No Great Expectations

Despite agreeing with Isobel re: Daisy's insufferability, I had a far more positive experience with How I Live Now than she did (Isobel, not Daisy). This could be due to either a nostalgia for a childhood spent reading about Enid Blyton idylls, a lifelong fascination with books involving war, (even imaginary, fantastical ones) or probably just that I had under- rather than over-expectations of a book marketed within the crossover genre.

Trying to write about the book a month on, all Isobel's criticisms seem well-founded, especially if it's being considered as a legitimate adult read. However, my interpretation of 'crossover' was ' a kid's book that adults may enjoy'. In this light, I thought that the children's first-person experience of the war leant the book a surrealism and unworldy quality reminiscent of JG Ballard's Empire of the Sun. This also allowed Meg Rosoff to get away with some of the characters' excessive quirkiness and the parts of the story that didn't really add up/make sense/seem at all rational. The key offenders here were the bizarrely empty incest scenes, the preponderance of telepathy in the Home Counties and the fact that none of the children were plausible ages.

So, essentially, it was a fun children's book that I'd consider recommending to an adult if it was lying around and they had a few hours to spare. I read it on a relaxing Saturday morning and found it had more substance than the usual televisual breakfast of Hollyoaks, CD:UK and Friends. It wasn't as good as Pop World though.