There’s some books that you pour over, that you don’t want to finish because you never want to leave the characters, this is one of them. I loved carrThere’s some books that you pour over, that you don’t want to finish because you never want to leave the characters, this is one of them. I loved carrying Rach, Kel and Shaz around with me, I missed them during work hours and loved getting back to them on train journeys, early mornings and late night reading sessions.
Rach, Shaz and Kel are from Doncaster, bezzies since childhood and Donny lasses through and through. They share everything, from blagging their way into nightclubs to trips to the Family Planning clinic when their periods are late (or they’re pretending for attention). Following them through the schoolyards, clubs, cornfields and chippies of Donny, their friendship seems indestructible. But as they grow up and away from one another, a long-festering secret threatens to rip the trio apart.
This is a book about the things we tell our friends and the things we can’t, about gossip as currency and the power silence can have over us. It’s a book that exposes the raw reality of girlhood, the ugly, painful and the beautiful. Reading it opened up old wounds and pulled old memories out from under their rocks. These girls are so vivid, so real; they’re unique, and universal.
Told in the Donny dialect, the girl’s voices jump off the page. The sense of place, and time - mostly spent in the early 2000s - is visceral. The perspective jumps from from third to second to first plural person, which takes a bit of getting used to, but works to make you feel part of their trio, and how they see themselves as individuals and a group, how their conversations jump over and weave into eachother’s.
There’s plenty of trauma in these pages - SA, drugs, alcoholism, eating disorders and absent parents - but it’s balanced with humour and nostalgia that leaves a bittersweet feeling when finishing it.
For fans of Trainspotting, Shuggie Bain and Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels. ...more
A fresh new voice and a nostalgic, funny, unsettling story of a lost girl, a mysterious presence in the woods and a dysfunctional family at a birthdayA fresh new voice and a nostalgic, funny, unsettling story of a lost girl, a mysterious presence in the woods and a dysfunctional family at a birthday party on a languishing summer’s afternoon.
Told from the perspective of one of the troupe of young cousins who make up the main cast, this story plays with the idea of memory, where events of our childhood take on an uncanny, slippery quality: did the woods really swallow up your cousin in a hole, or did it just feel like that? The story resists easy interpretation: What is real? What is imagined? Does it even matter? And why the eggs?
I loved how it showed the propensity for both cruelty and loyalty of in a group of young kids. It felt like a Grimm’s Fairy Tale version of stories from my childhood, Peter Pan, the Famous Five. What’s even better is that within this unsettling tone, there are moments of genuine humour, an impish tone that cuts through the horror.
It won’t be for everyone, the pace meanders and the answers are left just out of reach, but those who love atmosphere and a strong narrative voice should definitely pick this up. ...more
Via religion, comets, World Wars, nuclear weapons and the Cold War, overpopulation, AI, 9/11, covid, AIDS, pandemics and climate change, Lynskey invesVia religion, comets, World Wars, nuclear weapons and the Cold War, overpopulation, AI, 9/11, covid, AIDS, pandemics and climate change, Lynskey investigates the historical, political, scientific and cultural reasons for our obsession with the end of the world.
Told with humour and clearly an incredible amount of research, Lynskey provides a sweeping investigation into our desire to play out the very worst that could happen in all our various mediums and all their possible formats, as safe spaces to explore our anxieties.
Having been obsessed with dystopia since watching 1998’s Deep Impact as a (probably too young) girl, I thought maybe there was something a bit wrong with my brain. But reading this, Lynskey has persuaded me that’s it’s entirely normal, and likely inevitable, that the worriers of the world will always need to read and consume stories about its ending; both the nihilistic and hopeful human stories that accompany it. ...more
A thoughtful, infuriating and inherently political speculative novel that deals with the seductive danger of technology and the slippery nature of thoA thoughtful, infuriating and inherently political speculative novel that deals with the seductive danger of technology and the slippery nature of those that wield its powers.
Sara is returning home from a conference abroad when agents from the Risk Assessment Administration pull her aside at the airport. As a Moroccan American, Sara is well versed in being the victim of profiling at an airport, but as the interview goes on, she realises this time, things are even further out of her control.
Using data from her dreams, the algorithm has determined that she is at imminent risk of harming her husband. Retained for 21-days in a ‘facility� for this pre-crime, she discovers that the ever changing rules mean that it will take more than good behaviour to see her family again.
