General Chat

Please review The Last Templar
19 Minutes and any other books that you read from the list.

I didn't read The Last Templar, if you remember I said I would only continue if I didn't always read the two books as I had so many others waiting to be read here. so I read the following instead, which was on the list although didn't win.


review The Accidental Time traveller by Sharon Griffiths

A fairly light read but I quite enjoyed it. Although I half guessed the ending there was a further twist that added another dimension. Cleverly written and I enjoyed reading about the 50s life which I remember so well. It was a reminder of how easy we have many things, imagine life without washing up liquid let alone dish washers. And coffee out of a bottle ugh Camp coffee.
It was believable with likeable characters. I liked how the experience left Rosie with a sense of having too much these days and being able to manage with fewer handbags etc.
Probably a good book for reading on a flight or on the train because it didn’t take too much concentration

Review Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult

Not a book for reading to relax in bed before sleeping. I thought it was very well written and thought provoking. OK Peter shot the pupils and tutor, he was obviously guilty, but the background, the whys and wherefores were interesting. Was it Lewis’s fault that Peter had the opportunity to acquire guns and the knowledge of how to use them, was it Lacy’s fault for always pitting Peter against his brother? Was it the students’ fault for their constant bullying? Was it even Alex’s fault for withdrawing Josie’s friendship as a young child? Or was it a combination of all those that somehow made Peter the person he became? It is difficult to put yourself in his place when you have not been in his situation. Strange too that I found myself almost pitying him rather than those he shot. And, knowing he was guilty, hoping he’d get off.
It is a chilling story, not least because it mirrors true life happenings. In fact i didn’t read it when it first came out because I think there had been a similar shooting in an American school very recently. And of course there was Dunblane, although that was not a pupil.
I was actually surprised at the ending though (won’t say more in case somebody reading hasn’t read the book yet.) It was an unexpected twist and explained a few things that had not made sense to me before.
Another good read by JP.

Hi Ann,
have just seen this. Will be back tomorrow pm

Tess

The Accidental Time Traveller by Sharon Griffiths


Well what can I say? Great stuff!!! Easy to read and for some reason I kept thinking of my Milly Molly Mandie books. I enjoyed the British Version of Life on Mars returning to the seventies. I also loved Goodnight Sweetheart with Nicholas Lyndhurst harking back to the Second World War – I don’t think they played all six series here though. So what was there not to like about this book. I well remembered my mother’s string bag to put the messages in – then she graduated to ones made out of plastic tubing (such cleverness then). Life was somewhat different here to what it was like in Britain but there are lot of similarities and similar thinking especially. I think the author did a great job of binding the two eras together with the illness etc and the realities of the past all being there in the old newspaper records. And my husband liked that awful chicory essence coffee and my 20 year older than me cousin used to buy one that came in a tin mixed with condensed milk. NZ along with Australia make the best coffees in the world. That is the one thing that Helen Clark misses with living in New York.

Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Piccoult.

Oh Boy!! This lady writes about dysfunctional so well. Ultimately where did the responsibility lie for the killings? So many factors and what ifs. What makes a person resort to this – it is too real considering that such events do happen.

The Last Templar.

In one review of it I read: “With "Templar" in the title, this debut novel will inevitably draw comparisons to Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code.” So far so good I have not read anything by Dan Brown. It went on to say: “For those fatigued by the recent spate of Mary Magdalene/Holy Grail books, this novel will come as a welcome relief.”

On the whole I did not mind it – not something I would normally read – I do have the book in search Holy Blood and Holy Grail my Michael Baigent and co – So I could look at their photos in support of the book. I think on the whole he wrote a very good book mixing fiction with fact (we seem to read a lot of these). People have to read it with the realization in mind that fantasy is not fact. I am sure that a lot of people of certain denominations would be incensed by such a book.
Someone on a message board said about it being made into a mini series etc and that would the NBC be so ready to slam Islamic beliefs as they do with the Christian faiths?
To be fair I think the book slams all religions not just Christianity. But it is a novel!!

The Past and other lies by Maggie Joel:

They certainly did have some hidden secrets – the three generations were all a strange lot and the majority of them did come up with some stories. But on the whole the story was excellent- its portrayal of England in 1926 was quite vivid as were the next two generations. There was a bit of toing and froing in that you started with the most recent generation and then back to the first generation, which left you waiting to find out what had happened with the most recent. So it was fairly compelling to get the whole story and lots of mystery that gradually came to the fore. The last bit left me wondering what had happened when the bus did crash into the bridge – I know what I thought happened. Maybe we were meant to think along the same lines.

