La's Orchestra Saves the World, Alexander McCall Smith

My love of Alexander McCall Smith is tempted to rate this novel higher than I otherwise might, but I must be honest. It's lovely and gentle and slow but not a riveting read.

The central character is La (short for Lavender), a British woman who finds her life upturned when her husband leaves her for another woman. Not the type to hold a grudge, she moves to a cottage in the countryside and begins to contribute her small part towards the war effort - one of her endeavours being to start a village orchestra. Based on the title of the book, I'm led to believe that McCall Smith may have meant the theme to be about the power music, but I didn't really get that sense as a reader. The orchestra (and the war itself) seemed rather incidental to the central storyline... and I use the word 'storyline' very loosely because there really isn't much of one. She ponders, she meanders, she wonders and thinks, and while it's all very lovely, it isn't exactly the stuff of literary genius.

The saving grace of the novel is the slight romance between La and Feliks, a 'Pole' displaced by the war and now working for the British Army. It's not hot and steamy by any means, but very adult and genteel, much like the rest of the book.

The Ugly Truth, movie review

With a better script, this could've been a smarter movie. As it is, it relies heavily on the good looks of the two leads, the funny but misogynistic and shallow comments of Gerard Butler's character and Katherine Heigl's ability to embarrass herself. In short, it gives you exactly what you could expect and nothing more.

There are some very funny moments, like Katherine Heigl hanging upside down from a tree, but the plot is like something out of a sweet dreams book (does Kiss Me Creep ring a bell for anyone else?) extracted for an older audience with the addition of some crude humour – although when that crude humour is delivered by Gerard Butler, you can't help but be charmed by the smarm. The Ugly Truth tries so hard to be a funny movie that the attempt to bring in some depth towards the end flounders entirely and becomes psych 101 cliché. Anyway, who's going to believe that someone who looks like Katherine Heigl is a loser at attracting guys?

But it is a funny movie – the audience laughed a LOT during the showing I was at – and a particularly good date movie for its feelgood factor and gender-balanced humour.

G.I. Joe, movie review

G.I. Joe had one redeeming factor: it increased my endorphin levels. I couldn't stop laughing at the terrible dialogue, hokey plot, lame accents and one-dimensional characters. At one point, the evil geniuses (genii?) are two bald, burnt men hobbling away by foot – yeah, scar-ee. You couldn't help but feel sorry for Dennis Quaid, who is lumped with a few clichès and a pretty thin hapless part in his role as the head of the Joes – supposedly an elite fighting squad, who somehow manage to stay one step behind the villains all the way through the movie, despite their fancy gadgets and high tech weaponry. Channing Tatum does a credible brooding job as Duke, the central character and one of the newest Joe recruits, but Sienna Miller... what's with the catwalk strut all the way through the movie? Is she normally that bad an actor or was she simply embarrassed to be part of this film? Marlon Wayans gets a few laughs in his black-sidekick role, but it doesn't come near the calibre of Chris Rock, who perfected this part a long time ago.

Questions (spoiler alert):

• Why was the US buying the nanomite weapons in the first place, knowing that they're so destructive that the rest of the movie is made up of trying to stop the bad guys from using it?
• Why do weapons need to be 'weaponised'?
• How is it possible that so many ppl on the two opposing 'elite fighting teams' have random ties to one another?
• If the Baroness is suddenly meant to overcome her mind-control device at the end when she suddenly recognises and remembers her previous life with Duke, then why, at the beginning when they cross paths, does she say, 'you of all people should know'?
• Why the hell would her younger brother suddenly turn into an evil genius after one bomb blast?
• Why are the martial arts flashbacks set in Japan, but the kid (Storm Shadow as child) speaks Korean?
• Doesn't a white ninja suit defeat the purpose of being a ninja in the first place (to be unseen)?
• As much as I like Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who the hell cast him as the evil mastermind? He still looks like a 12 year old.

Rating: Go watch it if you need a laugh, but if you want a good tight action film, look elsewhere.

The Miracle at Speedy Motors

"Fat lady: you watch out! And you too, the one with the big glasses."

Wise, traditionally-built Mma Ramotse and her high achieving assistant Mma Makutsi begin receiving threatening letters at their agency. Who could be behind them? And why? This mystery is one of several sub-plots in this wonderfully warm ninth instalment of the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall-Smith.

I've already written several reviews about this series, including In the Company of Cheerful Ladies, The Kalahari Typing School for Men and Tears of the Giraffe, so I won't bore you with another panegyric of what a wonderful writer McCall Smith is and how lovely and touching his books are. Suffice to say it's a quick and easy read that leaves an impression on the reader about the beauty and expanse of Botswana and its people. Mma Ramotwe is a wonderful literary creation - may the series live long and prosper.

Catch-22, Joseph Heller

Catch-22 is a brilliant and scathing anti-war book that's equal parts frustrating, funny and absurd. The hero (or central character, since he's hardly heroic) is Yossarian, a bombardier whose main objective is to stay alive throughout the war (WWII). Unfortunately for Yossarian, his attempts are thwarted at every turn. Trying to prove himself mad (and therefore unfit for duty) is undermined by the evidence that he wants to stay alive, and only a sane person would want to save their own life. That's the essence of Catch-22, and the reason for it being coined in the common lexicon.

