One Night In Winter By Allan Massie
The Bodley Head, 1984 Dallas Graham, a former writer with one novel long behind him, now runs an antique shop. He has a more successful and still sexy wife who has affairs from time to time and who...
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Neroâs Heirs by Allan Massie
Sceptre, 1999, 248p This comes with an encomium from Gore Vidal on the front cover, âMaster of the long ago historical novel.â Since Vidalâs own Roman excursion Julian was no petty achievement...
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The Sins of the Father by Allan Massie
Hutchinson, 1991, 299p. In Argentina in 1964 two young lovers, Franz Schmidt and Rebecca Czinner, children of German emigrés, decide to marry. When the two sets of parents meet, Becky’s father, Eli,...
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Arthur The King by Allan Massie
A Romance. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2003, 292 p. A novel about King Arthur? What new is there to be said? Well, Massie’s approach is different. This is the second part of his Dark Ages trilogy as told...
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Charlemagne and Roland by Allan Massie
Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2007, 232 p. The last in Massie’s Dark Ages trilogy, this is mainly the life story of Roland, nephew of Charlemagne. As in previous instalments we have the interjections and...
View ArticleProjected New Year Reading
Happy New Year everyone. As I mentioned before the good lady suggested I should take part in her blog friend Peggy Ann’s Read Scotland Challenge. This post is about what I intend to read. (Whether I...
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Surviving by Allan Massie
Vagabond Voices, 2009, 208p. This is the second book I’ve read this year eligible for the Read Scotland 2014 Challenge and the second not set in Scotland. The author has a large back catalogue some of...
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Mr Mee by Andrew Crumey
Picador, 2000, 344 p. Mr Mee bears several Crumey hallmarks; explanations of concepts from Physics (and, in this case, probability) in literary form, characters from the 18th century, ruminations on...
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Change and Decay in All Around I See by Allan Massie
Futura, 1986, 160 p Massie is described in the blurb on the back of this edition as “Perhaps the finest of living Scottish novelists.” That reputation was built up in subsequent books. However, this,...
View ArticleReading Scotland 2015
A lot of my Scottish reading this year was prompted by the list of 100 best Scottish Books I discovered in February. Those marked below with an asterisk are in that 100 best list. (In the case of...
View ArticleThe Herald’s 100 Best Scottish Fiction Books.
The Herald – formerly The Glasgow Herald – is, along with Edinburgh’s The Scotsman, one of the two Scottish newspapers of note. (Aberdeen’s Press and Journal and Dundee’s Courier could never compare;...
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Death in Bordeaux by Allan Massie
Quartet, 2010, 284 p. Part One; Bordeaux, Spring 1940. A body is discovered and Superintendent Jean Lannes is called to investigate. He is acquainted with the deceased, Gaston Chambolley, whose penis...
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Dark Summer in Bordeaux by Allan Massie
Quartet, 2012, 244 p. This is the second of Massie’s Bordeaux quartet, set in that city during World War 2. The first, Death in Bordeaux, I reviewed here. It is now 1941. Partly due to the compromising...
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Cold Winter in Bordeaux by Allan Massie
Quartet, 2014, 237 p. This is the third of Massie’s Bordeaux series, set in that city during World War 2. The first, Death in Bordeaux, I reviewed here, the second, Dark Summer in Bordeaux, here. In...
View ArticleReading Scotland 2020
35 Scottish books read this year, 18 by men, 16 by women, and 1 by both. Four non-fiction (one on football, three autobiography,) three with fantastical elements. Three (in bold) were on the 100 best...
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End Games in Bordeaux by Allan Massie
Penguin, 1982, 158 p. It is the duty of the detective story to set the world to rights, to remedy the transgression at its heart (usually a murder) by bringing its perpetrator to justice. The literary...
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Klaus by Allan Massie
Vagabond Voices, 2014, 146 p, plus 3 p Afterword. The book is an exploration of the last days of Klaus Mann, son of Thomas Mann. Klaus’s life was always lived somewhat in the shadow of his father, who...
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