Down the Nile by Rosemary Mahoney

Down the Nile by Rosemary Mahoney (2007)
Read: January - February 2012

We picked this book up new (not common for us!) but from a discount bookstore (of course!) I was attracted to it for two reasons; being about travelling in Egypt and also being about rowing. I didn't have high hopes for it though, as we bought it at the same time as the Cleopatra's Needle / Cycling book which I thought was a bit naff. Finding that this book had a 'reader's guide' of questions for your book group to consider didn't really help either!

But I was pleasently surprised and found that I enjoyed this book and read it in about two weeks. While Rosemary was very confident at first about the prospect of being able to find a boat that she could buy, she soon realised that this was a difficult task - and another difficult task to convince people that she could/would row it!  It was a really nice character study to read about her befriending the receptionist at the hotel she was first staying at - and finding out more about her life and the life of a women in Upper Egypt. Rosemary had a clear understanding of what a white woman walking around by herself in Egypt could expect and took all of this with grace. She became fustrated at times, but didn't let attitudes get to her, which was reassuring.

Her realism and positivity paid off when she met Amr who was 'not like the other guys' as he wasn't fazed by a western woman asking him about his boat. He let her try his boat out and asked a reasonable price and by letting her into his home as well, the book contains further insight into life in Upper Egypt.

Rosemary starts her journey with help from Amr and once she has got over the hurdle of getting started, she is abel to finally get on with her journey as she imagined it; being alone on the Nile. This journey wasn't about proving physical fitness, or about going somewhere specific, it was just about having the chance to really see part of Egypt.

The issue that I felt wasn't addressed in the book was whether Rosemary realised that it may have been a slightly selfish act to try and buy a boat from someone. Yes, in the end she did just leave her boat on the bank for someone to find, but for the fisherman who's boat she bought I don't know if she considered that this boat was his livelihood. OK she was giving him a fair amount of money for it, but he would then have the trouble potentially of finding another boat. I see that she wanted to be authentic - rather than just have a boat made for her.

Her night-time incident in her second rowing trip did highlight the fact that anyone on their own could be vulnerable, but as the events evolve it's clear that she has been very lucky.  Without this incident though and you might question whether she was right to be cautious - I think it is always right to be cautious in situations unknown!

The Road to McCarthy by Pete McCarthy

The Road to McCarthy by Pete McCarthy (2002)
Read: January 2012

Scotty really enjoyed this book - and his last one - so it was about time that I got on to it.  I did enjoy this book and got through it in only a few weeks back in Cairo.  I hadn't got into the first book as much, partly because it wasn't clear where it was going. To an extent this book was the same as each chapter was very distinct, but actually this worked well to show the different stories within his travels.

Each chapter sees McCarthy travel to a different corner of the globe on the trail of the McCarthy clan. He ends up in Tazmania, Morroco, Alaska and America which shows how far flung McCarthys have managed to get! It's part clan (not quite family) history and part travel books as McCarthy tries to dig into the tales of various ancestors and meet peope and see places along the way.

I love the idea of him performing a reading to the rowdy game crowd in the lead-up to Paddy's Day and the tiny town of McCarthy where he is invited around for dinner. His tales of trying to shake eager local guides off in Morroco sound exactly as I've expereinced and all of these are told in a great style.

Davies: translator of Arabic literature

This article was in this week's Al Ahram: Davies: translator of Arabic literature

I recognised the name Humphrey Davies as he has indeed translated many of the modern Arabic novels I've read.  It's interesting that he doesn't want to be drawn into a conversation about what should or shouldn't be translated, and also that he's booked up with translating work (rightly so!).

An excert from the article (below) mentions one book I wrote about on this site, being Abbas El Abd. When writing about the book I did mention the translation and the translator's note!

