Reading Matters

'The Tivington Nott' by Alex Miller

Fiction - paperback; Allen & Unwin; 180 pages; 2013. Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

It somehow seems appropriate to post this review on the day of the Grand National, a horse race over jumps that has its roots in both hunting and steeplechasing (in which farmers would race their horses from one church steeple to another, jumping over ditches, hedges and whatever else happened to get in the way as they did so). Whatever you think of the National, there's no doubt that it demonstrates the superb athleticism of the horse. It also demonstrates the special relationship between horse and rider — how the two can work as one to achieve great feats of courage and stamina.

That's one of the central themes of Alex Miller's debut novel, The Tivington Nott, which was first published in 1989, but has just been made available to British readers for the first time thanks to a reprint by the publisher Allen & Unwin UK. It is an extraordinarily vivid account of one young man's participation in a stag hunt on the Exmoor borders and is filled with beautiful descriptions of Nature and the countryside — "the last ancient homeland of the wild red deer in England" — as well as depicting the bond between horse and rider like nothing I have ever read before.

An outsider's view

The story is set in 1952 on a farm in Somerset, where the unnamed narrator is a teenage labourer from London struggling to fit in. The first part of the novel sets out to describe how he is at odds with everyone around him — he refuses to call his boss master as tradition dictates, gets bullied by local labourers and is viewed with disdain by the farmer's wife ("Mrs Roly-Poly") who believes "boys from London cannot be trusted".

The only person with whom he should feel some affinity is another outsider, Major Fred Alsop, a retired Australian army officer trying too hard to be accepted by the locals who secretly despise him. The Major wears the attire of the landed gentry, talks too loudly and goes about as if he owns the place ("An Australian horseman in fancy dress prancing around on Exmoor. Out of a book, this bloke. A tourist!"). But even our narrator cannot fail to notice that the Major will never fit in —  he is tolerated because he has a rather impressive, and much sought-after, black stallion imported from Australia called Kabara.

It is Kabara that forms the bridging link between the first part of the story and the (far larger) second part, because our narrator ends up riding the stallion in the stag hunt, which is so evocatively described that you feel as if you are right there in the saddle with him.

Based on real people and events

Alex Miller makes no secret that this book is largely autobiographical — he, too, was a farm labourer in West Somerset when he was 15, before he emigrated to Australia alone when he was 17 . His "author's note" at the front of my edition claims that all the characters are based on real people and that he even used some of their real names.

This probably explains why the novel feels so authentic and "animated". You get such a sense of the claustrophobic closed social system in which he finds himself that it's hard not to share his loneliness and alienation. And it's easy to understand why he so identifies with Kabara, a gutsy stallion who defies the odds to compete with other horses more used to challenging West Country terrain than him, and the "Tivington nott", a local stag that has no antlers rumoured to live in the area.

What I loved most about the book was the sense of adventure and excitement it conveys as the narrator rides second horse to the stag hunt. Every little moment of the chase is recorded — the uphill battles, the treacherous descents, the death-defying jumps — so that most of the time your heart is in your throat willing him to stay on the horse and keep in sight of the hounds. And all the time Miller is conscious of conveying the mysterious beauty of the natural world.

In front of me the wide silent ride winds deep into the dark green and dun shadows of the ancient woods. I peer down this track, shaded and thick on either side with bracken and underbrush. A bird is calling repeatedly in there; a sharp short urgent sound, again and again. Then it stops and everything is silent and still around me. Those great dogs are in there too, somewhere. They are intently unravelling the labyrinth of animal scents, some of them perhaps staying true to the peculiar signature of the Haddon stag, approaching his secret lair, working the complex line closer to him by the minute.

Threaded into this thrilling narrative are little insights into various characters — the houndsman Grabbe, the whipper-in Matthew Tolland, the red-coated huntsman Perry, the chairman of the Hunt Damages Committee Harry Cheyne and the master of the hunt, Mrs Grant, among others — so that a well rounded picture of this close-knit community, where class and social standing is everything, is evoked.

But this is not just a fast-paced spinetingling read: the conclusion is a deeply moving one as our narrator realises Kabara has found his place, but he still hasn't quite found his...

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I read this book as part of Australian Literature Month, which runs throughout April 2013. The idea is to simply celebrate and help promote literature from my homeland and to encourage others to do the same. Anyone can take part. All you need to do is read an Australian book or two, post about Australian literature on your own blog or simply engage in the conversation on this blog and on Twitter using the hashtag #OzLitMonth. If you don't have a blog, don't worry — you just need to be willing to read something by an Australian writer and maybe comment on other people's posts. You can find out more here.

