Pilates Core Club book club was born during lockdown 1.0. as a way to give people a focus in trying times and keep everyone connected. I had just started providing online Pilates sessions through Zoom so it made sense to do the bookclub over Zoom as well. We’ve been lucky in Guernsey as the pandemic was controlled and as lockdown unlocked in the summer of 2020, we were able to start meeting in person.

Our little bookclub has grown and flourished and we’ve read and discussed some great (and sometimes not so great!) books. Here we have chosen our favourite 5’s books of 2020. Maz, our lead literary critic, has kindly written the reviews.

Enjoy!

An Officer and a Spy - Robert Harris
This was, by common consent our favourite bookclub book of the year. It is a true story which provoked lively discussion. Most of us had heard of ‘The Dreyfus Affair’. Apart from the fact that it concerned monumental miscarriage of justice and was deeply anti-Semitic, we knew nothing more about it.

Politically, it divided France so dramatically that it teetered on the edge of civil war. We compared it to Brexit in the UK. We also compared the miscarriage of justice in the Dreyfus trials to the trials of Jeremy Thorpe and Christine Keeler in the ‘60s which had been recently serialised on TV. We found the book compelling. Its depiction of gross nepotism, political corruption, false imprisonment, torture, and sanctioned murder in order to save face, focused our interest and concentration throughout.

Finally, we found Dreyfus’s lack of gratitude towards the whistle-blower, Picquard, puzzling. We concluded that in his characterisation of Dreyfus, Harris had exhibited many of the traits of victims of bullying and abuse.

Americanah - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

This book was our next choice.  Americanah is a term for a Nigerian who has returned from America with American affectations.  It follows Ifemelu’s struggle with racism, relationships and identity.  Identity is its most important theme: it is tied up with the motif of hair, associated with Ifemelu’s Nigerian identity.  We learnt about relaxing hair - straightening it into unnatural shapes with the help of chemicals - and the 8 hours it took to braid hair. Tiny, whose choice it was, who has braided hair explained the processes to us.  

Ifemelu’s attempts to find a job in the US using someone else’s green card eats away at her self-worth, and leads to depression, self-doubt and insecurity.  Satire, especially that of the 2 snobby dinner parties in the US and UK, is bitingly funny.  The novel raised questions about racism in the US.  It also led us to compare the anxiety of the Obama election with that of Joe Biden.

Finally, it raised questions about the morality of Obinze leaving a fully functioning relationship with his family for Ifemelu who had ignored him earlier.  Adiche argues he must find his true identity and personal fulfilment.  We weren’t so sure.

A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry

Our next choice.  Its themes concern the ability to endure and the importance of friendship. This assumes the protective role of the family. Biological families are presented as dysfunctional.  This is illustrated via 2 tailors, Om and Ishvar; Diva who fights fiercely for her independence; and the student, Maneck.

Set in India in 1975/6 under a state of emergency in which opposition is imprisoned and sterilisation enforced.  Dickensian in its panoramic approach, it portrays envy, superstition, caste, bigotry and pervasive corruption.  The city itself is anthropomorphic - feral and predatory, a monster with an insatiable appetite that feeds on its people.

Discussion centred on the state of India both then and now: although the novel itself names no names it clearly refers to India under Indira Gandhi, and the unnamed city appears to be Mumbai.  We discussed Mistry’s use of metaphor.  Especially effective was that of the quilt and quilting which bound this disparate group together, kept it warm and followed it everywhere.  We also noted how the chess metaphor came to signify their game of life.  We looked at the caste system, especially untouchables; the vulnerability of women; the tight control and cruelty of those in power; and of the middle class who were trapped in a corrupt system which they were forced to become part of in order to survive.

The Gustav Sonata - Rose Tremain

We considered this novel understated and beautifully written.  As with sonata form it was written in 3 parts with recurring themes or variations. 

Emotionally crippled by his mother, we came to the conclusion that Gustav has the psychological need to love and serve others without any hope of that love being returned.  We discussed Gustav’s relationships with his mother; with his surrogate mother, Lotte; with the General in his hotel; and finally, in more detail, with his complex relationship with Anton.

We drew connections between the non-sequential time bands in the 3 sections.  Much to his mother’s anger Gustav’s father used his authority to help Jews escape the gas chambers and cross over into Switzerland.  He was disgraced and punished - they were plunged into poverty, especially after his death.  Years later Gustav and his friend Anton play in the ruins of a sanitarium in the mountains where they have the power over life and death - their childhood game is endearing, but on a more sinister level it ties up with Gustav’s father and the earlier wartime sequence of the gas chambers.  In the final section the ruins rise from the ashes and become Gustav’s own sanitarium in the mountains.  

We looked at the idea of the impossibility of remaining neutral with reference to Switzerland, but which also applied elsewhere in the novel.

We drew parallels between themes explored in 1971 Visconti film of Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice with Dirk Bogarde as Gustav Aschenbach, music by Gustav Mahler; and that of The Gustav Sonata.  We decided both dealt with the relationship between Art and corrupting passion.

Two Caravans - Marina Lewycka

A funny book which made us all LOL.  What impressed us most was Lewycka’s ability to tackle serious, frighteningly threatening, issues with humour.  Tackled seriously they often lead to inertia fatigue, but Lewycka’s approach forced us to confront them.  

Dark forces were seen through innocent eyes.  Misinterpretation and confusion over language and culture became areas for poking fun.  This was often evoked by the use of the migrant voice conveyed via phonetic spelling, for example, mobilfon.  The gap between romantic fantasies of a better future, a sort of Arcadia; and its brutal, sordid and dangerous reality was another means of poking fun.  Lewycka never loses her humour, even in the face of vicious exploitation of illegal workers; of gun-toting Mafia-style pimps who see all women as business ventures; slum-like hostels; and the sickening brutality of chicken farming.  All these areas were ripe for discussion.

Lewycka’s epigraph at the beginning of her book is from The Wife of Bath.  This is a modern pilgrimage in which the counterpart of many of Chaucer’s characters are brought to life.  They set off on their journey in their battered old purloined trailer home across England on their way to Canterbury.