Stasiland by Anna Funder won the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction in 2004 (now known as the Baillie Gifford Prize) and chronicles the lives of several people who lived in the German Democratic Republic, also known as East Germany, during the Cold War. Funder, an Australian journalist, was working in television in the mid-1990s when she put an ad in a newspaper seeking stories from those who experienced life under the Stasi regime. They include Miriam who was caught trying to cross the Berlin Wall as a teenager, Julia whose Italian boyfriend raised suspicion among Stasi officers, and Frau Paul whose baby son was taken to a west Berlin hospital on the night the Wall was constructed leaving her stuck on the other side after refusing to inform for the Stasi. Funder also spoke to former Stasi officers, some of whom remained sympathetic to the regime. The number of Stasi officers and informants – estimated to be as high as 1 in 6.5 of the population – is staggering and their methods of surveillance, control and manipulation even more so. Given Funder collected these stories not long after the Wall fell, ‘Stasiland’ is an important collection of eyewitness accounts told by those who had recently lived through such a turbulent time. Continue reading
Tag Archives: Literary Fiction
Books I Read in July 2023
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The Booker Prize 2023 Longlist
The Booker Prize longlist was announced on Tuesday. The 13 titles are:
A Spell of Good Things by Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀
Old God’s Time by Sebastian Barry
Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein
If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery
How to Build a Boat by Elaine Feeney
This Other Eden by Paul Harding
Pearl by Siân Hughes
All the Little Bird-Hearts by Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow
Prophet Song by Paul Lynch
In Ascension by Martin MacInnes
Western Lane by Chetna Maroo
The Bee Sting by Paul Murray
The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng
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The Booker Prize 2023: Predictions, Possibilities and Preferences
In my Booker Prize blog post last year, I noted that my longlist predictions lists in 2020 and 2021 included the eventual winners in those years: Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart and The Promise by Damon Galgut. I posed the question of whether I could make it three years in a row. The answer was a resounding no, but I think it’s fair to say that last year’s winner The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka didn’t feature in too many other predictions lists either, so I guess that was a small consolation.
As ever, my annual list of predictions consists of what I think could be some strong possibilities alongside my own personal preferences, based on a few novels I have read and others I have heard about. Novels published in the UK between 1 October 2022 and 30 September 2023 will be eligible. It’s impossible to know for sure which novels have been submitted for consideration, although the latest efforts by previous winners are usually considered automatically. Continue reading
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Books I Read in May 2023
Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld is one of my most anticipated books of 2023. Sally is a comedy writer for the late-night sketch show The Night Owls – a fictionalised version of Saturday Night Live – where she meets Noah Brewster, a pop star since the early 2000s who is appearing as a guest host. Expecting to work with a vapid and self-absorbed celebrity, Sally is pleasantly surprised when they hit it off while writing sketches. Her awkward lack of self-confidence prevents romantic developments, until they reconnect through email correspondence during the COVID-19 pandemic. The atmosphere of the male-dominated writers’ room is convincingly depicted and Sally is a refreshingly well-written female lead character who isn’t defined by her feelings about having children. Sittenfeld uses some of the traditional tropes of the romantic comedy genre, particularly around conflict, while quietly reversing others. Rather than being in competition with a rival, the only real obstacle is Sally’s low self-esteem. This is easily one of the most enjoyable books I have read this year. Continue reading
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Books I Read in March 2023
Lessons by Ian McEwan spans the life of Roland Baines, born shortly after the Second World War. Taking in several major world crises from the Cuban Missile Crisis to the Chernobyl disaster to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as intimate domestic events, ‘Lessons’ is a sprawling epic and easily McEwan’s longest novel. Some elements of Roland’s early life are strongly autobiographical, including his childhood spent partly in Libya and his discovery late in life that he has a half-brother, as McEwan did in 2002. However, it is the repercussions from the piano lessons Roland received at boarding school that have the most significant impact on his life. I read but didn’t review McEwan’s previous novel ‘Machines Like Me’ in 2019 which I didn’t think was among his best work, but I would say that ‘Lessons’ is very much a return to form and genuinely engrossing. Many thanks to Vintage Books for sending me a review copy via NetGalley. Continue reading
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The Women’s Prize for Fiction Longlist 2023
The Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist for 2023 was announced yesterday. The 16 titles are:
Glory by NoViolet Bulawayo
Homesick by Jennifer Croft
Fire Rush by Jacqueline Crooks
Children of Paradise by Camilla Grudova
Stone Blind by Natalie Haynes
Trespasses by Louise Kennedy
Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
Cursed Bread by Sophie Mackintosh
The Dog of the North by Elizabeth McKenzie
Black Butterflies by Priscilla Morris
The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell
I’m a Fan by Sheena Patel
Pod by Laline Paull
Wandering Souls by Cecile Pin
The Bandit Queens by Parini Shroff
Memphis by Tara M Stringfellow
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My Most Anticipated Books of 2023
There are lots of new books due in 2023 which I’m looking forward to reading and my list continues to expand by the day. All publication dates where known apply to the United Kingdom only.
