The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter

There can be little doubt, this is a female book, framed by its femaleness and pre-occupied with blood - female blood: the blood of childbirth, the blood of the ruptured hymen, the blood of menstruation and the blood of violence. These are extensions of, or re-tellings of once popular fairy tales but with a heavy dose of the macabre. Gothic horror surrounding childhood innocence, and all so beautifully told. Primeval fears are exposed with great lucidity and never before have I read of quite so many female victims of bestial men. The one blessed relief, and Carter’s mischievousness is almost palpable here, is in the story of Puss-in-Boots. The lighthearted eroticism of this story is a wonderful antidote to the unreserved gloom of despoiled virgins and lupine men. A wonderful collection that delights the discerning reader but take care not to let your candle flicker, that fright may be your last.

The Secret History by Donna Tarrt

A wonderfully irritating book. Very well written but it does tend to drag in the middle section. Both a rite-of-passage and a campus novel and far more tragic than most examples of either genre. At times it is very dark and at other times it borders on the weird. However, the characters are finely drawn and with few saving graces. Most of the time one is sympathetic towards the narrator but rarely empathetic, and there were instances when I felt like kicking him up his backside. I think that reducing its length by a third, from 600 down to 400 pages, would be an improvement. The dissolute students who seem to work very hard on their Greek yet lack any personal ambition are a curious bunch who drift, Gatsby-like, through the story until the aberration of the murder changes all their lives. Then they wake up to the immensity of their crime and a wonderful tension begins, heats to boiling point and then explodes in a way the reader could not possibly predict. This is so carefully crafted that you immediately understand how this book got its status as a modern classic. Overall, this is an impressive book which I have no hesitation in recommending to readers who have a degree of stamina and I assure them that their persistence will be repaid, tenfold.

Red Gold by Alan Furst

A pacy espionage thriller sent in wartime France that brings home the many faces of resistance and throws light on the ruthlessness of the communist resistance groups and how firmly they were directed from Moscow. Clearly, there is at least one sequel otherwise the ending is both abrupt and unsatisfactory. Dare I say that the plot and structure is somewhat formulaic and so there are few real surprises. Great episodes such as driving the ancient truck loaded with machine guns from Marseilles to Paris with the inevitable run-in with the Milice. As spy thrillers go, it is very believable but has the feel of being just one unit on a production line. But then so are le Carre’s ‘Smiley’ novels and O’Brien’s Aubrey/Maturin stories. The dilemma for the reader is whether to seek to read them all or to read some, sure in the knowledge that by not reading others, one hasn’t really missed anything of crucial importance.