'Under the Skin' by Michel Faber

Fiction - paperback; Canongate; 305 pages; 2000.

This may possibly be the most difficult review I've ever had to write. Clearly, given my five-star rating, it's not because the book is bad; on the contrary, it is superb. But to try and write about Michel Faber's Under the Skin without giving away crucial plot spoilers is nigh on impossible.

This is a novel that is cloaked in secrecy — I've yet to come across a review online that gives away the bizarre content or the dramatic ending — and I'm not about to become the first to give it all away. Let me just say that it is quite unlike anything I've ever read before. It's intriguing and creepy and defies categorisation and the title is uncannily appropriate, because the story does, indeed, get under the skin...

An unconventional lead character

First, let's meet the main character, Isserley, who is "half Baywatch babe, half little old lady". She drives up and down the A9 in Scotland in her battered red Toyota Corolla and often picks up hitchhikers along the way — well, actually, she seeks them out, but more on that later. This is how one man she picks up describes her:

Fantastic tits on this one, but God, there wasn't much of her otherwise. Tiny — like a kid peering up over the steering wheel. How tall would she be? Five foot one, maybe, standing up. [...] The rest of her was a funny shape, though. Long skinny arms with big knobbly elbows — no wonder her top was long sleeved. Knobbly wrists too, and big hands. [...] Her face had kind of shocked him. It was small and heart-shaped, like an elf in a kiddie's book, with a perfect little nose and a fantastic big-lipped curvy mouth like a supermodel. But she had puffy cheeks and was wearing the thickest glasses he'd seen in his life: they magnified her eyes so much they looked about twice normal size.

So, now that we know that Isserley looks unconventional, I can tell you about her unconventional job — which is to cruise the main roads of Scotland looking for hitchhikers who are "hunks on legs". She wants big men, specifically men with muscles, and when she lures them into her car she can't help "savouring the thought of how superb he'd be once he was naked".

What happens to these men once they've been "caught" — or lured by Isserley's big bosoms, more accurately — is the crux of the novel. And on that score I'm keeping completely schtum. Sorry.

An "issues" novel

As much as I'm loathe to describe Under the Skin as an "issues" novel, it does contain many ethical, moral and political matters that may well force you to rethink your views on everything from Nature to meat consumption, sexual identity to the notion of mercy. How we view the outsider and our attempts to conform and make sense of the world are also key elements — and to what degree do we judge people by appearance and not substance or character.

While the prose style is not particularly elegant or lyrical,  Faber is very good at describing the beauty of the landscape and the rural sights that Isserley sees while she is on the road.

A luminous moat of rainwater, a swarm of gulls following a seeder around a loamy field, a glimpse of rain two or three mountains away, even a lone oystercatcher flying overhead: any of these could make Isserley half forget what she was on the road for.

And you really get a sense of Isserley's pain and hardship, and the sacrifices she has made to be successful in her job. She's a wonderful character — feisty, strong, opinionated and human — and despite her dubious occupation, it's hard not to feel empathy for her.

While the story swings between psychological thriller and macabre horror, with numerous twists and unexpected plot developments, Faber seems to have one hand firmly on the tiller: nothing is overplayed or gratuitous or even fully explained. He takes you on a ride as exciting as Isserley's adventures in her beat up old car and somehow makes you think about the world in a completely different way.

Under the Skin — which was shortlisted for the Whitbread Prize in 2000 — is definitely one of the most strange and original novels I've ever read. It's also one of the most thrilling and thought-provoking stories I've come across in years — and with all the books I devour, that's really saying something...

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I read this book as part of my year-long Project 1001.
I also chose it for my Riverside Readers book group and was delighted to find that the four other members who made the meeting loved it as much as me — there was certainly a lot to discuss. We awarded it a group score of 9.4 out of 10.

'Eventide' by Kent Haruf

Fiction - Kindle edition; Picador; 300 pages; 2005.

A couple of months ago you may remember that I read — and fell in love with — Kent Haruf's Plainsong, the first in a loose trilogy of novels set in Holt, Colorado. I loved the story so much that I raced through it in a matter of days and then felt completely bereft, because I wanted to spend more time with those wonderful characters.

Which is why reading Eventide, the second in the series, was so enjoyable: from the moment I opened the first page it was like being reacquainted with old friends. 

