Life A User's Manual - post VI

A better day on the Life A User’s Manual front but still not as much consumed, as I would have liked. The best thing to do is to pick out a couple of stories although there is again a slight advance in the Bartlebooth story that seems to link in with most of the other main characters.

Bullet points between pages 266 – 338

* There are some moments which would be perfect as a way of showing someone not reading this book what it was like and the collection of things that have been found on the stairs shows the exhaustive imagination that is being deployed here

* As usual there are some stories that stand out with the painter Hutting using a colour palette based on price as one story that sticks in the mind along with the German scientist who tried to recapture the spirit of the experiments he made during the war another

* But it is with a sense of reassurance as you get back to the more solid platforms of some of the stable characters of Madame Moureau and Bartlebooth and you hear about her disagreements over the development of her kitchen and start to learn more about his problems with jigsaws

* Setting himself the task of completing a jigsaw every two weeks starts to become harder not just because of age and boredom but because Winckler the maker of the puzzles views each of the 750 piece puzzles as connected to one large puzzle

* He makes the challenge for Bartlebooth difficult because he sets booby traps that are not sprung until several puzzles have gone by and puts shapes and inconsistencies into the shapes of the pieces that remind the rich Englishman who is really in control

More tomorrow…