You heard it here first

 
    It's always gratifying to find that one's opinion of a book is shared by others, and though I know this is a business where the subjective/objective scale is a shifting one and we can't talk in absolute terms, I'm still pleased when my views are echoed by other people, whether they are fellow readers commenting here and elsewhere or reviewers writing in the press. (I hasten to say that that's not because I have some inflated idea of my appraising skills, but because seeing that I'm not "wrong"or alone does bolster the confidence!).
    Anyway, two reviews giving five stars apiece to books I've read and raved about appear in the paper this morning. "Enormously impressive" and "extraordinarily fine" said I about Philippe Claudel's Brodeck's Report (my post on it is here), while this review hails it as "a modern masterpiece".
"Marvellous and memorable" was my summing up just yesterday of Tim Gautreaux's The Missing, which the newspaper ( I can't find a link for you) calls "impressively thrilling, and pleasingly complete".
    If I were to operate a rating system here I'd be giving both books the highest marks, too; though very different in subject-matter, feel and pace, they are wonderful examples of fine fiction.