michaelcattigan's reviews
469 reviews

I am a huge Patrick Ness fan!

Let me put that out there at the start of this.

I hugely admired his Chaos Walking Trilogy but was utterly blown away by the visceral emotion and mythic scope of A Monster Calls. There are few books that dig inside you as much as that one.

This book is different again: much closer to the feel of Chaos Walking although without the epic scope and scale - and no less powerful for that.

At one level, the book is a rip-roaring adventure: Seth, our protagonist, dies in the prologue. On page 11. Dies with 469 pages left to fill. Those pages recount what Seth does after his death. Maybe.

Having died in a frigid ocean, in winter, in America he is somewhat surprised to have found himself on the path of his parents' old house in an abandoned and apparently post-apocalyptic English town in Summer. Alone. Perhaps.

Echoes of I Am Legend, Robinson Crusoe and George Romero's films - minus the zombies - abound as Seth navigates this empty town, discovers and loots from camping stores and supermarkets. There's even a discovery of a foot print to make the link to Robinson Crusoe stronger.

Seth discovers - or is discovered by - two other survivors in the town: the defensive and resilient Regine and the delightfully tenderly vulnerable Tomasz. And with them, the book acquires other echoes: a sinister black-clad visored Driver pursues them as if stepping out of a Terminator movie; the world has - or may have - integrated - or been forced to integrate - itself into a digital alternative reality programme in the style of The Matrix.

There are sufficient run-ins with, escapes and rescues from and fights with the Driver that this book could be read purely at that adventure story level.

It does follow the tropes, patterns and cliches of the science fiction / action adventure movie genre.

And behind the adventure that awaits Seth in the world he wakes up in is a beautifully tender and painful tale of growing up. Seth is one of the very few gay characters I can bring to mind in Young Adult fiction. His secret relationship with Gudmund is described in beautifully tender prose. The taking of the photograph, which eventually exposes their relationship, is real and touching and deeply moving. As is the pain of separation between them.

And beneath this coming-of-age narrative is the deeply traumatic tale of Owen, Seth's younger brother, who was - perhaps - abducted from their home when Seth was eight.

It's a book of books, of stories, of narratives. Characters' pasts are revealed in dreams and flashbacks; characters reveal parts of their own stories to each other. The sharing and offering of their own stories rendering them vulnerable and binding the trio together.

Towards the beginning of the book in a flashback, Seth and his friends Gudmund, Monica and H are discussing the cheerleaders and Gudmund considers having sex with one for a bet to which Seth replies

"What," Seth said, "and then secretly find out that she's got a heart of gold and actually fall in love with her and then she dumps you when she finds out about the bet but you prove yourself to her by standing outside her house in the rain playing her your special song and on prom night you share a dance that reminds not just the school but the entire wounded world what love really means?"
He stopped because they were all looking at him.
"Damn Seth," Monica said admiringly. "'The entire wounded world.' I'm putting that in my next paper for Edson."
Seth crossed his arms. "I'm just saying a bet over Gudmund having sex with Chiara Leithauser sounds like some piece of shit teenage movie none of us would watch in a million years."

And that's the point. Seth knows how cliched some of the events are. He avoids living in the cliches of these narratives. The existence of convenient cliches cause him to come close to dismissing the reality of the world because it follows narrative tropes. He recognises that last-moment rescues would be expected if he were living through a story. He expects apparently dead antagonists to return for one last assault.

And he questions that. And we question it.

Is the world real? Are his memories and dreams real? Are Regine and Thomasz real? Are they echoes of Viola and Manchee from Chaos Walking? Are Owen, Gudmund, H or Monica real? Is the love between Seth and Gudmund real?

And does it matter?

This is one of the most thoughtful and - dare I use a deeply unfashionable word? - philosophical novels I have read for a long time. And the philosophy within it never becomes pure exposition. It is always embedded in character - and often undermined by either Regine's pragmatism or Tomasz' affection. As Regine tells Seth:

"I think I'm the only real thing I've got... wherever I am, whatever this world is, I've just got to be sure I'm me and that's what's real." She blows out a cloud of smoke. "Know yourself and go in swinging. If it hurts when you hit it, it might be real too."

