Review: The Marriage of Innis Wilkinson by Lauren H. Brandenburg

 This novel is the sequel to The Death of Mungo Blackwell, one of my favourite books that I read last year, so I jumped at the chance to read its sequel. 

The Marriage of Innis Wilkinson did not disappoint. Although reading Mungo Blackwell would be helpful for context, it’s not necessary as this novel works well as a stand-alone. 

Anyway. Margarette Toft and Roy Blackwell are engaged to be married. The only problem is the whole Romeo and Juliet situation they’ve found themselves in. Their feuding families are deeply unhappy with the match and keep giving subtle and not so subtle hints to call it off. Will Margarette and Roy make it to their vows? No spoilers here! 

I love Lauren’s writing and the world she has created. I think it’s set in America but it could so easily be a small quintessential English village. The characters are quirky and endearing, the setting idyllic, and the mystery and comedy mix together well. It’s a story that is fun, uplifting and ultimately heartwarming. It feels like a good cup of tea and chocolate biscuit while huddled under a blanket on a rainy evening. 

Review: Even If We Break by Marieke Nijkamp

 You know shit's about to go down when five teenagers head off to a cabin in the woods for the weekend. The question is: what, and how?

For Finn, Ever, Carter, Liva, and Maddy, disparate in their everyday lives but bound together by their love of LARPing, this weekend represents a chance of redemption and to mend the fractures between them. Ever, creator of the game, is the most emotionally invested due to their bleak short term prospects compared to the rest of the group. Liva, the rich girl in all typical ways except her unlikely love of the game, gifts the use of the cabin for the weekend - it's a perfect setting and truly an escape. Finn, who was attacked a few weeks back due to homophobia, never wanted to come but wanted to do it for Ever. Maddy, a girl with Autism and PTSD from a car accident, is there because she wants to be but it's more effort for her than everyone else. And Carter, obligated to prove himself to his family, sees it as a welcome escape from his burdens. 

However, as we can guess from the genre, things begin to unravel quickly. Liva had already told them about ghost stories from the mountains, involving bloody hands, a music box, and tiny figurines left behind, and these signs soon present themselves along with others. The fire blazes out of control. Doors lock automatically, with no way of unlocking or smashing them. Notes pertaining to everyone's dark secrets present themselves. And, before long, it escalates to murder. 

Members of the group are picked off one by one. Liva, whose character dies in the game, goes missing. Maddy is tempted by her darkest vice. Carter is picked off in the dark by a familiar voice. And then this someone comes for Finn and Ever. 

Marieke Nijkamp pulls no punches in her prose. From page one, things begin to fall apart figuratively and literally within the group. The mountain setting, though typical, is used to good effect. The use of the game is a particularly interesting and clever device as the actions of the game's characters mirror and magnify the tensions between the real life group members. 

The only thing I was left confused by was the reveal. The person responsible makes sense, but their motives seem a bit disproportionate, but perhaps a second read will help me make more sense of it. 

All in all, this is a cracking thriller read with a dash of good old-fashioned fantasy thrown in within the context of the game. 

  

Review: The Interpreter from Java by Alfred Birney

 With the legacy of the British Empire being all encompassing, it's sometimes easy to forget that there were other European countries building empires and committing atrocities in those countries. This novel explores periods during the Second World War and the post-war period in Indonesia, then known as the Dutch East Indies. 

Alan Nolan discovers his father's memoirs about his service during the war and post-war period - and the atrocities he committed. Though his official title was 'interpreter', his role included the interrogation and murder of Indonesian freedom fighters, desirous to throw off Dutch colonial rule after the Japanese were expelled from Indonesia. 

The first half of the novel mainly deals with Alan and his siblings, and the physical and psychological abuse they suffered at the hands of their father, an escapee to Holland from the brutal reprisals of the Indonesians against the Dutch and those who fought with them. They lived under their father's reign of terror until the eldest boys were thirteen, at which point all of the siblings were transferred to a children's home for their own safety. When Alan became an adult, he discovered his father's memoirs and, reading them, he started to see how his monster of a father got created.

This novel is blunt, brutal, and unsparing in its unpacking of the post-war period in Indonesia and the legacy it created on a wider level but, most importantly, in the individuals involved. Had Arto, the father, not been part of the service on the side of the Dutch, committing brutal acts, would he have gotten to the point where he was so plagued with his deeds that he became abusive towards his own children? How much of his abuse was from him and how much was because of his clear PTSD, not just from the war and after but from the abuse he himself endured as a child?

This novel is searing and brilliantly written but I would advise that if descriptions of abuse are triggering for you, that you steer clear. 

New Review: Son Of Escobar, First Born by Roberto Sendoya Escobar

 Before I write my actual review of this book, for transparency's sake I will explain that I got tagged in a tweet by a journalist for the inews, Etan Smallman, who did an in-depth article countering claims that the author of "Son of Escobar" made. The link, if you're interested, is here: https://inews.co.uk/news/long-reads/pablo-escobar-son-phillip-witcomb-book-friends-claims-doubts-fiction-612281

This book is written by Pablo Escobar's eldest son, Roberto, who writes that he was found in a safe house after a deadly shoot-out. He was adopted by an MI6 agent, Phillip Witcomb, and his wife, who stayed in Colombia. The cover was working with a business called De La Rue, while covertly working with gangs, such as Escobar's, in order to keep track of the rise and fall of smuggling and money-laundering in the country. 

