Civilized company for a modern and historical ramble through the streets and waterways of this great city. The problem is that this is written in the 90’s and Sydney (like London) is evolving so very quickly that things have changed quite a bit since then. Worth a dip.

Another summer orphan. Described as Unpublished Short Stories, sometimes there’s a good reason not to publish things. Of course once you’re dead nothing can prevent Greedy Bastard Publishers laying hold of your left overs. Not that bad, but also not compelling, which is a rare thing to say about the wonderful Vonnegut.

I also swiftly tired of this. Again it’s a summer orphan, staying on the shelves for another year, crying out forlornly, finish me.

Started really well, but once this ex-African Peace Corps hand returns to the idyllic land where he had such a seminal experience growing and helping the villagers, it grew into some kind of Evelyn Waugh story where the white man is trapped by resourceful natives, and I found it less interesting. I liked his observation that Africa like the rest of us, has grown cynical and exploitive. More re-writing please.

A wonderful book. I sometimes wish though that she would be edited because she writes history (story) so well, but occasionally bogs down into historical detail. Particularly research questions, maybe this, maybe that. Of course that’s history but we want narrative. A bit of blue pencil work would help a lot, but she is a serious historian of course and would hate that. By concentrating on the fall of Anne Boleyn we see the nightmare side to the Tudors, the savagery and the falling from grace, in this coup d’état engineered by the unlikeable Thomas Cromwell.

I was enjoying this but was forced to abandon my copy in London by the constraints of travel baggage. He loves his Dickens and his actors approach to this great author means he sees and feels the human being behind the novelist. One feels that Callow himself has suffered and empathises with this most humane and dramatical of novelists.

Described as a short history of Private Life, in fact it is a bit longer than that. A full length history of his own Rectory home in Norfolk, it delves into the history of so much that we take for granted. Dining, sleeping, eating, crapping: each function of humanity has had its evolution from our animal state. So a fascinating view of our homes, interspersed with excellent tales of the man who built the Crystal Palace, Jefferson’s lifelong attempt to build Montecito and many other fascinating stories.

John Banville isn’t only a good novelist, he is two good novelists. Here is another highly readable (the fifth) in his Quirke Dublin series. A mystery. And a mystery how he finds the time to write these books as well as his more enduring ones.

A damned beautiful novel. About him and Zelda, the falling in love, the drifting apart, the drinks, the lack of purpose. Very fine. His writing seems to look even better with distance. Here he has written the falling out of love, which is so hard to write. Now my second favourite Fitzgerald. The detail of his prose is fascinating and wonderful.

Again I’m disappointed, and yet I love him. His book starts with ridiculing female reactions to his books but within a few chapters you are feeling sympathetic to their views. Must he go on and on about the death of the novel when he himself is killing it? There are many hard truths about the failure of the novel and the futility of the Northern writer moving to London and then writing about the decline of the novel. But he keeps saying he has nothing to say but says it anyway. Irony? Of course. Wearying? Eventually. If you keep destroying our faith in what you are doing we may be tempted to take you at your word. He is one of our funniest writers. His essays are sublime. Is this all that is left after you have been Prized, praised and rewarded. Come on Howard. Bet you’re a Man City supporter.