Walter Lord  "A Night To Remember"(Penguin)



In his classic A Night To Remember Walter Lord gives us an intimate retelling of the last hours of the Titanic, starting from the crow’s nest and the moment the iceberg was sighted and concluding just hours later with the Carpathia steaming off for New York with the survivors.

In the course of writing this book, Lord interviewed many of the survivors, as well as crew from the Carpathia and the Californian - the ship that was closest but didn’t hear the distress calls until far too late. The result is an authentic, detailed and sensitive account of the night of April 12. The narrative is told in straight forward manner, and with a certain emotional distance being maintained but Lord includes moments and anecdotes which clearly illustrate the human aspect of this disaster: wives resolutely refusing to leave their husbands and those forcibly placed in life boats, family’s becoming separated in the crush, a terrified young man removed from a life boat and another who covered his head in a woman’s shawl and went undetected, the gentlemen dressed in their best and those in the life boat’s in all manner of dress, the bickering whilst waiting for rescue, and the fear that meant only one life boat went back to check for survivors amongst those that were in the water. While direct quotes from the survivors are not used, it is obvious in the memories shared and the emotions described that this is a book based on first hand accounts.

In one or two sentences at the end of numerous chapters, the initial disbelief, then the growing desperation on board the Titanic’s is contrasted with (what seems to us) the unfathomable decisions being made on board the Californian, whose crew saw the strange positioning of the Titanic’s lights and then later the flares, but arrived at every conclusion to explain what they were seeing except the correct one. There is a sense of tension as the Carpathia responds and races to the scene through the ice field, and in doing so reaches a speed that surprises even her captain.

A Night To Remember is rightly held to be a classic. It has a quiet power, is utterly compelling and in including the recollections of those involved, Lord gives readers plenty of insight into what it was like during the Titanic's last hours.

Niall Ferguson "Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World" (Penguin)





Ferguson writes as a pro-Empire historian, and thus a non-Marxist, but one who is not blind to the awful aspects of the process. I learned much from this book. For example, the Indian "mutiny" of 1857 can be directly linked to the impact of missionary activity, which had been barred by the East India Company, but which had been allowed to intrude in the years leading up to the mutiny. Second, who knew that India sent more troops to WW1 than Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa combined? And third, that Roosevelt and the rest of the American leadership in the lead up to their involvement in WW2 were explicitly anti-Empire - that their support for the UK was conditional on it not being support for the British Empire as it stood. (As it turned out, Britain was broke after the war, so the empire collapsed of its own accord. The fact that the US was the creditor now makes it seem that the cause and consequence may have happily linked in the Americans' minds.) This is a good book, well written.

Brian Greene "Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe" (Penguin)









Brian Greene is a very smart fellow, with a deep understanding of physics, and a wide range of knowledge in other disciplines. He is at his best when explaining cosmology and theoretical physics, but less convincing towards the end of the book, when discussing consciousness and meaning.

The relentless increase in entropy is the major villain of this book, sending the universe towards a dark future without organized matter. Evolution has locally produced molecules, life, and temporary order, by using sources of low entropy energy, but in turn dissipating the heat produced by the processes producing the order into the surrounding universe. There comes a time when the universe has no more low entropy sources of energy.

I wish Greene hadn't come up with the term "entropy two-step" to describe this exchange and then proceed to use it every few pages as a shorthand. He is worried about extracting free will and philosophical meaning out of the idea that physical systems can be described, in theory, completely by the movement of their particles. I see this worry in many books about consciousness, and I think it is overstated.

The very readable narrative portion of the book is 326 pages, and the more exacting mathematical and physical details, index, and bibliography comprises another 102 pages.

Emma Healey "Elizabeth is Missing" (Penguin)





Maud, an elderly woman with symptoms of dementia, is concerned for her friend Elizabeth, who she believes has gone missing. She obsesses on this, repeatedly visiting Elizabeth's house, as well as the police, much to the frustration of her daughter Helen, and the amusement of her granddaughter, Katy. In reality, Maud's condition makes her unable to comprehend the real reason why Elizabeth is not at home.

