Books time – August wrap up

Summer is that time when usually I read a lot. Thanks to the holidays, I come to have so much spare time, and my favourite companion on the beach becomes a book. This year though, I haven't read that much in August. I reckon it must be because the book on which I spent most of time was fairly long, and not really “summary”, but we will go there in a minute. Meanwhile, I hope you're enjoying reading my little August wrap up.

Hangover Square, by Patrick Hemilton

The books I love reading the most in Summer are usually thrillers. For some reason, the idea of a mystery to solve, a complicated case, really gets along with the long summer nights. Hangover Square is not really a thriller, thus it does involve a little mystery, and a main character with a peculiar characteristic: he has a “double personality”.

George Harvey Bone is a man affected by dissociative identity disorder. Sometimes, he goes under what he calls “dead mood”, and he can't recollect anything about what he did, where he went, what he thought about. Those episodes become more and more frequent with time, and George is a bit worried about them. When the other personality takes over George has one goal in his mind, and that is to kill Netta, a wannabe actress.

Netta is a very negative character. She is poisonous, lazy, takes advantage of other people, constantly drunk. She aims to become an actress, but she has no talent, nor the best attitude to obtain what she wants. In his “good moods” George is madly in love with her, although she isn't. She actually doesn't care at all about him, but takes advantage of his love to get money out of him. In his “bad moods” George is perfectly aware of Netta's negativity, and he plans to kill her, together with Peter, another acquittance of both Netta and George, and with whom Netta has a sort of affair.

During the book we witness George's “bad mood” planning his murder, and George's “good mood” realising Netta's bad influence over his life, but his impossibility to cut ties with her, even when he realises she is using him. The final part of the book thus gives everybody what they deserve.

Different Seasons, by Stephen King

I have to admit, with a bit of shame, that this is the first book by Stephen King that I am reading. And even though I know that usually “horror” books are better to be read in autumn, thanks to the Halloween vibe given to the period, I really wanted to read it, so that was my main summer reading.

The book is not short, is roughly 600 pages long, and it is a collection of four short stories. The first three of them can't actually be labelled as “horror stories”, but the last one contains a bit of horror feel, and it is one of my favourite.

The first story, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, is set in a prison, and it tells the story of Andy Dufresne, a banker convicted for the double murder of his wife and her lover. Here he meets Red, another convicted, and its Red himself to tell us the story of Andy and his redemption.

The second story, Apt Pupil, is maybe the one I liked less, but still is a very good story. It involves the relationship between Todd Bowden, and American boy with a sickening interest for Holocaust and the crimes committed then, and Kurt Dussander, and elderly man who was a nazist, escaped and lived under cover until Todd recognized him. Todd threatens Dussander to revel his true identity if he doesn't tell him every single macabre detail about the crimes he committed. So the two develop a relationship linking them in both good and bad times, cause the bad times will arrive very quickly.

The third novella is called The Body, and it is one of my favourite. It is about group of young boys, aged around 12, who leave for a journey in the woods to go see the body of a dead boy. It is not only about the journey those young kids will having, but also a story of friendship, bonds, and growth, because after having seen the body of a kid their age the four friends will never be the same.

The last story, possibly my favourite, and the one to read over Halloween time, is called The Breathing Method. The main character here is David, who one day is invited by a co worker to participate to a sort of reunion in a club where people tell stories to each other. The place is very peculiar, and David is surprised to realise that the books held in the library of the club cannot be found anywhere else, as well as the furniture, and everything contained in it seems rather unique... or not belonging to their time. On the Christmas Night a member of the club tells his story, involving a younger version of himself, a doctor, and his young patient, a pregnant woman, who wanted to learn the revolutionary “breathing method” linked to women's labour.

This story can be both a story of a club which is not really a club, or the story of the young mother, and her obstinate decision in giving birth to her son, doesn't matter what.

Coco Chanel, by Megan Hess

Last book I read is this absolutely lovely one by Megan Hess, a very talented artist who wrote both the synopsis of Coco Chanel's biography and the illustrations accompanying it. It is beautiful book, lovely to read and a joy for the eyes, and if you like the topic fashion, or in general admire that great revolutionary creator who has been Coco Chanel, I absolutely suggest you to give a look at this book.

So those were my August readings. Not too many, but as I said King's book is pretty long, and it took me a while to read it because I didn't feel its arguments were in line with the period I decided to read the book. Nevertheless, I really liked it, and I suggest you to give a look to all the titles mentioned above.

Talk to you very soon, until next time, take care!