A Quiet Place - Seicho Matsumoto

"While on a business trip to Kobe, Tsuneo Asai receives the news that
his wife Eiko has died of a heart attack. Eiko had a heart condition so the news of her death wasn't totally unexpected. But the circumstances of her demise left Tsuneo, a softly-spoken government bureaucrat, perplexed. How did it come about that his wife—who was shy and withdrawn, and only left their house twice a week to go to haiku meetings—ended up dead in a small shop in a shady Tokyo neighborhood?

When Tsuneo goes to apologize to the boutique owner for the trouble caused by his wife’s death he discovers the villa Tachibana near by, a house known to be a meeting place for secret lovers. As he digs deeper into his wife's recent past, he must eventually conclude that she led a double life..."

At first I blamed the English translation for the unremarkable prose and plodding pace of the story. It couldn't be the author (who is praised for his psychological thrillers) could it? But the more I read, the more I understood that the dull writing was a deliberate device. The main character, Tsuneo Asai, is a middle-aged bureaucrat who has made it up the ladder in the ministry through circumspect behaviour and persistent hard work. He thinks almost exclusively about his job and, as a result, his life is as unexciting as the prose Matsumoto uses to describe it. Only through subtle clues do we eventually realise this fixation on work actually hides a deeper lack of emotional attachment. Asai’s wife is younger than he is; described as plain, quiet and unassuming. She copes well with her husband’s travel and work schedule, spending time with her sister and attending haiku meetings. When informed of her death, Asai is understandably curious and begins an investigation that quickly turns into an obsessive need to learn exactly what kind of life his wife had been leading. At this point, the tone of the story changes and accelerates to keep pace with Asai’s increasing loss of self-control and descent into obsessive neurosis. 

I really enjoyed that Matsumoto flipped the traditional crime structure, instead of the murder happening at the beginning  and the plot revolving around it being uncovered. Matsumoto actually has the murder happen in the middle of the book. I don't want to say to much as I think it will spoil the book. 

Overall, definitely not going to be everyone's cup of tea. If you are looking for a rollicking thriller this is not it. It is tense, claustrophobic and has incredibly sparse bordering of out-right boring prose. It is definitely a book that requires the reader to be actively involved and engage in the subtle clues the prose gives you. 

Age Rating 14+ Murder, semi-sexual, injury detail. 

Spinning Silver - Naomi Novik

"Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders, but her
father's inability to collect his debts has left his family on the edge of poverty--until Miryem takes matters into her own hands. Hardening her heart, the young woman sets out to claim what is owed and soon gains a reputation for being able to turn silver into gold.

When an ill-advised boast draws the attention of the king of the Staryk--grim fey creatures who seem more ice than flesh--Miryem's fate, and that of two kingdoms, will be forever altered. Set an impossible challenge by the nameless king, Miryem unwittingly spins a web that draws in a peasant girl, Wanda, and the unhappy daughter of a local lord who plots to wed his child to the dashing young tsar.

But Tsar Mirnatius is not what he seems. And the secret he hides threatens to consume the lands of humans and Staryk alike. Torn between deadly choices, Miryem and her two unlikely allies embark on a desperate quest that will take them to the limits of sacrifice, power, and love."

Spinning Silver is a loose retelling of Rumpelstiltskin. I say "loose" because you will recognise certain elements from the original - turning things into gold, the importance of names, etc. - but this is a completely different story with different characters and many new plot lines. This actually disappointed me as I was looking forward to a more recognisable retelling. There's also not just one Rumpelstiltskin character, as several characters embody different aspects of the traditional imp. 

I love that it's a very pastoral fairy tale with forests and country magic. The setting of Russia, with the description of Russian foods and the heavy, oppressive snow was wonderful and made it all the more unique. The setting of the book gives it a lot of it's atmosphere, and it works very well. There are parts that follow the characters through quiet daily farming activities, but there is always magic and fear thrumming just under the surface.

I found it really interesting that Novik explored the idea of a Jewish moneylender in this Rumpelstiltskin. It was unique take and created a very clever way of making something magical into something made of a strong will, and how easily these two concepts can overlap. 

However, structurally I do have a few issues with the book. I counted no less than six different perspectives - honestly, I may have missed someone - and you have to learn the symbol/image for each character, as that is the only way you'll know whose point-of-view the book has moved to. This can get extremely confusing. Unfortunately this caused a disconnect between the characters and myself as I was unable to fully emote with them or become attached. 

