RECENT MODERN FICTION

The Proof of My Innocence (Jonathan Coe)

I am a big Jonathan Coe fan and a new book of his is a great event.

This differs from previous novels as it is a detective thriller about the murder of a left wing blogger Christopher Swann at a right wing conference hosted by Lord Wetherby.  Coe is a chronicler of the times and fiercely critical of Brexiteers.  This does skew his characterisation as these right wingers are typified as brutes.   Still he writes with humour even if the epilogue does contradict the previous reveal.

 

Alchemy/ S. J. Parris

This novel is set in 16th century Prague and one of the series featuring philosopher Bruno Giordano who is despatched by Queen Elizabeth’s spymaster Francis Walsingham to the court of Emperor Rudolf to investigate the disappearance of John Dee and murder of an alchemist.

It also features The Jewish community who are associated with the creation of the Golden monster. It’s good read but I wondered if the publishing house was intentionally creating a similarity with C. J. Samson who also writes in the same period, uses one word titles and a singular detective

 

The Fortune Teller of Berlin / J.C Maetis 

We now move to Nazi Germany where Adolf Hitler commandeers a clairvoyant Edith Kreuzer who is a spy carrying messages and working for S. O. E.

She is triply  disadvantaged: the father of her daughter Louise is the previous Jewish clairvoyant Eric Hanusser which makes Louise a ‘mischling’; her brother Tobias has Down’s syndrome and targeted for the Nazi euthanasia programme; she has the stress of keeping in with the unpredictable Hitler whilst trying to sway him.

Here she is helped by her watchdog who becomes protector and lover Stefan Hansel a senior SS officer and adjutant to Hitler   The oppression of the Nazi regime is well invoked and as with th other 2 novels it is a ‘good read’