Book Review: The Museum of Forgotten Memories

Title:               The Museum of Forgotten Memories

Author:           Anstey Harris

Written:          2020

Publisher:      Simon & Schuster

The cover of this book said “Gripped me utterly... Superb”, Kate Furnivall. I agree with this. I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, and I had a deep emotional agreement with Leo. He was, in the novel, born with Downs. I had worked in Taupo (New Zealand)’s IHC a few years ago where a young man died from his Downs. I also had an uncle, many years ago, who was epileptic and died during his seizure. I could relate to Cate a lot. If you’ve ever been to a museum and found it so full of information and history, then this tale is certainly about that, but it’s also about Cate and Leo and surviving after husband and father.

Cate and Leo are the family of Richard Lyons-Morris (pronounced Lee-on Morris: they used to get upset when people called them Lions Morris). That was why Leo, their son, was named Leo – people should pronounce his surname correctly. Except Richard didn’t like his surname, just used Morris.

Richard had what could be called a DNA problem – he became very depressed, lost a lot of weight, and killed himself. Just as his own father had done. Cate found out a lot of history about Richard from the woman who looked after the museum, Araminta Buchan – not particularly good at the start; Araminta was, Cate felt, stuck up with herself.

After Richard had died Cate and Leo were left homeless – or would have been, if they weren’t given a home at Richard’s family museum. It was supposed to be for a “real descendant”, and that was Leo, even though the Trust didn’t think he was “real” because of his Downs. Cate, and eventually Araminta, supported Leo and kept them there.

At the start Cate didn’t really like the museum, but, because it was her home now, she helped Araminta to get it ready to re-open. Unfortunately there were some protestors that same day who threw paint around in the diorama, covering the glass and the floor. Later that same night a fire burns inside, not caused by protestors yet almost as devastating. Curtis, a new friend of Leo’s, calls out many neighbours who come and help lift things out of the library and the diorama and other areas of the museum, but Cate burns herself, quite seriously. Many volunteers come and help them to clean and get everything back inside, where it needs to be.

Araminta Buchan tells Cate stories of the family and how she fits in. Her job is to keep this museum running, her admiration of the person who started it, Colonel Hugo Lyons-Morris, and her love of other people in the family. Why?

Cate’s love tales include Richard, Simon and Patch. Read the excellent novel and feel sad, feel happy, feel involved with Cate and her son, Leo. It’s a wonderful novel by Anstey Harris.

 

Book Review: The Good Turn

Title:               The Good Turn

Author:           Dervla McTiernan

Written:          2020

Publisher:      HarperCollins

Dervla McTiernan is Irish, but now lives in Australia. This book is her third novel, and all are written in Galway, in Ireland. The Good Turn is about police corruption and an investigation into that which causes too many more crimes and death.

Cormac Reilly is a detective sergeant running a serious crime investigation team in Galway, but his team has been stripped down to a skeleton team as Murphy, the Commissioner for the area, is running a drug crime team. Reilly is informed of a 12-year-old child who was abducted and he calls Murphy for more men, but Murphy turns him down. Reilly is left with Peter Foster, a new detective, Mulcair, a young and inexperienced garda, and Deidre Russell, the only woman, treated as the police receptionist. Foster is sent to an interview of a young boy, Fred, who is home sick. He says he had seen the abduction from his bedroom window – and, more importantly, he had taken a video of it.

Foster reports back to Reilly, and is sent back out to look around the area for anyone who might know the abductor. One name crops up, and Foster tries to find him. He is informed that the vehicle in Fred’s video is seen heading out of town, and he knows that, without other officers, he has to follow it. He rings the station and speaks to Russell and find that Reilly is at the house where the girl lives, and can’t be spoken to. He knows he needs more men, he knows he needs a helicopter, but he knows that he can’t order it: he would have to wait for Reilly.

Frustrated, he follows the vehicle down a non-road, towards the lake. He has to stop his own car, and walks the rest of the way. He sees the vehicle and sees the person who was driving it. He calls to him to stop the vehicle, but the driver drives towards him, forcing him backwards towards the lake. He fires, three times. That man is now dead – and no young girl.

