The Rest of Our Lives by Ben Markovits
It’s been twelve years since Tom’s wife had an affair, meaning it’s finally time for Tom to leave the marriage as he’d always intended now his youngest daughter has turned eighteen and is leaving the nest for university. Once he’s dropped her off in Pittsburgh, Tom realizes he really isn’t tethered to home like he was just 24h ago and keeps driving – in the opposite direction.
He’s suddenly got a few people from his past that he could really do with seeing, including a semi-estranged brother, an ex-girlfriend and a guy he used to, in another life, play basketball with. The return date keeps shifting, but so does Tom’s sense of what his future might look like after his list of ghosts from the past runs out.
I’ve loved Markovits’ character writing for a good while now, with his duology featuring the highly dysfunctional Essinger family (A Weekend in New York and Christmas in Austin) taking over my Christmas reading a few years back, so it was amazing to get my hands on this new novel with a fresh, complex character to get to know.
The book is essentially a road trip with no destination through Tom’s past, staying close to this single character throughout, which is a bit of a departure from previous books, with several crises brewing just between the lines. It could be something to do with midlife, or his wife’s betrayal, or the puffiness in his face each morning he wakes up, but things are definitely shifting inside this wayward man we discover through vignettes into his personal history.
A thoughtful meditation on the ripple effect of our past selves and whether freedom without direction is any kind of freedom at all. – Laura
Don’t miss our event with Ben at Mr B’s next Wednesday!
The Café With No Name by Robert Seethaler
In 1960s Vienna Robert, odd-job man and problem-fixer extraordinaire at the Karmelitamarkt calls time
on his arduous life of greasing awnings, hacking ice-blocks and lugging swedes. The next day he takes the keys on an empty corner cafe just beyond the market and with cleaning spirits and whitewash – but no thoughts on a name – sets about creating a new livelihood and a new community.
This is to be a Viennese cafe in an altogether different tradition to the pre-war ornate Kaffee Kuchen palaces of the capital’s central district frequented by Zweig, Roth and other intellectuals. In the gritty impoverished market district, Robert’s regulars will be the variously troubled folk navigating life in a city that’s modernising fast but is still shaking off the traumas of two decades earlier.
Over glasses of the cafe’s two wine options and plates of pretzels, bread and dripping and pickles, a steadily growing cast find a home from home in the Cafe with No Name. We meet redundant factory workers, a worn out wrestler who plys his trade by night in the market space and a butcher with a seemingly ever-expanding family. All of life’s traumas and triumphs – from new love to tragic accidents – are absorbed at those wooden tables, as the unassuming Robert and his cafe slowly becomes the linchpins of many lives.
“A Cafe with No Name” is a homage to friendship, community and – dare I say – the power of independent retail. Like Seethaler’s “A Whole Life” and “The Tobacconist” … maybe even more so … this is a book with so much heart. But it is never saccharine, thanks to Seethaler’s wonderfully understated prose and to the harsh realities of the lives being led in this uncompromising neighbourhood. – Nic
Don’t miss our event with Robert at Mr B’s next Tuesday!
The Silverblood Promise by James Logan
Lukan Gardodova, a disgraced noble, hasn’t spoken with his father in years, so when he receives word of his murder and a message written in blood, Lukan sets off to uncover the truth. With only the name of the city Saphrona, and a contact, he must use his guile, wit and swordmanship to find answers. However Saphrona is home to many a deadly secret, and each shadow will hold some danger for Lukan. With the only person he trusts being the pickpocket who he caught in the act, the odds are stacked against him, but Lukan has never been one to shy away from a challenge. As he delves deeper into the city’s underworld, he uncovers a tangled web of betrayal, corruption, and power struggles, all of which seem to point back to his father’s mysterious death. The more he learns, the more Lukan realizes that his father’s murder may be part of something far larger and far more dangerous than he could have ever imagined. – Henry
The Green Kingdom by Cornelia Funke
An absolutely delightful coming of age story with a slight puzzle twist. Caspia is sure that her summer
has been ruined when her parents announce they’ll be moving to Brooklyn for her dad’s work – but just for the summer. But Brooklyn is a unique place, and the first day in their rental house, Caspia finds a stack of letters between two sisters from the 1950s. One sister was a talented seamstress living in Brooklyn, the other a blind botanist travelling the world with their father. On her travels the botanist sends her sister riddles of the Green Kingdom – plant riddles.
And Caspia can’t refuse a good riddle. She decides to make the most of her summer by exploring Brooklyn through these riddles, making friends along the way.
This is a wonderful uplifting story for fans of Kate Dicamillo – a story of friendship, loving family, and local adventure. While it’s not Funke’s trademark expansive magical world, this book is full of whimsy and the possibility of magic. I loved every moment! – Hannah