These are the notes from the meeting at the Devonshire Arms,
Eight present
A good evening and lots of good discussion prompted by this
book, on the themes of how important memory is to our lives. Some members have
experience of friends and relatives with dementia, and this prompted lots of moral and ethical questions,
such as what makes a person, and what are we without memory? Also if people cannot
remember who they are, are they still human?
The majority present liked the book, although some more than others. No
one disliked the book (although the absent member did not like it at all).
Rob thought it was a pretty good book and very gripping,
although he read this on his new kindle which was challenging to him. He
thought the memory aspect was intriguing, although some bits did not hold
together. He noted that it was a first novel and the quality of the writing was
simple. Rob felt that the research carried out for the book was limited. For
example, he felt that Christine could not have got out of the care home in the
way she did.
Steve read the book really quickly, and thought the translation
was quite acceptable. He found it an easy read in a straightforward way, and on
reflection found this slightly disappointing. He liked the way that Christine’s
day was gradually built up over the chapters, but felt that the characters were
a bit colourless.
Richard thought the book was written in two bits (first 2/3
and last 1/3). He really enjoyed the fist 2/3, and thought it a very
interesting theme. He liked the memory aspect and talked at length how
important this is, and felt this bit was written well. But Richard realised straight away that Ben
was bad, and he felt the ending was poor and totally implausible. What really annoyed Richard immensely was the statement on the cover
that this was the crime thriller of the year.
Neil was less
convinced, and was certain that the writer was female. He felt much happier,
however, when he was corrected that the
writer was male. He thought too much was made of the writer’s first book, and
lots of the writing annoyed him. He was not convinced about the practicalities
of how Christine wrote her diary, and how she concealed this from her
‘husband’. But he felt that the writer drew out the tension well but like
Richard thought the ending was implausible, and had many drawbacks.
Chris B had read the book a long while ago, and this was his
second read (although he read it again 4 months ago, so had forgotten some of
the detail). He, with his added insight
to the book, felt that Christine should not have remembered things she did, and
how did she intuitively knew how everyday things worked? He felt at the beginning that something was
wrong with the husband. The class issues really annoyed him, but on balance a
good story with a hopeful ending.
Chris W enjoyed it and could not put it down, and it was a
great holiday read. He particularly liked the description of the really boring
home. Raz thought it was a good idea for a story, and found it easy to read,
but thought it was far too long, about 30% too long! He thought it was too
predictable but admitted it had a little bit of tension. He thought it was
Okish.
Mark T enjoyed the book very much, although it took him a
while to get into it. What grabbed his attention was when Christine wrote in
her diary “don’t trust Ben” .He felt the tension building from them on. He did
not realise what was going on for a while, although realised something was not
quite right early on. For example he could not accept that Ben had been doing
this for years and years. He thought the ending was very tense and thrilling,
and worried what was going to happen next. He was surprised that Ben (Mike)
could suddenly be so violent after seemingly so patient in the first part of
the book.
Although Mark Th was not present, he did read
the book, and commented by email afterwards. He enjoyed the first 100 pages,
but felt it had been done better on film before (Mnemonic) or non-fiction by
Oliver Sacks. He became very frustrated by the narrow bounds the story required
and very bored by the silliness of her re-reading every day so that by the time
the plot twist came – a bit like the Apothecary’s Daughter.
1 comment:
This is Steve, just clarifying that on the whole I disliked this book more than I liked it (hence 4/10). It had its moments, and I did read it quickly, but it left me cold and largely unimpressed, particularly from the point of view of the writer's capability (or lack of it) to paint around the subject. For me, that meant that all the focus was on the plausibility or otherwise of the day-to-day situations the protagonist found herself in, and on the whole I found that aspect wanting. But I enjoyed the input from those who know more about the field than I! Must learn to be more forthright in my 'live' comments!
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