In addition to the characters and relationships, the flashbacks and the power of stories, what (else) I love about this book - and I imagine others will be put off for exactly this as well - is that, in the end, on the final page, Seth and we are no clearer to knowing where this world is, how real Seth's experiences are or what is going on. At all. Ness saw no obligation to explain, tie things up or concretise anything.

The entire book is unsettling. Disrupts our sense of reality. Deliciously tilts our world. And it achieves it through simply written, elegant prose.

Remarkable.

Woohoo my first finished novel of 2015 and a start to my Reading Challenge!




This book was not what I expected. There was something very evocative and intriguing about both the title and cover - as well as the photographs inside. Almost all of which, according to the note appended to the novel, are genuine and authentic found photographs. I was expecting something haunting and thought provoking and this ... wasn't.

Now, I fully accept that my dissatisfaction with this book is probably in part because I misjudged the audience for it. But I think Ransom Riggs may have done the same. I had expected this to be an adult book and it's not. Hence disappointment. But here's the thing: as any cursory review of my blog will reveal, I have no problem with Young Adult books. I love Young Adult books and see no reason why they shouldn't be included in the Booker Prize and Pulitzer Prizes. I mean, look at just three: My Sister Lives On The Mantlepiece by Annabel Pitcher, Coraline by Neil Gaiman, A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness. Anything by Patrick Ness. Sublime.

So, the shift in gear in my expectation from Adult to Young Adult was not the source of my problem. It just wasn't hugely good.

Here's the premise: Jacob Portman was brought up on his grandfather's tales of monsters and children with strange powers. He believed these to be fairytales or repressed memories of Nazi oppression until he nearly witnessed one of these monsters murdering his grandfather. A series of clues lead to an island off Wales where his grandfathers fairytales suddenly prove themselves true.

There are echoes here of the X-Men's School For Gifted Children, of Harry Potter's Hogwarts... It's all a little familiar. A little derivative.

I also had a problem with the narrative voice. It is a first person narrative from the point of view of a teenager. And the language just wasn't right for that voice. Some very long, tortuously clumsy sentences such as

I was following my dad into our suspiciously dark living room as he muttered things like "What a shame we didn't plan anything for your birthday" and "Oh well, there's always next year," when all the lights flooded on to reveal streamers, balloons, and a motley assortment of aunts, uncles, cousins I rarely spoke to - anyone my mother could cajole into attending - and Rick, whom I was surprised to see lingering near the punch bowl, looking comically out of place in a studded leather jacket.

Wow. That's nearly 100 words. Including an Oxford comma. And a whom.

It is just clumsy and typical of a tendency towards over long sentences and oddly formal language. Riggs just doesn't seem very good at voices and I wish his editor had picked up the phone and said "Ever thought of the third person?" Here's another e ample which jarred with me. It's from the finale after a life-and-death battle

"When we leave here, this loop will close behind us. It's possible you may never be able to return to the time you came from. At least not easily."
"There's nothing for me there," I said quickly. "Even if I could go back, I'm not sure I'd want to."

I'm sorry! What? His mum, whom he left in America? His dad, who brought him to the Welsh island in the first place being stranded alone with the horror of having somehow lost his son?

No voice and character are not Riggs' strength! There was almost nothing to distinguish any of the peculiar children save for their power. And the fact that Jacob hooks up with his grandfather's ex-girlfriend. As you do.

Don't even get me started on Miss Peregrine's interminable info dump exposition about peculiar children, ymbrynes and time loops.

Putting all that to one side, though, the conclusion had promise. Escaping from time loop to time loop allowing for a myriad of different historical and geographical world's to be explored. Again, it's nothing shatteringly novel - the anomalies in BBC's Primeval spring to mind - but promising. This was Riggs' debut novel and I may be persuaded to delve into the sequel Hollow City. Maybe.