Back at the station Reilly says the girl is at hospital and isn’t talking. His office is overtaken by Inspector Reynolds, with no explanation at all. Reilly is dumped and Foster is sent to Roundstone in the country to work with his father – something he never wanted to do. His father is a garda, but doesn’t think Peter is any good. Foster visits his grandmother, Maggie, and meets another woman, Anna Tilly, who was staying there with her daughter. She is looking after Maggie. Foster finds out of a couple of murders in Roundstone, investigates them and finds more clues. What would he do? What would he tell Reilly? And what would happen to Murphy and Foster’s father?

McTiernan wrote very well. Readers who enjoy detective and crime novels need to read this.

The Rogue

The Rogue: Searching for the real Sarah Palin

By Joe McGinniss

Published by Crown Publishers USA, 2011

Occasionally I pick up a free book from a shelf outside the shopping centre book store. The books are often too old or not exciting enough (for me), but I’ve found some which seemed to be good books. One I found last week was written by Joe McGinniss, a writer I’d never read before, but the title of his book intrigued me: The Rogue – Searching for the real Sarah Palin. I had a quick look through it, thinking that if McGinniss was pro-Palin I wouldn’t take that book. Inside the cover it says “The Rogue” is the eagerly awaited result of his research and writing: a startling study of the illusion and reality of Sarah Palin...” That was interesting, but would the book be?

I hadn’t really seen or listened to anything on the news about Palin when she stood for USA’s vice presidency, but I did notice the really bad reports she received on the media. At that stage I wasn’t interested in following whatever she had done back in 2012. But McGinniss’ book was written before that election she lost, published in 2011. Perhaps reading it would give me more information.

McGinniss wrote that she blurted much; she made up a lot of stuff; she told far too many lies; she was religious (attached to evangelical religions such as Assembly of God, Pentecostal and Apostolic Reformation); and believed that this globe was only here for 6,000 years, ‘created’ by a fantasy being, her god (even though she often went with her husband to Iditarod dog sled races which have proof that dogs sledded humans for more than 10,000 years). I’ve been into true history, and this globe has been researched back for millions of years – earth, animals, universe - all more than 6,000 years old. Dinosaurs, Ms Palin, lived in the Mesozoic era on this Earth for between 266 and 165 million years and disappeared around 65 million years ago. They had gone many years before we got to 6,000 years old. Even many of the religious people understand this!

McGinniss added more I hadn’t known about, other stuff which made her a really ‘evil’ woman: she mis-used money as a governor; used her own children for her political games; pretended to give birth to a Down Syndrome baby (I agreed with Joe McGinniss that she hadn’t even looked pregnant, and her tale leading to Trig arriving was incredulously weird, even though there is a national USA organisation which arranges adoption of Down Syndrome babies.); allowed her husband to do whatever he wanted to do – as she was Mayor of Wasilla or Governor of Alaska; and told so many ongoing untruths about McGinniss (he was renting the house next door to her – his one was nowhere near as big and Palin’s house had been built closer to the fence than it should have been).

She was anti-abortion (abortion is legal in Alaska) and pro-guns (even though “In 2017, Alaska had the highest gun death rate among the states...”). As Mayor of Wasilla she fired anyone she didn’t like (usually Democrats – she was Republican) and did the same thing when she was elected as Governor.

Those who voted for her initially loved her and believed her, but they began to realise that what she was doing was her own self-build. As the Mayor of Wasilla and the Governor of Alaska she eventually lost most of her support in Alaska. After McGinniss wrote his book she had resigned as Governor and moved into the mainstream of USA. The majority of her supporters there were also religious like her, or were gun owners who supported her belief in guns.

McGinniss wrote well, which the exception of (to me) the extremely boring repetitions of what happened at Palin’s religious meetings. Throughout his book he included photographs which could have stung Palin – and she spent far too much time talking to whichever media would publish her complaints about how she was upset about where he was renting. He wrote about things that every voter needed to know, including her push for a (non-existent) gas pipeline and her claim of costs for flying herself and her family between Wasilla and USA (religious meetings). He spoke to many people who liked her, and many other people who no longer did. He collected information and put the essential stuff into his book. But he didn’t look over the 14 foot high fence into Palin’s daughter’s bedroom.

Maybe most of the readers of this review might think it’s not relevant for you, but, for me, Palin is Trump and everyone in this world should be concerned about what Palin – and Trump – are doing to us. Many writers do not like Palin, and call her up on her uncivilised life which seems very different than most other people – perhaps I should read the article online about her “anti-woman feminism” or another book which tells of lies that Palin has told. Maybe I need to read many more, too.

Even though I don’t live in USA.