Jonathan Coe

Book Review: The Proof Of My Innocence by Jonathan Coe

Posted on by Libby Price

“A BLISTERINGLY FUNNY POLITICAL CRITIQUE WRAPPED UP IN A MURDER MYSTERY, FROM ONE OF BRITAIN’S MOST BELOVED NOVELISTS – AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER NOW
Post-university life doesn’t suit Phyl. Time passes slowly living back home with her parents, working a zero-hour contract serving Japanese food to holidaymakers at Heathrow’s Terminal 5. As for her budding plans of becoming a writer, those are going nowhere.
That is, until family friend Chris comes to stay. He’s been on the path to uncover a sinister think-tank, founded at Cambridge University in the 1980s, that’s been scheming to push the British government in a more extreme direction. One that’s finally poised to put their plans into action.
But speaking truth to power can be dangerous – and power will stop at nothing to stay on top.
As Britain finds itself under the leadership of a new Prime Minister whose tenure will only last for seven weeks, Chris pursues his story to a conference being held deep in the Cotswolds, where events take a sinister turn and a murder enquiry is soon in progress. But will the solution to the mystery lie in contemporary politics, or in a literary enigma that is almost forty years old?
Darting between decades and genres, THE PROOF OF MY INNOCENCE is a wickedly funny and razor-sharp new novel from one of Britain’s most beloved novelists, showing how the key to understanding the present can often be found in the murkiest corners of the past.“

I thoroughly enjoyed Jonathan Coe’s previous book, Bournville, and so was delighted to be offered an advance review copy for his new book.

The book starts with Phyl at home after university, a very similar age to my oldest child, and so easy to identify with. Her parents’ friend Chris and his daughter Rashida come to visit the family. The book is then set over the time period of Liz Truss’s prime ministership (so yes, quite a concise timeline) and ends up being a book within a book within a book. It’s all a bit of a head f*ck – but in a good way – and the ending makes you question everything you’ve previously read, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Each book element is a different genre – from cosy crime, to dark academia, with some autofiction thrown in for good measure. This is all clever – as Jonathan Coe’s books always are! It also enables there to be flashbacks to the 1980s when a lot of the main characters first met.

Another similarity with Coe’s previous books is that the locations are close to where I live! Who knew Fish Hill outside Broadway would be such a feature (I spent my 50th birthday with friends in a hotel a short walk from that particular stretch of road).

There is an eclectic mix of characters – and you do have to concentrate not to get confused (although that might just be me?!) The commentary on the current state of UK far right politics is also ‘interesting’.

Overall the book is very good at drawing you in and you wanting to find out more – and I absolutely adored the way the murder ended up being solved (no spoilers here).

A big thank you to the publisher and Net Galley for my advance review copy in exchange for an honest review. The book is out in November 2024 and available for pre order now.

Book Review: Bournville by Jonathan Coe

Posted on by Libby Price

When I read the blurb for this new Jonathan Coe book – I was very excited to request a copy from NetGalley. Here it is – to see if it entices you too:

“In Bournville, a placid suburb of Birmingham, sits a famous chocolate factory. For eleven-year-old Mary and her family in 1945, it’s the centre of the world. The reason their streets smell faintly of chocolate, the place where most of their friends and neighbours have worked for decades. Mary will go on to live through the Coronation and the World Cup final, royal weddings and royal funerals, Brexit and Covid-19. She’ll have children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Parts of the chocolate factory will be transformed into a theme park, as modern life and the city crowd in on their peaceful enclave.
As we travel through seventy-five years of social change, from James Bond to Princess Diana, and from wartime nostalgia to the World Wide Web, one pressing question starts to emerge: will these changing times bring Mary’s family – and their country – closer together, or leave them more adrift and divided than ever before?
Bournville is a rich and poignant new novel from the bestselling, Costa award-winning author of Middle England. It is the story of a woman, of a nation’s love affair with chocolate, of Britain itself.”

I have lived within a few miles of Bournville all of my life and equally my parents and grandparents have also lived nearby – so it felt very ‘close to home’ literally as well as figuratively. The generations of the family in this story are about 1/2 a generation out from mine – but still incredibly relevant.

The book starts in Vienna in March 2020 – just as the world is about to go mad as Covid 19 hits. It then goes back in time to VE day in 1945 as Mary Lamb is a small child celebrating the end of the war with her family.

The book then uses huge events that are happening as key chapters in the book – it reminded me a bit of a historic blog post I did about remembering where you were when specific key events in the world happened. Also, the fact that lots of these events involve the Royal Family made it even more poignant given the fact that the Queen recently died.

This is a swooping family drama – and I’ve read some reviews complaining that nothing really happens – but it is the story of a family life – and thankfully my own family life doesn’t involve many murders or mysteries either!

For me the local backdrop was lovely – not only was Bournville unsurprisingly a key geographical location – I got even more excited as characters moved initially to the Lickey Hills – and then Barnt Green, which is the next village to us! Just like in the book – when we first moved to the village we found that lots of people worked at either The Austin (subsequently The Rover) or Cadburys – both of which loom large during the book.

I have to say that I had realised that Cadbury’s chocolate didn’t taste the same overseas – but I wasn’t fully up to speed with the politics of chocolate – particularly across Europe – so was educated on that by the book.

The book circles back to during the pandemic – and it is incredibly moving (even more so when I realised that some of it was based upon real life experiences of the author and his family during the covid 19 situation).

The book has some ‘Easter Eggs’ in it from the authors other novels – and a couple of names were familiar – but it’s a long time since I watched ‘The Rotters Club’ on TV back in 2005.

Now I probably would have bought this book for lots of my relatives – especially my Great Aunt who lives in Bournville – however there is quite an explicit sex scene, and it just feels really out of sorts with the rest of the book – and I’d be uncomfortable knowing she was reading it!

Overall, as a proud Brummie – and South Brummie at that – I really enjoyed the book and all of the local history entwined with British history of the last 75 years. It also makes you realise that what we’ve all been through with the pandemic will soon be history taught to kids in schools.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my ARC.