Here’s an interesting idea for a book. The writer picks some substances that are banned in various places around the world, and then visits each place to try to learn more about why they are banned. The twist here is that he isn’t just talking about them, in (almost) each place he tries out the banned substances to see what the fuss is all about.

This makes for some occasional childish situations – chewing gum on the train in Singapore, for example – but is far more interesting when he tries coca leaves in Bolivia or absinthe in Switzerland.

One drawback about reading this book is that since it was written about 20 years ago a lot of the situations and bans may have changed. One example – he describes the area around Oslo central station as strewn with junkies and broken syringes, trash and police and hopelessness. But we were there a month ago and it was the complete opposite, a peaceful clean area that was not unlike any other train station in Europe or even Japan. Apparently a lot has happened in 20 years, so the info I was getting from the book needed to be taken with that in mind.

The book theme shifts slightly towards the end as the writer spends a lot of time (and pages) cogitating about the philosophy of banning substances and what situations warrant it, the war on drugs, and the goals of a nanny state.

I thought the author had a very reasonable viewpoint – that as long as a person is making a rational choice and that choice is not causing any harm to others then it is the responsibility of society to let them do it. There are some exceptions to this, and the author lays out the argument in detail. I liked his philosophy, and his admission that it is probably difficult to pull off in the real world.

The book ended differently than I had expected when I started the book, but I like the more intellectual shift that it made and this content more than any of the other stories will make the book worth reading even after another 20 years or more.

Next I am reading They Both Die at the End by Adam Silvera.

This book is really sort of an extended short story, but it really packs in plenty of details, undercurrents and history. The stakes of the story appear at a leisurely pace, and I enjoyed waiting for them.

I suppose that this could have been drawn out, with some extra scenes stuck in there with fireworks between conflicting characters or dramatic revelations and tearful declarations – but the author dialed this down to the perfect amount.

The message of this story was received without it being overly preachy and I appreciated the calm, quiet approach here.

This was the second book that I’ve read by the author, and I enjoyed both of them very much. I’ll be on the lookout for more.

Next I am reading The Devil’s Picnic by Taras Grescoe.

One of the better non-fiction books I’ve read so far this year. The book is written in an unusual style, and even though it is translated from German to English, the writing is natural and clever.

Starting with the author’s childhood growing up in Yugoslavia and escaping the country as it exploded into civil war, the story follows him and his family as they try to get by as refugees in Germany, and then as their family is divided to different parts of the world.

The story shows the challenge for refugees forced to fit into wherever will take them, and how those challenges brought out the best in some and the worst in others.

I liked the unusual format – not a linear story but not a wacky time jump thing that is hard to follow, either.

The author has done some fiction so if I can find a translated version I am eager to read that and see what it is like.

Next I am reading Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan.

This is the first work of fiction that I’ve read by the author – I had enjoyed a non-fiction book a while back, and thought since I liked the movie Big Fish I should check out the book.

The film is a bit different from the book, but I thought that having seen the movie it actually improved my feeling of the book. Although they were different they weren’t mutually exclusive.

The story in the book was a little more intimate and I enjoyed how it was written. The structure of the book is unconventional – and in this case I thought it worked out quite well given the storybook nature of the main character.

More details into the stories that are told here would have been welcome. After a long story about how the main character met and married his wife she sort of faded away in the rest of the book.

And although the ending was really good (as was the movie’s ending), I thought that the strings of the story weren’t tied off quite as much as I’d have liked.

But I did get to read a ton of jokes, both good and bad.

Next I am reading Where You Come From by Sasa Stanisic.

This book was a struggle to get through. I’ve found that I don’t like books that use absurdity or outrageous characters/behavior to hold your attention – and unfortunately there was a lot of that in this book.

I liked the idea of it at first, kind of a whodunnit in the forests of Poland with a group of translators struggling to figure things out. But it gets weird quickly, and it is full of people doing silly things which I guess was an effort to entertain the reader.

This was a long book, and towards the middle of it I started questioning if it was worth going on.

After finishing the book I can say now that it wasn’t.

Live and learn, I guess. Next I am reading Big Fish by Daniel Wallace.

An enjoyable take on the legend of Achilles, and what went on (possibly) behind the scenes. More than a historical retelling, it is closer to a love story, and it manages to add to the legends of Achilles without dumbing it down.

The writing of the author is just as good as I remember, and it moves the story forward without getting in the way. The focus is on the telling of the story, and we see it from a different point of view this time.