Along with the evocative descriptions of rural Colorado — "The blue sandhills in the far distance low on the low horizon, the sky so clear and empty, the air so dry" — there were the lovely old McPheron brothers, Harold and Raymond, scraping their boots on the porch before going indoors. And there, in the kitchen of their farmhouse, was Victoria Roubideaux, the unmarried mother whom they had taken in two years earlier. Ah, remember me, I wanted to say. I've missed you  guys so much.

Old characters and new characters

While Eventide can be read as a stand alone novel, I think it probably helps to have read Plainsong first, if only to understand the touching back story behind Victoria and the McPheron brothers. But aside from a couple of brief references to school teachers Tom Guthrie (and his sons) and Maggie Jones, who had starring roles in the earlier novel, there's a host of new characters in this one.

Betty and Luther Wallace, a married couple living on the breadline, are beautifully depicted. They clearly have "issues" — they cannot keep their trailer clean, are worried that their children may be taken into care, live on food stamps and are "micro-managed" by a kindly and patient social worker — but Haruf never casts judgement. He lets his characters do that instead. "Would you look at that," says a man waiting in a supermarket queue as Betty and Luther load up their purchases. "They're eating better than you and me and they're on foodstamps."

Oh let them be, the woman said. Are they hurting you?
They're eating a steak dinner and I'm eating beans. That's hurting me.
But would you want to be them?
I'm not saying that.
What are you saying?
I'm not saying that.

Similarly, Karuf depicts the loneliness of 11-year-old DJ Kephart's life so realistically that you want to reach into the novel and give him a hug. His tentative friendship with Dena, a girl struggling to comprehend the fact her father has fled the family home, and the way in which they seek solace in each another's company is tenderly drawn.

Ordinary people

That the author can write about this diverse range of characters — from the very young to the very old, whether male or female — and make them seem flesh and blood real shows a very special talent for knowing what makes people tick. That they all share common traits —  loneliness, hardship and family troubles, among them — suggests he also knows how ordinary people struggle in their day-to-day lives. But he also knows that we are all capable of extraordinary courage and kindness. His novel is peppered with so many moments of truth that it's hard not to see Eventide as anything other than life-affirming.

I will admit that I read sections of this book with a giant lump in my throat, and yet there is nothing sentimental or saccharine in the understated, almost flat, narrative. But somehow, in its storytelling, in its evocation of place and spirit, in the characters' raw and truthful actions, you get so caught up in everyone's lives that you cannot help but feel deeply moved.

I'm conscious that I haven't really outlined the plot of the Eventide. But there's not much to say: each set of characters wrestles with individual difficulties, goes through ups and downs, and comes out the other side slightly more confident than they were when they initially started out. And despite the carefully measured, tightly controlled prose, the narrative is utterly compelling — I read this book in the space of 36 hours and then wished I hadn't been so greedy.

The good news is that I don't have to wait long to visit Holt, Colorado once again — Benediction, the third instalment in the trilogy, will be published in the UK by Picador in April.

'The Observations' by Jane Harris

Fiction - paperback; Faber and Faber; 544 pages; 2007.

If I was to name a "literary discovery" I made during 2012 it would be British author Jane Harris. I read Gillespie and I back in March and loved it so much it made my top 10 list of books for the year. Her debut novel, The Observations, would have been on that list, too, but I had to narrow down my choices and limiting one book per author seemed a quick and easy way to do that. But there's not much between these novels — both are delightfully fun reads.

A quirky take on historical fiction

The Observations is set in rural Scotland in 1863 and is narrated by one of the most engaging characters you are ever likely to meet in contemporary literature. Her name is Bessy Buckley — although she has changed it from something else in order to escape her past — and she's Irish, but has been living in Scotland for four years. (How she came to Scotland and what she has been doing since her arrival are revealed only when Bessy feels comfortable enough to tell you — and that's a good way into the novel.)

When we first meet Bessy, she is on her way from Glasgow to Edinburgh, where she hopes to find a "new situation" — her last employer, Mr Levy, has died. But she gets diverted enroute and finds herself on a farm known as Castle Haivers, where she meets an intriguing and very beautiful mistress, Arabella Reid, who employs her as an "in and out" girl looking after the house and garden.

But Arabella has strange ways — she also wants Bessy, who can read and write, to keep a journal as a condition of her employment. It is this keeping of the journal that makes The Observations such a quirky take on the traditional maid-and-mistress scenario — through it we learn so much, not only of Bessy's current life and thought processes, but of Arabella's weird fascination with the underclass.

