry is worried because he was with her the night it happened, with no memory of it at all. Thus begins a rollercoaster ride for Harry as the boundaries between his professional and personal lives become blurred. He is a confident and clever investigator, and halfway through the book, it seems he has solved the main case. However we soon see that this is an illusion as the bank robberies continue, and the story contains many more twists than I could count.


This is an early Jo Nesbo (first published 2002, translated 2008). It is set in Norway. I first heard about Jo Nesbo from a library patron and many people since have recommended Jo Nesbo to me.  As my first experience - I'll say it was easy to pick up and hard to put down, and not too taxing a read.  The lead characters were tough, just complicated enought to be interesting and the storyline was twisty, thrilling. For its genre of detective thriller Nemesis is great!