Alex Hyde’s Exhibition follows photographer Rabble Stone who rents a room in an artist’s Brixton home, immersing herself in a world of gallery openings and seedy glamour. As she becomes obsessed with the artist, not least her intimate self-portraits, capturing them in her own work, Rabble seems in danger of losing herself and her grip on reality. ‘Travelling from London to Algiers, to Berlin and New York, Exhibition is a story of love, ego and destruction, and the dark relationship between authenticity and celebrity, artist and muse’ according to the blurb which sounds right up my street.
Opening in Berlin just as Hitler’s rise has begun, art historian Rebecca Birrell’s Venus Vanishing, follows Hannah Sherman, determined to become an artist rather than marry into a life of domestic drudgery. Using her sewing skills to pay her rent, Hannah establishes a life for herself: mornings sketching at the museum; an hour in Saul’s bed; nights visiting Berlin’s clubs leading to an affair with Charlotte, a brilliant dancer. As she falls under her patron’s spell, she’s asked to practice an uncomfortable deception and discovers her work is being used in ways she would never have countenanced. Full of evocative descriptions, Birrell’s debut is a gorgeous, immersive novel which wears its meticulous research lightly. Review shortly…
Andrew Cunning’s debut, Clara and Christina, instantly appealed with its premise of a friendship which grows between a young academic and the author whose first novel entranced her when she was a first-year undergraduate. Christina is in her seventies, a reclusive who has, surprisingly, agreed to be interviewed for Clara’s monograph. They meet over several months at a coffee shop on Sunday mornings. Conversation flows well, Christina’s discursive replies to Clara’s questions rarely answer them, leading instead to wide and far-ranging debate. I loved this quiet literary treat of a novel which came out of Cunning’s own work on Marilynne Robinson who allowed him a rare interview. Review to come…
In Amit Chaudhuri’s Château Rouge, a writer is invited to Paris but finds that where he’s living doesn’t match the ideas he had of this much fabled city. As time passes, he realises that there are ways to see it other than through a romantic lens. Chaudhuri’s brief novel ‘takes its time, exploring tangents, diversions, side-streets, creeping into new spaces and remote angles, to open up fresh ground and appraise the city, the experience of travel, otherness – and the novel itself – anew’ according to the blurb. I’m not sure about that but having visited Paris recently I suspect I’ll read it.
Set over five months, Lucia Odoom’s Cosmos is an epistolary novella in which the eponymous Ghanian refugee living in Copenhagen writes to those he left behind about his new life. Sleeping in the city’s parks, Cosmos is a bottle collector who falls in love with Elizabeth, and she with him, changing his view of home and its significance for him. ‘Cosmos questions what it means to belong to a person, as much as to a place – it is a deeply moving story of diaspora and the invisible lives we pass every day, lives reduced to something temporary, precarious, abstract, painting a confronting and rich portrait of both love and loss in the margins’ says the blog making me want to read it.
That’s it for July’s first batch of new fiction. As ever, a click on a title will take you to a more detailed synopsis for any that take you fancy. Part two soon…
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I’ve made a note of several of these to seek out. I especially like the sound of Chloe Ashby, Family and Friends (will check out Wet Paint too, I’d not heard of this author before) and Clara and Christina. Thanks for the inspiration.
My pleasure! I loved Clara and Christina. I hope you enjoy them if you get to them.
I’ve got an eARC of Venus, Vanishing. My other July-release options are Ever Land, by Amy Abdelnoor; The Night Stairs, by Erin Kelly (of whom I’d like to read more); and Cool Machine, the third in Colson Whitehead’s Harlem series, the first two of which I absolutely relished. Lots of good stuff!
It’s a much better month than I was expecting. I hope you enjoy Venus Vanishing as much as I did, and thanks for the recommendations. Happy reading!
Normally I’m not one for the summer book market, but every one of these sounds tempting!
Delighted to hear that!
I’ve heard good things about Cunning’s novel and I am sold on Exhibition! (no surprise there)
The Cunning is brilliant, and I would have been amazed if you’d not been sold on Exhibition! I have it to read on NetGalley so will be reviewing it nearer the pub date.
Several of these look appetising, especially Venus Vanishing. Which I have forthwith reserved at the library. Together with others which my library serice is proposing to get – though sadly not the Chloé Ashby. Just as well for the TBR, especially as Sweden Looms now!
Venus Vanishing is a treat. I wonder why your excellent library is passing on the Ashby. When are you off to Sweden?
Next Monday. Trains from Harrogate to Cologne on Day One, to Malmö via Copenghagen and the Øresund Bridge (can’t wait for that!) then our first Big Stop in Göteborg for several days. and that takes us through our first week. Just contemplating our packing ….
That sounds a wonderful trip. I was in spitting distance of the bridge in February on the Copenhagen side. By coincidence, I’ll be on my way to Yorkshire next Monday!
Cunning’s book appeals from this batch. I am heading to Paris Thursday for a short visit. Reading Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London, and enjoying it. Have The Paris Wife to bring on the trip.
I think you’ll enjoy that, Lucy. Have a lovely time in Paris! You sound well set up for holiday reading.
Glad to hear you rate Venus Vanishing, as Picador pre-approved me for an e-copy.
Hope you enjoy it, Rebecca. I think they’re keen to push that one and justifiably so.