Maud's days are long stretches of time alone, with a morning visit from a caregiver and an afternoon visit from Helen. Notes are posted all around her house, reminding Maud to lock the doors, and not to cook. Maud also writes notes to herself, to help her remember details. Her pockets are stuffed with tiny scraps of paper, most of which make no sense to her later. Slowly, the reason for Maud's obsession with Elizabeth becomes clear, as Maud reflects on her childhood and the disappearance of her sister, Sukey, in 1946 when Maud was still a young girl. Author Emma Healey deftly weaves narratives from the past and present, unraveling the Sukey mystery while also unraveling Maud's cognitive abilities. Maud's character was exceptionally well-developed and while I have no idea what it's like to slowly lose your memory, this felt like a realistic portrayal on both a physical and emotional level.

An excellent first novel in my opinion.

Rose Tremain "Absolutely and Forever:" (Vintage)






I purchased this very speculatively in Daunt Books on the recommendation of a colleague, primarily with a view to taking my purchases on that outing over the £100 threshold to trigger the shop’s loyalty reward scheme. My speculation was well rewarded, and not merely in loyalty card points! It is a very entertaining novel.

The book takes the form of Marianne Clifford’s recollections of her life, starting in the early 1960s at the age of 15 when she fell deeply in love with Simon Hurst, an eighteen-year-old who attended the boys’ school affiliated with her own institution. Marianne has a quirky, self-deprecating style which is very appealing, and lends a comic cast to her memories.

I enjoyed the insight into life in the 1960s – not quite as hedonistic as the standard portrayal of the swinging decade would suggest. Marianne’s slightly naïve outlook on life lends itself to some poignant scenes that contrast sharply, but effectively with the general air of light humour.

I thought this was a charming and very enjoyable book.

Oona Frawley "Flight" (Tramp Press)




Sandrine is from Zimbabwe. She’s in Ireland on a student visa, supposedly to learn, but she is really there to work, to find a better life for herself, her husband and child back home, and her unborn child that she is keeping secret. She finds a job caring for Tom and Clare, an elderly couple who can no longer manage on their own. Their daughter Elizabeth doesn’t live with them and has a bit of an awkward relationship with her mother. The family used to live in Vietnam and America, where Tom worked in the spice trade.

It’s a very emotional read. It’s hard to see one’s parents fade away in terms of health, both physical and mental. As Tom becomes a mere shadow of himself, his story is unravelled through his memories and recollections of their time in Vietnam and America. My late grandfather had dementia and the last time I saw him, I don’t think he knew who any of us were. I was living away from Singapore by then, and learnt of his death via Skype. So it was hard to read of Tom’s decline.

“His hair is softer than she expected, thinning, and the scalp pulses like a newborn’s. She senses this pulsing in her hands. He is living, his mind is moving, and he is looking up at her with surprised, glazing green eyes. Her tears are for nothing. There is nothing to weep for, since he is unaware, gazing at her crying or laughing with the same indifferent emptiness in his look which seems always surprised now because everything lacks for him the context of memory.”

This is also Elizabeth’s story, one of belonging and fitting in – or not. Her childhood in Vietnam and America, then moving back to Ireland, then back again to Vietnam. Where does she belong? Is she Irish? Is she American? It’s similar to my own family. We are from Singapore, but the kids, being born in the US, are American citizens. We travel to Singapore once a year, and both sets of grandparents travel up here at least once or twice a year. My five-year-old once described himself as a Singaporean American. I wonder how he will feel in the future. Will he still have a connection to Singapore?

Although we don’t really learn much about Sandrine’s life in Zimbabwe, her experiences in Ireland are the key to this book. Her struggle to adapt to life in Ireland, to learn to be a caregiver for these elderly people she now lives with. The racism she experiences is because of the colour of her skin.

“She does not know that it doesn’t matter how she perceives herself to fit in. What she feels, how she might work to become part of this new society, it makes no difference. Sandrine has been spat and cursed at, has peered with shock into women’s faces as they have sneered at hers – she expected better of women and has been disappointed. At moments the desire to commiserate with another black Zimbabwean is overwhelming. She knows of the news that instances of assault are on the rise, the country is increasingly angry about non-nationals, and there is a referendum coming up that scares the life out of her.”