Anyway I shall conclude with a selection of the photographs which litter the book. They are undoubtedly cool even if they lack the power of the illustrations in Ness' A Monster Calls. I wonder how much of the planning of the story derived from the necessity to shoehorn in these pictures....

I do love a book with a map in its cover!


I must confess I'm not entirely sure what this map adds to the book, but at a personal level, I used to live pretty much where Shardlake's house is! Inside Lincoln's Inn. Abutting Chancery Lane.

And that, pretty much, sums up the appeal of the Shardlake series, of which this is the sixth. They are familiar and comfortable. The Tudor era is familiar. The legal world of the Inns of Court are familiar. The recurring characters of Guy and Barak are familiar.

And there's nothing whatsoever wrong with that.



I have missed the two preceding novels, Revelation and Heartstone, but there's nothing here that depends on a prior knowledge of those - or any previous Shardlake stories.

There are three interrelated plots within the novel: an ongoing bitter legal case which generates new friends and new enemies for Shardlake; an instruction from the Queen, Catherine Parr, to Shardlake to investigate the disappearance of a dangerous book; and domestic tensions within his own household. These plots alternate and weave together more successfully than I'd felt previous Shardlake novels had done. The conclusion twists deliciously and harrowingly for its protagonists - and the reader. And a continuation to the next book established in the epilogue. Shardlake is a cash cow that Sansom clearly intends to continue milking!

And why not?!

The book is very much a transitioning work: it marks a somewhat brutal retirement of Barak and Tamasin; the introduction of a new assistant, pupil barrister Nicholas; a complete gutting of Shardlake's own household; and, of course, the anticipation of the death of one King and succession of another. I'll miss Barak, who I hope may make guest appearances in the future, and particularly the somewhat fiery Tamasin, although Nicholas has promise as a character.

So, beyond the comfort and familiarity, what does the book offer? An effective enough depiction of the final months of Henry VIII's reign as a time of religious and political turmoil. There are a few slightly clumsy expositions of Anabaptists and Lollards - the benefit of Nicholas' role: the worldly Barak wouldn't have needed the history lessons! Plot points were repeated slightly too frequently for my liking: Shardlake sometimes ruminated on the plot to himself, reported to the palace and then discussed the case with Barak later. I would like Sansom to have a little more faith in my ability to keep up. Similarly, the machinations of the Court politics and the ruse and fall of traditionalist or reforming sympathisers was expounded too much.

Perhaps I have been spoiled though. After Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies, almost every depiction of Tudor London will seem ... Well, monochrome.

I'd also have liked the trail to have been a little less obvious. Shardlake - to me - needs to be piercing in his intellect and perspicacity. Here, his investigations were a little 'plodding': only four people had access to the Queen's room when her book was taken, so he interviewed them and followed the leads. A murder had been committed and the neighbour had disturbed the murderers, so he interviewed them and followed the leads. I did wonder once or twice what Shardlake offered the investigation which others couldn't provide beyond what we might nowadays call plausible deniability for the Queen.

I was also rather more interested in the legal case of the Slanning painting than Sansom seemed to be. For me - abd I fully accept it is possibly just because of my legal background - I'd have liked that explored further. The darkness eventually revealed, again, seemed a little convenient.

What Sansom has produced and offered is a well plotted, well paced, tense political thriller with a likeable cast. The tour-de-force moment, however, is the brooding, terrifying and corrupted presence of the king which presides over the novel.

Ahhhhh David Mitchell.

This, for me, is probably your crowning glory. I loved the realism and naturalistic voice of Black Swan Green; I also loved the mysticism and scope of Cloud Atlas. The Bone Clocks incorporates both those elements whilst ramping up the fantastical into a breathtaking and deft novel.


The novel most closely resembles Cloud Atlas in its structure: a range of interconnected stories narrated by a variety of characters. The connection between them, in this case, is straightforward: the character of Holly Sykes whose voice introduces the novel in 1984 as a fifteen year old girl; whose voice closes the novel as a seventy-four year old in a post-apocalyptic 2043; and who crosses the paths of each of the other narrators in between - Hugo Lamb, Ed Brubeck, Crispin Hershey and Iris Marinus Fenby.

