Reading for pleasure: February 2021

Rev Richard Coles, Kate Bottley and Giles Fraser (SPCK: £12.99; e-book £6.64)

This book reproduces the transcripts of the terrific BBC Radio 4 programme of the same name. 

The origins of the format came from a book festival where the three reverends hosted an event, which was packed out. The alchemy amongst the three friends was visceral, and was transferred to the radio. Despite being given the broad outline of their proposed chats, the series editor had nothing to fear: “Once they were plugged in, it was a case of letting them go.”

There are reflections on hatches, matches and dispatches, together with Christmas and Easter. The three broadcasters share their experiences of each event: funny, poignant and insightful. From the ardour of parents for their children to have a lead role in the nativity (despite being absent from church the rest of the year), to the passing of a verger who having more concern for the vicar than anyone else, ensured that a bottle of champagne awaited Bottley on her return home from a funeral. Despite their calling, the vicars are clearly only human; being all that is expected of them from their parishioners, a “kind of perpetual cheerfulness”. But, as Kate Bottley says, “Where's the place for me feeling a bit sorry for meself?” The final talk amongst the vicars was Easter 2020, just as the first lockdown was beginning to be given effect. Coles had lost his partner at Christmas, and the vicars reflect on the future of the church post-pandemic and the need to hold on to the light in the darkness.

Alan Furst (Weidenfeld & Nicolson: £8.99; e-book £4.99)

Set in occupied Paris in 1942, Furst introduces us to Paul Ricard, an aspiring novelist, who happens across a man being chased by the Gestapo. The man passes him a piece of paper: a drawing of a detonator for a German torpedo. This leads Ricard into the dark and secretive world of the resistance both in France and in Germany, as he seeks to recover more information for the Allies, travelling across Germany and setting up a false front in France. A safe line for Allied airmen is suspected of being compromised, and Ricard is sent down the line to identify the breach. A cast of characters from French and Polish resistance to German officers brings the story to life with a sense of setting, tension and pace.

Sergio Olguín (translated: Miranda France) (Bitter Lemon Press: £8.99; e-book £5.69)

This is the second outing for journalist Veronica Rosenthal, whom we first met in 2019 in The Fragility of Bodies. I described that work as not just black but downright Stygian. I also judged it as one of the best books I had read in 2019. Unfortunately, Señor Olguín seems to have been afflicted by the difficult second album syndrome. The fact that this novel is apparently based on true events should make it all the more shocking. Veronica decides to take a vacation and meets Petra and Frida, two backpackers from Norway and Italy respectively. They travel together for a few days, a journey which is cut short when the two girls' bodies are discovered, raped and murdered.

In much the same way that lawyers in crime novels usually become investigators, so it is with Veronica. She achieves significantly more success than either of the detectives in charge of the case, or the examining judge. There are of course complications, the main one being the sinister Three, whose mission is to murder Veronica, though it is far from clear whether this is for personal revenge, or on a commission for Doctor Zero. Rather like Veronica, Three leads a charmed life, getting over shootings and incarcerations until… (spoiler alert narrowly avoided).

The second complication is trying to keep up with a cast of characters only slightly smaller than War and Peace. Layering is one thing, but every fresh clue seems to unearth another family, whose members are either corrupt and well connected, or relatives or former lovers of someone or other. Throw in a bit of black magic – artefacts used in Umbanda rituals are found beside the bodies – plus the doubtful motives of Veronica's father, and of Federico, a junior but highly regarded lawyer in her father's Buenos Aires law practice.

No doubt to keep the publisher happy, there is quite a lot of sex. Some of it is well handled, if you'll forgive the turn of phrase, but rather a lot of it struck me as gratuitous. A perfectly decent read, but make sure you haven't read The Fragility of Bodies first.

Beth O'Leary (Quercus: £8.99; e-book £4.99)

Family relationships are a fascinating subject, and Beth O'Leary clearly thinks so too. She writes so well from a younger adults' perspective, but equally from an older point of view. The grandmother-granddaughter bond between Leena and Eileen is very strong; so much so, that they are the parties who do “The Switch”. They have many reasons for changing places, and their ultimate goals are completely different: Leena is regrouping professionally and emotionally, so that she can move on in life, and Eileen is catching up on things she missed out on in her youth.

Beth O'Leary's ability to form interesting, likeable characters is quite wonderful. She doesn't give the central figures a particularly easy time of it, and there is a desperately sad theme underlying the whole story; but in this tale, as with her previous novel The Flatshare, she really captures the reader, and before you know it, you are invested in the people portrayed and you can't wait to see how life turns out for them in the end. Younger or older, this is is warmly appealing.