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I've given this book a rare four stars as it's up there with the best books I've ever read. I picked up a lovely but unassuming 1951 edition from The Reprint Society for 30p at a book sale because I'd heard of the book, never seen the film, knew Clark Gable said "Quite frankly my dear, I don't give a damn", and thought I'd give it a go out of curiosity. I'm so glad I did.

What little I knew about GWTW portrayed it as a love story, not something I would usually read, so I was surprised to find that it is far more accurately described as a family saga set against the backdrop of war. The American Civil War is central to the story, partly for how it drives events, but also as a destructive global event that shows up Scarlett for the self-centred superficial diva she is. It's far from a history book about the war but there is lots of information to be had and it put flesh on the bare bones of my knowledge (I'm British and have never studied the American Civil War). I was looking up maps of the United States, looking up definitions of unfamiliar terms, and finding many pennies dropping into place about how the US developed over the next 80 years. I found that element of the book absolutely fascinating.

Margaret Mitchell has created an exceptionally convincing character in Scarlett O'Hara, whom you love to hate but have to admire, a wee bit grudgingly, as the book goes on. She's the girl you hated at school, the pain in the arse in the office, the competitive mum in the playground and every other woman who has ever had you grinding your teeth. However you see very clearly that she was bred to be that way (although efforts to instill some genuine manners and kindness fell on hard ground because Scarlett is a hard person) because being on top socially meant bagging the best husband and securing your future. In Scarlett's case the war intervened, and as society and the economy around Atlanta unravelled you see Scarlett having to draw on her hardness and selfishness to survive, quite literally. She has to throw off the social expectations of both her peers and the slaves at Tara in order to raise it up again from the dregs left to her after the Yankees swept through. Everything was literally gone with the wind.

Slavery is another pillar of the story. Attitudes towards it were central to the war and weren't straightforward within the southern states or within the black communities, before or after emancipation. Many of the difficulties during Reconstruction centred around Republican manipulation of freed slaves in order to gain votes. The moral dilemma is clear, but it's shocking to hear characters you otherwise consider 'good' using terms for black people that make us wince today and considering themselves benign slave owners.

I can't recommend this book highly enough. It falls short of five starts only because I feel about three quarters of the way through the book Scarlett's scandalising of society by working and swanking about with the incomers to Atlanta and then using Rhett's money to climb to the top of the harps on the same point for rather too long. The book is already 800 pages long and the point had long been made. Maybe Margaret Mitchell wanted us to feel the tedium that others felt about Scarlett's showing off and inability to know when enough was enough. Read the book.

I'm surprised to see this book rated so highly. I've read several Robert Harris books and have loved them, so expected Conclave to be excellent, but I was quite disappointed.

As usual Harris conjurs up a cast of thousands, but I can forgive him that as in many situations they add tremendous colour or are historically necessary (eg in An Offer and a Spy, the story of the Dreyfus affair). I usually tune out the unnecessary characters no problem, but in this book I found myself trying to keep track of the different cardinals with similar names but differing idealogies and it kept intruding.

The worst aspect for me of this book was the growing uncertainty that anything was really going to happen. There's infighting, a scandal and a bit of politics all the way through and I really began to wonder if that was it, and for me it wasn't enough to maintain my interest. When things began to hot up with Benitez I picked up the clues about his real identity so in the end it was an anticlimax.

Perhaps I'm missing the point of this book and in fact it's not to do with plot, suspense or sending up the church. Perhaps it's really about Lomeli, the very likeable protagonist who has to make difficult decisions and who continually examines his own conscience. He was an effective character, straight out of the Robert Harris school of excellent characterisation, and the saving grace of this book for me.

If you're interested in the process of electing a pope this is a worthy read, if repetitive (but I get the point of that, both literally and as a metaphor), but if you're new to Robert Harris read Pompeii first. It's Harris at his tremendous best.

I have to preface this review by saying I am a slave to Lennox and not the most objective of reviewers, but this is with good reason.

