Knowing that Nick Harkaway is the son of John LeCarre shouldn't really be a factor in the appreciation of this mad, lovely book, but when I put it down I couldn't avoid the conclusion that this was his answer to A Perfect Spy. Looming large over the story is the hero's father, an arch-criminal and a lovable, charismatic rogue, larger than life, who leaves a very confused son behind when he dies.

Anyway, will review properly later.

A fun, fast read, written in that slightly flat and plain style of a lot of YA science fiction, so much so I wonder if it was originally intended as such. Set in a future where the majority of the impoverished population escape the grim reality of a world in environmental, social and economic meltdown in a massive immersive virtual reality. The inventor of said reality dies heirless and leaves his immense wealth to whoever can win his final game. After years of puzzling over the initial clue, our hero solves it, and the game begins, with other players close behind an an evil corporation willing to cheat and even kill to lay their hands on the prize.

So, this is celebrated as a book for geeks of all shapes and sizes, particularly those with a fondness for eighties pop and gaming culture, with most of the clues and puzzles and games constructed around obscure eighties trivia. This should probably have been more annoying than it was, in fact a lot of it should have been more annoying than it was. The unpleasant future, some of which was arguably seeded in the excesses of the eighties, mitigates against it somewhat, and Wade's description of his early confrontation with the realities of his life creates a sense pathos that keeps the reader from begrudging him the escapism we have the privilege of both taking for granted and looking askance at. The mobile homes stacked on the outskirts of the city packed with the poor and the dispossessed is as potent and shabby and sobering an emblem of our possible future as the virtual reality is a vision of the amazing technology of tomorrow. The contrast between the two rings horribly true.

Cut my finger cooking so typing is a pain and then a vampire came and sucked all the blood out of me and transformed me into a primal, bloodthirsty beast haunting a post-apocalyptic nightmare landscape, in the thrall of one of twelve death-row inmates, telepathic monsters-in-chief of the twelve tribes of nosferati, so not only was dinner a bit late, but I'm not up to writing a long review because my finger hurts and savage bloodlust is crowding out my critical faculties. It's a big, meaty, dripping, throbbing, nyum nyum sequel to The Passage, notable for being written with a rare literary focus on style and character though not without neglecting the horror and the action. A bit too long maybe but I enjoyed it all. Now excuse me. Nom nom nom.

Half a book so this is half a revi-

The third volume in this terrific series, a fantasy/horror meta-story about the power of stories. Tommy Taylor finds himself trapped on board The Pequod, a-hunting the great white whale, or at least trying to find out what it is the whale represents and what it has to do with the power his father wielded and the very bad people trying to kill him and his friends. I love tis stuff, and it's such a relief that it's found an audience large enough to keep it going (unlike say, Crossing Midnight.) I'm very much looking forward to more.

I suppose this marks a return to form of sorts for Iain Banks. With the thesis-undermining caveats that I haven't read Steep Approach To Garbadale and I bloody loved Transition, Banks' non-M books have been pretty lacking since Whit. Generally readable and fun - if you ignore Song Of Stone - but lacking in depth, perhaps, with his customary skill, narrative flair, formidable imagination and exquisite writing all more or less present and correct, but not quite gelling to produce more than the sum of their parts.

Stonemouth hearkens back to The Crow Road, Whit, and presumably Garbadale. It features family and friends in a small rain-battered Scottish location, ancient and not-so-ancient incidents rediscovered through the present, old secrets and tragedies and past mistakes, all subtly and profoundly shaping the here and now.

Stewart Gilmour returns to the town of Stonemouth which he left five years before under dramatic and unpleasant circumstances. Granted leave to attend the funeral of the patriarch of one of two crime families who run Stonemouth, Stewart visits old haunts, meets old friends, remembers episodes from his old life and pines guiltily for his lost love.

Despite the dramatic denouement, this isn't a thriller, nor is it full of terrible twists and appalling revelations - there's a bit of business involving cameras and such, but it's slight compared to, say, the central mystery of Crow Road. No, most of the things that we learn about in the past are flagged well ahead, and though that generates its own type of tension - the fate of Wee Malky and the incident in the hotel toilet are typically brilliant Banksian episodes of horror and hilarity - this is very much the story of a man who has everything going back to the town that threw him out in the forlorn hope of coming to terms with the frankly shitty thing he did.

And it's grand. A rattling story with real heft and weight. Perhaps it needed a Crow Road mystery or a Complicity-style revelation to boost it into the upper league, but it's a perfectly satisfying read with some lovely writing, and that brilliant thing Banks does over and over again in any genre, which is to create an utterly believable group of friends and show us their lives together and apart as they grow up, go their separate ways, and revisit the things that shaped their lives.

This collection of fiendishly clever, delightfully witty and yet brilliantly human and insightful short stories build up to a coherent and satisfying novel. Moriarty and Moran, a twisted reflection of Holmes and Watson, criminal genius and murderous Boswell in partnership as consulting criminals. The Newman genius for literary gamesmanship is in full effect here. The layers of references and jokes and obscure characters belie a deft and confident writing style and a dazzling plotter. Moran is a monster and Moriarty is a monster's master, but by the end of the book Newman has given them each a human dimension without once threatening take their side or grant them too much sympathy. Utterly brilliant.