Sebastian Faulks - Where My Heart Used to Beat

WE did not engage with this - the first person narrator is perhaps meant to be distant  - It seems rather a deliberate construction of a book  and  not really believable.Not his best

Nikolai Gogol Dead Souls

Despite the title this is a satire on Russian life and characters. We did not all take to it  , but it  has its moments

The Code of the Woosters P.G.Wodehouse

Great turns of phrase,  an unlikely plot that he manages to draw together. The "masters" are fools the "servants" the wise ones. Bertie is a gentle soul who can't help getting in a spot of bother...
Some loved it   , other felt time could be better spent. But have to read one  in your life

Simon Mawer- The Glass Room

This is a readable story ( based on a true one)  but none of us felt it was great literature   . Good writing  , a weak ending  .

Pettina Gappah

The Book of Memory : Not a great success, a couple of us liked it  a, couple more in parts  and a couple not at all. Still it adds to list of Zimbabwean fiction and has interesting elements  but we didn't buy into the denouement

Svetlana Alexievich - Chronobyl Prayer

the writer and journalist - and Nobel laureate- records monologues of those who suffered from the effects of Chernobyl. Moving, harrowing , shocking    and -some of us thought, a bit repetitive although Bloke D objects to the use of  'repetitive' .

Italo Calvino - If on a Winters Night a Stranger

Clever- perhaps too clever for some. What is a novel / what is it to be a reader? Divided the group.Worth it- it is short