There’s No Such Thing as an Easy Job by Kikuko Tsumura

Kikuko Tsumura’s novel (translated from the Japanese by Polly Barton) is a quiet yet engaging musing on the place of work in modern life.

The book is split into five chapters – almost like short stories, but development of the main character occurs throughout – each of which details a new job. The novel begins with the unnamed narrator walking into a temp agency and asking for an “easy job” – one that doesn’t require her to think, read or write too much, as she suffered burnout syndrome as a result of her last job.

What follows is a thoughtful and calming inquiry into the elusive “easy job,” and the effect work has on our daily lives, no matter how mundane. The protagonist is employed in a range of quirky jobs: surveillance of a writer suspected of receiving contraband, a jingle-writer for a bus route, a rice cracker wrapper fact-writer, a distributor of public service announcement posters and a worker in a gigantic forest park. There are underlying elements of suspicious or even supernatural goings-on in each. Despite being billed as easy jobs, the protagonist finds each role more emotionally taxing as she simultaneously dedicates more of herself to the job, and is expected to carry out tasks beyond the job description.

Consequently, Tsumura’s novel also explores the implications of our modern ideas about work on our out-of-office life. From not being able to collect a parcel because she’s always at work, to becoming over-invested in working life, there are a lot of relatable notions and plenty of moments of humanity.

No matter how small, insubstantial or "easy" their jobs may seem, Tsumura treats her characters with dignity and respect and gently exposes the value of each and every one.

Ironically, reading this book was a very easy job - and in the best way possible. While the story gently meanders through the quirks and idiosyncrasies of working life, Tsumura hints at deeper issues that are food for thought. And speaking of food - I enjoyed the narrator's explanation of her daily meals maybe a little too much. That said, if you need an action-packed or overtly dramatic novel, this might not be your cup of (matcha) tea.​

Posted by AM

Catalogue link: There's No Such Thing as an Easy Job

Better Luck Next Time by Kate Hilton

This witty novel is, according to the author, Canadian Kate Hilton, a divorce comedy, if such a thing is possible. Certainly, the plot has among other things, two divorces as well as a divorce lawyer in the cast of characters, and it is very funny - I chuckled all the way through. Better Luck Next Time is the story of the Hennessey/Goldstein family and begins as so many family stories do, at Christmas.

Zoe doesn't want to tell her family she is getting a divorce. Her stay-at-home mother, Judy, puts on Christmas dinner every year, tears over the gravy and all. Mentioning the divorce would be just too much. Zoe's Aunt Lydia is a feminist icon, now in her seventies. Zoe's brother Zack made a name for  himself for writing a TV comedy loosely based on Lydia and her daughters - something cousin Beata, mother of Oscar, has never forgiven him for. Beata gave birth to Oscar at twenty, telling her family the father was a donor at a sperm bank. 

Into this setting, several secrets are revealed. That Oscar is the product of a one-night-stand at a party thrown by Zoe sixteen years before. When Oscar determines to find his father, he is furious at Beata for keeping his parentage a secret, and it doesn't take him long to find his dad who happens to be Will, an old university friend of Zoe's and partner at the law firm handling Zoe's divorce. Zoe's lawyer is Eloise, Beata's girlfriend - another secret kept from family. Oh, what a tangled web we weave.

The story is told from alternating points of view, beginning with Zoe, switching to Beata, as well as Mariana, whose marriage to shiftless musician Devlin is also falling apart. Mariana is a highly principled  journalist forced to write about pop culture and women's lifestyle themes to pay the mortgage and help raise her young daughters.

Through the year that follows, more secrets come out of the woodwork, people date, get married (there's a very funny scene at a bridal store and another at a women's rally with Lydia at the forefront. While these events keep the plot bubbling along, Beata, Mariana and Zoe and other characters do a lot of soul-searching and open their hearts. The book highlights with much humour the pressures women are faced with - family, love and career just for starters. 

But it's in the little details where much of the humour lies. The disastrous forays into online dating made by Zoe and then Mariana. The money to be made from the wellness industry, exemplified by FairMarket Beauty's owner Harmony Delacroix who becomes Mariana's boss. The speech Mariana gives at Beata's wedding shower is hilarious and would put off anyone contemplating matrimony.

