February Books: Fiction

 There are always mysteries in the mix of books I read and over the past several months, classics, too.

The Darkest Evening by Ann Cleeves

This is the latest in the author’s Vera series and, like the others, it was a page-turner (or screen tapper, since I read an e-book borrowed from the library). 

This book takes place around the winter solstice/Christmas and begins with a blizzard in a rural area of England. Vera is on her way somewhere after being stubborn and not heeding the advice of her colleagues to stay at home. She is finding the driving difficult. Things become more harrowing when she comes across what she thinks is an abandoned car on the side of the road. Thinking someone might have gone off the road, she goe to see whether anyone needs help. To her surprise, she finds the car is not empty, but contains a baby in the car seat. Thinking the mother had gone off to find help, she leaves a note and takes the baby with her so he can warm up. She heads for some lights in the distance and discovers to her dismay that she has arrived at the estate of estranged family members, where there is a party underway. Having no other options, she rings the bell and brings the baby inside. Shortly thereafter, a body is found in the snow. Vera calls her team and the investigation gets underway. 

I really enjoyed this book. I whipped through it and when I had to put it down, was eager to pick it back up again. At one point, I thought I had some plot twists figured out, but I was well off the mark. This is a great series and this latest addition is no exception.

Diary of a Nobody by Weedon Grossmith and George Grossmith (audiobook read by Frederick Davidson)

I’d heard about this book on the A Good Read podcast. Bth of the guests and the hosts loved it, so when I saw it was a new title in the e-audiobook collection on the library website, I borrowed it. 

Diary of a Nobody was first published as a book in 1892, although it was published in serial format before that. It is told from the perspective of Charles Pooter who is married to Carrie. They have a son, Lupin, who is just entering adulthood. Charles works as a clerk, but we’re never told what sort of firm it is. He decides one April day that he, a nobody, might just as well keep a diary, like the more well-known people do. The diary runs for 15 months and describes his interactions with friends, his run-ins with tradespeople, his new home in The Laurels, which is right next to the railroad tracks, his jokes, and more. It’s a funny book, not in a laugh out loud kind of way, but more in a quiet chuckles way. I think the way the reader reads adds to the sense of humour.

The Small House at Allington by Anthony Trollope

This is the 5th book in Trollope’s Chronicles of Barsetshire series, although he did not want to include it in the series at first. He was convinced to do so by his friends. Some have argued that this could be the first Palliser novel or that it could be a ‘hinge’ book between the two. It does not take place in Barset, but many of the same characters readers meet in previous novels make appearances here. It is also the introduction of Plantagenet Palliser, who is one of the main characters in the Palliser series. It was first published in serial form in Cornhill magazine in 1892 and then as a book in two volumes months after the completion of that in 1894.

This book revolves around the Dale family—a widowed mother and her two daughters, Bell and Lily. When Mr Dale died, they were left in less-than-comfortable circumstances, although they were not extremely poor, either. They went to live in the Small House on the grounds of the estate owned by Mrs Dale’s brother-in-law, who has never married and has no children. He takes an interest in the personal life of Bell and one of his nephews, Bernard, who will inherit. This leads to some complications as does Bernard’s visit to the Big House with a friend. There are other storylines besides that of the Dales, but almost all of them have something to do with this family in one way or another. 

I don’t want to say much more because to do so would be to give away plot points. I was listening recently to a book tube video in which someone was talking about classics in general and she said that she never reads the back of classics when she gets them, because they often include spoilers. That was true for me in this case. The World’s Classics edition I have did indeed give away a big incident on the back. When I read Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens, in the Wordsworth edition, it was not until the end that I realized that an important plot twist that was supposed to remain suspenseful until the very end, was given away in the list of the characters at the beginning of the book. My experiences with these books would have been completely different had I not known about these things in advance. So from now on, no reading the back or the list of characters before reading the book! I already save the introductions to the end, because they give a lot away, too.

As for this book, I loved it. It pokes fun at the aristocracy, illustrates a changing society and the struggles to adapt, addresses gender roles, class, the need to keep up appearances, and the role of money in happiness and unhappiness.

An Exhibition of Murder by Vivian Conroy

This is the 4th and thus far at least, final book in the author’s Murder Will Follow series set in the 1920s and featuring retired Scotland Yard man Jasper and his dog, Red, who travels with him everywhere. Each book has been set in a different location. In the first one, we meet Jasper and learn that he has retired to the villa he purchased on the French Riviera. In the second, he and Red are on holiday on a Greek island. The third book finds them in Venice, and in this one, they are visiting an old friend in Vienna. This friend is a museum curator who is very excited because of the opening of a new exhibition—an Egyptian death mask found during an archaeological expedition. The curator’s daughter is engaged to one of the men who found the mask—an older widowed man who has no interest in monogamy and who has a troubled grown daughter, cared for since childhood by a companion. Unsurprisingly, the opening does not go as planned and when the door to the room housing the mask is thrown open, attendees are faced with the mask placed over the face of the dead person lying on the floor. Many people had reasons to want this person gone and the hunt begins for the person who decided to get rid of them. There’s quite a cast of characters in addition to those already mentioned—a singer, a boozing reporter, a budding psychiatrist enamoured with the new ideas of a guy named Freud, an illusionist, an immigrant hiding money problems from her husband, and more. I enjoyed these books, and if there are ever more, I would read them. The three previous e-books had previews of the next one at the end, but not so with this one.

And with that, the February reading list is complete. Onward through another month and another stack of books!

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