So, mostly spoiler-free version:

Inspector Tyador Borlú is a senior homicide detective in Beszel, an eastern-European city-state. Beszel is pretty run-down and runs on the remnants of post-Soviet bureaucracy. Getting anything done here isn’t easy but Borlú’s good at his job. When investigating the murder of a young woman, however, he finds more and more barriers placed in his way. Someone’s doing their best to keep him from the truth.

On a basic level, The City and The City is a good, old-fashioned police-procedural-type of story. Miéville, however, adds a layer—that arena, I mentioned earlier—that brings that genre somewhere else. It’s pretty intriguing (especially if you haven’t read a review that lays it all out on a plate and shoves it into your gob on a massive spoon).

The blurb I was looking up, by the way is one stating that ‘comparisons to Kafka and Orwell are thrown around too readily these days…’ before going on to liken Miéville to Kafka and Orwell. I thought this a pretty lazy comparison and it annoyed me enough to try find the review. This annoyance is directed at the reviewer, by the way and is in no way intended to be a slight on The City and The City, which I enjoyed immensely and have no problem recommending. It’s original, intelligent and gripping.

And, if I know you’ve begun reading it, I’ll email you spoilers unless you send biscuits.

For now, though, here’s what I’ve just started. Salman Rushdie’s The Moor’s Last Sigh.

I’ve never read Rushdie before. Obviously, I’ll eventually get around to the obligatory Satanic Verses but I figured this might be a less clichéd introduction to Rushdie’s work.

Sprawlingly intricate seems to be the term that works best here. It’s a dense family history, across four generations of the da Gama/Zogoiby family, told by Moraes Zogoiby – the Moor of the title. The family histories are woven into India’s wider history and, if some of the stories I’ve read are to be believed, this was enough to annoy those with their own particular views on aspects of the subcontinent’s past. True or otherwise, it wasn’t enough to lead to a new round of death threats against Rushdie and hasn’t interfered with his abilities to take phone calls from U2 (Bono be praised).

So far, The Moor’s Last Sigh is deep and elaborate and beautifully written. I think I’ll enjoy it.

I haven’t done one of these Tea-And-Book posts for a while.  This is chiefly because my brilliantly fractured skull (and I’m certain it was fractured brilliantly, despite that I can’t remember the incident) gave me a headache that lasted about a month and I didn’t feel much like focussing on text.  Rest assured, however, that I have consumed just as many cups of tea as normal.

Anyway, Banville.

I’ve been a Banville fan for quite a few years now.  The logophile (word-geek) in me loves the thesaural manner in which he spills intriguing words onto the page.  I love the fact that I always have to dig into a dictionary on a couple of occasions when I read one of his books.

The prose-geek in me, however, practically wets himself at the promise of a new Banville because it’s not possible for the man to write a single sentence that isn’t so polished it gleams, blindingly, from the page.  Lyrical, evocative, poetic, beautiful; to quote the vernacular of the Youth, Banville the man (ahem).

The Infinities is Banville’s first novel under his own name since he won the Man Booker with The Sea (he’s written as Benjamin Black in the interim – I have these on my shelf and really must get around to them).  Set in a big, old country house somewhere in the middle of Ireland over the course of a single midsummer’s day, The Infinities follows the members of the Godley family as their father lies, comatose from a stroke and dying, in bed.  Banville chucks in a number of themes that he’s touched on in previous books including a massive helping of Greek mythology.  You see, the book is narrated by one of the old Gods, Hermes to be precise.  Even big daddy, Zeus himself, features as do some minor deities. The gods watch the family through the day, plotting and intervening here and there (Zeus in his own inimitable fashion).

The Infinities contains something that I don’t remember reading from Banville before – a dash of what’s essentially speculative fiction.  Maybe I’ve become a Banville purist or something but it seemed a little incongruous to me; and like an easy path to showing the breadth of impact the dying Godley patriarch’s intellect has had on that world.  It’s probably also possible to accuse Banville of over-egging the pudding slightly on The Infinites. It’s a little plump around the waist and not quite so pared and perfect as The Sea or The Book Of Evidence was.

