Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children has been gathering admirers ever since it was published in 1981, with its demonstration of its own assertion that "to understand just one life, you have to swallow the world".

One of the latest to fall under its spell is NickVirk , who pointed to the quote in his review as embodying: "[A] philosophy [that] encapsulates the complexity of human life … Rushdie, like his protagonist Saleem, has swallowed the world whole and thus he is able to give the readers of Midnight's Children a breathtaking experience in this novel of magical realism."

NickVirk found the allegory powerful and the prose hypnotic, concluding:

Each page, full of mesmerising metaphors, is evocative, feeding the soul with its thoughts on life, death and everything in between … Midnight's Children has firmly cemented its place on the top shelf of my bookshelf – a humble honour reserved for those novels which have had an irrevocable impact on me.

Meanwhile, RedBirdFlies explores Kate Atkinson's novel Life After Life, which deals with themes of mortality and asks which aspects of our lives we would alter if we had the chance. Its central character, Ursula, repeatedly dies and is reborn. RedBirdFlies writes:

This is not a typical tale of transformation of a protagonist. While we recognise Ursula's character in the many lives she lives, the story shows just how different our lives could become ... It is clear that Kate Atkinson refuses to be bound by genre, labels or form, preferring freedom in her approach, she resists categorisation which makes her an exciting and unpredictable writer

comicrelief agrees that the book has many levels, arguing that "its philosophical message is never pompous, but subtle."

And finally, Dylanwolf offers a brisk perspective on Cees Nooteboom's Lost Paradise – "a slender but haunting novel that swoops from Sao Paulo to Australia to the Alps".

"Complex, intellectual, modernist," it is another novel with a strong metaphorical life. The title, writes Dylanwolf: "is a reversal of Milton, and what is being attempted is perhaps a contemporary meditation on ourselves and our relation to the world, an exploration of the 'riddle of what other people represent'."

And that's all for this week. As ever, if you are interested in posting your very own review, just find the book of your choice and click on the button marked "Post your review". And if we've mentioned your review here, get in touch at claire.armitstead@theguardian.com, and we'll send you something from our cupboard that you might just enjoy.