Each section works as a self-contained tale; and the whole is coherent, compelling and tragic. The way in which Mitchell incorporates his human voices into a fantasy cosmography and mythology is exquisite.

Let's take a look at the different sections of the novel.

Our first introduction to Holly Sykes in A Hot Spell sees her escaping her parents' pub and cheating boyfriend. Holly reveals that she had heard voices inside her head as a child, which she named The Radio People before being 'cured'. As she walks, she encounters the equally teenage Ed Brubeck, an angling Esther Little to whom she agrees to offer asylum and a somewhat incomprehensible and unexpected encounter with a homicidal magical being. Following a quick memory swipe, we follow her off to The Isle of Sheppey where she picks fruit briefly before Ed Brubeck finds her to reveal that her brother, Jacko, has gone missing.

Holly was a wonderfully engaging character: realistically naive and gullible, regurgitating opinions and half-formed thoughts; childishly impulsive; impetuous and independent. And strong.

The second section, slightly oddly entitled Myrrh Is Mine, Its Bitter Perfume, a line from the carol We Three Kings, follows the Cambridge student Hugo Lamb in 1991. Ironically, that is one year before I entered Cambridge. The Cambridge depicted was not one I remembered - possibly as I wasn't a member of the choral society, didn't hang out with minor aristocracy and wasn't groomed by societies of immortal atemporals. I was somewhat disappointed not to be approached by MI5! There did seem to be an element of caricature in the characterisation ... but then, it was still a highly enjoyable caricature!

And I wasn't a sociopath, which Hugo Lamb was. He seemed utterly devoid of conscience, ethics or morals, leaving friends dead, women used and the helpless cheated. And yet was somehow compelling. I liked him; and felt slightly dirty for doing so! He is also the deeply unpleasant cousin in Black Swan Green and the reveal there was a genuinely pleasurable ahhhh moment!

His encounter with Holly Sykes in a ski resort was brief and tender, offering him (and her) something akin to redemption.

The third installment, The Wedding Bash, set in 2004, was in my opinion the strongest and most tightly controlled section. Holly is now in a relationship with Ed Brubeck who is a war reporter for Spyglass Magazine, the same magazine featured in Cloud Atlas. They have a daughter, Aoife, and have amassed in Sussex for Holly' sister's wedding.

This section alternates between the domestic tensions in the Sykes-Brubeck household and Ed's recollections of a near-death experience in Baghdad. Ed's feeling of being torn between his world's - domestic and international - was utterly convincing. As were his almost self-destructive interactions with Holly.

Perhaps the reason for the success of this section was the extremely light-touch fantasy elements.

It was a shame in some ways that it was succeeded by the weakest section, Crispin Hershey's Lonely Planet set in 2015 following Crispin Hershey, author of Dessicated Embryos - a thinly disguised Martin Amis of Dead Babies fame - on the literary tour route as his career floundered. Partially as a result of a negative review of his most recent book by Richard Cheese man, whom we had previously met as an undergraduate friend of Hugo Lamb.

This section didn't add much to the novel: Hershey was a self-interested and self-pitying egomaniac - without the delicious darkness of Lamb. We do see his character evolve, but it is one of the longest sections of the novel narrated by its least engaging voice. But it does serve to re-introduce both Lamb and the fantastical more concretely.

And that leads us to 2025 and An Horologist's Labyrinth. This section explores the fantasy element to its full: its narrator is an atemporal immortal b
with psychosoteric powers of mind reading and control (scansion and suasion), telekinesis and others. Magic, in short. We learn of Horologists like Iris Marinus Fenby who reincarnate and Anchorites who decant others' souls to achieve immortality. We learn of the war between them and the significance of 1984 and the offer of asylum becomes explicit.

This section could have stood as a fantasy element in its own right: the mythologising is deft and detailed, the characters convincing, the familiarity we have with Holly by this point, moving.

