Snake in the grass #1. Fern Tree. February 2012. The Tartar Steppe by Dino Buzzati tells the story of a young officer and his life spent guarding an old, increasingly neglected border fortress on a dull frontier. It's a slow book. Very little happens: our protagonist misses his chances to escape the drudgery of this post, and slowly drifts into the monotony of barracks life. His career, and (more importantly) his life slides by quickly. Then, almost suddenly, he is old and ready to die. This is a tricky book to categorise. Slow moving almost to the point of catatonic, it's about the need to seize chances when they emerge. The risks of being locked into dull routine and letting life slip away are more than displayed here. Not for the faint hearted! Second up is The Death of Napoleon by Simon Leys. The conceit of this short, but complex novel is that prior to his purported death in exile, Napoleon Bonaparte manages to switch identities with a noncommissioned officer by those p...