Slipping between her dream life and the nightmarish reality Sara faces at the facility, this novel is fraught with all too real fear of beguiling technology giants, and how they can be used to ostracise, manipulate and victimise their users. Interspersed with report sheets, transcripts, and terms-of-service lingo from the prison guards, there is a realistic, poignant lyricism that exposes the cruel bureaucracy in which Sara is trapped.
There are also clear parallels being drawn to the US government ICE detainment centres, where immigrants are held in often privately owned facilities, who are given no rights nor reasons, or timelines for their release.
This deeply personal and political book will boil the blood, but also hint at hope for change through collective action. ...more
A quintessentially pastoral British dystopia. The opening reads as an ode to the green, green grass of home, and the novel soon shows us how inextricaA quintessentially pastoral British dystopia. The opening reads as an ode to the green, green grass of home, and the novel soon shows us how inextricably linked our society and future is with the nature we depend on. The Death of Grass shows us teetering on the edge of disaster, and how quickly our base instincts rise to the surface when our resources and legal systems fall away.
Littered with beautiful landscapes and fluffy clouds, Christopher draws stark contrast with the characters violent, brutal actions. And those actions are not only in the name of survival; the urges for murder, lust and power also rear their heads when certain people know there’s no one to judge them.
A deadpan, subversive story of creativity, sexuality and individuality. Refreshingly honest and provocative, this is an unforgettable story of a womanA deadpan, subversive story of creativity, sexuality and individuality. Refreshingly honest and provocative, this is an unforgettable story of a woman with myotubular myopathy writing out her fantasies, whose partakes in a life threatening dare/ blackmail with a carer/enemy.
I’ve probably spent more time thinking about it than I did reading it; about the balances of power, her hatred of print novels due to their inherent ableism and having now written one, about pointing out the voyeurism of able eyes on the disabled body, while asking readers to see her body as a sexual thing, about that ending....
It’s a book of dichotomies all existing together, a messy, muddy, unflinching picture, refreshingly told. ...more
I loved the synaesthesia of her descriptions, and the ferocity of her imagery, her writing is undeniably propulsive. But I felt it was perhaps too 3.5
I loved the synaesthesia of her descriptions, and the ferocity of her imagery, her writing is undeniably propulsive. But I felt it was perhaps too derivative of IWHNKM and Handmaids Tale, without ever fully realising her world or her characters. I don’t mind books that leave themselves open to interpretation, in fact I prefer them, but this suggested maybe more plot holes than intentional omissions.
Also TW: sexual assault, and animals being killed, which is not what I needed to read currently, but that’s a personal perspective ...more
Mind bending Grotesque Greedy Kafka-esque Furious Disgusting Hilarious Satirical Genius
This is definitely NOT for everyone, but for those that it’s for, roMind bending Grotesque Greedy Kafka-esque Furious Disgusting Hilarious Satirical Genius
This is definitely NOT for everyone, but for those that it’s for, roll on up for the greatest show on earth’s future. ...more
This book is excellent. Witty, intelligent, and so relatable. Weaving in personal, intimate memoir and well researched, wide reaching examinations of This book is excellent. Witty, intelligent, and so relatable. Weaving in personal, intimate memoir and well researched, wide reaching examinations of love under capitalism, motherhood under patriarchy, marriage, politics, religion, self love and addiction through a millennial, trans woman’s lens. It had me nodding like a nodding dog and saying mmmm on many occasions.
Using cultural touch-points, historical events, literary and feminist theory, and myth to evaluate her own issues with modern day versions of love, Faye writes accessibly, flowing seamlessly from one idea to another without ever losing the reader in her argument.
Particular highlights were her in depth analysis of Lana del ray’s 2012 album, Amy Winehouse’s public shaming, Sex and the City’s groundbreaking idea that female friendship is where women often find their real ‘soulmates�, and her writing ‘fuck you� in the margins of Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunuch.
Love is a political thing, and capitalism has made love a commodity. And Faye is both entangled within the nets of these social structures, whilst also being othered by them. But I didn’t take from this book that she does not believe in love in all its forms, just that we should interrogate what it is before we put it on a pedestal, or jump in head first. In the post-script she writes:
“Love is a risky business and it hurts. I want to bear witness to that, and still try anyway[…]Sometimes the truth is that the agony has very little at all to tell me except the certainty that I have a body that still feels and a heart that still beats, and so still a future beyond.� ...more
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