Rich's Reading Notes is a personal reading journal about books, ideas, and the thoughts that stay with me after reading. /atom.xml Richard Hindes 2026-09-27T00:00:00Z

Don Carpenter's stunning debut novel touches on love, loneliness, and how difficult it can be to leave your past behind

2026-09-27T00:00:00Z 2026-09-27T00:00:00Z /reviews/hard-rain-falling/ To call Hard Rain Falling a crime novel would be doing it a disservice; the strength of this book is the way that Carpenter writes his characters. The book follows a few different characters’ perspectives, but mainly focuses on the life of Jack Levitt, an orphan who grows up without any role models and ends up getting himself into trouble. Jack is physically intimidating and quickly falls into a life of crime. One day in a pool hall in Portland, Oregon, he meets our other protagonist Billy Lancing, a mixed race boy a few years older than Jack who is exceptionally skilled at pool and is himself a hustler. They get talking, Jack secretly plans to rob Billy and dupe him out of his pool winnings, but holds himself back. Jack ultimately does break and enter into a home and later gets sent to prison.

A strange, cynical, and oddly funny account about grief, privilege and the possibility of starting again

2026-09-25T00:00:00Z 2026-09-25T00:00:00Z /reviews/my-year-of-rest-and-relaxation/ My Year of Rest and Relaxation is a novel about withdrawal. Its premise is simple: what if you could opt out of your own life for a year, sleep through almost all of it, and wake up renewed? Ottessa Moshfegh has taken that idea and placed it in the hands of a cruel narrator who is unusually difficult to sympathise with. Our unnamed narrator is a young woman living in New York City in the year 2000. She is described as being tall, conventionally attractive, and financially secure (albeit living off a large inheritance, but there is no mention of that dwindling at all). Clearly she is designed to be a character that the reader would be envious of. Yet, owing to her grief at having lost both of her parents, she believes that her best course of action would be to take a year off. As in, literally hibernate for a year, with the help of progressively stronger sedatives and prescription medications. Contrasted with our narrator is her best (only?) friend Reva, who is bulimic and who does not have the luxury of financial freedom. However, the narrator is not sympathetic to her; indeed, she spends a lot of her time punching down on Reva.

Kafka's unfinished novel about a man accused of an unknown crime is a strange exploration of guilt and shame. It is also a triumph.

2026-09-04T00:00:00Z 2026-09-04T00:00:00Z /reviews/the-trial/ Someone must have been telling tales about Josef K., for one morning, without having done anything wrong, he was arrested. Josef K. is awakened one regular morning, on his 30th birthday, expecting to be served breakfast like any other morning, only to find two men in his bedroom. He is told he is under arrest. So begins The Trial by Franz Kafka. The Trial is an unfinished novel. It was written by Kafka in 1914, shortly following the cancellation of his engagement to his fiancée, Felice Bauer. Like the other unfinished works by Kafka, it was compiled by his longtime friend Max Brod following his death. Kafka kept a diary which gives us lots of insight into his life; from that we know that he started his work on The Trial by writing the first and last chapters first. As for the remaining chapters, some of which are unfinished, we do not actually know with 100% certainty which order Kafka intended these to go in, although the order in the Oxford World Classics edition which I read reproduces the chapters in their generally accepted order. This adds to the dreamlike quality of the novel - although there is a clue in the changing of the seasons (the novel takes place over a year, so passages about the snow or the sun, for example, give us a clue) - the fact that the chapters are largely standalone makes the experience of reading it feel disjointed and off-kilter.

John Langan's cosmic horror asks us how far we would go to see a loved one again, but lost me before I could answer

2026-08-31T00:00:00Z 2026-08-31T00:00:00Z /reviews/the-fisherman/ There are definitely some positives to take from this book. I thought that the first act of the book, which introduces us to our protagonists Abe and Dan, was quite strong. I enjoyed Langan’s prose in this section: Abe has a strong inner voice and you get a good sense of the sort of person he is, and there’s a sense of foreboding that builds as he and Dan make their way down to Dutchman’s Creek.

A dark satire about a luxury tower block whose middle-class residents willingly descend into violence, tribalism, and chaos.

2026-08-25T00:00:00Z 2026-08-25T00:00:00Z /reviews/high-rise/ Later, as he sat on the balcony eating the dog, Dr. Robert Laing reflected on the unusual events that had taken place within this apartment building during the previous three months. So begins J.G. Ballard’s 1975 novel High-Rise. The premise of High-Rise can be summed up as: in a forty-storey East London tower block, aimed at middle-class professionals, the residents of the block turn to degeneracy in a way that is reminiscent of Lord of the Flies. Degeneracy is definitely the right word: there are beatings, killings, and even suggestions of cannibalism.