I was concerned that this book might not quite work, that the literariness and the fantastical might jar. But I was wrong. Save for the Hershey episode, I don't think there's a single misstep.

There is, however, one overwhelming message in this book: stock up on tampons and insulin in 2030. And move to Iceland.

Death Bringer.

An apt title to read this week as I have struggled with another vile bug. Or possibly the same vile bug that I've had since Christmas and never really shifted.

The Death Bringer virus.



Or perhaps just book six in the Skulduggery Pleasant series.

I lost faith a little with Mortal Coil and the unnecessary violence inflicted in Valkyrie Cain there. I was pleased that Landy appeared to have stepped back: there is plenty of violence in here - plenty! - but it has a comic book quality to it rather than horror. It is perhaps telling that the final conflict is resolved in a Forbidden Planet store for a couple of reasons.

Ok. Let's look at the plot. In some ways, the plot felt freer than previously. Almost pared down. The various generals of Mevolent's war had been dispatched with previously and it felt as if Landy had drawn a line under that. Our antagonist instead was the Necromancy Order who had been erstwhile allies and were tutoring Valkyrie. They had discovered (or twisted into being) a sufficiently powerful necromancer to act as the fabled Death Bringer.

Once it was realised what the Death Bringer was intended to do, which isn't wholly surprising given its name, Skulduggery, Valkyrie and the Sanctuary seek to stop her.

A lot of fighting ensues.

We also get a good chance to study the terrible Darquesse, the ultra powerful version of Valkyrie fated to destroy the world. And we discover the truth about - and again witness - Lord Vile. The full Lord Vile. Not just his armour. Their combat certainly came across as cool. And violent. Bones shattered and organs were crushed. But healed instantaneously. There was also something reminiscent of Man Of Steel about it though: two functionally invulnerable characters fighting each other quickly becomes repetitive. And stale. And dull.

In fairness, Landy does just about pitch it right. Better than Man of Steel.

The novel also seems more character driven than previously. Although there has been a gap since I read the previous ones so I may be doing them a disservice. The darkness at the heart of both Skulduggery and Valkyrie get star billing with echoes of Jekyll and Hyde. The somewhat cliched love triangle between Valkyrie, Fletcher and the vampire Caelan is resolved - with an always enjoyable swipe at Twilight

"We're not Buffy and Angel, or Romeo and Juliet, or those other two from West Side Story. We're not even Edward and Bella. OK? You're far too freaky for me."
He looked at her. "We're meant to be together..."
"And this is exactly what I mean."
"Our love is written in the stars."
"And there you go again."
"I love you."
"You bore me."
He faltered. "What?"

And we see far more of Valkyrie at home, with her parents, her baby sister and even her uncle and cousins.

Along with the fighting, Landy's hallmark has been the comedy elements to his books: Skulduggery is typically described as wise-cracking; Scapegrace and Thrasher return as the comedy zombies. Personally, I think the comedy was overdone here a little: following the deaths in the assault on the Necromancers' Temple, Cleric Craven and the remains of the order seemed to degenerate into farce and were almost played for laughs which detracted from the credibility of their threat. And the incessant joking and wisecracking from Skulduggery became just a little tiresome.

I did enjoy Fletcher's character assassination of Valkyrie, though, when she dumped him

"Do you even care? I mean, I know you're crying, I can see the tears, but they're not tears for me. You're crying because you feel bad. Those tears are about you, because everything is about you. It always is, isn't it? The world revolves around you because you are just that selfish.... I don't think it even occurred to you that I would be hurt. It never entered your head. You're that obsessed with yourself, you know that?"

And I have to say I do kind of agree with him: she is an engaging character but all her wisecracking gives her a certain air of self-importance. It is important that we see her in these more domestic and mundane and emotionally vulnerable.

The novel leaves many potential threats by the end: Melancholia, Eliza Scorn, the continually misbehaving reflection and, most interestingly to me, Kenny Dunne, a journalist slowly patching together an exposé of the magical world of Dublin.

