The Covenant of Water, by Abraham Verghese

 First, an apology/admission: I finished this book a couple of weeks ago, and really should have written about it straight away while it was fresh in my mind. It was so good that I raced through it, and really I should have re-read it before writing about it, but it's over 700 pages long, so that isn't going to happen!

It is set in the southern tip of India, in what was then called Travancore, but is now, I think, Kerala. It begins in 1900, with a 12 year-old girl called Maryamma (but always to be known as Big Ammachi), who is on her way to become the second wife of a much older man, and the mother of his child, Jo-jo. Parambil, where he lives, is a remote, tiny hamlet. You might expect this to end badly, but in fact it doesn't: eventually the unlikely couple fall in love, and Big Ammachi becomes the matriarch of a successful community. 

After a few chapters, there is a sudden switch to the other side of the world - to a boy named Digby, growing up in Glasgow with a mother who is incapable of looking after him. Despite this difficult start, he becomes a surgeon, eventually joining the Indian service. A terrible accident ends his career in the service, and by happenstance, he ends up not far away from Parambil.

It takes a long time, however, before we find out how these two stories intertwine. The novel is meticulously and very cleverly structured, with one thing leading to another seemingly inevitably. Everything, it turns out, is connected: something that happens in one generation is bound to affect the lives of later generations, sometimes for good, sometimes not - there is a lot of terrible tragedy in this novel, though also a lot of tenderness, a lot of love, and quite a bit of humour. It's a family saga - it takes us all the way up to the 1970s, telling us a lot about the history of India in the 20th century along the way. The large cast of characters are beautifully realised: it's like Dickens in that way: no character is too insignificant for the author to be fascinated by him or her, to want to get under his/her skin.

I found it quite rivetting - a marvellous book. One thing - Verghese, who also wrote Cutting For Stone, is a surgeon himself. He describes medical procedures and the pathology of various diseases in considerable - often excruciating - detail: I found myself skipping paragraphs at times. And therein lies another puzzle: how on earth does he find the time to write a book - especially one of this length - alongside maintaining such a demanding career? I have no idea. But I'm glad he does.

Allan Ahlberg

 This week, the great children's writer Allan Ahlberg died. (As with everything, people will have their own opinions as to what's 'great' and what's not, but I really doubt that anyone who's read Alan's books with children would dispute that accolade.)

Some of Allan's books.

You may not be able to see it very well from this small picture, but these books are very well-worn. Pages are creased, some are even torn: one has a couple of pages missing. That's because they have all been read many, many times, first with our children, now with our grandchildren. They are very, very well-loved.

All these were illustrated by Allan's wife, Janet, who died much too soon. (He went on to write more books with other terrific artists, but I don't think they will mind me saying that his partnership with Janet was particularly special.) The illustrations are brilliant: so detailed, with so much to look at and talk about. Peepo, for instance, describes what a baby can see when he looks around him. It is set in wartime - the baby's father is in uniform - and much of what he sees is familiar to someone who can recall a fifties' childhood, but I really don't think that matters: Peepo is for small children, who take in and are fascinated by everything they see - it doesn't matter if what they see is different to their own world, the point is that it's interesting - and that it's about a family, about everyday goings-on. So on one particular spread, these are Alan's words:

He sees a bonfire smoking

    Pigeons in the sky

His mother cleaning windows

    A dog going by.

He sees his sisters searching

    For a jar or tin

To take up to the park

    And catch fishes in.

Janet takes up the pointers in the text and runs with them - but she also adds so much more: an outdoor toilet with a coal-hole next to it, an old-fashioned pram, a skipping rope, a toy tricycle, the mother's pinafore, the baby's toys, a little dog, and much more besides. So much to talk about and discuss, so much to share and enjoy.

Each Peach Pear Plum takes figures from nursery rhymes and fairy tales and spins a tale that includes all of them, ending in a triumphant page turn that reveals all the characters having a joyous picnic together: the Wicked Witch chortles happily, Little Red Riding Hood strokes a sheep, Robin Hood feeds Baby Bunting, and so on. Pure genius. And the words are perfectly balanced, so that each page of text leads you into the picture opposite, and then, with bated breath, onto the next page. (This book is very well-worn.) 

The other books in the picture are for older children. They too are absolute classics. They're just lovely to read aloud. The text is perfectly paced, leading you to pause in just the right places for a reveal or a joke, and again, the pictures don't just illustrate the text, they add to it. I'll leave you with this picture of one of my favourite spreads in this or any other book. Allan, thank you for the stories. The angels are lucky to have you. I can just imagine them sitting around chortling - and asking for just one more before bedtime - please!