Book 53: "The X-Files: Ground Zero" by Kevin J. Anderson

The story begins with a scientist leading the development of a new kind of atomic bomb being found dead after an atomic explosion in an office where they only ever ran computer simulations of explosions.

Exciting but extremely far-fetched!

Book 54: "The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break" by Steven Sherrill

Reprieve. Into the Minotaur's life there occasionally comes a reprieve from the inevitable loneliness, relentless and exhausting, that is endured by those who live forever. These moments of reprieve are dangerous times, though. When looking out at eternity, it's easy to lose sight of the past, to repeat the same mistakes. If not careful the Minotaur can be seduced by a turn of luck - can be blinded, so to speak. In these sweet and rare moods, he's prone to acting hastily.

M is the Minotaur who lived in the labyrinth of Knossos all those years ago, who came to an arrangement with Theseus and slipped out of the back exit leaving the Greek hero to claim that he had killed him.

Five thousand years later he is a chef in a grill restaurant in North Carolina, having realised a long time ago that cookery skills will always be needed and don't change too much over the centuries. In this version of our world people are aware that the old immortals are still hanging around, so although they may be shocked to see a man with a bull's head, no-one rings the newspapers and M isn't likely to end up in a freak show.

Unfortunately for M, his bull's head makes him top-heavy and he is always ripping things accidentally with his horns. Speech is also hard for him, so he doesn't like talking and finds it difficult to connect with his neighbours and his colleagues at the restaurant.

Book 55: "Sir Phoebus' Ma" by Zoe Teale

Sometimes we walked too close together, sometimes too obviously far apart. We walked in circles - then took a train, straight through the suburbs, out, away from Tokyo, away from the wires that crossed the skies and kept the people netted to the streets.

Anna is a young British woman who spends a year working as an English teacher in a Japanese school. Her supervisor, Moriya sensei, monopolises her time, preventing her from making other friends and making her feel very uncomfortable.

The book's rather odd title comes from a quotation from Stevie Smith about writing stories about real people, rather than making a joke of the peculiarities of foreigners.

Book 56: "Losing Nelson" by Barry Unsworth

Think of that quarter-deck. At the forward end, looking across the waist to the forecastle, there was only an open rail. That is where your Horatio stood. Think of him there, dressed impeccably, full uniform, cocked hat, silk stockings, buckled shoes, Immaculate. Unoccupied, fully aware of his danger, carnage all around him. Like a rock, Charles, like a rock. That is the way, that is the way forward, Horatio is your lifeline, stay with him, he will get you out and about. Join the Nelson Club, there must be one - in London there is a club for everything under the sun. I'll get my secretary to find the address.

As a child Charles Cleasby became interested in Lord Nelson, encouraged by having a schoolteacher who was a Nelson buff, but his interest faded during his teens. When he had a nervous breakdown at university and refused to leave his room at all, his psychiatrist suggested that he take up his hobby again, as a way of rekindling his interest in life, but unfortunately his hobby developed into an all-consuming interest, and Charles started to see himself as Nelson's other half.

He never went back to university or got a job, and at the age of fifty he is a virtual recluse living in the house he inherited from his father, and his only social life is attending the twice weekly meetings of the Nelson Club in Bloomsbury. He keeps a large collection of Nelson memorabilia in his basement, where he also re-enacts all of Nelson's battles on their anniversaries, even if that means getting up before dawn to start the battle on schedule, moving his model ships across the glass table in the basement at the exact time they did so in the real battle.

When he employs a secretary to come in twice a week to help him with the biography of Nelson that he is writing, he is perturbed by her wilfulness in seeing Nelson as a vain man, interested in money and honours, who cares nothing for the lives of his men, rather than as the patriotic hero revered by Charles as a bright angel. What makes things worse is that he has just reached a very difficult point of the book, when he has to decide how to approach the events in Naples in June 1799 which may not show Nelson in a good light at all. I seem to remember reading something else in which the exact meaning of the word embark is vital.

Deciding what to read next

After three books about lonely people in a row (books S, T & U for the A to Z Challenge), I decided that my next read should be something rather more upbeat than a man's wife and mistress trying to come to terms with each other after his death, so I put "Instances of the Number 3" by Salley Vickers aside and went to the library to look at the V shelf after work today. As I've reached the stage where I am bored with the A to Z Challenge and want to get it finished as quickly as possible, I pulled out the two thinnest books and had a look at them.

The first was a book of Indian short stories (good) about alienation and exile (bad - more loneliness) so it went back straight back on the shelf. The second was a humorous murder mystery set at an academic conference on Edgar Allan Poe, and although the protagonist was described as a loner, that is not necessarily the same as being lonely, so I decided to risk bringing "Borges and the Eternal Orang-Utans" by Luis Fernando Verissimo home with me.