November Reading

I started November by reading Philip Roth’s 30th novel, THE HUMBLING, having read all 29 of his previous books in the past, as Roth is one of my four or five favourite writers of all time. This new, short novel tells the story of an aging actor who has lost his magic and is unable to act; instead he retreats to an introspective existence, which becomes charged by the arrival in his life of the daughter of some old friends. Challenging and provocative as ever, it’s a quick and sharp read which needs to be read in conjuction with his recent, short novels about the ageing process and death to be fully appreciated.

I followed this with Ron Rash’s novel SERENA, a terrific novel set in the Appalachian mountain in the 1920s, a story of ambition and greed, murder and environimental plunder. It’s utterly gripping and features in its central character, Serena Pemberton, a villain as dastardly and malevolent as Heathcliff. The book was highly praised in the States, and rightly so.

Jennifer Johnston’s new novel TRUTH OR FICTION is an intriguing story of a journalist who visits an elderly Irish writer in order to write a piece on him and gets rather more than she bargained for when, over three days in Dublin, she finds herself increasingly involved in the lives of the eccentric writer and his difficult family. It’s very funny at time, and even disturbing; the work of one of Ireland’s great modern novelists.

I’ve never read Orhan Pamuk until this month when I read his deeply moving THE MUSEUM OF INNOCENCE, the story of a young man who embarks on a doomed relationship with a distant relation when he is already engaged and the effect this has on his life. The chapters dealing with the narrator’s loneliness after the breakdown of the relationship are extraordinary.

I also read two classic novels that I’d never read before: first, John Cheever’s BULLET PARK, a strange, almost hypnotic novel about two men, Hammer and Nailles, and their different approaches to living in the American suburbs in the 1960s. I read all of Richard Yates earlier this year and it put me in mind of the quiet desperation of some of his couples. Also Christopher Isherwood’s A SINGLE MAN which is a beautifully poetic account of a grieving English professor trying to make sense of his newly single life in California. I need to read more of both of these authors.

Richard Bausch’s PEACE is a short, taut, highly intense piece of fiction examining a moment of war, when three soldiers and their guide ascend an Italian mountain. The novel makes a dramatic impact on the reader.

I also read Tom Cho’s quirky collection of pop-culture influenced stories LOOK WHO’S MORPHING, a pair of rather gloomy childhood-based psychological dramas, Ghanian writer Yaba Badoe’s TRUE MURDER and Brian DeLeeuw’s IN THIS WAY I WAS SAVED, Leanne Shapton’s quirky novel that relates the breakdown of a relationship through the couple’s personal possessions IMPORTANT ARTIFACTS AND PERSONAL PROPERTY, Steven Amsterdam’s dystopian novel THINGS WE DIDN’T SEE COMING and re-read Frances Hodgson Burnett’s LITTLE LORD FAUNTLEROY for the first time since I was a kid as I’m writing an introduction for a new Puffin Classic edition of the novel, due to be published next year to coincide with the novel’s 125th anniversary.

Amsterdam

I was in Amsterdam yesterday for a press day to mark the publication of the Dutch language edition of THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE, entitled Het Winterpaleis in the Netherlands and Belgium and published by Arena.

Among the interviews I did was a television programme which was filmed in the Hermitage Museum, Amsterdam, a sister-museum of the Hermitage in St Petersburg, where I wrote much of the book in 2007 and revisited for a reading last month. I didn’t know that there even was a Hermitage in Amsterdam until my schedule came through, although in fairness it has only been open a few months. It’s a fascinating place though, a former nursing home turned into a museum and which displays collections on loan from Russia. Definitely worth visiting if in the city.

Outside the Hermitage Amsterdam

Author’s Choice

Amazon recently asked me to pick 10 books for their ‘Author’s Choice’ website. Not easy to pick and they’re not my favourite ten books of all time but just ten books that mean a lot to me for various reasons, which are listed on the page.

I chose: Treasure Island, David Copperfield, The Ghost Writer, The Cider House Rules, Saint Maybe, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, The Talented Mr Ripley, Anna Karenina, The First Rumpole Omnibus and The Northern Clemency. You can buy each of them at about 33% off on the author’s choice page, where I list my reasons for each choice.

Illustrated Boy

For the first time, THE BOY IN THE STRIPED PYJAMAS is available in a beautiful illustrated edition, courtesy of my Italian publisher Rizzoli.

The illustrations are by the Italian artist Gianni DeConno, who has done a fantastic job of creating new images of Bruno and Shmuel for this hardcover edition.

Richmond Literary Festival

Claire, Nathan and I

I was in London over the last couple of days and took part in Book Now, the Richmond-Upon-Thames Literary Festival, my last reading of 2009. It’s been a busy 7 months of travelling since THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE was published but it was nice to fit one last festival in before Christmas, particularly as I was reading once again with Claire Kilroy, at a festival programmed by an old friend, Nathan Hamilton, who was a student on the Creative Writing MA at the University of East Anglia during ‘04/’05, when I returned to my old uni as Writing Fellow.

From The Republic of Conscience

To the National Library last night for the launch of FROM THE REPUBLIC OF CONSCIENCE, a collection of 30 short stories by leading Irish writers, each one exploring a different article in the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights. The stories, which were commissioned by Amnesty Ireland, ran on a weekly basis in the Irish Times last year but this is the first time they’ve been collected together in book format and the book was launched by former Irish President Mary Robinson.

The collection features new work by – amongst others – Maeve Binchy, Dermot Bolger, Eoin Colfer, John Connolly, Roddy Doyle, Anne Enright, Carlo Gebler, Hugo Hamilton, Seamus Heaney, Jennifer Johnston, Neil Jordan, Claire Kilroy, Colum McCann, Frank McCourt, Ross O’Carroll-Kelly, Joseph O’Connor, Glenn Patterson, Colm Toibin and myself. I wrote THE ROUND HALL, based on Article 10, which states that everyone is entitled to a fair trial.

It’s available now in bookshops, also from Liberties Press itself and on Amazon.

More Spanish Interviews

I’m leaving Barcelona today after a busy few days of press interviews to discuss THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE. If you speak Spanish or Catalan and want to see what was said you can read some of them online: Publico, ABC Newspaper, El Correo, La Vanguardia, and listen to a radio interview from Catalunya Radio.

Now – on to the airport.

Barcelona

I’m in Barcelona at the moment to promote THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE / LA CASA DEL PROPOSITO ESPECIAL which has just been published by my Spanish publisher Salamandra and my Catalan publisher Editorial Empuries. It’s my 3rd time in the city; I was here a couple of years ago when STRIPED PYJAMAS won the Que Leer Award for Novel of the year, and last year when MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY was published, although I haven’t seen as much of the city as I have Madrid. Last time I was here I pledged to learn Spanish by my next visit but I have been sadly remiss and remain monolingual, so interviews have to be conducted through translation. But you get used to that and off you go. Today was a full day of interviews, some of which are – rather mysteriously – already online: one for EFE, the other for Publico. More to come.

Dutch House

The Dutch edition of THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE has just been published in Holland by Arena with the title HET WINTERPALEIS.