Reviews
til ll ill? :glt )Ml 8 MICHEL FABER The Apple if‘Ja'ioogatei 0..
Often, the image of an author is someone beavering away in the privacy of their own soul not caring a jot for anyone other than the characters and their own measuring of success. So, it’s almost reassuring to hear when a writer has not only listened to what readers think but gone out on a limb to act upon their suggestions. Michel Faber may have thought that he had seen the back of his Victorian creations in The Crimson Petal and the White, but the devotees to hooker Sugar and her clan had other ideas. In his foreword, Faber recalls the many people who wrote to him with a simple message: ‘whatever became of Sugar and how dare you leave us dangling like that.’ This new book gets off to a slightly irritating start with Faber reprinting a large selection of the correspondence which all say the same thing, though not always in
different ways.
Fortunately, The Apple (which mainly features back stories of the
subsidiary characters from Crimson Petal) gets things back on track swiftly.
With the elegant and stately manner which both attracted and repelled critics of his novel, Faber draws out gentle moments and intricate details with deft precision. Though the gruesome side of the times is never far from revealing its ugly self: the vicious dog slaughter of rodents in ‘Clara and the Rat Man‘ is one notable example. While The Apple is largely a tasty treat, it’s hard to escape feeling that Faber was subconsciously railroaded into the project. (Brian Donaldson)
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GUY GRIEVE Call of the Wild illodder x Stoughtoni .0.
For the \ears. (Rn
Grim e worked in The Sr‘otsr'ii.'irr's commercial department. climbing to he Head of Strategic Marketing. Buying home men 'right. his head bu.'.'rng With reader's incentives. Grieve dreamed of escaping to the Alaskan Wilderness. a vis‘ion that would be realised following a fruitful pitch to his editor. With his family's full bleSSing. Grieve
departed on a yearlong iournev down the Yukon, filing weekly columns
The rejection of civilisation in favour of Simple living and the call of the wild is a theme
TOIILISH
MY ESCIP
that has peppered literature from Jack London to Paul Theroux. At tiriies. Grieves slavish dexctio" tr the box. '53 ow" adventure style threatens to turn his account into parody. Where his storj. catches fire is in his breathless depiction of the uriiute perils of Slll‘.'|‘.ll‘,g such a harsh environment. the difficulties of liLilliil'lf a tent. negotiatir‘g the first snows. catching beavers and (lCOgl'lg bears all provide an insight into nature's Cruel beauty
iAlIar‘. Radcliffei
AL GORE An Inconvenient Truth F“! We: coo
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lie/M'tit‘ a hrzrr'lil, ei'ttxfti-reri "?’l“.l'l’l;ll .iffw treii‘l: r heater} 1 i.‘. o‘ the 118 t readerii“. '1 2'9“. H: No one u“: have faulted hair: for spending thr- rest of ti s life sticking pin“. inti. t‘iilt)l‘?f$ of Florida governor .leh Bush ant Katherine l larris, that states Republican adrriinistrator who went the extra mile to ensure (tore ‘.‘./as the closest runner up in political lllfilt)l‘,. Instead. he has continued to focus on his numher one political and moral goal: getting the world to wake up to glohal warming.
lhis hook of the film veers from glossy page after glossy page of National Geographic style shots of planet earth from up above. (lull policy statement and bafflineg irrelevant Gore fairiin histories. The pictures work hesl when pinpointing contrast. such as the border of Haiti and Dominican Republic telling in one sweeping irriage the very different green policies of two governments or the before and after shots of Ariierrcan national parks. iBrian Donaldsoni
(JlllLlJllLN’S lAlL DAREN KING Mouse Noses on Toast
iFaheri COO
The number of authors who shift from adult to kids fiction per year probably matches the
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dig. li'xt', u"; .irw‘nirt ti'r rrronster. it'l'l fsiz'Nim h’illhristriiat; tree decoration. iv .oii‘rl iniagine, there r; {ilt"l'_, for the adult til get wt of this stom, Thoiiri'i ll‘. such over seriévtiw: tiriies; (:an .ve wall, the PM htrllll; uiihitteii ht iriouse nose, at a
press corifereorte’.
Brian [)onalrlsr n
EX X ,l/'\l, U‘ {Ah/lit MAGGIE O’FARRELL
The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox
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The parairreter'; of mental illness have shifted over the years. but not so long ago ,oung womer‘ coulrf he sectioned sirnpl, for being .vhat most parents tern: 'a handful] The eponymous heroiie of Maggie Farrell's heartbreaking new ride! is one Such teenager. Spirited. intelligent and utterly stifled by 1930s upper-class life. Esme Lennox’s refusal to copforrn leads to 60 years in a mental institution.
O'Farreil slowly pieces together memories of a stolen life when Lennox
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ALSO PUBLISHED
CoLM TOIBlN
Mr in nu nu 80M
Colm Talbln Mothers and Sons Short stories about familial relationships as a son hurres his mother then goes to a rave on a beach while another goes in search of his ma in the Pyrenees. Picador.
Boy ‘Chubby’ Brown Com/iron as; Muck! The true hlue life story of Mr Royston Vasey. lime l/i/arr'ier.
Margaret Mahy Maori/gal) 's Fantasia Three odd kids Join a Circus and strange things start to happen. Faber.
Colum McCann Zo/i A novel roughly based on the true life of a legendary Polish gypsy poet called Papsuza. Worden/old <2 Nico/son.
Jo Nesbo The Redbreast A killer is on the loose who may have links to Europe's neo—NaZis and a battle on the Russran front in 1944. This young Nordic writer is being dubbed ‘the new Chandler.‘ As in Raymond. Not the Friends fatty. Harv/ll Seeker.
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lKelly Aoteri
'7' Beak/1’. THE LIST 29