The Wasted Vigil - Book Review

Author: Nadeem Aslam

Genre: Historical Fiction

This is a story about people searching for something in the most war torn country in the world, Afghanistan. Englishman Marcus has lived there for 40 years and is looking for his grandson and the truth about what happened to his daughter. Lara has travelled from Russia to search for the truth about the fate of her brother who was part of the Russian invasion in the 80s. David is an American revisiting his past; he was a CIA operative during the invasion. And Casa is an extremist who finds his narrow view of the world challenged by the hospitality of the Westerners and a possible love interest.

This book immediately grabbed me with its interesting characters and mini stories. The beginning is like a series of set pieces and then a number of characters coalesce into the same location, and what passes for a plot begins. But that’s not an issue, not really. The writing is great, the characters believable, the state of the world regrettable. There are moments of genius here, moments of fascinating history and moments of shocking religious examples. But the author loses his focus a little which is a shame as it had the potential to be brilliant. However, there is a lot to enjoy and it will get you thinking. Recommended to the reader who truly wishes to be transported to a different time and place.

A solid 4/5. I would definitely read more books by this author.

The Goblin Emperor Book Review

The Goblin Emperor

Author: Katherine Addison

Genre: Fantasy

Absolutely wonderful. Charming, touching and funny. A fish out of water, coming of age, ascension to the throne story. Despite only being 18, Maia, an unwanted son of the emperor, is suddenly thrust into the spotlight after an airship crash kills his Father and his half-brothers. Which, to his horror, makes him the new emperor. Half goblin in an elf dominated palace, Maia must get to grips with his massive new responsibility before others decided he’s not worthy. He gradually makes allies and learns how to conduct himself. Easily the best fantasy book I’ve read this year and happily, there will be more books set in this world. I can't wait.

Corpus Book Review

Author: Rory Clements

Genre: Historical Thriller

This had promise but anything that takes me 9 days to read clearly has issues. (A book this length should have taken me 4 or 5 days). Granted, I put it down for 2 days to read something else, but that is a further damning indictment. So what went wrong? Well it was well researched and I definitely got a sense of time and place. But it moved too slowly and there were too many characters to keep track of. A cast list at the beginning would have been useful. As would have a timeline. Every few chapters are preceded by a date but these are meaningless unless you know the exact date of the abdication. So as a tension driver those section headings utterly failed. I was hoping the finale would save it (thus earning 3 stars at least), but the action peaked too soon and the original murder was not even solved. The ending went on far too long and the author went to great lengths to explain the fate of certain characters. Most of which I didn’t care about and the murder, which I did care about, was left to speculation. So the ending managed to be both boring and frustrating. A great idea, but a very patchy execution.

2/5

PS I think I will read the sequel though, it sounds good and another reviewer I trust said it was better than this first one.

Hello!

Welcome to the Infinite Bookcase, a new book blog. Because the world needs one more of those right? Well either way, I've gone to all this trouble now so here we are. I just wanted somewhere I could talk about one of my favourite things; books and readings.

Why infinite? Because a bookcase is never finished! It is constantly being re-invented, added to, subtracted from. If you've read everything on your bookcase(s) then... well at the risk of upsetting you, you're not a 'real' reader. I know, I have high standards but that's because I'm an obsessive reader. As in, every spare waking moments when it's possible to do so I'm reading a book. I realised last year, as I broadened my tastes, that there are simply too many books to read. Which is why every opportunity simply MUST be given over to reading. On the train, on the bus, on lunch, on the loo, in bed, doctors waiting room, waiting for dinner to cook... Reading can be applied to a wide range of situations if you re-evaluate your commitment.

This is not to say this blog is meant for fanatics only, far from it. 
All are welcome here.

Eventually, there will be a sizeable library of reviews. That's the intention. But all in good time. After all, you don't want to spend too much time reading this blog when there's all those books to read...

(And if you're wondering, I have 11 bookcases, 90% full, about 35% of books have been read)