Roberto describes the rise and rise of Pablo Escobar, whose name is recognised worldwide. One of the most notorious drug lords to have ever existed, the book describes how his rise happened partly because of the facilitation of American and British governments, rather than in spite of their intervention. Roberto describes how he never knew he was adopted until the day he was dropped off at boarding school in England, (as a soon-to-be adoptive parent myself, I can tell you that that is categorically one of the worst ways you can tell your child you adopted them), and never knew he was Pablo's son until he was an adult. 

The book reads almost like a blockbuster movie. It's extremely compelling, suspenseful, and nail-biting in places. Whatever the disputes over the claims made in the book, it's definitely worth the read due to its brilliant telling. Maybe just take it with a pinch of salt. 

New review: CrimeDotCom by Geoff White

The internet and the World Wide Web are two of the most profound inventions in the history of the world. They have impacted the world in myriad ways an for as many advantages as they bring, they have also unfortunately brought ever more complex problems to solve.  The million dollar question is, can we truly ever be safe online? By that I mean a few things; can our data be stored safely, can we retain digital privacy, and an we trust the companies who promise those things?

Geoff White's explosive new book shows that there may never be an end to this conflict. For as the web keeps improving and expanding, there will always be those with a drive to find and exploit holes, whether for monetary gain or just for the challenge. 

Geoff White's book takes us on a whistlestop ride of some of the most major crimes and hacks to have affected the digital world that have had very tragic consequences. From credit card fraud - a so-called victimless crime, a myth which Geoff White thoroughly debunks - and the hacking of the NHS, to hugely ambitious nation-state attempted hacks, such as a time when Ukraine's entire power grid was switched off. 

Each chapter reads like some sort of heist or hacking movie plot. It's hard to believe, for those like myself wholly unacquainted with the world of tech apart from the very basics needed to go about my daily life, that such things are not fiction. But the world of cybercrime, state sponsored digital warfare, and geopolitics are becoming frighteningly ever more intertwined. And none is more worrying than the chapter that deals with hacking the vote. Those whom have followed the excellent work of Carole Cadwalladr will be familiar with the Cambridge Analytica story that Geoff White talks about in this book. The internet and world wide web seems to have begun as a great egalitarian project, or even just a more efficient way of working, but with the rise of big tech and power concentrated in the hands of a very few, very flawed (as it turns out) people, we have to be more stringent than ever to protect ourselves online. 

I thought that I wouldn't understand a lot of the terminology used in this book, but I needn't have worried. Geoff White explains terms like end-to-end encryption, concepts like Bitcoin, and the Dark Web, in very easy-to-understand terms without ever feeling condescending. His passion for the world of cybersecurity and the human stories behind it is palpable. It also feels a bit like being able to arm oneself against so many of the run-of-the mill crimes that are being attempted by individual or low level hackers throughout the world. 

The internet isn't going away. Companies are coming up with more sophisticated ways of preventing hacking and theft of things most precious to us, even if we aren't aware of their value as we should be. But, as the saying goes, forewarned is forearmed so I highly recommend this book. Not just because it's a thoroughly interesting read, but because it will give you a good foundation of what it means, as a human, to be online and how to navigate that space while protecting and guarding ourselves on it. 

Review: Set My Heart To Five by Simon Stephenson

It is the year 2054. A few decades previously, humans got collectively locked out of the internet and chaos. A few decades later and society was reimagined, with bots (a combination of human DNA and software engineering) living among humans. The main bot of this story is a dentist called Jared who is living a pleasant life until one day when a strange number appears. He realises it is the number of teeth he will see for the remainder of his bot life. He consults his human doctor friend who, after some questions, diagnoses him with depression. Jared thinks this can’t be true because he is a bot and can’t feel things.

Eventually he discovers that his friend was right and sets out to make a difference in his life. The only problem is that if he does that, he will be tracked by the Bureau of Robotics and his memory will be wiped.

He flees across America to Los Angeles where he sets out to write a movie. He also meets a woman who he falls in love with before realising that time is running out for him.

This novel is charming and quirky with a huge depth of feeling that builds as we discover with Jared what it means to be human. As Jared is a bot, he presents to us the inconsistencies and illogical instances that happen as a result of being human, which don’t always mean negative results but can nevertheless be nonsensical.

Set My Heart To Five is published soon and set to be a major motion picture.

Review: The Puritan Princess by Miranda Malins

Say the name “Oliver Cromwell” and most people will immediately think of a few choice words or events. Villain, tyrant, ruthless, Ireland. The Pogues even wrote a song about him, hoping he would rot in hell! 

As the person who led the Parliamentarians to victory against Charles I, he eventually became Lord Protector of England rather than king. Several long-standing myths about him exist: he banned Christmas, music, art - basically anything fun. 

This novel will put paid to a lot of those myths for we find a very different Cromwell. 

The Puritan Princess tells the story of the Cromwell from the pov of his daughters. The family see their fortunes change dramatically, from run of the mill gentleman farmer and relatives to the first family in England, living like a royal family in all but name.

I didn’t know much about the interregnum period, but it’s a lot more conflict driven than I thought. The factions and political games are worthy of the Tudors. The court is a lot more lavish than one would have expected given their criticisms of Charles I, and the music and art scene just as dynamic. 

I loved the micro and macro dramas in the book, both on the family level and the national level. One section of the book, I won’t say which, had me weeping. Malins has breathed life into this family who are not universally talked about, particularly in school, which seems shortsighted given their significance. It is so well researched and dramatised historical fiction and I would have seriously enjoyed spin offs about each member of the family. Fans of historical fiction will really love this book.