The Hopkins Manuscript by R.C. Sherriff is a 1939 dystopian science fiction novel. Scientists discover that the moon is going to collide with Earth. We watch events unfold via the memoirs of one Edgar Hopkins, former school teacher, now retired to a West Country village, pursuing interests in poultry breeding and amateur astronomy.

This is not a story that makes sense on a realistic level. The process of the Moon crashing into Earth, and its aftermath, is plainly ridiculous. But then a lot of old science fiction is ridiculous, as is a lot of new science fiction, if not now then in a few years time. Not much science fiction will remain scientifically accurate, even if it was somewhere close in the first place. This is fitting really, when truths in science always tend to be replacing earlier truths.

So is that a problem? Is it a problem that Shakespeare in As You Like It refers to the world as almost six thousand years old, because that was the prevailing wisdom in his day?

Maybe there is something else about a story that lasts better than the facts of it. For example, we could look at The Hopkins Manuscript as allegory. I wouldn’t be the first to suggest that the Moon disaster might be intended to symbolise World War One, followed by reconstruction, followed by people engaging in absurd nationalism, causing a slide towards another war. Of course you could question the value of complicating the issue by getting all enigmatic and symbolic. Why not just write about World War One? Well, maybe you could answer that in terms of putting a manuscript into a different font to help check for mistakes and typos. The change helps you look with new eyes, and possibly see errors more easily

So there may be some historical allegory going on. Personally I prefer to see the story’s factually absurd events as standing in for the more realistic experience of witnessing a falling apart of what we assume is stable and permanent. We all have our own universes where reliable moons sit in steady skies. It’s impossible to think of the Moon falling. And yet it does. I think we all know that feeling, or we will know it at some point.

So, The Hopkins Manuscript is ridiculous. And yet maybe there is something to be said for ridiculous – when life is like that sometimes.

On the orders of his aunt Agatha, Bertie Wooster is obliged to visit a country house busy with romantic confusion amongst multiple couples. He endeavours to sort things out, whilst saving himself from marriage to a woman he doesn’t love.

Amongst all the chaos, Jeeves tries to comfort Bertie by quoting Marcus Aurelius:

“Does aught befall you? It is good. It is part of the destiny of the Universe ordained for you from the beginning. All that befalls you is part of the great web.”

Bertie is not best pleased to be told this, The idea of a great web is meant to be comforting, but for most of the book the opposite is true. There is a sense of hopeless entanglement. The mess of circumstance has a web-like feel of one problem leading to another in a disastrous chain reaction. It is not until late on, once Jeeves has done some of his arranging, that the web changes its nature, to become something where solution leads to solution in a virtuous circle.

So is the web of fate a spiders web where we are trapped, or a knitted hammock where we can find peace and repose? Well, take your pick. The Mating Season explores both interpretations. I don’t think you will be too surprised, if you know anything at all about Wodehouse, to hear that the final outcome suggests the optimistic view. Nevertheless, we have to go through the tangles of pessimism to get there. And while the tangles are comedic, they do nevertheless explore the light and shade inherent in the idea of fate. Not bad for frothy comedy.

Learning to Swim is a 1999 novel by Claire Chambers. I was surprised to learn that it won the Parker Romantic Novel of the Year Award. It didn’t really come over as a romance to me, more a very good coming of age story.

Young Abigail Onions lives a conventional life in suburban South London, doing quite well at school, practising her cello, having a few problems making friends. She meets Frances, and is introduced to her bohemian family. Frances’ brother Rad is a presence in the background, then the foreground. They all go through school together, enjoying some happy times, enduring a number of disasters, water often common to both. Just as school years come to an end, events split the group, before a reunion between Abigail and Rad about a decade later.

Despite the title of the book, Abigail never learns to swim. But without giving anything away, she does eventually learn that if you fall in the water, it’s best not to struggle and thrash about. Drifting and floating will make it easier for someone to come to your aid.

In general terms this water survival philosophy is expressed as:

“Over the years I’d discovered that the key to contentment is low expectations.”

Learning not to struggle will help Abigail survive, and ironically might also allow her to achieve her most heartfelt desires. Low expectations aren’t the same as not trying. Grown up music teacher Abigail tells a reluctant cello student that a musician is the product not of great breakthroughs, but of hours of mundane practice over many years. The thing is to practice everyday, like doing the housework. Do that for long enough and you’ll be a musician.

I took the same approach to writing this review. Just write another one. Don’t try too hard. Float through it.

This book is a great read, funny, moving, and in its own self-effacing way, wise.