Once again the ‘One is never better served than by oneself’ axiom is proving entirely false as far as my experience is concerned. One is much better served by others, or at the very least much better helped - not meaning to sound royal. Thanks to Twitter this time round. I set out about six months ago to exclusively read literature written by Algerian writers (I use the term literature loosely). I wanted to see if there was a distinctive feature or thread in ‘Algerian novels’, a particular Algerian experience encrypted in the numerous works of those born and raised on that land. Or is literature in essence ‘universal’, drawn from a common source of knowledge and experience - you know the one high up there, limitless, mighty, impalpable and damn repetitive - similar in expression and theme for every place and every people. It turns out that this exclusive-reading is proving rather painful - I don’t recommend it - and I have taken a break several times to clear my h...