Perceptive, funny, and deeply entertaining. A highly impressive debut novel by Ben Lerner

2026-07-17T00:00:00Z 2026-07-17T00:00:00Z /reviews/leaving-the-atocha-station/ As far as debut novels go, I think this may be one of the finest I have read. Not because of an intricate plot (in fact, there is very little plot in this book) but because Lerner makes us think about the uncomfortable gap between who we think we are and who we want other people to think we are. The main character of the novel, Adam Gordon, is an American student studying in Madrid, having been awarded a prestigious fellowship. I felt like I was meant to hate Adam’s character. He is presented as an aloof, entitled liberal arts student on a grand tour of Europe. I have to say that I actually enjoyed reading about his routine, eating “hard bread and chorizo” in a café and then hopping over to the Museo del Prado or El Retiro. As the novel progresses we learn that Adam indeed hates himself, which strangely makes him more likeable to read about. In a way, it feels like Adam is partially redeemed to the audience because he recognises his own self hatred. His honesty with himself doesn’t excuse his behaviour, but it does make him surprisingly sympathetic. However, the closeness that Lerner has to his character (Lerner himself received a Fulbright scholarship and studied in Madrid in 2004) makes Adam’s relentless self analysis feel even more uncomfortable. It feels as if Lerner is turning the microscope on himself as much as he is on his protagonist.

A sprawling novel with more brilliant characters and subplots than I quite knew what to do with.

2026-07-07T00:00:00Z 2026-07-07T00:00:00Z /reviews/david-copperfield/ Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. So reads the first sentence of David Copperfield, the novel that Charles Dickens himself claimed was always his favourite work. I have never, at least by choice anyway, read any Victorian literature. I was drawn to David Copperfield because of the book’s setting: large portions of the book take place in the East Anglian towns of Lowestoft, Great Yarmouth, and Blundeston. Dickens gives us a glimpse of what life was like in Victorian England in these areas. I think it would be impossible for me to review a work of this length and ambition with the care and diligence it deserves. It is a sprawling fictional autobiography which follows David’s life from childhood to adulthood. How will Mr. Copperfield turn out? Will he be able to overcome the pain and heartbreak he goes through in his early years and make his way in the world?

A mysterious and deeply lonely novel that kept me reading, even when it refused to give answers.

2026-06-07T00:00:00Z 2026-06-07T00:00:00Z /reviews/i-who-have-never-known-men/ I Who Have Never Known Men is a bleak, post-apocalyptic novel by Belgian author Jacqueline Harpman, first published in French in 1995 and later translated into English in 2022 by Ros Schwartz, after which it surged in popularity online. It’s a fairly short book at around 200 or so pages, and I tore through it in a few sittings. The premise of the book is that 40 women are being held prisoner in a bunker underground. They are policed by male guards, who forbid the women from talking to them or from getting too close to each other. None of them know why they are being held prisoner, or if they are the only ones being held in captivity.

A subtle and very human novel about outgrowing your younger self without ever fully being able to escape them.

2026-05-21T00:00:00Z 2026-05-21T00:00:00Z /reviews/metroland/ Metroland is the debut novel by Julian Barnes, published in 1980, when Barnes was already in his thirties. It follows our protagonist Christopher Lloyd across three different stages of his life, from cynical teenager to settled suburban father. The first section of the book was easily my favourite. Christopher and his friend Toni are teenagers growing up in suburban London, and both are desperate to reject anything they see as conventional or middle class. They spend half the book acting intellectually and morally superior to everyone around them while also being deeply immature themselves. A lot of their conversations are pretentious, nihilistic, and completely overdramatic in the way that teenagers can be, but Barnes writes them with a lot of affection and humour. I found it genuinely very funny!

Frank Herbert transforms the Dune Saga into something stranger, slower, and more inward looking.

2026-05-15T00:00:00Z 2026-05-15T00:00:00Z /reviews/god-emperor-of-dune/ After battling through Children of Dune, I was uncertain whether I wanted to continue with the series. I found myself frustrated by its length and by the meandering cloak-and-dagger intrigue, which often felt as though it was going nowhere. However, the final section completely changed my perspective. I was unexpectedly engrossed by it, and I had to find out what happened next. Children ends with our protagonist Leto fusing with the sandtrout, the larval form of the sandworm familiar from earlier books. They form a living armour around his body, granting him physical strength and speed, rendering him nearly invulnerable, and allowing him to seize control of Arrakis. Now, 3,500 years later, his transformation has taken its final shape: he has become a grotesque human–sandworm hybrid. I had heard that things become strange in God Emperor of Dune, but I was still unprepared for just how bizarre some of its ideas would be.

