"Rain Darling", Merle Collins

Short stories, 1990

Short story collection and a bit of a mixed bag. Of the seven pieces, the three more extended works pack a huge emotional punch, while the remainder feel more like exercises in reportage. The family tragedies in Rain and My Sister Cherish are particularly poignant and hugely moving, with the narrative mixing matter of fact, unsentimental language with some truly heart wrenching scenes and situations. This collection feels as if it's a great introduction to a little known author who can really pull emotions without playing them too obviously.

"Symposium", by Muriel Spark

Novel, 1990

Wonderful satire offering flashbacks of a group of largely unlikable acquaintances trying to work through burglaries, prejudices, wills and weddings. This slim book starts at a cracking pace, landing the reader right into the story, but manages to build with a horror and focus sharpening towards a clever conclusion. This is a book containing a wonderfully eccentric collection of nuns, mad uncles and thieves and really grips the reader and builds a thick, stimulating atmosphere. Not a particularly cuddly read, but an enthralling one all the same.

"Too Many Targets," by John Peel and Dave Rogers

Novel, 1990

Brisk fiction for Avengers fans, bringing the whole set of main protagonists - Steed and all his partners - from each of the 1960s series. There's a familiar, reborn protagonist as well. Fans will probably either despair of the canon being mucked about or delight in the retro implausibility of what is, after all, an old and always fantastically tongue-in-cheek series. For all these reasons, it's hard to critique; this is a book pretty much solely driving a plot which fairly adeptly juggles characters and situations which work better on screen.