"Davies says that he makes a point of calling on living writers whose work he translates for advice, among them Ahmed Alaydi, whose novel Being Abbas El Abd ( An takun 'Abbas al-Abd ) is written in a mixture of styles, including parodies of the standard language, the Cairene vernacular, the speech of the country's young people, and the langue de bois of the Egyptian national press. In this work in particular the challenge for the translator lies in finding apt equivalents for these styles in contemporary English, bearing in mind that the readers of the translation may in themselves be used to different varieties of English vernacular"

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd (2002)
Read: December 2011

I read this in about two weeks over the break in the UK. I was given a soft paperback version by MummyB in the summer as she had read it; having been given this copy by her sister who had read it too. I was a little skeptical about the 'get all the women you know to read this book' message that I'd heard about this book, but was willing to give it a go. I knew in the back of my mind that a film had been made of it, so it must be half decent.

Indeed it was. It was a classic female tale of identity, discovery and sisterhood. The story is framed by the politics of race, but while they feature they do not dominate the story. There are only three male characters (all of whom are minor) but this does not make the book lacking. I had some frustrations at times with Lily, as I wished she would be as honest as she could be with the others, but I understood her worries about telling the truth at times. It was a feel-good book and one that gives you hope to do well and be done well by others.

I must admit to having passed it onto a charity shop, rather than onto another woman directly, but I think I have done my bit to get the good book around. Will I see the film? No. But that's more because I enjoyed the book and don't need the film to reaffirm that, rather than not wanting to repeat the story again.

The Devil's Paintbrush by Jake Arnott

The Devil's Paintbrush by Jake Arnott (2009)
Read: December 2011

I picked this book up that had been on our shelves for about a year, as I knew it was one that would end up back in the UK. So if I managed to read it and finish it during the holiday I could just leave it there.

It was only after I picked it up that I realised that it was actually a signed copy (!) and that it was actually signed to my dad (I'd thought it was ours, but maybe it was more of a 'loan' copy).

I didn't think it would be such a hard read, but it was difficult to keep track of the characters and where the story was going at times. It was another book of flashbacks and characters that would wander in and out of the narrative. I'd hoped that it would give some more insight into colonialism in Egypt during this time period, but there was very little mention of the setting (and very little set here) which was disappointing.

I did manage to finish the book back in the UK and passed it back to dad. Reassuringly he also wasn't too impressed with it. Guess that was why it ended up on our bookshelf!

The Fourth Assassin by Matt Rees

The Fourth Assassin by Matt Rees (2010)
Read: December 2011

It never takes me long to read a Matt Rees and I always try to save (and savour) them. This one I've had on the bookshelf for a year and I just couldn't wait any longer. It only took me a few days to get through as I was reading it on the bus as well as before bed. The moment I finished it though I went on to rees' website to see if he'd written another one (he hadn't :( ) which means this is the last Omar Yussef  book for me for some time.

The book is set in New York and the backdrop is a cold UN Conference, but soon becomes a tale of murder that Omar and his son are caught up in. Rees paints the picture well, and you feel like a first-timer in the city trying to work out the streets, subways and people. Whilst Little Palestine offers a touch of back home for Yussef, it remains alien. It was great to see the old characters had made it over the pond too and the story linked back to previous installments nicely.

What Rees does so well is writes what seems like a simple story, but it isn't - it just seems simple because his writing is so accessible. In the same way you don't really realise the setting of the characters being from Palestine and all the cultural points that are referenced - he manages to write these in such a way that it feels natural that you are immersed in this way.

A really great book that I wish I could read again and again - more please!

Alexandria Lost by Alan Smart

Alexandria Lost by Alan Smart (2008)
Read: November - December 2011

A trio of stories in a small neat hardback with some pencil illustrations that I couldn't not pick up when I saw it in the shop. I actually found this book in the small shop of the eco-lodge I stayed in in Fayoum and am embarrassed to say that it's sat on the shelf for a year before I've read it!
The three stories were all linked to Alexandria in some way, but were set with different characters, storylines and at different times and places. It was nice to see the theme between them being Alexandria, even through the three protagonists of the stories had different experiences of, and connections to, the city. It shows that Alexandria will always be a constant.