Still though, it is a beautiful read.  Even a bad Banville (which this most certainly isn’t) is preferable to most of the books on Amazon.  For the odd, little thing that pulled me from the story, there were chapters and chapters of wonderful, rich, flowing prose to pull me back and carry me along, happy as a metaphor mixer in shit.

I will sing Banville’s praises all day, to be honest.  I love his writing.  If you’re not familiar with him, don’t just sit there, pop off and get something he’s written (pretty much anything).  I challenge you not to like it.

Are you still here?

The scone: Fruit.  The jam: Strawberry.

The book: Risk: The Science and Politics Of Fear by Dan Gardner.

I spotted Dan Gardner on Charlie Brooker’s Newswipe a few weeks ago.  He said sensible things and then his book was mentioned.  Impressionable type that I am, I rushed to the internet to order up a copy.

Risk’s raison d’être is that, as a species, Homo sapiens has much, much less to worry about now than at any stage in its past but most of us go around anxious and stressed about stuff that has a minuscule chance of occurring.

Our brains couldn’t keep pace with our species’ development and, although we’re flying about in jets and curing disease, our brains are still somewhere around the early, hunter-gatherer stages of our evolution.  However, instead of a useful ‘there’s a lion in that bush’ brainwave, now that we have very few lions to dodge, we’re getting ‘there’s a paedophile in that bush’ brainwave.

I’m oversimplifying massively of course but the jist is the same.  Although the clever ‘head’ part of our brains can work out the statistics of there actually being a paedophile in the bush, more often that not, the ‘gut’ part of our brains goes on what it ‘knows’ – and it reads the Daily Mail. Risk looks at how and why this behaviour happens and – maybe more interestingly – looks at how that behaviour can be, and is, exploited.

Risk is well written and entertaining throughout.  At times it strays towards feeling a tiny-bit academic but it really is only a little and it’s worth it for the wealth of information you’re getting.  I really recommend everyone read it.  I’d go so far as to say it’s required reading.

And, if you don’t read it, a paedophile will move into your bushes.  Go and make it so, gullible ones.

It seems I didn’t.

I tried to take a break.  I started two other books and gave up a dozen pages in.  They were too light.  My brain had grown accustomed to the distressing world of Peace’s Yorkshire and was unable to turn itself to something less somber and grim.

That was slightly worrying.

As it turns out, 1980 is slightly (very slightly) less bleak than either of the previous books in the series.  Less bleak than 1977 – I think – because its protagonist is not so tainted as either Bob Fraser or Jack Whitehead (77′s ‘heroes’); his point of view a little less grimy and sordid. Less bleak than 1974, possibly, because even the grisliness of the Ripper murders holds less emotional resonance than the tortures and murders of the children in the earlier book.

Don’t think it’s a walk in the park however.

Peace brings more of the prose we’re used to; expressive, personal, and beautifully burrowing. We’re with our new protagonist, Peter Hunter but he’s slightly more removed from what’s come before. For all the pain and lies and secrets that are in Hunter’s head, we’re just glad that it’s not so awful in there as in previous books.

Peace makes some progress towards winding up this tetralogy (quadrilogy isn’t a real word) in 1980 and I’m looking forward to finally getting to 1983.

This time, however, there will be something between this and the next Peace book.

At least it is in David Peace’s 1977. Bleak, gloomy and darker than closing your eyes at the bottom of an ocean where even those weird, ugly fish are scared to go.

Awful, terrible, beautiful darkness.  Peace just won’t leave you alone. His words gnaw and eat at you and his story remains in your, now fetid, brain for a long, long time.

I read 1974 a few months ago and needed a bit of time before moving on. I’ll need more time before moving to 1980. These are not easy-reads but they are remarkable reads.

Much has been made of Peace’s ‘stream of consciousness’ prose and it is beautifully lyrical and engaging.  The story focuses on the Yorkshire Ripper murders and is told from the first-person perspective of two different characters (two characters from 1974).  This throws you for a few seconds as you process the first character switch but it’s easy to accommodate.  Oddly – and adding to the disorientation – while both characters narrate their 1st-person story in alternating chapters, one does so in the present-tense and one in the past-tense.

And the violence…  While there was plenty of violence in my last read, No Country For Old Men, it was more distant; slightly more stylised. Peace’s violence is in your face (and your hair and under your fingernails).  It’s visceral and savage and affects you more deeply. Like I say, it’s difficult to forget.

