Reviews 

This is her first book, and very different from The Colony (no.1019). Set in 1940’s Germany, the central figures are a soldier on the...

Published in 1995, so 25 years old. Made me wonder about the author’s sexuality. There are three main characters, Tim Cranmer the...

Probably his last published book, as he died last week. Le Carré is a writer (like Graham Greene) whose prose an English middle class...

I found this hard going; it was dramatised on Radio 4 but maybe their adaptation was better than the book. About an English governess who...

Thought I should follow the first great 19th century novel about adultery with the 2nd, but it is long (850 pages). Completely different...

Recommended on BBC’s A Good Read, and I had never read any of hers before. Good, but I struggled to understand the underlying theme. Set...

An Xmas present from Cristina next door, who is I think a fan and may even have met the guy. Very good, not the sort of book or writer I...

Although I think regarded as a classic of 19th century Russian literature, I thought this had dated badly and didn’t really enjoy it. My...

Obviously having my own Prague spring as this was inspired by 677 above, and apart from Kafka, Hasek is the major Prague writer from the...

Haven’t read this for a long time but it is a brilliant book. About sex, love, metaphysics, and the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia in...

This is a huge and very challenging book. The basic plot is relatively simple – three brothers with an unpleasant and dissolute father,...

I have never read this before, although our old paperback edition was bought 41 years ago. So better late than never. I didn’t enjoy The...

Been meaning to read this for years, strange and paradoxically both difficult and easy to read. Very long and unfinished, in fact Gogol...

This is a lot easier than Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky; a quite light social comedy on the surface, although the central figure Bazarov...

I quite enjoyed this, although it took ages to get going (around page 300!?). One of my problems was that none of the characters were,...

The last, I think, or intended last, Rebus. I found this structurally very similar to no.228 initially, with Russian money playing the...

A strange Wallander book that begins with an apparent Swedish domestic and expands into an attempt by the African white supremacists to...

Can't give this a number (see no.89), but I have finally finished 'War & Peace'; it is a huge book. i would like to re-read it, but would...

21.03.2013 Meanwhile, where I am now halfway through 'War & Peace', which I started post no.83. It is good but hard work - last night's...

Best holiday read so far. About an English girl who goes to Cambridge pre-WW2 and falls in love with a Russian émigré communist. She is...