The Marquess Of Queensberry by Linda Stratmann (Yale UP, £10.99)
The Marquess Of Queensberry by Linda Stratmann (Yale UP, £10.99)
Stratmann's rehabilitation in the public consciousness of the person credited with bringing down Oscar Wilde and probably hastening his death is not undertaken lightly, and it is truly fascinating. A portrait of a man "not easily liked" but admirable in his search for his lost brother does create sympathy and Stratmann's style is both scholarly and accessible.
Forever Yours by Daniel Glattauer (Maclehose, £8.99)
Glattauer's commitment to stylistic economy means a tendency to structure dialogue with personal pronouns followed by a colon, which is irritating at best, thoroughly distracting at worst. But his thriller-like tale of possessive Hannes whom single Judith meets by chance in the supermarket one day is reasonably tense, if rather conventional.
These Days Are Ours by Michelle Haimoff (Penguin, £8.99)
The attempt to crystalise the vapidity of a generation of privileged New York twentysomethings is a little obvious in Haimoff's love story, coming down as it does mainly to naming designer brands and cool eateries, but her female protagonist Hailey is not without charm, even if the end result isn't quite as cool as it wants to be.
The Other Side by Alfred Kubin (Dedalus Press, £9.99)
The danger of a purely ideological enterprise is exposed in this unusual novel first published in 1908, and which seems now to be horribly prescient about what the Nazis would perpetrate 30 years later. A "dream state" is created, where reason doesn't matter, only instinct, and its full horrors are realised. Powerful but highly engaging too.
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