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ClareR (5726 KP) rated Katastrophe in Books

Dec 6, 2022  
Katastrophe
Katastrophe
Graham Hurley | 2022 | Fiction & Poetry, Thriller
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
I can’t even begin to describe the storyline of this gripping novel set in the final stages of the Second World War. There is so much going on at what must have been a very chaotic point in the war. Stalingrad has been lost to the Russians, Germany is in retreat, and Werner Nehman has been taken captive. The Russians have decided that he is to take a message to Goebbels.

Katastrophe has a dark, menacing atmosphere - logical, really. This is war.
There are a number of overlapping stories, but I never confused them or the characters - that’s a mark of a good book, I always think.

It’s an excellent blend of fact and fiction, and the huge amounts of research that must have gone into this, results in a book that is both fascinating and hard to read (the torture scenes are pretty gruesome).

Despite the horrors of war, I thoroughly enjoyed this - and it was only after reading it that I discovered it was the seventh in a series. I’d better add them to the teetering tbr, then!

Many thanks to The Pigeonhole for serialising this. Another book I would have otherwise missed out on!
  
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Suswatibasu (1701 KP) rated The Golden House in Books

Jan 1, 2018  
The Golden House
The Golden House
Salman Rushdie | 2017 | Fiction & Poetry
8
9.0 (2 Ratings)
Book Rating
Insightful and readable
This novel by Salman Rushdie is a present day commentary on modern day America in the build up to Trump and how fact and fiction as well as art and reality collapse into one other. There have been a number of books written in the wake of the shock of Trump (this desperate need to make sense of things) and Rushdie’s novel definitely helps shed light (or explain the darkness) upon the situation.

Narrated by René, an aspiring filmmaker, this account feels very similar to the likes of The Great Gatsby, in which everything is rather hyperbolic because it is written from the perspective of an outsider. Following the exceedingly wealthy Golden family, René attempts to figure out the mysterious circumstances of their arrival from India, and the subsequent, often cataclysmic events surrounding them, in which the narrator plays a part. The slow emergence of a dark history of corruption and evil is paralleled by Rushdie's perception of the rise of ignorance, untruth, bigotry and hatred, and of "The Joker" (i.e. Trump, although he is never named).

The writing is brilliant. It is discursive, sometimes addresses the reader directly, even sometimes adopts the form of a screenplay and has a wonderful voice of its own. The context surrounding the Mumbai bombings is intriguing as much of it is based on factual information. The truth is, after all, stranger than fiction.

While the style is not flawless, as the postmodern blurring between supposedly objective narrative and things René has "made up" for his screenplay did get a little haphazard, however, this may be Rushdie's attempt to reflect how "post-truths" are disseminated in a similar fashion. Nonetheless, I thought The Golden House was enjoyable. Even after all these years, Rushdie is able to adapt his writing to suit a modern generation.