Review: 'Anything Goes' by Lucy Moore

While posting a separate review, Amazon just asked if I wanted to review Lucy Moore's 'Anything Goes'. I absolutely ADORE this book so I popped a few words down to try and convince Amazonians that they should buy this book, love it and buy it for friends and family. Just like I did.

'I am going to keep this very short indeed - Anything Goes is a fabulous book. Lucy Moore's style of writing is so easy to read, and each chapter addresses a different yet fascinating part of the roaring twenties, so the book remains fast-paced and exciting. Buy this book and read it. I urge you.'

Off you trot, go and buy this book. Or support your local library by borrowing it!

Review: 'The Passages of Herman Melville' by Jay Parini

Apologies to the lovely, lovely people at Bookhugger for this slightly tardy blog post! They were kind, as ever, to send me a book to read that I otherwise would never have picked up but am very pleased to have received. Thanks go to them!

The book in question? The Passages of Herman Melville by Jay Parini (Canongate, 2011).

First of all, hats off to the design team - the cover of this book is truly gorgeous and the spine alone is beautiful enough to warrant a blog post. (Regretfully I cannot find a picture of the spine, but do check it out at a bookshop.) Inside, as well, the little details add to the overall impression of beauty - the fonts and chapter openers, while not screaming from the rooftops, ooze class. I like.

I have not yet read any of Herman Melville's work, so I was not looking for a detailed biography or an analysis of the writer's life. Instead, as a newcomer to the 'topic', I was hoping for a novel and that is what I got. Parini's writing is very easy to engage with, and I particularly enjoyed the fact that we see 'HM' largely from his long-suffering wife Lizzie's perspective, as well as from HM's point of view. So we experience her domestic abuse but we also experience HM's besotted relationships with such different characters as Fawn Away and Toby.

Throughout the book, the juxtaposition of youthful voyage and discovery with the older, more sinister and dissatisfied HM serves to make the opposite sides of his life experiences resonate strongly. The tales of HM's encounters on a number of whaling ships of varying quality are well related, and I could almost sense the salty air, social groups and sexual frustration beaming from the pages. HM's experiences in port towns and paradise, including a stay at Calabooza Beretanee (probably the most idyllic prison known to literature), are exciting and Parini succeeds in making each scene come vividly to life.

In short: do pick it up, do 'ooh' and 'aah' over the design, do read it and do put it on your bookshelf for all to admire. That way, even if none of your friends read it (although they ought to), they can still bask in its external beauty.