I find with this blog that some books can be reviewed almost from the moment you finish them. Others, I need time to ... ruminate. To cogitate. To digest. To reflect on.

This book, Ali Smith's Man Booker Shortlisted How To Be Both, definitely falls into that latter category. It is beautiful. It is thoughtful. It is clever, smart and profound. Funny, touching and sad.



The novel is in two parts and one quirk of the publishing is that some copies commence with one story; others start with the second. I actually had this as both an e-book which began with the story of Francesco del Cossa, a renaissance painter. Simultaneously, my audiobook version started with the story of Georgia, a contemporary teenage girl. I literally had both!

The two characters are connected in a dazzling array of parallels between their stories, their lives, their experiences. Their stories don't simply parallel each other's: they intertwine and weave and writhe around and through each other.

Let's consider the title: what boths are we being shown how to be?

Certainly, this novel clearly explores our capacity to be both male and female. It took me a little while to realise that Francesco was a girl and pretty much as soon as I did she bound her chest and dressed as a man to be accepted as an artist. George has been given a deliberately ambiguous name and her friendship with the equally ambiguously named 'H' starts to explore her sexuality. Neither George, nor her wonderfully created mother, realise that Francesco is female. This exploration of gender and sexuality was no surprise: having read her Girl Meets Boy, itself based on Ovid's account of Iphys in his Metamorphoses, some years ago now.



We are also asked to be both in the past and present, both alive and dead: Francesco's life in Renaissance Italy is gorgeously captured for us and made alive; she is brought to the present by George's interest in her art; Smith grounds George in our present with her text messages, iPad and technology; and George keeps her mother alive by reliving her memories and creating rituals. Ironically, the dead characters (Francesco and George's mother) almost felt the most alive. This issue of past and present is also addressed at a grammatical level as George constantly reminds herself of the appropriate tense to use to discuss her mother.

We also explore the dichotomies between the real and the painted - and by extension the unreal; the painter and the painting; the art and the viewer; the observer and the observed. As I was reading, and I don't know whether this is true of any other reader, I assumed that Francesco del Cossa was an invention and only when idly googling did I discover that she was real, that the Palazzo Schifanoia frescos exist in Ferrara, which is itself a city I am familiar with through literature and the staple GCSE poem My Last Duchess by Browning. A poem which is itself based on an historical scandal - and which accuses the Duke, quite wrongly of having his first wife killed. Misrepresentation, history, fiction, reality, creativity all twining around each other. What actually is the real? And does it really matter?

Smith's language throughout was gorgeous: sparse and even spare at times, realistic and painful at others, and warm elsewhere. There are philosophical and political stances explored in the novel but at no time does it detract from the humanity created within its pages.

Within the novel, George's mother refers to Francesco's art as

so warm it's almost friendly. A friendly work of art. I've never thought such a thing in my life. And look at it. It's never sentimental. It's generous, but it's sardonic too. And whenever it's sardonic, a moment later it's generous again.
She turns to George.
It's a bit like you, she says.

That formulation seems a perfect description of this novel itself: friendly, warm, generous, sardonic.

As a footnote, the novel I've moved onto now is Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch which also revolves around art, another dead mother and a grieving child. That novel seems to luxuriate in its own language and descriptions - all of which is fine! - but a marked contrast to Smith!

Anthony Horowitz, for me as an English teacher is almost synonymous with his teenage spy Alex Rider. Although probably with fewer helicopters, assassins and explosions. And more writing. The series is a very boy friendly, speedily paced series of novels which are one out go-to series for reluctant boy-readers. So it was with some surprise and not a little interest that I discovered, on reading the afterword essay following The House Of Silk, that his career includes Midsomer Murders, Agatha Christie and Foyle's War.

Apparently, this is the first officially sanctioned new Holmes novel - sanctioned by the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Estate. And what is clear from reading it is that Horowitz knows his Holmes! Knows him well! So well he even includes a quiz at the end of his afterword. I got 6 / 10. Could do better. He also includes frequent references to other novels and short stories: The Red Headed League. The Hound of the Baskervilles. The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans. These are all explicit and fleeting, nothing which would put off a newcomer to Holmes but a pleasing nod to the canon for those readers familiar with it.