Since the story is so well-known there aren’t too many twists, but for someone coming to it for the first time this would be a rollicking ride. Through most of the book I was trying to figure out they would get through the ending, but the compromise that was made didn’t feel like cheating.

One complaint I have was that there was so much going on unseen in the world of the gods, and the way it was related back to us felt clunky and unnatural. I would have liked to have seen them in action more, but the author chose to focus on a few mortal characters rather than on the gods on Mount Olympus.

It is a rather short novel, so it was hard to stop turning the pages knowing it wouldn’t take long to get through. Excellent book!

Next I am reading The Extinction of Irena Rey by Jennifer Croft.

Partly a mystical fairy tale, partly a travelogue of the world’s (mostly) unknown secrets, this book should have been right up my alley. Not only is it largely concerned with travel, but it contains a secret mysterious library with secret doors that connect across the globe. I’m not sure why I didn’t like the book more.

It certainly isn’t a bad book – the writer has an engaging style and the prose is easy to read and has a lighthearted approach to descriptions. The natural world and the animals that live within it are especially well done.

But what I found myself concerned with was the point of this journey that we are on. The main character embarks on it with very little introspection, and considering the time they have on the road alone, you’d think they’d have more thoughts and theories on it than they do. We usually hear about her joy and adventures not firsthand but in her memories, which makes us wonder if she is really out there living or just plodding on to stay alive. Most of the interesting introspection is left for the end of the book.

We are asked to believe in some magic, and once we accept that proposition it makes the “real-life” magical moments that the main character discovers less, well, magical. She talks of amazing things that she has witnessed in her travels but they are less amazing when coming from someone with a mysterious magical curse.

Still, the concept of the interconnected library, the thoughts on travel and what it means, and the metaphors throughout are interesting enough for me to enjoy the book. Not sure if I can recommend it for everyone, though.

Next I am reading The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller. I really liked her book Circe, so I’m hoping this turns out even half as good.

I was starting to get into this book, set in a unique time and place for fantasy books – the era of the Spanish Inquisition – but as the main character started to “awaken” to a sexy dude with eternal life I realized that I had read something like this before. Oh yeah, this is the same author that wrote Ninth Wing, a groaner that I had somehow finished last year or so.

How did this book get into my backlog? I guess I have to be more careful. But it made me think a little about what I liked about this book. The writer has a great skill with writing prose and pushing the story forward at the right pace. There are few slow points and we get right to the next big event. I was also happy that this isn’t the first in a series, which is so common in fantasy books.

But the magic system was pretty unclear, and I couldn’t help thinking why our hero needed to be afraid when she had so much power at her fingertips. The romance angle was predictable and didn’t seem necessary, and unfortunately many of the characters were pretty shallow and one-dimensional.

But I finished the book, hooray me. Next I am reading A Short Walk Through a Wide World by Douglas Westerbeke.

In the end I really enjoyed this book, but the sort of campy/folksy start had me wondering if I really wanted to continue this book or not. The early stages of the book set the time frame in history, and tries to show the irreverent and odd characters that make up the population of the Greek island.

But once we get through this, the story takes its time and tells a story from many points of view. The writing felt lyrical and focused on the beauty of life on the island, and unfortunately later it is contrasted with the lifestyle of the residents during war time.

The story arc of Madras, the young fisherman, and how he turned out after the war was especially heartbreaking, but this book is filled with heartbreaking moments. Scenes from the Second World War related by various characters are absolutely brutal. The character of the goatherder was used for laughs now and then, but reading about his lifestyle had me reconsidering mine.

I like stories like this that span lifetimes, and we see how small things connect to others later in life, and how decisions turn out for better or worse.

Personally I thought the ending of this one, and what eventually happened between Corelli and Pelagia felt sort of unnecessary or tacked on, but I can see how some might feel it was a necessary full circle.

Although the book was a little preachy at times I enjoyed reading it, and was surprised to find that it was written so recently. I’m not sure I want to read it again in the future – so much heartbreak is hard to take.

Next I am reading The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo.

I usually really like this author so I was bummed out with how this book turned out. There is a lot of promise – a story from the perspective of a bio-engineered war dog – but I didn’t think it came off very well.

Having one of the main points of view being from an intelligent dog is fine, but the voice of that dog seemed pretty cliche. Things like, “I am a good dog” and “The Master is angry” just felt awkward to read. I understand what the author was trying to evoke (I mean, I think I do) but it seemed amateurish and clunky.