Though I appreciate books with multiple layers and complex plots, I think shedding some parts of this would have only benefited it. Some chapters lean away from complex and interesting, and toward dense and confusing. Despite encountering wondrous and unexpected forms of magic, Novik's characters are neither astonished nor surprised. Their flat response evokes a perpetual sense of apathy, a problem that's exacerbated by glacial pacing, further compounded by two of the female protagonists having such similar plot lines and personalities as to feel redundant.

Spinning Silver holds all the ingredients of a magic spell and there are some truly wonderful moments, but the execution leaves one cold and unsatisfied.

Age Rating 15+. Domestic violence, murder, discrimination. 

Red Rising (#1) - Pierce Brown

"Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded
society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day, believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars liveable for future generations.

Yet he spends his life willingly, knowing that his blood and sweat will one day result in a better world for his children.

But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Soon he discovers that humanity already reached the surface generations ago. Vast cities and sprawling parks spread across the planet. Darrow—and Reds like him—are nothing more than slaves to a decadent ruling class.

Inspired by a longing for justice, and driven by the memory of lost love, Darrow sacrifices everything to infiltrate the legendary Institute, a proving ground for the dominant Gold caste, where the next generation of humanity's overlords struggle for power. He will be forced to compete for his life and the very future of civilization against the best and most brutal of Society's ruling class. There, he will stop at nothing to bring down his enemies... even if it means he has to become one of them to do so."

This was a solidly good book, so much so that I recommended it to my Dad. The plot was unique enough to be interesting, the world building unique and the writing strong and exciting. 

While you read, you will recognize many ingredients from other YA/fantasy series. The big discovery of society's true nature was reminiscent of the Matrix. The caste system is like Divergent. The Institute sorts it's students into houses like Harry Potter. The cutthroat competitions among the Golds is very like The Hunger Games with a smattering of Lord of the Flies. And the nature of the training is described as a year-long deadly game of capture-the-flag, in which the houses (all named after Roman gods) fight one another while the proctors float about them and watch from a levitating mountain called Olympus felt very Rick Riordan. 

Yet Red Rising is more than the sum of its parts. Brown manages to craft all these elements into something new, believable, exciting and surprisingly very brutal for the supposed YA tropes it consists of. I couldn't help getting swept away in Darrow's story as we follow him from the lowly life of a miner to the very heights of Olympus and there where moments that genuinely shocked me. 

The main negative that drops this books from being excellent to good  is the main character, Darrow.  He is frustratingly perfect. Average, he is most definitely not. Darrow is meant to be perfect because he's the SYMBOL OF HIS PEOPLE, he was plucked from the mires of obscurity to save his people. Unfortunately, this left him with little place to grow or develop as a character. He didn't have to struggle, he didn't feel out of place, he wasn't lagging behind. There was no tension there. He would make a fantastic face of a revolution, but in terms of characters I can get behind, root for and care about... he wasn't doing it for me. I preferred the other characters around him, such as Pax, Mustang and my favourite little murder goblin, Sevro. 

The language, while most of the time excellent, with the prose being original but not bulky, left the political language incredibly melodramatic. There was something so contrived, even scripted, about it. Like preachy political (Communist) propaganda, spoken on a clifftop with sword pointed in the air. It made me roll my eyes more often than it made me feel inspired. This is not helped by the egotistical strain of some of the writing, where Darrow, and I have a feeling Brown in extension was patting himself on the back. There is one scene in the beginning of the book, where Darrow is internal monologuing that he is the best Helldiver (drill driver) and that everyone else is too scared. Just scared dogs cowering to the Golds and only he is brave, manly and macho. I was like...Dude, you are 16...chill...I think they probably have more life experience. Maybe they are scared for a reason? hmmm?

The reason this book does work is the real sense of tension, nastiness and drama. It's easy to get caught up in the atmosphere of the story. You get the feeling throughout that the author isn't afraid to rip your heart out, shred it, and stand laughing amid the fallen pieces. Which enabled me to read on with interest and investment, despite my lack of connection to the main character. I will certainly be reading the rest of the trilogy as I think that Darrow will have more room to grow on a bigger playing field. 

However this is certainly not a YA novel. There was rape,  hints of cannibalism and a realistic brutality to the fighting that I don’t think is suitable for a younger audience. Thus...Age Rating 16+.