[books 2013] First two!
1. Arctic Chill by Arnaldur Indridason
Yet another Icelandic thriller. Just as grim as the last one. This one explores immigration into Iceland, as the crime being investigated is the murder of a young half-Thai boy.
I think I need to take a break from all this Nordic Noir.
2. Joseph Anton: A Memoir by Salman Rushdie
The only one of Rushdie's books I've previously read is The Ground Beneath Her Feet. It's long and hard work, but I loved it. It's about music, and people who are born not belonging, two things very close to my heart.
When this came out, I caught Rushdie on Start the Week and The Daily Show plugging it. It's about his time under police protection after the fatwa, and it sounded really interesting.
It's fascinating, and beautifully written. I had a lot of thoughts about it, which basically distil down to - whether he did write something blasphemous or not, the Western, secular world should have stood up for him a lot more vociferously than it did. But instead, there was a lot of blaming the victim going on. My theory is that it was mostly anti-intellectual - a lot of commentators didn't understand the book, so they declared it rubbish and said that he deserved what he got. There was very little emphasis on free speech, and freedom of thought and ideas.
This book is the reason I want to read more Proper Literature. He's a writer in a very intellectual tradition, playing about not just with language, but with big ideas, and seeing where they go. I've kind of come away from that in recent years, and I should really re-engage. I don't necessarily want to go out and read all of his books, but I think I will give Midnight's Children and The Satanic Verses a try. I've never particularly got on with magical realism though, so I'll see how it goes.
Yet another Icelandic thriller. Just as grim as the last one. This one explores immigration into Iceland, as the crime being investigated is the murder of a young half-Thai boy.
I think I need to take a break from all this Nordic Noir.
2. Joseph Anton: A Memoir by Salman Rushdie
The only one of Rushdie's books I've previously read is The Ground Beneath Her Feet. It's long and hard work, but I loved it. It's about music, and people who are born not belonging, two things very close to my heart.
When this came out, I caught Rushdie on Start the Week and The Daily Show plugging it. It's about his time under police protection after the fatwa, and it sounded really interesting.
It's fascinating, and beautifully written. I had a lot of thoughts about it, which basically distil down to - whether he did write something blasphemous or not, the Western, secular world should have stood up for him a lot more vociferously than it did. But instead, there was a lot of blaming the victim going on. My theory is that it was mostly anti-intellectual - a lot of commentators didn't understand the book, so they declared it rubbish and said that he deserved what he got. There was very little emphasis on free speech, and freedom of thought and ideas.
This book is the reason I want to read more Proper Literature. He's a writer in a very intellectual tradition, playing about not just with language, but with big ideas, and seeing where they go. I've kind of come away from that in recent years, and I should really re-engage. I don't necessarily want to go out and read all of his books, but I think I will give Midnight's Children and The Satanic Verses a try. I've never particularly got on with magical realism though, so I'll see how it goes.