January 2013 book review

Beginning this month we are going to post reviews of books we've read and would like to recommend to you.  We in the Adult Services department read a variety of different genres so you'll see posts from all of us for the latest bestsellers, science fiction, nonfiction, and anything else that captures our attention. Enjoy!

Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan

Do you recall novelist Ian McEwan’s haunting Atonement?  There are plenty of us that have been chomping at the bit for Ian to pen another historical novel with a strong female lead. This time it’s in the seventies.  Ooh, how groovy.  And, it’s about the morally gray world of MI5... and reading!  

Our heroine, Serena Frome, is a Cambridge mathematics graduate and a lover of books. She devours everything from pulp fiction to classic literature.  Nearing her graduation, Serena falls for an older, wiser man. Based on her degree, intelligence, and book knowledge, he decides her career destiny lies in the mysterious world of the British spy agency.  Are you hooked now? 

McEwan accompanies us into the bygone decade so fluently you don’t miss the present at all.  The intrigue mounts as Serena is assigned to “Sweet Tooth,” a program to secretly fund left-wing, anti-communist writers, in an effort to do combat on the cultural front of the Cold War.  

Serena is asked to evaluate the handsome Tom Haley, and then to fund him via a front organization.  Haley’s stories are Chekhovian and gothic. They are summarized in detail, sometimes directly quoted.  This allows McEwan to entertain us with a remarkable collection of short stories within the book! What a novel idea!

Here’s where the Booker Prize-winning novelist shows his masterpiece: Serena is captivated by Tom not only by his words on paper but by the man himself.  They have an affair, and she struggles hour by hour whether or not to reveal her true identity.  

I highly recommend Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan.  A tasty book that’s a real treat for the senses.

Review by Susie B.