An intimate and bawdy voice

The most striking thing about this chunky novel is Bessy's voice. It's intimate, bawdy and very honest. She has a wicked sense of humour — for instance, she introduces the stuck-up Reverend Pollock as "Reverend Bollock", and at a posh dinner party hosted by Arabella she sings a self-composed song "about a man who is afflicted by a severe case of intestinal gas and who is prone to fart in inappropriate places" (hilariously entitled The Wind that Blows down Barrack Street).

She also has a rather mischievous streak that sadly backfires on her in a most alarming way — and it is this turn of events that packs quite a powerful punch. Indeed, for a book that is seemingly a simple tale of a young maid trying to please her employer it is filled with delicious twists and turns that keeps the reader on their toes: you are never quite sure what is going to happen next.

There's an intriguing undercurrent of menace that runs underneath the storyline (think Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca), but The Observations is mostly a comic tale. Yet Harris balances the humour with moments of poignancy. (Bessy's back story is particularly tragic — even if she doesn't realise it — but the sympathy card is never played, which makes it even more sad.)

My only criticism is that the ending is a bit "twee" — all the loose ends are too deftly and neatly tied up — but I can't stress how much I enjoyed being in Bessy's lively and entertaining company for the 10 or so days I took to read this. I really can't wait to see what Harris delivers next.

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This book was chosen by Miranda for our Riverside Readers book group. Unfortunately I couldn't make the meeting in early December, but apparently the book wasn't universally loved, although the group did give it an overall rating of 8/10.

'The Devil I Know' by Claire Kilroy

Fiction - paperback; Faber and Faber; 384 pages; 2012. Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Claire Kilroy, a young Irish writer, first came to my attention in 2008 with her second novel, Tenderwire, an astonishingly good literary thriller about an Irish violinist, which is set in New York.

I was less enamoured of her next book, All Names Have Been Changed, which is about a bunch of creative writing students at Trinity College who become dangerously obsessed with their once-famous, now washed-up tutor.

Her fourth — and latest — novel, The Devil I Know, came out in the summer and I greedily gulped it down in a matter of days. It is an extraordinarily funny satire about the recent collapse of the Irish economy — and certainly the best Irish book I read all year.

A public inquiry

This Faustian tale is set over 10 days in March, 2016, when Tristram St Lawrence, 13th Earl of Howth, is giving evidence at a public inquiry into the collapse of the Irish economy.

"People have been saying a lot of bad things about me in the press," he tells the presiding judge. "I am here to say a few more."

Tristram is from Anglo-Irish stock and grew up in a castle in Howth, a fashionable suburb of Dublin, but left the country in the early 1990s. He makes his living on the international conference circuit as an interpreter ("I do all the major European languages"). But in 2006 he returned to Ireland by accident — literally — when his plane flying from Birmingham to Florida was diverted to Dublin Airport after a near-disaster in the air.

During his unscheduled stopover, he stays at the airport Hilton, where he runs into an old school chum now turned property developer, Desmond Hickey. From this unexpected rendezvous an entire web of greed, hubris and deception — involving speculative development, corrupt politicians, prostitution and international money lending — is set into motion.

Getting rich by doing nothing

As Tristram's tale unfolds over the course of the inquiry, we learn that he is a recovering alcoholic, and that his mentor, Monsieur Deauville, is always just a phone call away to provide support and encouragement whenever he feels the need for a drink coming on.

M. Deauville later acts as a shady businessman, who sets up Castle Holdings — "It bought nothing, sold nothing, manufactured nothing, did nothing, and yet it returned a profit of €66 million that first year" — in Tristram's name. This shell company, which effectively acts as an unsupervised licensed bank, provides the much-needed funds for Hickey's big development project just a few hundred yards shy of Tristram's ancestral home.

The Claremont project, on the site of a derelict cement factory in Howth, includes eight apartment blocks ("the guts of 400 residential units"), 12,000sqm of office space and a hotel. But it needs to be rezoned from industrial to high-density residential and commercial — an unlikely prospect given its location in an area of outstanding natural beauty. But this is where Minister Ray Lawless (note the name) steps in to sort things out, brown paperbag style.

This speculative development costs €10 million for the land alone, but within a week of its rezoning it is valued at €60 million. When a glamorous PR campaign swings into action, people queue around the block to be the first to buy an overpriced, not-yet-built apartment. Hickey, Tristram and co are coining it, but instead of quitting while ahead, Castle Holdings goes further into debt to fund bigger and potentially more profitable developments. And then the global financial crisis of 2008 hits — with devastating consequences.

Darkly comic morality tale

The Devil I Know  perfectly captures the madness and chaos that gripped Ireland during the boom years. Indeed, that madness and chaos becomes Beckett-like towards the end of the novel, which descends into a kind of crazy magic realism. While Kilroy's style is far from pretentious, her narrative is rife with puns, word play and Irish literary references — great fun if you are into that sort of thing, but not obtrusive or bothersome if you are not.

