Review catch-up – capsule reviews of Weston, Wiles and Uketsu!

You know what it’s like. You read some wonderful 10/10 type books, but don’t feel inspired when it comes to writing about them! I have two such in the review queue – but they’re not for today. Instead here are capsule reviews of other good reads that I really enjoyed that are also in that pile.

Alive: An Alternative Anatomy by Gabriel Weston

I actually read surgeon Gabriel Weston’s latest blended work of anatomy and memoir back in the spring, but it got buried and I found it again. Each of the chapters concentrates on one of the body’s organs – from skin to gut, brain to kidneys, but the text is bookended by ‘Dead’ and ‘Alive’. Dead is very much the introduction to why she loves anatomy via seeing an autopsy, and how this project was to look anatomy with ‘fresh eyes’. Little did she know then that she’d become a patient too. All the anatomy is absolutely brilliant. It almost makes me blush, but the chapter on ‘Genitals’ was eye-opening. She describes the development of them in the womb in detail.

But here’s the crux. This is what I want my kids to know. Even when male and female genitals do start to diverge, the differences between them, remain tiny. And, within what is essentially a very similar anatomical scheme, the equivalent of the penis isn’t the vagina, but the clitoris.

She intersperses stories from her own life and career into the anatomy, which add to the narrative. But in between some of the chapters are short sections relating to medical problem she alluded to at the beginning. She’d had a ‘mitral valve prolapse’ as a student, and now, suddenly, over twenty years later is experiencing palpitations. These sections, presented as memos, emails, diary entries and the like sit slightly awkwardly with the rest of the text.

Her writing as ever is not only clear and concise, but enthusiastic, allowing herself to be taken off topic on occasions, digressing into philosophy for instance. If you liked her first memoir Direct Red, you’ll certainly enjoy Alive.

Source: Own copy. Jonathan Cape hardback, 290 pages. BUY at Blackwell’s via my affiliate link (free UK P&P)

Will Wiles – The Anechoic Chamber and Other Weird Tales

I don’t read many short stories, but was impressed by the two novels I’ve read by Wiles – Care of Wooden Floors and The Way Inn; the latter was certainly ‘weird’. This collection comprises 9 stories – I’ll just highlight a couple…

‘The Anechoic Chamber’ concerns a researcher who is sure he hears a sound in the anechoic chamber – the walls of which are lined with sound absorbent foam covering all the angles. Those who enter the chamber are cautioned,

The Technician shook her head. ‘This is far beyond quiet, Mr Immerman. ‘This is…’ She tapped the side of her head, just above her ear. ‘It gets in here.’

You can probably imagine the effect of minus 12 dB (yes, negative sound, that’s right) to the experimenter’s brain. Weird but basically true.

I really liked ‘Notes on London’s Housing Crisis’ which reflects Wiles’ interest in architecture. In it he/the narrator describes a system of SLOCs, housing structure ‘struc’ Locations – so you buy a pod and you can reSLOC it anywhere, ‘Wake up in Camden, … go to bed in Blackheath.‘ Like a posh container ship? Everyone in London now has pods and SLOCs. So much so, traditional housing stock (damp, needing renovation) can be bought for a song. An interesting concept, and as a whole, an interesting short story collection – I’d say slightly weird rather than all-out weird, however, this A-format paperback in Salt’s Modern Stories collection was well worth reading.

Source: Review copy – thank you! Salt A-format paperback, 163 pages. BUY at Blackwell’s via my affiliate link (free UK P&P)

Strange Pictures by Uketsu, translated by Jim Rion

The anonymous Uketsu, is a bit of a Japanese phenomenon online, specialising in horror and mystery so his biog says, and Pushkin have snapped up both available titles, translated by Jim Rion for us.

In a prologue, we’re shown a picture (left) of a building, a girl and a tree with a bird in it. A psychologist tells us that it was drawn by an eleven-year-old girl – she picks out features of the drawing to discuss and gives her conclusion that the girl is going to be OK. Or is she?

The next three chapters contain three stories, each picture driven, each with a mystery and hidden secrets. A woman lies dying and draws five pictures, an old lady praying, a young woman and young man, a baby and a child – but how do they all link together? A child draws a picture of his home, with some of the windows scribbed out – what does this mean? A murder victim makes a ‘desperate sketch’ of a landscape in his dying moments halfway up a mountain – what does it mean?

It’s not all drawings – there is plenty of narrative accompanying them. The reader can play detective, or go with the flow – I did the latter, but after the secrets of the first story are revealed, I was soon spotting links in the second and so on – but can’t claim to have been anywhere near solving what happened in that first picture which is the at the crux of the novel.

Is it a gimmick? Of course. Does it work? Mostly. Will I read the other book, Strange Houses? Probably.

Source: Own copy. Pushkin Vertigo flapped paperback, 238 pages. BUY at Blackwell’s via my affiliate link.