Latest reading.

Eleanor Rigby by Douglas Coupland.

Liz Dunn is a lonely, middle-aged, overweight woman, living a mundane life in Vancouver. Resigned to her life of a boring clerical job, a small dingy home unit, and strained relationships with her immediate family. She has come to except the way her life is and always be.

Suddenly, one day, her life takes a different track as the Hale-Bop comet streaks high across the sky. An event in her past, when she was a teenager, and the consequences of that event, comes back into her life - her son!

Jeremy is in his early twenties and is enduring his own problems. A young life of foster homes and various jobs has left him aimless. At the same time his body is destroying itself, limiting his future.

The coming together of these two people seem to come at the right time for both of them. As one needs emotional support, the other needs physical support. Jeremy, with his positive outlook and determination to live as much as possible, brings Liz out of her shell and changes her life. Jeremy broadens her horizons and possibilities to the world. Liz, at the same time, provides Jeremy with a home and material comfort that he needs. So, for a short time, a familial bond forms between the two.

After Jeremy's death another bolt from the blue brings another change in direction to Liz's life once again, and events lead her to Austria to confront another element from her past that connect her to herself and Jeremy - Jeremy's father Klaus. A middle aged man, Klaus is lonely as well, due to his own mental health problems. He and Liz form a connection, and through the memory of Jeremy, develop a relationship. Suddenly life doesn't seem lonely for either of them, and companionship replaces solitariness for the future.

Coupland's novel focuses on how seemingly ordinary lives are, deep below the surface, extraordinary in their own unique way. Also, no matter what type of person we are or what type of lives we lead, all of us need to connect with other people.

Abaza : a modern encyclopedia. By Louis Nowra, 2001.

Welcome to Abaza, the strange pacific nation of Louis Nowra's novel. Structured like an encyclopedia, it tells the history, culture, society, and personalities of the island nation. Four condemned men await their fate in the capital's jail. Each, with different positions in Abaza society, narrate the story, detailing the various elements that contribute to the country's make up. From the various despotic rulers; the mad revolutionary and his child army; the drug pitu; the macabre adventures of Tegi the cartoon charater and his creator; and the corruption and violence.

Linking all this is Aba, the svengali figure, who weilds the true power. His machiavellian acts ensures his own position within the power structure of Abaza's government and politics, but condemns others - including Abaza.

At first I read it like the encyclopedia it sets out to be, by going back and forth to the various entries that were linked to one another. A quarter way through, however, I gave this up and decided to read it straight through like a regular novel. By doing this, I, as the reader, later discovered how the various links to other entries came together to form the whole. Also, Nowra succeeds in writing the entries in the voices of each of the condemn men - from the semi-literate child soldier, the educated professor, the journalist, and the former government insider. Each supply the various outlooks of Abaza through their place in society.

At times funny, shocking and ugly, this fictional nation state of the south pacific is vividly brought to life. So, do yourself a favour, take a trip to Abaza.

First reading.

The Birthday Boys by Beryl Bainbridge.

What bonds men together to rndure hardships is the focus of this novel. The expedition of Robert Scott to Antartica is a classic story of man versus nature, man versus man, man versus himself.
Told in the first person from five different perspectives, we, as readers, obtain an insight to all the characters from each other's point of view. The ambitious Scott; the dependable Wilson; the stalwart Bowers; the stern Oats; and the opportunistic Evans. All five detail their lives, relationships and motivations that lead them to their fateful expedition that ends in disappointment and lost.
Bainbridge's account of the physical and mental hardships, hostile environment, and the attitudes of the era, are imaginatively retold in this finely written historical novel, as these men confront themselves and finally nature. 7/10.