I laughed a lot while reading this book and quoted long passages of it to Mr Reading Matters, because I knew much of it would resonate. (He once worked in a cement factory in Howth, for instance.) Like all true satires, it uses wit as a weapon — to highlight the stupidity, idiocy and foolhardiness of those builders, bankers, politicians, developers and businessmen who put their own greed before the good of the nation and the environment.

As a morality tale, The Devil I Know is a truly fine and entertaining one. Having seen firsthand those now-abandoned housing developments that are scattered the length and breadth of Ireland, I have often wondered, how on earth did so much development get approved — and funded? This book, in its darkly comic way, explains it pretty well.

'Plainsong' by Kent Haruf

Fiction - paperback;  Picador; 301 pages; 2001.

The eagle-eyed among you may have noticed that I don't tend to read much American fiction. That's mainly because I made a conscious decision four or five years ago to expand my frame of reference and to read more translated fiction or fiction from other countries. But if someone champions a particular American novel I will take notice.

So, when Canadian author Lauren B. Davis named Kent Haruf's Plainsong as one of her favourite books for Triple Choice Tuesday earlier this year I knew I had to read it. "Not only is his writing nearly perfect in its precision (not an extra word, not a single imperfect metaphor, every detail exactly chosen), Haruf's compassion, his simplicity, his understanding of the human soul are inspiring," said Lauren. "Unlike so many contemporary writers, who expend vast quantities of energy being oh-so-clever, Haruf eschews wit for heart."

She wasn't wrong. Plainsong is a beautiful, sincere story about real people with complicated, messy lives — and I loved every single carefully chosen word of it.

A cast of troubled characters

The novel is set in rural Colorado in the 1980s and follows the trials and tribulations of a handful of diverse but interesting characters, each of whom has a personal problem to work through.

There is Tom Guthrie, a schoolteacher, who is left to bring up his two young boys — Ike, 10, and Bobby, 9 — when his wife, incapacitated by depression, leaves him.

There is Victoria Roubideaux, a 17-year-old schoolgirl kicked out of the family home by her mother when she falls unexpectedly pregnant.

And there are the two old, never-married, McPheron brothers, Harold and Raymond, who run a farm and take in Victoria despite never having lived with a woman before.

A larger cast of subsidiary characters, including the elderly Mrs Stearns, Victoria's compassionate teacher Maggie Jones and no-hoper student Russell Beckman, provide extra interest and drama.

Carefully structured

The book is structured around several carefully intertwined narrative threads, which culminate in a rather splendid, satisfying — and moving — ending.

The plot isn't particularly complex or even well developed, but that isn't why you read this book. Instead, Plainsong's strengths lie in its evocative language, the brilliant characterisation and the "message" which is essentially an examination of the ties that bind people — and communities — together, and the ways in which our day-to-day struggles (whether at school, on the farm or in the home) make up the richness of our lives.

I particularly enjoyed the references to rural living, including the depiction of cattle farming and the descriptions of the rugged landscape and the changing seasons.

They [Ike and Bobby] stamped their feet and flapped their arms in their winter coats, warming themselves and watching their father and the old McPheron brothers in their efforts. Overhead the sky was as blue as just-washed café crockery and the sun was shining brilliantly. But the afternoon was turning even colder. There was something building up in the west. From far off over the mountains the clouds were stacking up.  The boys stayed near the smudge pot, trying to keep warm.

Haruf's great skill as a writer is to make us feel involved in each of his character's lives, whether it's the young, slightly sad Guthrie boys who desperately miss their mother, or the shy, socially awkward McPheron brothers who are gentle, kindhearted but emotionally out of their depth when Victoria comes to live with them.

His prose, however, is what makes this book such a deeply affecting read. It is free of sentimentality. In fact, it is almost flat. Mostly it is delicate and lovely. There were times when it reminded me of Irish writer John McGahern, because it has that same simple but lyrical quality. And even the subject matter — ordinary lives lived against a backdrop of beautiful scenery and strong community ties — evoked that same feeling I get from the very best Irish fiction.

If you want to read something completely absorbing, something that will transport you into another world and introduce you to characters you will come to know and love, I cannot recommend Plainsong highly enough. It was first published in 1999 and a sequel, Eventide, was published five years later.

'Everybody has Everything' by Katrina Onstad

Fiction - paperback; Emblem Editions; 312 pages; 2012.