A dense and often frustrating continuation of the Dune Saga, elevated by big ideas about legacy, power, and the future of humanity.

2026-04-27T00:00:00Z 2026-04-27T00:00:00Z /reviews/children-of-dune/ Nine years following the events of Dune and Dune Messiah, the desert planet of Arrakis has become green and fertile. Water is no longer scarce, and the Fremen people are changing their ways. Their former leader, Paul Atreides (played by Timothée Chalamet in the film adaptation), is gone. Following in his footsteps are his two children, Leto II and Ghanima. he ecological transformation of their planet is destroying the giant sandworms that live there, and therefore the source of spice, the mind-altering drug their economy is based on. They must find a way to save their people from economic ruin and assume the throne on Dune. But there are others who are conspiring to take control of Arrakis.

The inventor of the World Wide Web gives an account of his early years, the development of his breakthrough invention, and his vision for what the future of the Web should look like.

2026-03-26T00:00:00Z 2026-03-26T00:00:00Z /reviews/this-is-for-everyone/ In This is for Everyone, Sir Tim Berners-Lee traces the origins of the web from his early fascination with electronics while growing up in a household of computer scientists, to his time at CERN, where he encountered the problem of siloed information across departments and machines. It is here that the book is at its strongest, clearly articulating his central insight, which is that the links between pieces of information are more powerful than the information itself.

Lindsey Hilsum covers the career of a war correspondent who plunges herself from one crisis to another and gives us an insight into the toll it takes on her.

2026-03-22T00:00:00Z 2026-03-22T00:00:00Z /reviews/in-extremis-the-life-of-war-correspondent-marie-colvin/ In September 1999, Marie Colvin and two other reporters were the only ones to stay in East Timor. The territory was under siege from Indonesian militia, who were invading it following the end of Portuguese rule in 1975. They were the only ones willing to stay and cover the humanitarian crisis that was strangling the civilians. It was reported that up to a third of the entire population had been killed by soldiers or died from disease or from famine.

A sharp, character-driven novel about a family attempting to correct the wounds of their upbringing, only to discover how stubborn those patterns really are.

2026-03-03T15:14:53Z 2026-03-03T15:14:53Z /reviews/the-corrections/ What struck me most about The Corrections is how each member of the dysfunctional, middle class Lambert family believes they are the only reasonable one. Alfred, the patriarch, is suffering from Parkinson’s disease. His wife, Enid, who is struggling to look after the ailing Alfred, wants to get the whole family back together to the fictional Midwestern hometown of St. Jude for “one last Christmas”. As we learn more about the troubled lives of each of the family members, we learn why this is such a tall order. This is certainly a character driven novel, and Franzen produces a very detailed character study of Alfred, Enid and their 3 adult children, Gary, Chip and Denise. We learn about the many ways in which the dysfunctions of the parents cause their children to rebel and attempt to “correct” the perceived shortcomings in their parents’ relationships: Gary, the eldest son, is a high earner, is married with 3 children and makes his home in a big house in an affluent neighbourhood of Philadelphia, but wrestles with the lack of control he feels over Enid, his wife Charlotte, and his 3 children and siblings. Chip, disgraced after a workplace scandal, attempts to rebuild himself as a writer, but can never seem to focus on his manuscript. And the youngest daughter, Denise, gets in a string of several dysfunctional relationships of her own, choosing to bury herself in her career as a cook to cope with it all.

Almost 30 years on, Nick Hornby's personal and deeply self-aware account on the highs and lows of supporting a football team remains fresh and engaging.

2026-02-18T20:02:05Z 2026-02-18T20:02:05Z /reviews/fever-pitch/ Why do people obsess over sport – and do they ever grow out of it? At the tender age of 11, Nick Hornby found himself stuck between his arguing parents who would soon get divorced. Looking to bond with his father, he joins him to watch an Arsenal game in 1969. What he didn’t know then was that this single game would mark the beginning of a lifelong devotion to the club.

A review of Cory Doctorow’s argument that the internet didn’t decay by accident -- it was designed that way.

2026-02-10T00:00:00Z 2026-02-10T00:00:00Z /reviews/enshittification-why-everything-suddenly-got-worse-and-what-to-do-about-it/ Many people have a vague sense that online platforms feel worse than they used to, but struggle to explain why. Facebook is a familiar example: once a place to see updates from friends and family, it has become dominated by ads, promoted content, and algorithmic noise. In Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It, Cory Doctorow argues that this decline follows a predictable pattern — one driven not by cultural decay, but by economic and legal incentives that reward platforms for degrading their services over time.