The book is filled with a veritable Forrest Gump box of chocolate range of characters. Madness of some sort seems to be a general theme, although each to a different degree. Hungry Joe is war-mad from trauma, Chief Halfoat is race-mad from exploitation by white people, Milo is profit-mad and even bombs his own squadron to make money, Colonel Cathcart is approval-mad, continually raising the men's number of missions in order to get his picture in the newspaper, and the list goes on. There's whore-mad, son-in-law-mad, weakling-mad, danger-mad, mad-mad... Yossarian, who simply wants to stay alive, seems the sanest of them all, despite showing up to a medals ceremony completely naked and signing a fictitious name to official documents and causing havoc.

Although I think Catch-22 is a work of real genius, the experience of reading it was not enjoyable. With its circular logic and dark humour, it is incredibly frustrating to read, and its many idiosyncratic characters can be difficult to keep track of. Nothing seems to make any sense at all and power is held absolutely by absolute idiots. It's a maddening book that acts as a parable to question society, and in particular, war.

As a female reader, I have to also take a moment to mention the role of women in the book, as much as I don't want to. Apart from the doctor's greedy wife, no woman is mentioned without a reference to her sexuality, whether she's a whore, a colonel's wife or a nurse. It's disconcerting that in a book about power, women are hung on the very bottom rung of the ladder. The men are subject to the whims of their superiors, but women are subject to the whims of everybody. A particularly disturbing scene occurs later in the book where one of the men in the squadron (who you think you know, even as a reader) rapes a domestic servant and throws her out of a window to her death. I'm sure there's a thesis in here but this is only a book review so I'll end on this topic here.

Right at the very end, in the last few pages, the story eventually breaks out of its frustrating confines (not before things get a lot worse first) and finally a gust of hope is introduced. These last few pages, for me, made the whole book worthwhile. Finally you get a taste of what Yossarian (and you, because in the process of reading your empathy is entirely with him) has been wanting all along. But it doesn't come the way you think it will. I won't spoil it, but it's a truly rewarding ending.

Overall, Catch-22 is brilliant, funny and a little disturbing.

Cheri, movie review

Cheri is a story set in the belle epoch – a period of history in France when high class whores were some of the most celebrated and powerful figures in society. Leah (portrayed beautifully by the gorgeous Michelle Pfeiffer) is an ageing courtesan who begins a sexual affair with her friend's 19 year old son, Cheri (played by Rupert Friend). After so many decades and so many lovers, Leah finds herself truly in love for the first time, only to be informed that his mother has arranged a suitable marriage for him.

Actually, 'suitable' is a difficult word to use regarding this movie because so much of it is so very unsuitable. Not only does Leah begin a sexual relationship with a boy she's known since he was a baby (whom she even nicknamed Cheri at the age of six), but it's clear that she has maternal feelings toward him, and he filial feelings toward her. The fact that they don't hesitate to give in to their desire for each other, purely because they can, reflects the indifference of their culture to any sense of right and wrong. So many boundaries are crossed that it's no wonder their unhealthy obsession with each other leads to tragedy.

As an aside, having heard that the author of the novel this movie was based on was a woman who had had an affair with her stepson, I couldn't help but think this story was a little self-serving – trying to bring sympathy to the mother figure in this Oedipal story to justify her own actions.

But enough of my moralising – back to the review. The packaging (cinematography, score and costuming) was beautiful and Michelle Pfeiffer did a great job as Leah. It was also a better movie for showing no gratuitious nudity (except a few shots of Rupert Friend's rather taut butt), b/c it focused the storyline on the relational aspect rather than the sex, and added a measure of elegance to an otherwise tawdry affair.

Stephen Frear's voice overs were a bit jarring because the narrator had no relevance to the story, however the narration itself provided interesting insights into the characters. I'm still undecided about whether it was necessary.

On the whole, Cheri is a romantic tragedy (rom-trag – is this another genre?) that's not so much Romeo and Juliet as it is Mrs Robinson.

In Your Dreams, Tom Holt

In Your Dreams is Tom Holt's second novel in the fantasy series about J.W. Wells & Co - a multi-national corporation where magic is a commodity, and where young Paul Carpenter (the somewhat hopeless inoffensive type) finds himself bound by employment. We first met Paul in book one, the eminently readable The Portable Door. In Your Dreams takes up where that story left off, ramping up the fun while taking us deeper into this wacky fantasy world. In this second book, Paul grows a little more accustomed to his workplace surroundings and even becomes promoted to full 'hero' status after slaying a dragon (admittedly a very small one that he accidentally squashed to death by sitting on).

But new mysteries abound - prickly new love-of-his-life Sophie abruptly leaves him and soon Paul finds himself eyeball deep in the world of the Fey - the magical Faerie-like creatures with power over 'glamour'. One faction of the Fey, Paul discovers, is bent on world domination through infiltration of dreams, but with half of Hollywood in their pocket and the ensuing income this provides, no-one at profit-driven J.W. Wells & Co seems inclined to act, leaving Paul somehow the only person in the world who can take them on and save the world.

Again I have to give kudos to Tom Holt's imagination for the absurdly funny and magical elements of this book, but perhaps more so to his literary skills which manage to translate what he sees in his head onto the pages of a book. That's tough stuff. He treads the fine balance of poking deprecating humour at his hero with a genuine fondness that really comes across so we're all rooting for him too. Well worth a read.