2 comments about Beneath the Diamond Sky.

1. Genre, huh? What is it good for?
   
   Beneath the Diamond Sky has only been out a couple of months and the so far brief snippets on Amazon, Picador and Wakling's own site describe it as being 'in the vein of Alex Garland'.
   
   Dunk! I go: and dunk! again. Forehead firmly and with a satisfying slapping sound into one of those low beams that tend to delineate my routes through any bookshop of note. So, rather like his first - saddled with a 'corporate thriller' tag in some circles (though not according to me or Arena (who rightly big-upped its genuine literary merit)) - that initial piece of info did not light my candle. I mean, Alex Garland? I'd long ago decided - admittedly with no real evidence other than that everybody at some point seemed to be reading The Beach and/or The Tesseract - that he was firmly in the Not For Me category. Maybe I didn't like cover, I don't know, but I did feel rather smug when movie turned out to be so poor. Shallow? Heck, yeah.
   
   Still, sod it, time to stuff flimsy prejudice right up where it belongs. OCTP* turned out to be a rollicking good read and a stylish turn too, so away with assumption.
   
   In Beneath the Diamond Sky a group of Western backpackers (a mix of Brits, Americans, Israeli and Dutch) is kidnapped by Kashmiri militants while trekking through the Himalayan foothills. The political forces, the motives for their capture, are only ever really hinted at (stuff here for the bigger picture and a chillingly similar factual multi-national hostage story) because what we're interested in here is the fate of the hostages' minds and characters and how they deal with the situation they've had thrust upon them. Not just them, in fact. Cut into the kidnapping narrative we also bounce back to the UK for insights into their families and how they're doing.
   
   The main protagonists are a couple, Ethan and Kate, whose already troubled relationship is simply thrown over the edge as they're cast into a desperate nightmare they can barely comprehend. At home, Kate's sister Rachel struggles with her guilt over their dishonest relationship; Ethan's father battles with his own uncompromising political and personal dogma; and pointlessly, ponderously, government diplomacy fritters in the background.
   
   Wakling juggles the component parts of his story very well. Think about it: this could easily become a static stagy one-set piece, half a dozen prisoners in one room, slowly unravelling (and they do unravel). But what you get instead is a distinctly smart and unsettling novel about the effects of adversity on everyone, not just the unlucky - and boy do they get unlucky - few kept in tiny room. Rachel's and Kate's and Ethan's stories overlap cleverly, usually held together by neat little segues (Kate's pilot motif for instance, as she aims to keep sane by reliving her recent flying lessons), phrases or symbols.
   
   And then - like a sort of literary salmon, kinda - Wakling rises free from the 'thriller' mainstream - as he did with OCTP - by a) being able to throw in poetic gems at will:
   
   "Somebody flipped a switch and the sound of a string quartet threaded through the small talk"
   
   b) keeping so much of the terrorists' motivation a mystery, and c) daring to give us the ending he does.
   
   It's an intense and, yes I'm going to have to use it, claustrophobic journey through shifting alliances and crumbling mindsets where the only thing that really holds firm - although it makes no sense at all to us - is the unspoken ideology of the militants. In a way it reminded me of Iain Banks's Canal Dreams, that sense of a foreign experience, unknowable and cruel, accessible only via extreme sensations (survival, mostly) but always distinctly alien. As Kate tries to hang on to her mind I kept thinking about Onada Hisako and the things she has to do to keep going in similarly grim circumstances.
   
   Bright future ahead, I'd say.
   
   *Oh, and for those of us who've read On Cape Three Points there's a smart little easter egg tucked away in the text; very enjoyable.



2. Having travelled to India, I was excited to pick this book up. Unfortunately the book is barely readable. The character development is poor and the constant flashbacks seem unnecessary and annoying. Lacks any element of a good thriller. One of the few books fit for the trash.

No comments about Message of Love.

No comments about His Banner Over Me Is Love.

No comments about El secuestrado.(pasaje humorístico sobre secuestro en España)(TT: The hostage.)(TA: humorous narrative on kidnapping in Spain): An article from: Epoca.

4 comments about Let Me Be Your Hero.

1. In 1741, teenage Lady Claire Lennox fell in love with Fraser Graham, who reciprocated her feelings. They married in a love match, but their relationship collapsed when she believed he betrayed her as he was there when her father was brutally murdered.
   
   Eight years later, Claire as the oldest of four sisters leads her clan though her uncle has powerful influence over her. However, she has avaricious enemies from within, who have made deals with outsiders that would destroy her and her clan. Fraser still loves Claire and knows that serpents inside her clan have plotted her demise. He would die to keep her alive and his chance has finally occurred; he rescues her from abductors who now pursue them with an urgency to kill.
   