Nineteen Minutes

I found this an interesting and asorbing book, you coudn't help but feel (pity? not sure if that is what it was) for Peter and the things that happened to him throughout his life that had lead to the school shooting and there is the question of whether or not if the people in his life had treated him differently and helped him if things would have turned out differently.

Just as an aside I only learnt recently that one of the local country schools here in this part of NZ had a shooting incident back in I think the 1930ish era. From what I can recall it was a disgruntled former employee of the school.

The Last Templar

When I started reading this I kept thinking this story seemed awful familar yet I knew I had not read the book before, a couple of chapters in I realised it was because I had seen the mini series Persephone has mentioned. The book was an okay read, I do think this kind of story has been overdone in recent years (I personally found The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown and dull and unoriginal book), I liked the parts about the 14th century knights somewhat better than the modern bits.

Thank you for your replies. Goodness Perse you did a lot of reading this time. Well done.

Nineteen Minutes by Jodie Picoult

Wow! What a good story - I've just lent it to my daughter. A very sad story about Peter - even his mum didn't help him stand up to bullies when he was little, and that was the bit I found hardest to understand. As Ann said, there are so many places you could lay the blame, if you chose to do so, for his terrible actions. Those of you who haven't read the book yet I do recommend it.

On the Road by Jack Kerouac

Supposedly a semi-auobiographical book based on Kerouac's own experience as a young man. It took me ages to get into it then I couldn't put it down. It is a great tale of what the US was like in the 1950's for young, bright wannabe writers, travelling back and forth across in their country in search of experience and adventure. There were lots of descriptions of all the different countrysides, from mountains to coast, and I loved all of that. I couldn't quite work out how the travelling was paid for apart from petty theft - then realised the narrator was having some work published.

Not really a happy story but very interesting if you want something different to get your teeth into.

A is For Alibi by Sue Grafton

I have read a few of this "alphabet" series and enjoyed this first one just as much. The heroine, Kinsey Milhone, is a likeable private sleuth who wears me out with all the work she does! An easy but enjoyable read.

Thank you, still a few to go.

I managed to get and read all three this time!

The Last Templar by Raymond Khoury

This was my favourite book of the three. The bit at the Metropolitan Museum would have made a great scene in a film! It explained the history of the Templars really well and it was interesting to read about the Cathars again after 'meeting' them in Winter Ghosts (at least I think it was that book).

Nineteen Minutes - by Jodi Picoult

Found this quite upsetting to read. When you followed the threads of abuse/misunderstandings etc. to the end result it really made you wonder about people around you. As Ann says, all the more thought provoking when you know things like that have really happened. I couldn't quite believe the school would have brushed off the awful things that were done to Peter, especially when he was very young though.

The Accidental Time traveller by Sharon Griffiths

I didn't get on very well with this book and I'm not quite sure why. I found it difficult to believe that Rosie would just have accepted being pitchforked into the 1950's house and found the ending rather predictable. I did, as others have said enjoy reading about life in the 50's (not that I remember much – having been a mere child at the time!!!!!!)

Nineteen Minutes. By Jodi Picoult
Although fiction, this book showed just how many people are affected when a person ‘snaps’ after years of bullying. It also shows that parents with the best of love and intentions, can make little mistakes which can contribute to the situation. So many people whose lives will never be the same again.

The Last Templar. By Raymond Khouri
I did read this book right to the end although it is not to my taste in reading material. A lot of lives lost over an ancient artifact and the method of stealing it in the first place, were over the top for me.

Interesting Helen,

I read Kerouac's book when I was about 17 and I had trouble getting into it and had to perservere but did enjoy it. I also read "The Big Sur" around this time. Kerouac's one is in "The group of penguins" along with Catcher in the Rye - I think there is 10 in the collection. This was when I first joined the library much to my mother's horror - reading books that other people had handled was just not on.

Persey

Hi Persey, I've never heard of The Group of Penguins!! But I read Catcher in the Rye when I was at school although I can hardly remember it now. Must read it again! I haven't read the Big Sur, though, something else for my list!

Thanks for your comments
Helen x

Sorry I didn't get back when I said I would. Will try to make some (brief) comments latter this evening.

Tess