Transcription by Kate Atkinson

Eighteen-year-old Juliet is recruited by an MI5 operative to be his girl typist and dogsbody. They are involved in an undercover wartime operation to root out fifth columnists, or Hitler sympathisers, who are called things like Trude and Betty. They do this by setting up office in the next door flat to their mole’s fifth column headquarters, a Dolphin Square apartment where ‘Godfrey’ lures these unremarkable women to condemn themselves, thinking that they are informing a Gestapo agent and helping the Third Reich (in between tea and biscuit breaks).

It is Juliet’s task to transcribe hours of recorded conversation, along with young Cyril whose job it is to maintain the equipment. Juliet is an orphan and has no one to turn to for advice, she is very naïve and yearns for her boss Perry to declare his love for her. She also hankers after more exciting work, which eventually comes her way. But this is probably a case of ‘be careful what you wish for’, especially in wartime.

Based on true stories and transcriptions from the national archives, the setting and atmosphere are exactly right, which is what Kate Atkinson is good at, with some fine writing, but the plot meanders around a great deal. I got rather confused with agents, double agents, double-double agents, it became a bit tortuous. But no matter, we get the general idea that this was complicated and dangerous work because you never knew who to trust, least of all MI5. 

We are partly in the head of an older Juliet, now working at the BBC, looking back at her young self with a mixture of affection and exasperation, and a dread that some awful truth is going to catch up with her.  The ‘service’ it seems will never let you go.
If you enjoyed Kate Atkinson's Life After Life, then this has a similar feel of women coping with the difficulties of wartime. This older Juliet appears to feel, what is the point of it all, war? And it's hard to disagree...

The colour of Bee Larkham’s murder by Sarah J Harris

A very original and individual book about a twelve-year-old boy who is extraordinary in several ways. Firstly, because he believes he has committed a murder. Secondly, he has synesthesia, which is a when two senses get tied together, so that whenever he hears sound, he sees colour. We are led right into Jasper’s psychedelic world of bursting oranges, reds and greens, soothing blues and disturbing muddy browns. He loves to watch the parakeets which have set up home in his neighbour Bee Larkham’s tree, because their birdsong makes gorgeous shimmering colours. 

But his favourite colour is cobalt blue, the sound of his mother’s voice, who died when he was small and was the only person to truly understand his colours, because she shared the same trait. Jasper is also unable to recognise faces, and has learnt to know people by their clothes, or the colour of their voice. But this is tricky, especially when Bee Larkham begins to ask him to deliver secret messages to friends of hers. Bee is a troubled young woman, inconsistent and destructive and something is driving her.

There is a plot here, and it is gripping enough, and revolves around some dark behaviour and the consequences of that in a small community, resulting in danger for all concerned. But the true story is about an autistic boy trying desperately to understand the world around him, his painful isolation, and the sheer beauty of his own inner world and the joyous colours it contains. Jasper can be funny, frustrated, full of rage or just plain baffled, and the story unfolds entirely from his point of view. When life overwhelms him, he paints out his thoughts and frustrations on canvas, and his bedroom is littered with tubes of brightly coloured acrylic paint. Somehow the idea of Jasper attempting all his life to paint the exact blue of his mother’s voice, to calm and comfort him, is truly moving.

You Let Me In by Lucy Clarke

Interesting idea this. When you Airbnb your house, can you really trust who has been wandering around your most intimate space? 

Best-selling author Elle Fielding decides to Airbnb her gorgeous clifftop house in Cornwall, to get a bit of cash because she’s spent so much money having the building work done. But the reality is she has no idea who has been in her house – which is so obvious it’s startling in a way. 

When she returns odd stuff starts to happen, things are missing or out of place, and someone has been through her most private things. What’s more, Elle begins to worry that her sharing on social media has made her vulnerable. Is it an obsessed fan, or someone from her past life? Or perhaps she is imagining it all, under the burden of trying to finish her second book to deadline, and coping with her broken relationship.

Lucy Clarke writes well and I believed in her characters, Elle and her slightly bossy sister Fiona, and the life she has made for herself in Cornwall. Her increasing anxiety also seems natural and I found myself wondering why on earth anybody would invite complete strangers into their home to stay while they weren’t there. She creates a strong sense of place, on the Cornish coast, which made me want to take a beach walk, or stand on a windy clifftop. 

Altogether, this book is atmospheric and worth a read.

The Rules of Seeing by Joe Heap

Unusual subject matter for this fiction. After regaining her sight through a ground-breaking operation, Nova finds her new sense bewildering and exhausting. Learning to see is not as simple as you might imagine – Nova sees like a baby, cannot judge distance, cannot distinguish one object from another but sees everything as a flat plain. Several times she wishes she had not undergone the operation, and dons her dark glasses again to go back to being blind. 

This part of the narrative was interesting and challenging, as I had never imagined regaining your sight could be a two-way street, and sometimes unwelcome; Joe Heap describes it all very well. 

As the story develops, Nova begins a relationship with a friend Kate she meets in the hospital, wife of an abusive policeman who can’t seem to pluck up the courage to leave her husband. They end up in a love affair, which has so many ups and downs I felt that the narrative had stagnated somewhat, and had become repetitive. 

Ploughed on through but found the ending unconvincing. Nevertheless, I expect this book might win awards. Anyone read this and completely disagree?