Horowitz' tone and structure is also pretty authentic. I mean, I don't profess to be a Holmes expert, but the familiarity of the opening scene - Holmes at 221b Baker Street astounding Watson with his deductions as we await a fateful knock at the door - takes you straight back to The Hound of The Baskervilles. Similarly, the length of time spent without Holmes, his disappearance from the narrative, the intertwining of two apparently unrelated plots, the time devoted to other characters giving their own stories in their own voices all felt delightfully familiar. In fact, if anything, characters seemed to be falling over themselves to tell their stories.

I usually don't worry too much about spoilers but a Holmes novel does require a certain delicacy, I suppose. So let's instead look at some of the ingredients Horowitz has added to his mix: an art dealer haunted by a vengeful figure from America; a corpse discovered in a hotel room; the Baker Street Irregulars and a charitable school; and, of course, the eponymous House of Silk. We also have the familiar cast: Lestrade, Mycroft and Mrs Hudson. And a mysterious nighttime assignation with an unnamed yet urbane criminal figure. As Horowitz' sequel is named Moriarty, I think we can make certain assumptions!

These last few years have been golden ones for Holmes fans: BBC's Sherlock with Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman is a delight; Robert Downey Jr's films are fun. Horowitz' Holmes, though, does seem far closer to Jeremy Brett than his more modern counterparts. I have to say that, in my head, some of Holmes' dialogue was read in Brett's lugubrious tones. Stiller, calmer than the somewhat frenetic Messrs Cumberbatch and Downey. Maybe hearing Brett's voice intone Holmes' words is a tribute to Horowitz' writing; maybe it just reveals how impressionable my mind was when, as a child, I saw Brett in The Hound of The Baskervilles.

So, returning to Horowitz, I thoroughly enjoyed this. It was, possibly, a little too self-conscious of its place as part of the canon and maybe a little too reverential. But perhaps that is the nature of all pastiches: without that reverence for the source material it would become a novel featuring Sherlock Holmes rather than a Sherlock Holmes novel.

I've been considering reading this for a while. I do like Sanderson's world building, especially in the Mistborn series; I also have a penchant for superheroes, dating back to a misspent youth. Sanderson's take on superheroes was appealing and tempting, especially as the sequel to Steelheart, entitled Firefight, came out in January this year.

And yet... For some reason I've hesitated, not quite prepared to part with cold hard cash for it. Thank goodness for libraries! Got the book out, paid nothing. And, in all honesty, I'm glad I didn't pay for it.

So, the basic premise is that something called Calamity appeared in the sky and people were gifted the powers we are so familiar with from superhero movies: Steelheart himself has very obvious echoes of Superman with invulnerability, flight, strength and energy bolts, albeit from his hands, flapping cape. He also has the ability to turn matter to steal. We also come across characters who can phase through walls and command shadows, create illusions and turn invisible, generate electricity, and demonstrate precognition. We also hear of people with powers to control earth or fire, to heal or to reduce people to ash with a thought or a pointed finger. These gifted people become known as Epics and quickly become warped, homicidal and power-hungry.

A small group of rebels known as The Reckoners and led by the enigmatic Prof try to fight back by eliminating individual Epics. The novel commences as David infiltrates the Reckoners and shares his plan to defeat Steelheart.

This is very much a Young Adult read: it rattles along with the pace of a computer game from set piece battle to set piece battle. The pace, however, led to somewhat two dimensional characters for me, again reminiscent of video game stock characters: a tank sporting an oversized gun, a sharpshooter, a hacker, a planner. There was never any time to feel as if I knew them, or even that there was anything to know.

Sanderson's world here was also not an original world such as he created in the Mistborn or Way of Kings. It is Chicago, transformed to steel by Steelheart and cloaked in eternal night. Sanderson does like to identify his worlds with individual features: the ash and fog of Mistborn; the rock and winds of The Way Of Kings; and now this steel cityscape.

