The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
Yeah.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
Part of the problem is I think that Hussie character – and he does come back at the end of the book and we get two chapters, I think, in his point of view.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
He's a fascinating character.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
And some of the questions at the end that he starts to talk about this colonial experience –
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
And that he begins to worry that his whole career, and he comes across as a kind man, a fairly benevolent administrator.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
Obviously, we're only hearing it from his perspective, mind you.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
But we do get that sense that he had a genuine interest in these people.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
And he's now worried that his whole entire career is
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
has actually just led to more problems for these people rather than less problems, even though it was sort of with the best of intentions.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
And I think some of those questions were actually, they were really fascinating.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
And I actually would have liked them to been a bit more central to the book.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
Rather than Charlie's experience of returning from the war, which I think is quite a, it's one that we've seen before, that seemed really kind of fascinating to have a look at someone.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
It seemed to me that Hussey was having a bit of a kazooish-a-guru kind of moment of reflecting on his life and realising just it's been for nothing, a bit of a despair about it.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
And I thought some of the questions around that were really fantastic.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
What did you make, Aoife, of the way she wrote the landscape?
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
I think that was probably the strongest part of the novel, I think.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
The landscape was really wonderful and at times it's almost a dreamlike place.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
I think the landscape was very successful.
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
I, in fact, would have enjoyed more of that and particularly...
The Bookshelf
On Graham Norton's A Keeper, R.O. Kwon's The Incendiaries and Georgina Harding's Land of the Living with David Hunt, Aoife Clifford and Anne Summers
His time with the Naga people, and it's sort of suggested that he's actually lost in the jungle with these people.