Paperbacks

This week's releases reviewed

Homer and Langley

EL Doctorow

Abacus, pound(s)7.99

EL Doctorow's poignant book, a "a free imaginative rendering" ofthe lives of New York eccentrics the Collyer brothers, wasshortlisted for the Man Booker prize last year. It tells the storyof the American century through the lives of the siblings, upper-class New Yorkers, living in a large house on Fifth Avenue. Homer,the narrator, becomes blind while still a teenager; his brother,Langley, goes to fight in the Great War and comes back traumatisedand wheezing from the effects of mustard gas. As the brothersretreat into eccentricity, and the house becomes increasinglycrammed with the newspapers and bric-a-brac Langley collects, theevents of the century come and go, often referred to obliquely andall seen, as it were, through Homer's blindness. Doctorow has takenliberties with the real-life story: the Collyers died in 1947, buthe extends their lives. That said, within his reinterpretation henever loses focus and stays unerringly true to Homer's vision. It'san impressive feat of imagination and a beautiful piece of writing. CATHY DILLON

Molotov's Magic Lantern: Uncovering Russia's Secret History

Rachel Polonsky

Faber and Faber, pound(s)9.99

When Rachel Polonsky took up residence on Romanov Lane in Moscowin the 1990s, she found herself amid both grandeur and terror inwhat was the address of the Soviet elites. Vyacheslav Molotov,Stalin's closest protege, had resided in her very apartmentbuilding, and when Polonsky gained access to what remained of hisvast personal library she embarked on a journey of physical andscholarly proportions to match the immensity of Russia itself.Molotov, apparently, was a bibliophile and the book sets out tocapture the times and places discernible in his literary collection.Polonsky travels as far as the permafrost in the north and Russia'sfar eastern border with Mongolia, in each place confronted with thepast of a country fashioned through changing ideology.Contradictions of elegance and dilapidation, greatness and barbarismpervade this erudite travelogue as Polonsky takes the reader on anintellectual excavation of Russia with digressions of dreamycontemplation and comment on relations of power. SARAH McMONAGLE

For Richer, For Poorer: Confessions of a Player

Victoria Coren

Canongate, pound(s)8.99

Victoria Coren discovered poker in her teens, when it became away of escaping her adolescent woes. Her love of the game followedher into adulthood. She has seen it leave smoky casino card roomsand embrace the internet and watched as Scandinavian maths geekstook over from Stetson-wearing Texans at the top of its tree. ForRicher, For Poorer is an account of how she has grown up with poker.The game's growing popularity offered her opportunities inbroadcasting and newspapers. She has presented tournaments on TV andwrites a poker column in the Guardian. As a player she has developedinto a formidable operator who won pound(s)500,000 in a EuropeanPoker Tour final and has earned a $1.5 million. A narrative of thefinal helps form the spine of a book that acts as a memoir and ameditation on the game, and details the still thankfully colourfulcharacters she meets at the card table. BARRY O'HALLORAN

The Crazy Life of Brendan Behan

Frank Gray

AuthorHouse, pound(s)12.49

Although not containing a lot that is new, this compact biographyis an enjoyable read informed by a broad knowledge of Irishpolitical, social and cultural history. "In the space of a decade(1954-64), Brendan Behan rocketed to fame as a playwright,autobiographer, columnist, humorist, wit, roustabout, debauchee,charmer." Forever self-righteous, he saw himself as a David fightingso many Goliaths - or, like Don Quixote, "he was given to tilting atwindmills, sometimes with honourable intent but with self-destructive results". Gray stresses the influence of Behan's wife,Beatrice, arguing that without her he would be remembered only forThe Quare Fellow, because his alcoholism would have preventedfurther worthwhile output. Sadly, Behan eventually succumbed to hisown hunger for fame and the media's hunger for sensation andscandal, and the damage done by drink led to his early death, at 41.BRIAN MAYE

The Suicide Run

William Styron

Vintage, 192pp. pound(s)7.99

The five stories in this posthumous collection were drawn fromthe author's own experience in the US marine corps. Setpredominantly during the build-up to the Korean War, they depict themental anguish of soldiers on the brink of combat, waiting withshredded nerves and over-active libidos to step into war's abyss.Styron's ornate prose has a wonderful rhythmic flow. His soldiersdisplay all the lustful, cocky swagger of arrogant youths, yet theyare also second World War veterans and, as such, are haunted by thespectre of past horrors, horrors that lie in wait on anotherbattlefield just over the horizon. The title story, a sultry, white-knuckle sex odyssey across the US, is a particular gem. Told with afrenetic humour that bleeds out into lyrical disquiet, it paints avivid picture of young men trying in vain to drown out their owndeath knell. (Styron himself died in 2006). DAN SHEEHAN