Abundance by Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler

It took me ages to read this book because I wanted to remember all the detail, which of course I haven’t. It is too chock a block full! Abundance is a great antidote to the pessimism that grips my world. Its subtitle is ‘The future is better than you think’. His chief premise is that if you fix basic needs like water and food and health, then you fix problems like overpopulation and scarcity. And this can all be done through technology and technophilanthropists. The book begins with a fascinating discussion of perspective, which challenges our default position of negativity. I loved this part because it told me to wake up and get a grip. There follows a lot of fascinating detail about the problems facing the world and the technological solutions that are available and becoming available to resolve them, cheaply, simply, quickly. I loved the philosophical bent of this book too – it’s almost like a self help book on the power of positive thinking but with good reason: it’s the young and brave who solve the problems because they have unfailing belief in themselves and their ability to do it. I bought this book for several friends at Christmas. Enough said.

All That I Am by Anna Funder

Wow. I loved Stasiland and I loved this book too. I love the way Funder gets underneath a story and although it is based on truth manages to make it mysterious and compelling reading. This is the story of a cohort of largely Jewish playwrights, journalists and political activists who were exiled to Britain and France before the war and worked against Hitler’s regime from there. It is told by Ruth, who was a member of the upper class Jewish elite and Toller, a writer and activist. Central to both their lives is Dora, their cousin and lover respectively, a star around which the story revolves. It is obvious from the moment you open the book that Dora is dead, but what takes a while to unfold is that the story is told in two different time frames: during the thirties leading up to the second world war, and the present, when Ruth lives in Australia. What was really moving about this book is the enduring presence of Dora in Ruth’s life, some seventy years into the future.

The Monkeys Mask by Dorothy Porter

An astonishing book really, a thriller starring a gritty, vulnerable, tough lesbian detective, and written in compelling verse. It reminded me of the old Beowulf type epic tales, originally told and retold in ancient halls and finally written down.

The Other Hand by Chris Cleave

I had a lot of trouble with this book which is about a Nigerian refugee who escapes from detention and tracks down the English couple who witnessed the incident that led to her flight. This would be a good book to read if you had little understanding of the refugee situation. But I found the book quite depressing. The reviewers on the cover described it as profound and provocative, and one even said it was seriously funny, but I found it grim, predictable and exhausting.

Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner

Everybody I know has been recommending Crossing to Safety, after it appeared on the bookclub show on TV I think. This is a fine, mature, understated book about the relationship between friends and between partners. There was a lot to love about it: It’s beautifully written, with elegant and accurate language. Stegner knows exactly what word to use. There’s not a lot of drama to it, so it’s a quiet novel about the day to day detail of a lifelong relationship and it’s all the more authentic for that. The characters are utterly believable. I kept finding shadows of myself in the domineering Charity, which was uncomfortable. Yet in a way I could understand why she was as she was: immensely capable, motivated only by the wish to help others, yet trapped by her gender, her five children and by the age in which she lived. These days she’d be a corporate lawyer working in social justice or something. Not that any of this is even hinted at in the novel. She’s happy with her life, sees no other choices lost, but organizes the people in her world because it is simply better that way. Stegner was quite old when he wrote this book and you can see his maturity and the wisdom that comes with it. He understands about relationships, so partners can be overwhelmed and exhausted by each other yet still be utterly dependent on one another like old vines that have intertwined. Mmmm, wonderful.

The Joy of Sin by Simon Laham

We heard this writer speak at the Festival of Dangerous Ideas in Sydney a few weeks ago and I was so fascinated I bought the book. He’s an experimental psychologist in the field of human behaviour and his book is a collection of really interesting research that looks a few of what could loosely be categorized as ‘sins’. That’s a conceit really: a device on which to hang his information. It’s not really about sin at all but that doesn’t matter at all. It’s a great book to read but of course because it’s a collection of experiments it’s unlikely that I’ll remember any of it in a fortnight’s time.

The Magus by John Fowles

This is the third time I've read The Magus, and I do admit I'm losing patience with it as I get older. It's the story of a schoolteacher, a fairly unpleasant selfish young character, who goes to Greece to escape a love affair and to teach on an island school. He meets a local man, Conchis, and becomes involved in a series of mysterious, theatrical events that utterly confuse him about what is truth and what is fiction. Through it all he begins to learn about himself and about his life and finally comes out of it all a changed man. He finally understands that with free will comes responsibility. The book was originally called The Godgame and the premise is really very silly: that a wealthy man on a remote Greek island could play god and invent and carry off these masques is ridiculous. And it is pretentious. But it's still a compelling narrative and I did find myself utterly absorbed by it all over again.