I’m two thirds through and I’m now going to sneak off somewhere quiet and finish it.  If I don’t post again, it’s because I’m huddled in a foetal position, weeping quietly and despairing.

The keen-eyed among you will have noticed my new Penguin Classics mug.  I recently treated myself to two of them. Keep ‘em peeled to see the other make an appearance soon.

*I’m certain I’m not the first to have made this, rather weak, joke.  Apologies.

Oddly enough, I’ve actually failed to catch the film yet so I went into the book with no preconceptions. I’m told that the film is a pretty faithful adaptation though.  It’s on the DVD list.  Will get to it soon.

As for the book, the prose is not quite so stark as The Road but it’s certainly been honed to within an inch of its life.  It’s tight, yet rich, and it’s always gripping. McCarthy’s sparse punctuation quickly seeps into your brain and it’s only when you see an occasional contraction complete with its apostrophe that you remember their absence.  It all makes for a quick read.

It also makes for a splendidly engaging, often disturbing read.  You’ll have heard about the violence, I’m sure, and there is plenty of that.  Mostly cold and considered violence and always chillingly rendered.  Brilliant.  It’s probably fair to say that I’m a McCarthy convert.

Incidentally, because I’m a book-snob I normally hate to read a book that has the movie-poster as its cover. The fact is, this one was almost two quid less than the non-film-cover version and there’s a recession.

I’m hoping to get to see the film next week – weather permitting – and I really wanted to read the book before I did.

The postie brought this at lunchtime and, bad father that I am, I bundled my daughter into the next room to rot her brain watching TV while I sat in the kitchen and made a start on The Road.  It was either that or read aloud to her and I think TV is probably the lesser to those two particular evils.

I’ve hit the halfway mark (despite my child selfishly interrupting me a number of times for things like food) and can report that it’s an extraordinary read.

At the risk of sounding a bit wanky, the prose is unembellished to the point of being stark – and all but the most essential punctuation is absent – but it’s certainly no less beautiful or disturbing for it. This is my first McCarthy, but I believe he writes like this in some (all?) of his other novels.

Anyway, wankiness aside, The Road has been distressing, haunting, riveting so far and I’m certain the second half will continue to ratchet things up.

Looking forward to it immensely.  It may need another cup of tea though.

Oh, I’m also impressed by how many synonyms for ‘grey’ he has found.

For those interested in such things, Joe Penhall – who adapted it for the screen – writes about it here.  Someone I follow tweeted this link but I’m afraid I can’t remember who. Sorry I can’t credit you. Rest assured you are in my thoughts though – vaguely, anyway.

So then, I’ve just started The Death Of Bunny Munroe by Nick Cave. About a third of the way through at the moment and enjoying things so far.

If you are a regular reader of these ramblings, you might remember that, a few months back, I went to ‘An Evening Of Readings, Music And Conversation With Nick Cave‘.  The ‘reading’ bit of that evening with Nick, was from this book.  It’s Cave’s latest novel and he was plugging it between singing some splendid songs and getting heckled for being misogynist.

This latter was from a lady who took umbrage at the content of some of Cave’s prose.  While I think Offended-Lady was completely wrong, there is plenty in The Death Of Bunny Munro to cause offence to a certain type of person.  Basically, if you’re the type of person who really thinks that all men are bastards and that everything – literally everything -  revolves around men attempting to bed every woman they meet/know/know of, this book may not be for you.  The eponymous hero is not a terribly nice guy and while he’s not doing things to ladies’ bits, he’s thinking about lady-bits.  You might think him an unsympathetic character, then.  You’d be wrong – I wouldn’t want to hang out with Bunny Munro but I certainly care what happens to him.

So far, a good helping of sex and death and masturbation.  Oh, and an episode where, after parking in a disabled spot, Bunny tells his son, “if a traffic warden comes by, pretend to be a spastic or something.”

It’s good.  Get it.  Of course, yours won’t be signed by Nick Cave (like wot mine is) but at least you’ll get a good read.  If you’ve read Cave’s And The Ass Saw The Angel, well, this is nothing like it.

Oh, I am enjoying this book and tea with some M&S Rhubarb & Ginger Cookies.  Delicious.