   This well written mid eighteenth century Scottish romance is clearly aimed at fans of the sub-genre who will fully appreciate the authenticity including the vernacular that makes the period so alive in the capable hands of Elaine Hoffman. The story line takes its time to set the background of the era and enable the audience to know the key players, but once done moves into ultra speed. Claire is a wonderful besieged heroine who feels with evidence and encouragement by her uncle and aunt that her beloved more than failed her when her sire was killed. Fraser seizes his second chance to prove his love and loyalty to his spouse, but must risk his life to do so. This is must reading for readers of tense Highland dramas with fabulous casting, who will look forward to the siblings' tales.
   
   Harriet Klausner



2. This book is awful. The "vernacular" -- "ye ken," "willna," "oot," "verra," "canna," "breeks" -- gets in the way at best, and is absurd at worst -- i.e., "ye arena going to miss the best part." There is no character development -- they meet, fall in love, she divorces him . . . . Really, one of the worst books I have ever read.



3. This book contains so many mistakes that I wonder if somebody proofread it before it went to print.
   
   In the first place, the synopsis on the back cover is misleading, since it doesn't give you a sense of how the story really unfolds. For example the back cover reads "Eight years ago (...) she lost her heart and her husband to foolish pride" But it was not eight years ago but only two (they meet in 1741, get married a year later and get divorced after one year of marriage), that would mean they parted ways in 1743 and get reunited again in 1745. Even counting from the time they first met, to the end of the book, it doesn't make 8 years but barely 4. The synopsis also reads "After his daring rescue sends them running for their lives through the wild, windswept hills..." and I wonder, when did this happen? The rescue occurred at the end of the book, not in the middle as the synopsis makes you think, and they never ran to any hills. It seems to me that the cover was designed and printed before the novel was written, and then the author changed her mind and wrote a completely different story.
   
   Second, this book is a sequel to "The Highlander" which takes place in 1740 and maybe the beginning of 1741, and is the story of Jamie the Earl of Monleigh and Fraser's brother. However, when at the beginning of this book somewhere during the Spring or Summer of 1741 Claire's father asks Jamie if he is married yet or thinking of getting married, he responds that he is not married, that he is thinking about it but cant decide between all the lasses. That threw me off, since by that time he must have at the very least met Sophie and decided to marry her. Later in the book, Sophie magically appears as if the author had suddenly remembered her.
   
   Another thing is that this novel does not seem to take into account the historic events of the time and place in which it develops. In 1745 a mayor uprising occurred in Scotland. I'm no expert, but I have read several other novels from this period that seem to have more consideration for history, and as I understand it, in 1745 the Highlanders rallied to Prince Charles Stuart and rose against the English in an attempt to put the Stuart king on the throne. The English crushed the rebellion and the Highland Clans suffered harsh reprisal for their participation in it. I would have thought that an event of this magnitude would at least be acknowledged in this book, but it isn't even mentioned.
   
   The book ends abruptly. What was called the epilogue should have been the last chapter, then it needed a real epilogue to tell us what happened after Fraser rescued Claire, and what punishment was given to the villains of this story, Isobel and Lord Walter. I have rarely encountered characters so evil as these two, and was looking forward to the time when they would be punished for all their horrendous acts. To simply be told that they had been arrested and were going to be tried is not the end I had imagined for them. It is too easy and doesn't even begin to pay for all their murderous acts and cruelty. After all the suffering they caused and the violent scenes that were vividly described, I think the readers were cheated out of the satisfaction of seeing them receive their just punishment.
   
   One think I did not particularly like, was that the characters were too young. When the book started Fraser was 19 and Claire 15. By the end they could not have been more than 25 and 20. It is not impossible to believe that a girl of only 16 years could assume and fulfill the responsibilities of an earldom, or that she could show such maturity, but it is difficult. It would have been more believable if they were a little older. But that is just my personal opinion.
   
   All in all, I think the story had the potential to be a good one, if it had been properly developed and someone had taken the time to correct the errors. As it is, it appears that it was written in a hurry just to have something ready to meet a deadline.
   
   By the way, I wonder what book did Harriet Klausner read, because judging by her review it certainly wasn't the same one I read. It makes me wonder about the helpful votes she received. Maybe there is another version of this book I know nothing about?



4. I read the review of Thea and I agree whole-heartedly that the book was filled with discrepancies. When the book mentioned Fraser's brothers, Alexander (Arabella's twin) was left out of the book. In the Highlander, Arabella and Alexander were inseparable. Thea's review sums up the rest of the discreapancies quite accurately.

No comments about The Male maulers (French Line).

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No comments about Allison, Lieblong discuss kidnapping. (manufactured home magnate Johnny Allison and close friend and investment adviser Alex Lieblong): An article from: Arkansas Business.

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No comments about Another Man's Castaway (-).