There are so many elements of every Lennox book to enjoy: the outsider's view of Glasgow, the humour, the descriptions of a city I love so well, the period detail, the supporting cast and more. This goes for every Lennox book and Dead Men and Broken Hearts doesn't disappoint.

I really love the rehabilitation of Twinkletoes McBride in particular in this book. The self-improving man mountain isn't unique to Craig Russell's books but little details such as the pride Twinkle takes in his car and on being on the phone just tickle me, as well as the acknowledgement that in his harder core days he knew all about being on the run and came to Lennox's help after he escaped custody and hid in the barge. I felt every step of Lennox's exhausting and painful journey back to the barge in the smog.

This book contains one of the most incredible pen portraits I've ever read. At the beginning of Ch 3 Lennox describes a case which involved tailing a sales clerk accused of theft. His account of following her and what she spent the money on was extraordinarily moving and pathetic and restrained, and incredibly effective.

This book keeps you guessing. Unfortunately because of the way I came across the books I'd already read vol 5 so knew about Fiona, but apart from that the twists and turns in the plot of this story having you changing your mind every five minutes about who the bad guys really are. I like the fact that sometimes you can't apply that label and it depends on your perspective. Russell is always good at bringing in suspense as Lennox sails far too close to the wind, goes places he shouldn't and gets into seemingly inescapable situations, but he always comes out alive, if not intact.

If you want wit, excellently drawn characters, a city that's a central character and an effective whodunnit, pick yourself up a Lennox.

This was always going to be tricky. TKAM is a rite of passage as a young reader (my daughter read it aged 13 and was captivated from beginning to end). It captures the magic of childhood and leaves you feeling enriched (horrible word but it's the right one). I picked up GSAW knowing it couldn't be the same, but I wasn't sure how it would be different.

Scout is the protagonist. Essentially the story is of her inability to come to terms with the explicit tension that's grown in the South between the NAACP and the white community and how betrayed she feels by Atticus, who raised her to be so straight and colour blind but yet is reluctant to see the South run by "backward" "negroes" - both words used in the book. What Scout learns is that Atticus' lightning rod, his watchman, is his equal treatment of the local black people in terms of manners and fairness in law, rather than necessarily believing that blacks and whites are completely equal in ability and level of civilization.

This book therefore is harsher than TKAM, but Scout, or Jean Louise as she's referred to, is recognisable and although this book was written before TKAM you can see the progression from its events to GSAW. Hand on heart I didn't enjoy it as much but I think it would have been impossible because it followed such a flawless book. I found it a bit rambly and waffly, but that's a particular pet hate of mine (espcially just having read The Little Parish Bookshop which was a waffly nightmare). It was lovely to meet Calpurnia and Atticus again and see that Scout was still the same person underneath. Some parts were very enjoyable, but I found Dr Finch really maddening. I could have done with less existential agony, but that's what this book is. I could see overlaps with The Help - Aunt Alexandra's 'Coffee' is brilliantly, awfully toe-curling.

In the end, sad to say, I was quite relieved to finish it, but I'm glad I read it.

Perhaps I'm not intellectual enough for Hemingway, or perhaps I'm too focussed on a decent plot and believable characters, but this did absolutely nothing for me and every one of its 256 pages was a trudge. I resorted to entirely skipping the conversations between Lt Henry and Catherine as it was mind-numbingly boring. How on earth was this adapted for the TV with such cardboard dialogue?

The other characters blended into one (perhaps that was the intention) with the exception of Rinaldi and a stab at making something of the priest. I gained little insight into WWI and learnt nothing new about its effects on people, but then I come from a generation that has now had 100 years to learn about the war and so comes at this book from a wholly different position from its original audience.

I had so wanted to enjoy my first Hemingway, but sadly I enjoyed neither the writing, the characters nor the plot, such as it was. Perhaps one day I'll read another Hemingway but for now, the best I can say in this book's defence is that at least it was short.