The Standing Pool by Adam Thorpe

Synopsis:  Two Cambridge academics, the historians Nick and Sarah Mallinson, take a sabbatical with their three small and lively girls in a remote Languedoc farmhouse. But the farmhouse has its own histories, rather more fraught than those the Mallinsons are used to dealing with on the page. Nick once wrote that ‘History is more about amnesia than memory.’ But what if that amnesia is a saving grace – disturbed at one’s peril, like the murk of a standing pool? As the illusion of Eden retreats, the couple feel the vulnerability of being among strangers, and being strangers themselves – even in their own place, and even to their own children.Sarah frets about the danger of the swimming pool and the nightly visits of the wild boar, while Nick is more concerned by the guns of the local hunters. Meanwhile, however, there is Jean-Luc, the gardener, living alone with his invalid mother in the village, whose private world involves hammering nails into a doll, collecting arcane rubbish, and spying on Sarah’s naked dips in the pool. What should the Mallinsons make of him? Writing, as always, with linguistic elan, an alert ear for dialogue, and huge imaginative flair, Adam Thorpe deftly interweaves social comedy with narrative suspense, returning us – brilliantly and inexorably – to the dark and terrifying mysteries that feed at the heart of this thrilling novel.

Review:  Throughout this story there is a sense of menace that left me wondering how and where it was all going to end  At times the writer lost me particularly in some of the ‘academic exchanges’ but what I enjoyed was the way the really ‘nice’ Mallinson family were juxtaposed with the creepy handyman Jean Luc – it is this contrast, with the suggestion of something horrible about to happen, that kept me reading.  I spent the whole of the book wondering exactly how dark things would become and it is only at the end that this is answered.  On the whole a good read but at times I got bored with Nick Mallinson and the Mallinson children were unbelieveably precocious.

LibaryThing rating:  3½/5

Other books read by this writer:  None, but have twice attempted Ulverton (I got bogged down at the same point) I will give it a third try sometime.

Review by JudyB

Wishful Thinking by Melissa Hill

Synopsis (from back page)

Three women with three very different lives board the train to Dublin. Each of them looking for something out of reach.

Every day Rosie Mitchell desperately misses her late husband Martin, but will giving her grown-up children everything they want bring her happiness? And is it too late for Rosie to carve out a new life and find a new purpose?

Recently married Dara Campbell, successful solicitor in her mid-30s, has it all but is blinded by memories. Dara can’t see that her fantasy is standing in the way of a happy marriage. When faced with a blast from the past Dara has some tough decisions to make.

Louise Patterson is only 24 but has had a tough start in life and now she’s determined to live for the moment, but will her drive to appear the party girl in the face of mounting debts be her undoing? And are her new friends all they appear to be?

Can these women learn to look forward and accept the good things already in their lives? As the train heads towards Dublin little do they know that fate has something else in store for them.

Rosie, Dara and Louise realise that wishes don’t just grant themselves. You have to take your wish, and make it happen all by yourself.

Review

Wishful Thinking follows the lives of three women who are all connected by the same train journey, a journey that they make each morning. The story actually starts on the day that the train fails to arrive at it’s final destination and instead derails just a few miles into it’s journey. It’s at this point that the story jumps back four months earlier and where we’re introduced to our main characters for the first time.

This opening chapter immediately grabs you and makes you want to keep reading, not that I would have given up anyway as I am a huge fan of the author, but as the story unfolds you can’t help but worry about the fates of the three women who you come to know and love as if they were real people.

All three of these women are extremely likable, if a little naive at times, and I think it’s this fact that makes them so real and believable. The problems they all have are ones that real women have to deal with and as a result you can relate to them about everything that’s happening in their own lives.

In fact as they are all so likable I’m actually finding it really difficult to pick a favourite, so with this in mind I’m going to go with Twix the spaniel who I came to love from the very first moment she was introduced. Such a sweet little dog and without giving anything away I had tears literally streaming down my face a couple of times during the scenes involving her…particularly that last one which has to be one of the saddest things I’ve ever read.

Another thing that I loved about this book, was the fact that the three main characters were connected or should I say their lives intertwined in other ways other than the fact that they all happened to take the same journey each morning and yet they never actually officially meet. I thought this was a really nice touch and one that I didn’t expect…I guess I thought they would all end up having more of a history together so the fact that they never even spoke was a nice little surprise.

I’ve now read all of Melissa’s books and have loved every single one of them and even though I don’t think the twists in this book were quite as shocking or as unexpected as the ones featured in her other books, this was still a really good and enjoyable read and one that I’m sure I will read again at some point in the future.

Another page-turner from a fantastic storyteller.

Reviewed by Karen.