Katrina Onstad's Everybody has Everything — longlisted for this year's Giller Prize — is billed as a story about parenthood, but I think it's more accurate to describe it as a portrait of a marriage. It is also a compelling examination of how different people find fulfilment in different ways. More importantly, it is so filled with home truths — about relationships, friends, family and society — that if you don't recognise yourself within these pages you will see someone else you know, perhaps a friend, a sibling or work colleague.

A portrait of married life

The story revolves around a married couple — Ana, a high-flying corporate lawyer in her late 30s, and James, 42, a documentary film-maker who has just been laid-off from his television job. From the outset, it can be assumed that it is Ana, the major breadwinner and ambitious career woman, who wears the trousers in the relationship, but as the narrative evolves we learn that nothing is quite what it seems and that both partners are deeply flawed and grappling with their own needs and desires. The title of the book may suggest that "everybody has everything", but do they really?

For a start, Ana and James cannot have children. They find this out on the morning they are to attend the wedding of their friends Marcus and Sarah, who is eight months pregnant. They have only known Marcus and Sarah for a short time, but the friendship becomes a central part of their busy lives and the resultant child, a boy called Finn, effectively becomes the child they couldn't have.

James had developed an unspoken narrative in which he and Finn had a special bond. He did not tell Ana how it made him feel, this warm bag of socks over his shoulder, the pleasure he got when Finn moved his penny-shaped mouth. [...]  Sarah and Marcus waved as they walked away, pushing the stroller, calling thank-yous behind them as Ana and James stood on the porch, James's arm protectively around his wife, wondering if anyone else had noticed that Ana had never once held the baby.

This difference in attitude towards Finn — James is warm, affectionate and doting; Ana cool, detached and indifferent — comes into sharp relief when a car accident leaves Marcus dead and Sarah in a coma: two-and-a-half-year-old Finn is left in their care. Having parenthood thrust upon them in this way is an unexpected — and for Ana in particular, unwanted — challenge. Much of the book highlights how they deal with this change in circumstances and priorities.

Finding fulfilment

The crucial element of the story is not so much whether everyone can be an effective parent, but how people find fulfilment in their lives. For Ana fulfilment comes through work and career; for James it is is being a father. It is this unconventional take, in which Onstad pits the ambivalence of motherhood against the warm glow of fatherhood, that I most admired about this book. And because she does it in such an intelligent, perceptive way, without ever casting judgement or aspersions on Ana, it feels all the more real — and hard-hitting.

In highlighting the ways in which both individuals approach their new-found parenthood, Onstad is able to show their strengths and weaknesses as a couple. And by the end of the novel you come to understand that no matter how far apart marriage partners may grow, the importance of a shared history can never be underestimated. (On more than one occasion I was reminded of Joshua Henkin's 2008 novel, Matrimony, which is a wonderful portrait of marriage over the course of 15 years.)

Admittedly, there are a couple of narrative "twists" near the end which I felt weakened the story  (I won't reveal my concerns, for fear of the spoiling the plot), but on the whole I loved this sharply observed novel and devoured it in a weekend. It is tender and compassionate without being cloying or sentimental, and intelligent and wise without being dry or preachy. And I would dearly love to see Everyone has Everything make the short-list for the Giller Prize, which is revealed on Monday.

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I read this book as part of the Shadow Giller Prize 2012. I will include links to reviews by other jury members as and when they are published. Thanks to Mrs KevinfromCanada for hand-delivering this copy to me.

'The Pilgrimage' by John Broderick

Fiction - paperback; Lilliput Press; 130 pages; 2004.

Upon publication in 1961 The Pilgrimage, like so many Irish novels that dealt with sex and the Church at the time, was banned by the Censorship Board. Four years later it was retitled The Chameleons and sold more than 100,000 copies in the US.

It was John Broderick's first novel. He went on to write 11 more — most of which are out of print — and an autobiography, but he got his start as a journalist and book reviewer. He died in 1989.

A dark book about sex

While the scandalous element of this novel may have lost its potency — so much about Ireland has changed since then and the Church is no longer a dominant force — there's no doubt that this is a very dark book, and the depiction of sex within it still has the power to shock. I've not read Fifty Shades of Grey, but I suspect there's a particular scene in The Pilgrimage that even EL James would not even think to write.

Set during the 1950s, this is very much a story about the hidden Ireland, about what goes on behind closed doors. It is also a disturbing portrait of what happens to ordinary men and women when the Church tries to control sex and sexuality. And it peels back the facade to show how women and gay men were particularly affected by the hypocrisy at the heart of its religious doctrine.