There is such a lot of fun in Better Luck Next Time, a comedy of manners for our time. I would love to see more books by this author - she's such a breath of fresh air. This novel is available in both print and ebook format from the library. 

Posted by JAM

Catalogue link: Better Luck Next Time (print)

Catalogue link: Better Luck Next Time (ebook)

Truly Madly Guilty by Liane Moriarty

I wasn’t sure if this would be my sort of read – especially after seeing Moriarty’s book Big, Little Lies making it to the small screen with a lot of glam and transported to the U.S. But I felt like a contemporary novel and pretty soon I was swept into the lives of friends Erika and Clementine, and the weight of a recent terrible event that hangs between them, threatening their friendship.

Truly Madly Guilty is a story about a simple suburban barbecue. Vid and his wife Tiffany, plus daughter Dakota, are neighbours of Erika’s and her husband Oliver and Vid loves to entertain. A recent convert to classical music, Vid is fascinated by Clementine who is a professional cello player. On the day of the barbecue, however, Erika and Oliver invite Clementine and her husband Sam and their little girls for afternoon tea. Erika and Oliver have a serious proposal to put to their friends.

Moriarty has a knack for keeping the reader hooked. The story see-saws between the day of the barbecue and afterwards, so that we don’t know what it was that happened that was so bad that Clementine gives talks to various community groups about it. Not until about halfway through the book. And thanks to a lapse of Erika’s memory, we don’t get the full story until almost the end.

Another thing she does really well is creates tension through her characters. Erika has had a difficult childhood, never able to bring friends home because her house is a disaster zone, her mother a hoarder. Erika and Oliver are both serious professionals who find socialising difficult, yet they are a tight couple, doing everything together. But both are struggling with the effects of their childhoods. 

Talented Clementine is the golden girl by comparison. But Clementine’s husband Sam, the terrific dad who wants more kids, doesn’t understand Clementine’s music; he's struggling at work and can’t talk to Clementine about it. Clementine isn't great at the stress associated with auditions so everyone's tiptoeing around her feelings.

And then there’s Tiffany, who has something of a dark past, and who doesn’t understand why her daughter loves to read so much. Is there something wrong with her? Vid solves everything by throwing money at it, but is affectionate none the less. If he knew Tiffany's secret, would he forgive her?

Moriarty stirs all this guilt, anxiety and secrecy into the mix then adds one terrible event with adults behaving badly and then having to deal with the fall-out. How the characters interact with each other afterwards creates plenty to keep you reading. One thing is for sure, nobody is going to be quite the same again.

Truly Madly Guilty is a terrific read, engaging and thought-provoking - a classic page-turner. I'll be picking up more by this author, for sure.

 Posted by JAM

Catalogue link: Truly Madly Guilty

On Turpentine Lane by Elinor Lipman

Laura Lipman is an old hand at witty and charming comedies of manners. Her first novel, Then She Found Me was made into a movie starring Helen Hunt, Bette Midler and Colin Firth. On Turpentine Lane is Lipman’s eleventh book and I can see how her stories would translate well to the screen with their snappy dialogue and quirky characters beset by difficulties.

The story takes us into the world of Faith Frankel, recently returned to her home town and working at her old school, writing thank you letters to benefactors. Yes, apparently, there are jobs like that. Her fiancé is on a walking journey across the United States, supposedly to find himself, but seems to be finding a lot of attractive women if his social media posts are anything to go by.

Faith decides to buy a house, you guessed it, on Turpentine Lane - a run-down, do-up with a chequered history, including rumours that the previous owner murdered her husbands by pushing them down the basement stairs. And when her father finds photographs of babies in the attic that seem to have died, Faith feels more than a little unnerved.

But the mystery surrounding these discoveries is a helpful distraction from problems at work – being falsely accused of fraud – and with her family. Faith’s father has left her mother to reinvent himself as an artist painting fake Chagalls, and her brother’s confidence with women has been sapped by a bitter divorce.

