Before Night Falls by Reinaldo Arenas

This novel reads like the most unfiltered sequence of events and emotions you could hope to find. From his developing sexuality in a small Cuban village, (involving plenty of bestiality, some activity with his cousin, and being abused by his uncle on the way to the market), to his life as a young homosexual man and straightforward accounts of many encounters, to surviving under Fidel Castro's regime at it's most oppressive. Arenas writes what happened, and it's hard to believe that he's not being honest.

And why wouldn't he be honest, writing as he was, close to his death in New York. His book is an eye opener and told me more than I ever knew about the Castro regime. Not only homosexuals but promiscuous women were targeted. Arenas writes that dictatorships are almost always anti-sex, as , to paraphrase, they are anti-freedom and life force. Writers were also targeted and oppressed as was anybody else that could have been a threat. I learnt to my surprise that Gabriel Garcia Marquez was a supporter of Castro.

Arenas writes about a life that never had freedom. But he writes with more freedom and less restraint than most writers ever will.

The Horse Boy

This is a different kind of book. A true account/ travelogue of a family travelling through Mongolia, trying to heal their son's autism by taking him to see shamans.

Why would parents of an autistic child do that? The father is a hippy with experience of working with shamans. The autistic child, Rowan, seems to connect better with animals than with people, so taking him riding across Mongolia makes sense. The father also noticed that Rowan improved after being around shamans in America.

When you write it down, it's flimsy reasoning for such an unconventional solution, but that's what makes it a good story. The writer is not entirely convinced by everything the shamans say and do, but he's prepared to try anything to help his son.

From my various experiences of travelling in Asia and trying to solve my bladder problem, there's a lot of bullshit in the world of alternative medicine, but there's probably good stuff too, hidden under the bullshit. There's also a load of crap in the way the western system is run.

In America, Rowan's parents try every form of therapy they can think of before they find themselves giving large amounts of cash to Mongolia's most esteemed shaman. The shaman says some of Rowan's symptoms will stop, and they do. Rowan goes home transformed. Was it the shaman or just the time in Mongolia that helped him? You decide.

Eating Animals by Jonathon Safran Foer

I don't usually read books like this. I don't usually read anything that's not fiction.

But abusive, intensive farming is not fiction. And ever since I heard about the various horrors of factory farming, I have sometimes eaten meat and sometimes not eaten meat.

I liked Foer's investigation into animal farming in America, not because it told me anything new, but because it was good to read that Foer had for many years oscillated in the same way I have. Like him, I have been tempted by the taste and convenience of meat, and not been able to finally decide if I wanted to be vegetarian, vegan, only give up pork and chicken (cows are slightly less mistreated), or what.

This book didn't make me a vegetarian, because I was pretty much a vegetarian anyway, but the logic and information it provides will make it easier for me not to eat meat.

UFO In Her Eyes by Xiaolu Guo

This novel is so good it's difficult to write a quick review of it. One of it's best features is it's readability. The story is narrated entirely by excerpts of Chinese government files. These are short and always relevant to the story, and that keeps you entertained and reading quickly.

The Scotland on Sunday describes this book as ' a damning portrait of totalitarian China.' While the book definitely comments on modern day China, (or future day, as this novel is set slightly ahead of time, beginning in 2012), the main theme is how an undeveloped Chinese village has development thrust on it after a peasant woman sees a UFO, saves an American tourist from a snakebite, and unwittingly brings money and modernity to the village.

The way the Chinese authorities get involved in trying to develop the village of Silver Hill, without concern for individuals or businesses, actually reminded me of how the British government re- housed by Grandma to develop her estate. It was a bit more extreme in UFO In Her Eyes, but the principles are the same, individuals are like ants in the face of larger forces.

I haven't been to China. But I have been to a host of other Asian countries. Being a white Englishman,  I've often been asked if I'm an American, and often been treated with undue preference just because I am a westerner. It frequently seems as though people really respect America. Why would they respect America? I don't think that American culture is superior to any other culture. The only reason is economic success and the effect of the media. If Afghanistan was the most powerful, rich country in the world and the centre of film and entertainment industries, turbans would probably be fashionable from Melbourne to Manhattan.

These themes come up in Guo's book. The development of the village is aimed to 'bring it up to speed' with China's cities and the western world. But why do they need to do that. Personal development is no good if you try and be like other people. You have to see what's good about yourself. The same is true for countries. They can take ideas from one another, but they shouldn't follow and imitate.



N.B. I have no idea if China imitates America as I haven't been there. Korea and Koreans certainly did to some extent, and Taiwan does in many small ways, New York style taxis, English language schools being called American schools, the most fashionable area of Taipei having a mini Statue of Liberty, a Starbucks, and a 'New York, New York,' department store or whatever it is.

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie

There are some books you are sad to finish, and some you are glad to finish. For me, Half of a Yellow Sun came into the second category. Not that it wasn't good, I just got bored.

Set in Biafra and Nigeria before and during the Biafran war, the most satisfying part of the book was the beggining and the end. The beginning detailed the story of a village boy as he went to work for a University Professor. The way the book described the boys' viewpoint of his master's friends and their politically minded discussions. Every night the adolescent listened to his employer's friends discuss politics, and then secretly listened in on the Professor making love to his wife.


I think this part was most entertaining as it showed the viewpoint of a poor African boy as he went from village to a middle class, educated household. This shift was well portrayed and I found it enjoyable and easy to envisage. For some reason, when the book went into the Biafran war, it felt like it was concentrating more on events and less on characters, and so the read lost some of its' interest.


This novel got excellent review and won the Orange Prize. It might be the only literary prize to be sponsored by a mobile phone company, but it's still an achievement. Sometimes, though, a book stops grabbing you, and no review can change that.