An upstanding woman with a secret life

The story is largely told through the eyes of Julia Glynn, a fine upstanding Church-going woman, who has a secret life. Married to a rich bedridden man, who can no longer fulfill her sexual needs, she seeks out casual encounters with strange men and rekindles her affair with her husband's handsome young nephew and personal doctor, Jim Glynn.

But when Julia receives a malicious note from an anonymous correspondent detailing her relationship with Jim, she fears that this secret life may become exposed. Not that it puts her off too much — she later instigates a sordid night-time relationship with the household's butler, a cold man called Stephen Lydon, who may or may not be her husband's former lover.

As you can see by this brief description, the relationships in this novel are rather complicated and twisted — all the more so when you begin to realise that Julia's marriage is merely one of convenience. Nothing is spelt out, but if you read between the lines it is clear that her husband is gay and that even on their honeymoon in France, when they "struck up a friendship with a young German who accompanied them everywhere and waved them a sentimental farewell at the airport", he was having an affair right under her nose.

Restrained prose

Like the best Irish novels, the prose here is restrained, stripped back, bare. Every word counts. Much of the plot moves forward by dialogue, and it is this dialogue which reveals so much about his well-drawn, believable characters — it's like every time they open their mouths, they reveal their souls.

And despite the lack of any superfluous words, Broderick manages to convey feelings and whole atmospheres — usually of malice and foreboding — so that they resonate off the page. A recurring theme is the claustrophobia of small town life, where everyone knows everyone's business — or thinks they do — something that Julia finds particularly difficult to live with.

She was glad she had brought the car: to walk through the narrow, claustrophobic streets of this town with its almost indecent sense of intimacy would, at that moment, have been more than she could bear. She was too accurately attuned to the tempo of the place not to know that the tiniest change of mood, or worried preoccupation, was as accurately registered as an earthquake on a seismograph. These people did not lay bare their petty secrets by any logical system, but by an instinct which was almost entirely physical; and, therefore to Julia most terrifying, since her own reactions were largely of the blood. For that reason, like many others who live in those closed communities, she had developed a natural gift for dissimulation to an uncanny pitch of perfection. The city dweller who passes through a country town, and imagines it sleepy and apathetic is very far from the truth: it is as watchful as a jungle.

Two kinds of pilgrimage

The main plot, which involves Julia's husband planning a trip to Lourdes in the hope he may be cured, gives the book its title. But it could also be argued that the way Julia uses her "smooth-skinned marble body" is a form of pilgrimage, too.

I loved this book for its insights into human nature, its political and social commentary, its spotlight on hypocrisy in the Church and people's spiritual obsessions — all told in such a simple, crisp prose style and at a surprisingly gripping pace. The ending, which is abrupt and does not feel in keeping with the rest of the novel, has meant more to me with the passing of time.

I haven't been as excited by an Irish author since I discovered the late, great John McGahern in 2005. This was the first novel I have read by John Broderick; it won't be the last.

'Heaven and Hell' by Jón Kalman Stefánsson

Fiction - paperback;  Maclehose Press; 215 pages; 2011. Translated from the Icelandic by Philip Roughton. Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Jón Kalman Stefánsson's Heaven and Hell, which is set in Iceland at the turn of the 19th century, explores the fragility of friendship amid the dangers posed by the ocean. A quote on the front cover  describes the book as "an unusually intense reading experience". I would add that it is heart-breaking and utterly beguiling, too.

Sea-faring drama

The story brings to life a small fishing community at the "far end of the world" — sandwiched between "the sea on one side, steep and lofty mountains on the other" — and is, essentially, a novel of two halves: the first explores a treacherous overnight fishing trip in which one man dies from the ice-cold temperatures; and the second recounts the impact of his death on his closest friend, who is known throughout the narrative as "the boy".

The first 100 or so pages are among the most exciting — and eloquent — that I have ever read. It is written in the present tense, so the prose is immediate and often electrifying as it draws you into a foreign world full of life-or-death moments. It feels like an adventure story — and brims with heart-hammering drama.

As a portrait of fishermen putting their lives in danger every time they go out on the water it is intimate and fascinating. We learn how much they hate the ocean ("cold-blue and never still, a gigantic creature that breathes"), the great leveller which does not choose whom to drown and everyone — "rotten bastards and good men, giants and laggards, the happy and sad" — is made equal.

