The Visitors by Simon Sylvester

review by Maryom

17 year old Flora has always lived on the small Scottish island of Bancree - and it's always seemed a dull, safe sort of place, that she can't wait to leave. When newcomers, a man and his daughter, move into an abandoned house on lonely Dog Rock, Flora is curious about them. After-all, why would anyone pick such an out-of-the-way place to live?  Flora and the daughter Ailsa quickly become friends but the father seems withdrawn and menacing, not making any attempt to fit in with the community.
 At the same time, people have been disappearing from the island - maybe they've just fallen in the sea and been washed away, or got lost on the way home from the pub and are now lying in a ditch, but could there be a killer at large?


The Visitors is a mix of coming of age novel, psychological thriller and myth, set on a remote weather-beaten island somewhere vaguely in the Hebrides. It opens well, setting the scene as Flora and her boyfriend part company as he heads off south to university, capturing her frustration that she must wait another year before it's her turn to head off into the wide world. With another disappearance plus the arrival of newcomers, the atmosphere of fear and mistrust builds, and in between Flora listens to traditional tales of the selkies - sea-creatures, half-human, half-seal, that capture the hearts of fisherman  - and wonders if all these things are related. 
 Now, I'm not averse to novels that mix and mash up reality and fantasy, and as fond of a gothic thriller as the next person - I loved Lauren Beukes' Broken Monsters and The Shining Girls both of which are in a similar vein mixing murder and supernatural, and Amy Sackville's different take on the selkie myth, Orkney - but this didn't grab me. I wondered why, because the story-telling was good and the main characters believable. Then checking links and such for this post, I realised - too much is given away in the 'blurb'; instead of leaving the mystery to unfold as the book is read, most of the reveals are given away in it. It's rather a pity as I think if I'd read it 'cold', I'd have enjoyed it much more.

Another of the shortlist for this year's Not The Booker Prize - see also my review of Iain Maloney's First Time Solo
Maryom's review -  3.5 stars
Publisher - Quercus 
Genre - Adult/YA crossover, thriller,

First Time Solo by Iain Maloney

review by Maryom

It's 1943 and Jack Devine, a farmer's son from Aberdeenshire, has been impatiently waiting his chance to join in the War. Swayed by the glamorous image of the RAF, he volunteers as a trainee pilot. After being accepted, he has to wait - a long year spent kicking his heels at home while his friends are called up for the army. Eventually he thinks his chance has come but it's more like going back to school - studying aerodynamics, engineering, maths and law, exams to pass before moving on to the next round of training, more studying, only interspersed with marching, PT and more marching. Will he ever actually get to fly?

First Time Solo shows us the WW2 from an unusual angle -  the perspective of a group of 18/19 year olds; just old enough to fight but through having chosen the RAF, held back from joining in and 'doing their bit'. Their frustration and impotence bubble through on every page, all too often bursting out in violence. The only relief comes through drinking and jazz. With his two new friends - short, pugnacious Glaswegian Joe and black-marketeer Terry with his suitcase crammed with chocolate, nylons and cigarettes - Jack sets up a jazz band but Joe's loud Communist sympathies and readiness for a fight soon threaten to pull the threesome apart.

 Told in the first person from Jack's point of view, it all seems rather school-boyish at times with endless cramming for exams, skiving off cross-country running to play cards and petty animosities building between them. School-boy 'ragging' soon escalates - and they've the opportunity and means to turn it into something really nasty. Jack himself, although obviously greatly affected by events such as his brother's death and a friend's injury, tries to maintain a manly 'stiff-upper lip' and dismisses his emotions in short, curt phrases, and I sometimes wondered if a third person narration would have given greater emotional impact.

The story is based partly on the war-time experiences of the author's grandfather - watch this space as we'll have a guest post tomorrow from Iain Maloney talking about the transition from family history to fiction.

All in all an intriguing debut, one that's made its way to the short list for 2014's Not The Booker prize, and definitely an author to watch out for.

Maryom's review - 4 stars

Publisher - Freight Books

Genre -  Adult, historical fiction, WW2

Brick Mother by SJ Bradley

Review by The Mole

The story is set in a secure psychiatric hospital where patients with very varying illnesses are kept. The staff are constantly short handed and competence levels seem to vary immensely. The reader knows from page one that this is a powder keg ready to blow and awaits each new page for it to happen. There isn't one hero and one villain, in fact I'm not sure there's a hero at all, but we experience a little of what life is like for the staff with their power struggles and capabilities.

I was amazed by this book because I was over half way through before I realised that nothing had actually 'happened' but I was still reading. Despite the setting for this book the reader will see parallels in almost every employment sector they have been in - people held back by being too much of a threat; people promoted beyond their competence; people without the authority to stop what they see shouldn't happen; people recruited to fill seats without adequate training and understanding and much more.

I did find it compelling and slightly worrying, and the ending is not what I would have voted for.

My version was a review copy as it was nominated for the long list of The Guardian's "Not The Booker prize 2014" and I have to admit to being disappointed by the quality of the editing in MY COPY and also the fact that it hasn't made the short list.

A disturbing read but one that will keep you reading and make you wonder about mental heath care.

Publisher - Dead Ink Books
Genre - Adult contemporary fiction