This is a close-knit Jewish family, where everyone has an opinion about everyone and everything and a tendency to interfere. This adds much to the humour as Faith and her brother plot to patch up their parents’ marriage, and there is plenty of heated discussion.

Faith has a lot on her plate, but fortunately help is at hand from Nick, her amiable and good-looking colleague, also having a few relationship problems of his own. The story bubbles along as Faith’s house turns into a crime scene and Faith has to deal with one drama after another, towards a warm and humorous ending.

On Turpentine Lane is a light, bright page-turner will have you chuckling as you read - surely just what is needed in times like these.

Posted by JAM

Catalogue link: On Turpentine Lane

Calling Major Tom by David M Barnett

Although Thomas Major (yes there is a little bit of Bowie in this novel) is not an astronaut; he is flying solo on a seventh month voyage to Mars. His mission is to dig trenches, plant seeds and generally get Mars ready for the first commercial settlement mission. For Thomas being alone is just what he wanted; just like having a shed at the bottom of the garden. What he is not so keen on is reading up on how the spaceship works and what he is supposed to do when he gets to Mars.

Down on earth the Ormerod family are struggling. Grandma Gladys's forgetfulness has her putting her phone in the fridge and the butter on the sideboard plugged into the wall socket. Keeping the family situation a secret so that she and her science mad younger brother, James, don’t get taken into care is teenager Ellie, who is trying to keep up with her school work whilst holding down three jobs.

These two worlds collide when Thomas discovers a working terrestrial telephone on-board and inadvertently rings Gladys. What transpires is a storyline that has you cheering for the Omerods and even the most unlovable Thomas.

Confession time – I read the first few chapters so quickly that I couldn’t make heads or tails out of why this grumpy non-compliant scientist was allowed anywhere near a spaceship. Was I reading a fantasy novel? And did I want to read a book about a 7 month voyage to Mars? I am pleased that I went back and reread the beginning of this book because if you can believe that the Brits are using a second-hand spaceship to get to Mars then it kind of all makes sense.

As you glide from solving cryptic crossword puzzles in space to hoping the schoolyard bullies who are making James’s life a misery get their just desserts, you can’t help but feel a wee bit sad that Thomas and the Omerods will never physically meet each other. This heart-warming debut novel with its quirky and humorous characters is memorable in the most delightful terrestrial ways.

Posted by Miss Moneypenny

Catalogue link: Calling Major Tom

The Sixteen Trees of the Somme by Lars Mytting

This novel had been recommended to me by several people as a fabulous read, and it did not disappoint. An interesting hybrid of historical fiction, contemporary fiction and family thriller; The Sixteen Trees of the Somme is compulsive reading.

Edvard Hirifjell grows up in rural Norway knowing that his parents died in mysterious circumstances in France when he was three years old, and that he himself disappeared for a few days at the same time. His great uncle Einar may know more details, but he is estranged from the family and never spoken of.

Edvard lives a contented and comfortable life with his grandfather Sverre on their isolated farm. Because his grandfather fought on the German side of the war in Russia; and his great uncle worked for the Resistance, a family feud as well suspicion from the locals who suffered under the Nazi’s haunts the Hirifjells. A beautifully crafted coffin made by Einar arrives for Sverre years before his death; leading Edvard to suspect Einar may still be alive somewhere and have the answers to his questions about the death of his parents.

A burning need to find answers to his family history and an unusual missing inheritance takes him to the Shetland Islands (once Norwegian territory) and his great uncle’s last known residence. In the Shetlands Edvard meets the mysterious Gwen, and together they piece together the past; each not trusting the other with the whole truths of their respective family histories. Their journey takes them to the WW1 battle grounds of the Western Front, and they begin to understand the significance and story of a small woodland in Somme. The tension builds and the whole story is beautifully interwoven.

The Sixteen Trees of the Somme is translated from the Norwegian. Lars Mytting has written the unlikely yet internationally successful non-fiction book Norwegian Wood, about the Norwegian art of wood stacking, (wood also plays a major part in the Sixteen Trees of the Somme as you may gather from the title).

This cleverly plotted and beautifully crafted novel is highly recommended.

Reviewed by Katrina

Catalogue link:  The Sixteen Trees of the Somme