There are some promising looking debut novels out in January including Really Good, Actually by Monica Heisey loosely based on the author’s experience of getting divorced in her late 20s and We All Want Impossible Things by Catherine Newman about female friendship. Death of a Bookseller by Alice Slater is one of the most intriguing crime fiction debut titles and will be published in April. Continue reading
My Books of the Year 2022
There were three novels which really stood out for me in 2022. Case Study by Graeme Macrae Burnet was longlisted for the Booker Prize last year and skilfully presents the fictional biography of psychoanalyst Arthur Collins Braithwaite as authentic source material.
Careless by Kirsty Capes is an excellent debut novel which was longlisted for this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction. It is about a 15-year-old girl in care who discovers that she is pregnant and Capes handles the narrative very convincingly.
I’m Sorry You Feel That Way by Rebecca Wait is a memorable novel about the impact of mental health and dysfunctional family dynamics, which sounds depressing but is written with very dry humour.
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The Booker Prize 2022 Longlist
The Booker Prize longlist was announced on Tuesday. The 13 titles are:
Glory by NoViolet Bulawayo
Trust by Hernan Diaz
The Trees by Percival Everett
Booth by Karen Joy Fowler
Treacle Walker by Alan Garner
The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shahan Karunatilaka
Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
Case Study by Graeme Macrae Burnet
The Colony by Audrey Magee
Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies by Maddie Mortimer
Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley
After Sappho by Selby Lynn Schwartz
Oh William! by Elizabeth Strout
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The Booker Prize 2022: Predictions, Possibilities and Preferences
The 2022 Booker Prize longlist will be announced on Tuesday 26th July and I have made my annual list of predictions in terms of what I think could be some strong possibilities alongside my own personal preferences, based on a few novels I have read and others I have heard about. As ever, it’s impossible to know which novels have been submitted for consideration but those published in the UK between 1 October 2021 and 30 September 2022 will be eligible. My longlist predictions lists in 2020 and 2021 included the eventual winners in those years: Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart and The Promise by Damon Galgut. The question is, can I make it three years in a row…?
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The Women’s Prize for Fiction Longlist 2022
The Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist for 2022 was announced on Tuesday. The 16 titles are:
The Bread the Devil Knead by Lisa Allen-Agostini
Salt Lick by Lulu Allison
Careless by Kirsty Capes
Remote Sympathy by Catherine Chidgey
The Paper Palace by Miranda Cowley Heller
Flamingo by Rachel Elliott
The Sentence by Louise Erdrich
Build Your House Around My Body by Violet Kupersmith
Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason
The Exhibitionist by Charlotte Mendelson
The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki
This One Sky Day by Leone Ross
The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead
The Final Revival of Opal & Nev by Dawnie Walton
Creatures of Passage by Morowa Yejidé
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Books I Read in January
Case Study by Graeme Macrae Burnet is set in the 1960s and consists of a fictional biography of Arthur Collins Braithwaite, a radical psychoanalyst with a practice based in north London, interweaved with notebooks written by one of his patients which have been purportedly “discovered” by her cousin and passed on to the author. The patient believes Braithwaite is responsible for the death of her elder sister, Veronica, and poses as Rebecca Smyth in order to find out more about him. As with the Booker Prize-shortlisted His Bloody Project, Burnet displays his impeccable narrative skill in presenting the story as authentic source material. There is plenty of satire in the depiction of Braithwaite’s rivalries with his contemporaries, reminiscent of the spoof biographies in Their Brilliant Careers by Ryan O’Neill, while pertinent questions about the nature of identity and reality are posed in “Rebecca’s” pursuit for answers. ‘Case Study’ is another outstanding novel by one of my must-read authors. Continue reading
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My Most Anticipated Books of 2022
My list of most anticipated books coming soon in 2022 is growing by the day, so here are some of the highlights. All publication dates where known apply to the United Kingdom only.
To Paradise by Hanya Yanagihara is out this month and spans an alternative version of New York in 1893, 1993 and 2093. I’ve heard nothing but positive reviews so far, even from those who didn’t get on with her second novel A Little Life. I expect it will appear on several predictions lists for the Booker Prize later this year, along with Young Mungo by Douglas Stuart which is out in April, after the Scottish author’s debut novel Shuggie Bain won the Prize in 2020. Continue reading
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Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo and Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo was the joint winner of the Booker Prize in 2019 alongside The Testaments by Margaret Atwood which I read earlier this year. It follows the lives of 12 characters, mostly black British women, spanning several decades in four overlapping clusters. In the first part, we are introduced to Amma, a theatre director, her daughter Yazz, and Dominique who is Amma’s former partner in the theatre group. Then there is Carole who works in banking, her mother Bummi and her school friend La Tisha. Shirley is a teacher whose mother Winsome is retired in Barbados and has worked with her colleague Penelope for several years. Finally, Megan/Morgan is a non-binary social media influencer, whose relatives Hattie and Grace were based in the north of England in the early 20th century.
