Bedside Books

I have been ploughing my way through a rather unpleasant and very long forensic thriller recently that is a bedside book, but I gave myself a few days off that to read one of the others - Red Shift by Alan Garner. I bought this ages ago at the odd Birsay Books, our visit to which was documented here . Then I read the first few pages, wasn't gripped and left it to one side while I read other stuff. And somehow never got back to it, until now. 

When it first came out I remember a review which said it was 'difficult to read because of the disjointed conversations which didn't clarify who was speaking' and occasionally when the conversations went on for pages I understood what they meant. It also said the book was Romeo and Juliet through time and space, and I can sort of see why the reviewer said that without necessarily agreeing whole heartedly. It's the sort of reductive comment I tend to deplore; I remember an English lecturer once describing Gaskell's North and South to me as Pride and Prejudice in Victorian costume which missed so much of the point that I couldn't; be bothered to discuss it. 

Red  Shift was weird, but it was also wonderful, and honestly I don't think you can appreciate it on a first reading so I shall reread it another time now that I have some understanding of the structure and themes behind it. For what we would  now class as a YA book, it was a challenging read, technically and emotionally, but worth it.