1998: Last Days of Summer

Book Name: Last Days of Summer

Author: Steve Kluger

Genre: Epistolary

Year Published: 1998

I've been looking forward to reading this book for a while, due to it being described as epistolary. It has a bunch of different media used throughout, such as interviews, letters and newspaper clippings, which makes you feel like you're really experiencing stuff as it happens. I read another book a while ago which was similarly constructed, but using emails and texts - I couldn't tell you what it was called... I did love the style though, hence my excitement for this one!

So as I picked this solely on the basis of its genre, I was completely ignorant of its actual content, so I was pleasantly surprised to find it was about Brooklyn during the Second World War, and an unlikely friendship between a Jewish boy and a black baseball player.

As someone with zero baseball knowledge, and a low interest in war novels, this is not the kind of book I would have chosen normally. However, the story is compelling, the characters interesting, and the epistolary style immerses you in both the geography and history in such a way that a lack of knowledge is actually not that bad. It is a testimony to Kluger's writing style that I was able to learn a variety of things from reading this novel, about Jews, military terms, baseball, wartime America and so on. 

The way the book is put together using the different media really lends itself to you wanting to keep reading, so I was able to finish it pretty easily, which was almost a shame. I would have loved to have read more about the era, and will definitely be searching out similar books. Feel free to give me some recommendations! I definitely recommend this one!  

Books I Read Inbetween: Shutter Island - Dennis Lehane; The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern

Other Books I Considered: About A Boy - Nick Hornby; Skellig - David Almond

1965: Dune

Book Name: Dune

Author: Frank Herbert

Genre: Science Fiction

Year Published: 1965

   So... Dune. This book took me about five months to read. It was definitely a new reading experience for me as half of me really wanted to know what happened in the story, and was eager to keep reading. The other half struggled with the science fiction language and premise, something that I've always found difficult to get my head around quickly. I would spend days reading constantly and then struggle to get back into it for a while. 

   The book itself is well written. The premise is engaging and entertaining. Dune covers quite a large period of time in the life of one Paul Atreides, who grows from young teenager to man during the course of the novel, and the story relates to his family's journey to a new planet which his father is placed in charge of. Of course things don't go as expected, and during the course of the novel we are subjected to a ton of storyline concerning family, religion, politics, economics, ecology and much more. 

   It is clear that Frank Herbert put an amazing amount of time and effort into the construction not just of the book, Dune, but of the world it describes also. It is very historically and geographically rich. There is even a glossary in the back of the copy I read to assist with the foreign language terms used during the course of the novel, which I ended up referring to regularly at the start. 

   Overall then, this was definitely a book that required a lot of attention and concentration for me, but I feel like it was worth it in the end. I thoroughly enjoyed the actual story, but I cannot deny that I found it a difficult read. When I finally finished it, I did watch the film for comparison, and as is often the case, I would strongly recommend reading the book as well or instead, if only because I feel you cannot get an appreciation of the depth of the novel Herbert created otherwise. 

  Highly recommend if you already like science fiction, or are looking for a book to stretch your reading horizons!

Books I Read Inbetween: Splinter - Sebastian Fitzek; Fifteen Days Without A Head - Dave Cousins; After Tomorrow - Gillian Cross