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Summer Reading: Part Two
The Country of Others by Leïla Slimani, translated from the French by Sam Taylor, is the first book in a planned trilogy of historical fiction. In a very different setting and genre from Slimani’s breakout thriller Lullaby, ‘The Country of Others’ opens just after the Second World War when a Frenchwoman from Alsace, Mathilde, falls in love with Amine, a Moroccan soldier fighting for the French and moves to Morocco with him in 1946 when they get married. Mathilde raises their daughter, Aïcha, and son, Selim while Amine works on the farm, but she becomes increasingly disillusioned with her choices. Inspired by the life of Slimani’s grandmother, who also left Alsace after marrying a Moroccan soldier, ‘The Country of Others’ is a very personal project for Slimani. It suffers slightly from a lack of narrative drive, often reading as a series of vignettes, but perhaps a bigger picture will emerge as the trilogy progresses. I look forward to reading the next instalment which will be set in the 1960s. Continue reading
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Summer Reading: Part One
I have read a lot of great books over the summer and I now have a massive backlog of reviews to catch up on. Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller tells the story of 51-year-old twins, Jeanie and Julius, who still live with their mother in rural isolation, until her sudden death forces them to confront some harsh realities of life in the modern world and the truth behind some dark family secrets. It’s quite a meandering novel, often melancholic in tone, but I really enjoyed Fuller’s richly descriptive prose which captures the oppressive atmosphere of the twins’ daily lives. ‘Unsettled Ground’ was shortlisted for this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction, and while it wasn’t too surprising that the judges crowned ‘Piranesi’ by Susanna Clarke as the winner last week, I think ‘Unsettled Ground’ would have been a worthy winner too, and I will definitely seek out Fuller’s other novels. Continue reading
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The Booker Prize 2021 Longlist
The Booker Prize longlist was announced on Tuesday. The 13 titles are:
A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam
Second Place by Rachel Cusk
The Promise by Damon Galgut
The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris
Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
An Island by Karen Jennings
A Town Called Solace by Mary Lawson
No One is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood
The Fortune Men by Nadifa Mohamed
Bewilderment by Richard Powers
China Room by Sunjeev Sahota
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead
Light Perpetual by Francis Spufford
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The Booker Prize 2021: Predictions, Possibilities and Preferences
It’s that time of year again – the 2021 Booker Prize longlist will be announced on Tuesday 27th July and I have made a list of predictions in terms of what I think could be some strong possibilities alongside my own personal preferences, based on a few eligible books I have read in recent months, as well as several that I haven’t. As ever, it’s impossible to know which novels have been submitted for consideration. Last year, for the first time since I started writing these posts, my longlist predictions list included the eventual winner Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart, so my first prediction is that it is highly unlikely I will repeat this trick for a second year in a row….
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Three Books in Translation
After a long period of neglect, I have been reading more books in translation recently, including some recently published titles. There’s No Such Thing as an Easy Job by Kikuko Tsumura has been translated from the Japanese by Polly Barton and sees an unnamed woman in her mid-30s walk into an employment agency looking for a job that has the following traits: it is close to her home, requires no reading or writing and preferably very little thinking. The book follows her attempts at five different roles: surveillance, recording voice ads for buses, writing fun facts to be printed on cracker wrappers, putting up posters and park maintenance. Tsumura wrote her debut novel after her own experience of job burnout and it captures a sense of listlessness in a way that will have you counting down the days until you are entitled to claim your own pension. With deadpan humour and a bit of magical realism, it ends up being a bit of an aimless novel overall, yet also quite thought-provoking about the meaning of job satisfaction, particularly in the context of workplace culture in Japan which is known for extreme presenteeism.
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Three Bluemoose Books
Bluemoose Books is one of my favourite indie publishers and I have been reading some more of its titles over the past few weeks. Should We Fall Behind by Sharon Duggal has recently been featured on the BBC’s books programme Between The Covers and has deservedly won plaudits for its sensitive and non-judgemental portrayal of the most marginalised groups in society. Duggal’s second novel tells the story of Jimmy Noone who is homeless in an unnamed city and has been searching for his friend, Betwa, who grew up in the local area. He is seen as a threat by Ebele, a single mother who lives with her six-year-old daughter Tuli, while her landlord and employer, Nikos, who owns a furniture shop nearby thinks he is a nuisance. Jimmy does, however, generate more compassion from their neighbour, Rayya, who is a carer for her terminally-ill husband Satish. The way in which the characters’ backgrounds are slowly revealed is very effective, emphasising that ordinary people have extraordinary stories to tell, that actions are not all that they appear to be and how people can end up on completely different paths and become invisible to the rest of society. This is a perceptive and poignant novel and I look forward to reading more of Duggal’s work. Continue reading
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