Shylock Is My Name, The Burgess Boys and With Your Crooked Heart

One of the few books I could not finish was "J" by Howard Jacobson, a hardback I found in a second hand bookshop. So I only read "Shylock" as it was in the Hogarth Shakespeare series. This time I persevered, but only just. I found there was far too much long and tedious soul searching for my liking. There are the occasional witty remarks that mostly relies on word reversals: "a dope smoking media don who disapproved of dope and media". Yes, this is as good as it gets. The main character, Simon Strulovich, meets Shylock in a cemetery and takes him home. It reminded me (too much) of my favourite play, Harold Pinter's "No Man's Land". There is some interesting dialogue between them, but the fact that on nearly every page there is something about being Jewish just seems too much. Later circumcision becomes the heart of the story and this is when the plot becomes more interesting. But not enough to encourage me to read anything else by the author. 

Elizabeth Strout is truly amazing . She does not seem to indulge in fancy structures or dazzling prose, just concise, pure and consistently readable writing. Welcome back Shirley Falls. This fictitious town in Maine has provided the setting for four of her six novels. This time the "action" alternates with New York, to where the brothers Jim and Bob Burgess have escaped their home town. Leaving behind Bob's twin sister Susan, they are soon beckoned back by one crazy act by her son Zach that needs their legal expertise. Typical of this writer, we have a family in crisis. The alienation of the middle aged siblings are contrasted with the close family relationships of the local Somali population. And so are the startling differences between Shirley Falls and New York. Bob and Susan are both divorced, the former's relationship with his ex-wife Pam seems better than many marriages. They inhabit one amazing scene at the boathouse bar in Central Park. After the trials and tribulations of most of this glorious book, the last 70 pages are some of the best I have ever read. Truly emotional and uplifting without being sentimental, this is Strout in her prime, having written this book five years after her Pulitzer prizewinning "Olive Kitteridge".

I'm a huge admirer of Helen Dunmore. Of her fifteen novels, this is the twelfth I have read and the only one that I found disappointing. I never thought I would ever say that. Whilst her prose is as fine and intelligent as ever, her examination of the relationship that Louise has with two brothers falls flat. The author's experimentation with writing some chapters in the second person singular occur far too often. Maggie O'Farrell just uses it once in her novel "This Must Be The Place" and that worked fine. I didn't mind the switching from first to third person, but using the second person was too distracting. And it could not hide the lack of plot and drama.