In many ways, Steelheart feels very similar to Mistborn: a city dominated by an apparently invincible tyrant; a plucky band of rebels; mysterious powers. What it lacks though was the charisma of Kelsier or the depth and humanity of Vin. The Prof and David simply didn't have the same power.

There are some fabulous and thoughtful Young Adult books out there - nodding to Phillip Pullman and Patrick Ness, Julie Berry's All The Truth That's In Me - and some cracking fun one - Derek Landy and Skulduggery Pleasant. This book falls somewhere in the middle. It is a decent read but it takes itself too seriously to be joyously fun and doesn't have the depth to really explore the characters.

And it really annoyed me that Sanderson - or David anyway - cannot differentiate between a simile and a metaphor. It is David's character trait that his similes are lame:

"Wow," I said. "It's like ... A banana farm for guns."
"A banana farm, Megan said flatly.
"Sure. You know, how bananas grow from their trees and hang down and stuff?"
"Knees, you suck at metaphors."
I blushed. An art gallery, I thought. I should have said "like an art gallery for guns."
These are not metaphors. Similes!





This is the first of my reviews of this year's CILIP Carnegie Medal nominees. Well, my second. Patrick Ness' More Than This I read back in August - see here for my review - six months before the shortlist was announced. And to be honest, it will take some beating!

Anyway, this is my first knowing CILIP Carnegie read.

And I must say I enjoyed it thoroughly! I don't think it's a winner but a great read. I mean, fairytales, wolves, witches, werepeople, cross dressing. And a slightly underused hen. What's not to like?

Fairytales and mythology have continued to inspire writers and are enjoying a revival with Neil Gaiman, Angela Carter, Susanna Clarke, Helene Wecker, Ali Smith, Ali Shaw, Erin Morgenstern and the ubiquitous Disney - who would watch Frozen when you could read The Girl With Glass Feet? So, in this environment, expectations are high for Tinder. Heady company, Ms Gardner!

And the opening lines do not disappoint.

Once in a time of war, when I was a soldier in the Imperial Army, I saw Death walking. He wore upon his skull a withered crown of white bone twisted with green hawthorn. His skeleton was shrouded with a tattered cloak of gold and, in his wake, stood the ghosts of my comrades newly plucked, half-lived, from life. Many I knew by name.
Based on the first fairy tale Hans Christian Anderson's wrote, The Tinderbox, Tinder's narrator is Otto Hundebiss, a common soldier drafted into the Imperial Army during the Thirty Years War of 1618-1648. Following the slaughter of his compatriots, Otto drifts into a fairytale world of hidden castles, unruly princesses and fearsome werewolves. Following the structure of the original take, Otto has to face three trials in order to retrieve a mysterious tinderbox, keeping the riches he finds there. Instead of returning it to its owner, he keeps the tinderbox, causing her to be killed. In a nearby town, he discovers that the tinderbox grants him the power to summon monstrous werewolves.

The language of the novel maintains the sparseness and occasional lyricism of the classic fairytale. There's not the depth of character or psychology you might expect: Otto never becomes more than a cipher for the traumatised child soldier, the common man struggling against social inequalities, or sexual maturing. He doesn't work as a character, even though Gardner does toss us flashbacks to the horrors that Otto has experienced. But that's all okay because this is, at the end of the day, a fairy tale.

The illustrations in the book by David Roberts are also worth a mention: they are gorgeous! Simply gorgeous. Stylised and unreal but gorgeous.



The novel certainly holds the imagination with the quality of an hallucination or a dream and a similar logic. Gardner has said that the novel was inspired by the experiences of returned soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan and of child soldiers in Rwanda as well as the Thirty Years War. For me, these real world parallels were mere echoes - although parents may want to exercise caution as the fate of Otto's sister becomes clear as well as the fate of the daughter of a neighbouring farm. It is perhaps here that the more modern conflicts and our outrage at the use of rape as a weapon of war become most patent.