There are shouts, a few frantic gestures, and then it's as if we were never here, the dead body sinks, the blood within it cools, memories turn to nothing, fish come and nibble the lips that were kissed yesterday and spoke the words that meant everything, nibble the shoulders that carried the youngest child piggyback, and the eyes see no longer, they are at the bottom of the ocean.

We learn how important religion is to them — they make the sign of the cross over everything and hell is all around, for instance, "hell is having arms but no one to embrace" and "hell is being seasick in a sixareen out on the open sea, needing to work and many hours from shore" — and how dependent they are on the weather, which is often stormy and ominous.

But we also learn how their difficult and often lonely lives are made bearable by small pleasures: letters from their wives and children living on the other side of the mountains, dry socks, newspapers, coffee, brennivín, tobacco, rock candy and books. One particular book — Milton's Paradise Lost — has special significance in the story, not least because lines of poetry fill the heads of "the boy" and his best friend, Bárđur, who later dies at sea.

A grieving boy

The second half of the story — entitled "The Boy, the Village and the Profane Trinity" — is set on the other side of the mountains, as far from the ocean as the bereaved boy can get. There is a substantial drop in narrative pace, but nonetheless it is a beautiful portrait of small town life, albeit in a 19th century Icelandic village, and of coming to terms with great personal loss.

Jón Kalman Stefánsson is a masterful storyteller. His prose style switches from fable-like simplicity to long, rhythmic, beguiling sentences, and back again. Perhaps it is a strength of Phillip Roughton's translation that everything flows seamlessly — nothing jars, nothing is out of place. It's the kind of novel I want to read again, if only to recount the joy of the beautifully crafted sentences, ripe with meaning and metaphor, and to revel in the language Kalmann uses.

Heaven and Hell is a powerful story about friendship, redemption, despair and the ocean. It was an unexpected delight to read it and certainly the most enchanting book I have read this year. It deserves a wide audience.

Update: The publisher has alerted me to a wonderful interview with the author on the Maclehose website. It explains that the book is part of a trilogy (the second volume is due for English translation next summer) and that the author is also a poet (hence the poetic nature of his writing and the references to Milton). I also like his references to brennivín, an Icelandic schnapps, which I can verify as a rather deadly drink having once brought back a bottle from Reykjavík!

'The Colour of Milk' by Nell Leyshon

Fiction - hardcover; Fig Tree; 176 pages; 2012. Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

The very best novels are always the ones that tell a story in a truly distinctive voice — Nell Leyshon's The Colour of Milk does just that.

A teenage farm girl

Beginning in "this year of lord eighteen hundred and thirty", it is narrated by the ever-feisty and sharp-tongued Mary, who is 15 years old and has an extraordinary tale to tell.

Mary, who has a crippled leg — "mother says it was like that when i come out into the world" — lives on a farm in the West Country with her parents, her beloved grandfather and three sisters. One day her father tells her that she is to move to the local vicarage, where she will work for Mr Graham, whose wife is unwell, as a live-in help. The prospect is shocking, because she's never been further than the top field of their property, and nor has she slept in any bed other than the one she shares with her sister.

She goes to the vicarage relunctantly. As much as she hates her father and the way he treats her, she misses her family and her usual routine desparately. But there is one good thing about working at the vicarage: Mr Graham has promised to teach her to read and write. And that is how we get to read Mary's first-hand account of her new life.

An unforgettable voice

The most striking thing about The Colour of Milk is the prose style. There is not one capital letter in the entire narrative, but the sentences, so heart-felt and direct, are easy to follow.

this is my book and i am writing it by my own hand.
in this year of the lord eighteen hundred and thirty one i am still sitting by my window. the wind comes through the cracks in the window frame.
i am tired from doing this and my wrist aches from doing this.
but i promised myself i would write the truth and the things that happened. i will do that.
and my hair is the colour of milk.

The narrative, which is very much tied to the seasons, is divided into four parts — spring, summer, autumn, winter — so that we experience the full cycle of rural life in the early 19th century. During the year we see Mary transform from a naive farm girl into a semi-literate woman, but along the way she gets to experience far more than she bargained for when Mr Graham wants to teach her more than her letters...

A memorable ending

The Colour of Milk is a truly compelling book because Mary's voice is so urgent and authentic. And the ending, which is shocking, unexpected and heart-breaking, is the kind that makes you gasp out loud — and then you want to have a big sob. The story is so imprinted on my mind it has stayed with me for more than two months now (I read it on the plane to Canada back in April) and is by far the best (and most memorable) thing I have read so far this year.

It's the type of novel I want to press into everyone's hands and say, here, read this. If that's not an endorsement for a fine little novel (it comes in a very compact size), I don't know what is.