Fiction Reviews Archives - Page 92 of 120

Her Father’s Daughter by Marie Sizun (transl. Adriana Hunter): A sharply poignant gem

5 August 2016 / 18 Comments

Although I’ve read several books published by Peirene – including the dazzling poetic White Hunger, set in a savagely cold Finnish winter – this is the first I’ve reviewed. For readers who haven’t yet come across them, Peirene publish novellas in translation, dubbed by the Times Literary Supplement ‘Two-hour books to be devoured in a […]

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Books Read (But Not Reviewed) in July 2016

1 August 2016 / 12 Comments

Emma Jane Unsworth’s Hungry the Stars and Everything‘s been knocking around my shelves for some time. I’ve heard good things about Animals but I’m afraid the Katie Fforde endorsement on Hungry’s jacket was somewhat off-putting, suggesting it might be a tad fluffy. Well, it’s not. Helen Burns is a restaurant critic with a talent for

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Everything I Don’t Remember by Jonas Hassen Khemiri (transl. Rachel Willson-Broyles): A story in many voices

29 July 2016 / 8 Comments

What attracted me to Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s prize-winning novel was its structure. It’s the story of a young man who dies one April afternoon in Stockholm, his car wrecked in a crash which some speculate may have been suicide, others are sure was an accident. Khemiri tells Samuel’s story through a series of interviews with

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Muse by Jonathan Galassi: Adventures in the publishing world

27 July 2016 / 14 Comments

I’d been looking forward to Jonathan Galassi’s novel, smacking my lips over the idea of a treat not to mention an escape from the ‘hell in a hand cart’ news we seemed to be drowning in. It’s all about the book world and what could be more comforting than that? Paul Dukach, the misfit in

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Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett: The ties that bind stretched too far

20 July 2016 / Leave a Comment

Much lauded by the likes of Peter Carey and Colum McCann, Adam Haslett’s Imagine Me Gone is a nuanced portrait of a family trying to cope with the emotional depredations caused by not one but two of its members grappling with mental illness. It follows the family from its beginnings when Margaret and John meet

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The Girls by Emma Cline: Time for girls to become women

20 July 2016 / 6 Comments

The Girls is another one of those novels about which there’s been a good deal of brouhaha – lots of Twitter love and advance anticipation for months – but like The Nest and The Essex Serpent, similarly lauded to the skies, it succeeds in living up to all that hype. I’m going to have to

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My 2016 Man Booker wish list

19 July 2016 / 31 Comments

It’s that time of year again. I had thought I might ignore the whole kit and caboodle this time around but I was prodded into action by an analysis of trends in Man Booker winners subtitled ‘Male and Middle-aged in Third Person’. On that basis mine is a list of no-hopers, or close to it,

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The Tidal Zone by Sarah Moss: Living in uncertain times

15 July 2016 / 10 Comments

I’m something of a Sarah Moss fan having thoroughly enjoyed the closely linked Bodies of Light and Signs for Lost Children, set in the nineteenth century, and Names for the Sea, her account of her year spent in Iceland. Her writing draws you in: it’s imaginative, witty and she knows how to spin a good

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Conrad and Eleanor by Jane Rogers: Absence makes the heart grow fonder

13 July 2016 / 6 Comments

This is the second novel I’ve read in a year in which traditional gender roles are reversed within a marriage – Andrew Miller’s The Crossing saw Tim decide to stay at home and look after their child while Maud continues her work in clinical research – and I’ve since read a third, Sarah Moss’ superb

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The Crime Writer by Jill Dawson: Literary fan fiction at its best

8 July 2016 / 25 Comments

Better start this with a confession: I’ve never read a Patricia Highsmith novel. I’ve often thought about it, been urged by fans to do so, but I’ve never got around to it. Jill Dawson, on the other hand, has long been addicted to Highsmith’s fiction as she tells us in her acknowledgements. Obviously, my reading

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Sweetbitter by Stephanie Danler: Dangerous liasons in the kitchen

6 July 2016 / 11 Comments

Sweetbitter is one of those books that turned out to be very much better than I expected. Its blurb reminded me a little of Merrit Tierce’s viscerally intense, short, sharp Love Me Back with its restaurant backdrop, the location changed from Texas to New York. I knew I’d probably read it but Tierce’s book had

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