Flight takes time to get into. But when you do get into it, it is a gem. It is a story about feeling lost, both within the world and within themselves. It is unsettling, it is emotional. It is a thoughtful story that makes you examine your own life, your own situation, and where you belong.

Sophie Mackintosh "Cursed Bread" (Penguin)




This is a book about obsession and centres on the real unsolved mystery of the 1951 mass poisoning of a French village.

Our story follows Elodie, the wife of the village baker. Elodie is bored with her simple life. She becomes taken with Violet, the fancy cultured wife of the Ambassador. They recently arrived in town and Elodie finds herself enraptured by them. As Elodie begins to recall the events leading up to the mass poisoning of the village, her reality begins to blur and her imagination takes hold.

This was a fever dream for me. It bounces around a lot. While I found the story very intriguing, keeping up with it was challenging as the storyteller's reflection was disjointed. It's erotic and strange, but I was invested in what was happening.

Jonathan Scott "Into The Groove: The Story of Sound From Tin Foil to Vinyl" (Bloomsbury)




Into the Groove by Jonathan Scott is a detailed history of recorded sound, from discoveries and experiments to popularisation and improvement of playback material.

This probably would have been more history than I would have wanted if it wasn't for the fact that Scott made it all so interesting. I learned far more than I expected, especially the time before records. Before the advent of CDs and all that has come after, most people of age will remember their early experiences with records. Probably their parent's or sibling's albums. The first I bought with my own money was Deep Purple In Rock in 1970. I never stopped buying them.

This book will fill in any gaps you have (I had a lot) in the history of recording and playing back sound and make you recall just how special it is to put an album on. He is right when he highlights how playing an album is different, and for many better, than just digitally pulling up a file.

I would recommend this to anyone with an interest in audio, from listening to the technical aspects. This is indeed a history, but one that is told in an engaging manner that keeps your interest piqued.

Samantha Harvey "The Western Wind" (Vintage)





I found this paperback in my local Fleuers bookshop for a quid and it looked intriguing. However, it is a bit of a mixed bag. Samantha Harvey's The Western Wind is set in an out-of-the-way village in 1490s England, and the first half of the book in particular is a careful portrait of a small medieval community, written with a keen eye for landscape and the mundane details of everyday life. In that early part of the novel, too, Harvey impressed me with her attempt to enter into a medieval mindset—there are some anachronisms, yes, but I'll take a more convincing mentality with some mistakes about days and clothes any day over a book where 21st-century characters are playing dress-up in perfect period attire.

However, the novel flags in the latter part, even its early lyricism fading; it read almost as if Harvey ran out of things to say earlier than her self-imposed chronological structure allowed. Still an interesting read, and I would pick up another book by Harvey if I came across it, but I finished The Western Wind feeling as if there were possible depths to it that she had never quite plumbed.

Gayford Martin "Spring Cannot be Cancelled: David Hockney in Normandy" (Thames & Hudson)




The book is somewhat falsely advertised though: “It is based on a wealth of new conversations and correspondence between Hockney and art critic Martin Gayford, his long-time friend and collaborator. Their exchanges are illustrated by a selection of Hockney’s new, unpublished Normandy iPad drawings and paintings alongside works by van Gogh, Monet, Bruegel, and others.”

This gives the impression that the book consists mainly of “their exchanges”, but that’s not true at all. The book is mainly Martin Gayford’s musings and anecdotes about Hockney and art in general, indeed based on their Facetime talks and emails. I’d say the bulk of the text, about 80%, is Gayford’s prose, intersected with fragments of what Hockney said or wrote.

Not that it is fully without problems: the main issue being that Gayford isn’t critical at all, and I think the book would have benefited if he would have given a different viewpoint to some of Hockney’s statements – most notably about Duchamp and about photography.

Another issue is its overall lightness: some parts border on the clichéd – panta rhei, true, but that isn’t very insightful. Gayford is at his best when he simply tries to describe Hockney’s work: “a seamless blend of the sophisticated and the straightforward.”