book reviews so curt, even a sociologist wouldn’t ask them to elaborate: twenty-seven word hot takes on what I’ve read this autumn

Paul Lewis & Rob Evans’ Undercover: The True Story of Britain’s Secret Police. Remember news stories about police officers undercover for years within protest movements? This book’s fascinating on the psychology of deceit and emotional survival after being deceived.

Conor Woodman’s Around the World in 80 Trades. Car journey choice from library’s limited audiobook stock; though buying/ selling’s usually like dreams (duller when re-told), camels, elephants, wine, coffee, spices, jade etc enlivened northbound M1. 

John Updike’s Couples. Synaesthetic, troubling Kennedy-era partner-swapping novel by Great Novelist (/“penis with thesaurus” – DFW). Sociology, finance versus craft, mid-century America’s willed misunderstandings of Freud to justify/ bless misogynistic cruelty.

Stephen Johnson’s Character Styles. Requires substantive background in counselling/ psychotherapy and a tolerance for polysyllables; provided you have those, this compassionate, intelligent book draws together many threads (characterological, existential, psychodynamic, gestalt).

Zadie Smith’s Swing Time. ‘White Teeth’ was/is important for me (promised joy during tough times); ‘On Beauty’ mattered (don’t diss the ‘Judaeo-Christian sublime’); this assured, well-observed, funny, serious novel doesn’t disappoint.

J.B. Priestley’s The Shapes of Sleep. Mr Inspector Calls has, eats cake – disdaining, imitating ‘American pulps’. His hero’s at one point “so curt, even a sociologist wouldn’t care to develop the subject” – sick!   

(Talking of books and so indirectly of civilisation, this is of course the year of Brexit – one of the most extraordinary acts of wilful self-harm ever committed by a sovereign nation against itself. I’ve baked a Black Forest Gateau and dedicated it to Angela Merkel; I’ve also been reading about Trotsky and stockpiling tinned foods and paracetamol – what have you done?)