The main arc of the story seemed to have run its course, and then the book went on for quite a bit longer – in an attempt to fit a few more issues into the story.

I’m not sure I can recommend this one – there are so many better books by this author.

Next I am reading Corelli’s Mandolin by Lous De Bernieres.

I had heard that this book has some great world building in a fantasy genre, and while there is an interesting world in these pages it didn’t really spring to life organically.

The story starts off quite well, and we learn to like the main character as she navigates her precarious position in the world. But after a while the story gets quite mysterious, and everything grinds down to a pace too slow for me.

I don’t think this book needed to be as long as it was. I understand that the author is setting up the world for further novels, but maybe too much front loading here.

Although I really liked the character, part of the story was that she was not invested so much in the crucial events – she is always ready to just bug out and run. And since she wasn’t invested, it was hard for the reader to get invested as well. Why should I care about character A, B and C when the world will end in a few months?

I was a little disappointed in this book because it held a lot of promise. With some skillful editing I think there is a pretty good story to be told.

Next I am reading Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

This book was recommended by another author as a good spy novel, and after reading it I agree.

It has all the things you’d expect in a spy novel, and I imagine that people who read a lot from this genre might complain that there isn’t a lot of new ground being broken. But for me as a neophyte I enjoyed it for what it was. The pacing could have been improved – sometimes the writer got all caught up in the details and backstory and neglected to move the plot forward. However other times the author skillfully moved the story along to skip over the boring bits.

There are a lot of exotic locations, many of them written with details and attention that make me think that the author has been there. The characters are entertaining, although sometimes a little predictable. Bad guy is 100% bad, good guy is clearly good.

One thing I liked about the book was at the end of each chapter a quick recipe is given for a meal that was enjoyed in that section of the book. It was a great idea and I can’t wait to cook some of the dishes, but with so many chapters you started to see where the characters had to eat a meal soon so that a recipe could be included.

I think that this is the first in a trilogy, and there was enough in this book that I liked to move on to the next book later on. There is also a movie (starring Jennifer Lawrence) so I’ll have to check it out sometime, too.

Next I am reading Kalyna the Soothsayer by Elijah Kinch Spector.

The problem with reading an old classic book is that sometimes the story and plot developments that were revolutionary at the time end up feeling out of date. Even though you are looking at a prototype it feels like old hat.

So it was with this book, which really is a great haunted house story. The scares here are effective and elegant, there is some great psychological terror going on, and the resolution was very satisfying. I was so glad that I hadn’t heard anything about this book before reading it.

Besides the story the author writes characters really well. One character early on is introduced by the nameless narrator as a liar. This throws the whole thing into unclear territory, and just this simple fact kept me on my toes for the rest of the book.

I don’t read a lot of horror, but this elegant and more cerebral approach was definitely worth the read.

Next I am reading Red Sparrow by Jason Matthews.

I’m no genius, a fact that can be clearly established based on my academic records and even the writing on these pages. But even I figured out the twists and the villain while reading this mystery/thriller.

I picked this book up because it was name-checked in another book I read recently, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. There was an odd vibe to the writing – very British and feeling sort of old fashioned. Maybe because of this it was easy to suss out what would happen in the end.

It was a quick book to read, though, and so I guess in a way it was entertaining. I saw that there are a bunch more books featuring the same characters, but I don’t think I’ll continue this series.

Next I am reading The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson.

This book is a novel (and sort of a fairy tale) about someone drawn back into his family history in Georgia after escaping from the country with his father and brother during the civil war following the breakaway from the USSR.

For the author, I felt like the book served as a memorial for their life in Georgia, their memories and the people that they left behind. Sometimes I read a book and I feel like the author was seeking catharsis – this was one of those cases.

For myself, the book was a good chance to revisit Tbilisi and the parts of the city we visited. It gave the city a deeper historical context, and it was fun to read about places that we had walked through ourselves. I enjoyed some of the characters – one taxi driver kept giving out great insults – while others were a little grating.

The author’s style was a little different – voices of characters that lived on in the narrator’s head, backfilling information over and over again – these decisions felt a little gimmicky to me.

The story itself was just a bit too perfect – key characters appear at precisely the right time: the villain, the hitchhiker, the soldier in Ossetia. I guess that was why I felt it more of a fairy tale than a novel – but if you can suspend the disbelief maybe you’ll enjoy the story.

The end turned unexpectedly violent – which caught me off guard – but this book is the story of a violent revolution and violence (and hope) between people. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised.

Next I am reading The Mermaids Singing by Val McDermid.