I read Iron Curtain by #VesnaGoldsworthy. A page-turner set in the 1980s. A young privileged 'red princess' from a poor unnamed central European country elopes to London in the name of love. The sense of displacement has echoes of the Patricia Engel book I read just before this. There's also enjoyable farce here even if the clichés about the UK are laid on a little thick at times. #bookToot#bookstodon#keefsreads
Just finished Reward System by #JemCalder. Short stories about young adults navigating their lives in the smartphone era. Not much happens. But the writing is plenty good enough to maintain interest. #BookToot#bookstodon#keefsreads
Read #Bournville by #JonathanCoe. Redeemed a bit by a strong finish, when the writing and subject matter clearly gets personal, but a really disappointing clunky book. Too reliant on lazy nostalgia; I expected spangles and Choppers to appear at one stage. Some odd writing. Rather than develop characters naturally he just bungs in their internal monologue on one occasion. #bookstodon#BookToot#keefsreads
Just read Animal Life by Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir. Musings on life, death and light seen through the eyes of two generations of Icelandic midwives. Not much happens. But that's ok. What did I take from it? A reminder that human life is odd in some respects. Babies of other animals develop far quicker...and the earth will outlive us all. #bookToot#bookstodon#keefsreads
Just finished Lucy by the Sea by #ElizabethStrout, the last of the #LucyBarton series. Set, and I guess written, in lockdown. Not convinced either is conducive to good art. Didn't enjoy as much as the first installment. My main thoughts were that it is striking that Lucy, despite her success as a writer, has little agency over her own life and where it goes. And perhaps that shows us the effects of earlier poverty and poor parenting are hard to shake off. #bookToot#bookstodon#keefsreads
Took a while to get going, but very much enjoyed Shrines of Gaiety by #KateAtkinson. A tale of gangland crime set in London just after WW1. A reminder of how cheap life (particularly female life) was back then. Although the main reason to recommend it, is because you will really want to know what happens to the characters she creates. #bookstodon#BookToot#keefsreads
Read The Exhibitionist by #CharlotteMendelson. The central figure is an appalling man child who everyone else spends their entire time trying to appease. If you've had a narcissist in your life, this may not be the book for you. I guess women deliberately downplaying their success not to upset men is a theme many will recognise. Did I enjoy it? On balance. But the dickishness of this man is relentless. #Bookstodon#BookToot#keefsreads
I've had terrible readers block. Red Team Blues by Cory Doctorow was the cure. It races along and made me think about how money has been reduced to 0s and 1s and how insecure that is. It didn't improve my opinion of the crypto bros either. It's not perfect; I had a "really?" moment as it came together. But it did the job. #bookstodon#BookToot#keefsreads
Still struggling to focus on reading. But enjoyed #HarlemShuffle by #ColsonWhitehead. Not sure what it all means but an entertaining insight into the blurred space between straight and criminal life in Harlem in the 1960s. #bookstodon#bookToot#KeefsReads
Just read Ghost Country by Chris Petit. Enjoyable in parts. But throws too much in. The Troubles, Brexit, Covid. A spy-thriller mush that is 200 pages too long. Always a tell when clunky devices are used to explain plot points. #bookstodon#BookToot#keefsreads
Finally finished The Nutmeg's Curse by Amitav Ghosh. Learnt a lot of things that probably should have been obvious to me. Mainly about how colonialism uses destruction of the environment as a weapon. The displaced lived alongside nature, the occupiers saw it as a resource to be exploited. They still do of course. The richer ones have their eyes on other planets... #Bookstodon#BookToot#keefsreads
The Unfolding by #AMHomes. As Obama wins the 2008 election, Republican grandees start to plot... the ups and downs of the family life of the main character run in parallel. It's satire mostly, rather than a deep insight into what these people believe in although their methods feature. They're a lot like you and me. Except they're richer and want to overthrow the government. #bookstodon#KeefsReads
Just read The Country of Others by #LeilaSlimani. Possibly for the second time. May be going mad. Anyway a young French woman falls in love in 1944 and makes a new life in Morocco. The turmoil in that relationship reflects the upheaval under French rule. I was struck by the symmetry between the dreadful way Amine, the husband treats his wife and family, and the way the colonial power treats Morocco. #bookstodon#BookToot#KeefsReads
The second book in the series, Watch us Dance, covers the family's path from poverty to affluence. Morocco is navigating its way through the early years of independence. It's a much more convincing book than the previous one. You want to know what happens to these characters amid the turbulent growing pains of the country. #LeilaSlimani#bookstodon#BookToot#KeefsReads
Old God's Time by Sebastian Barry. Cruelty and grief can drive you mad and love is not always enough. As a result the distinction between actual events and those described by the (unreliable) narrator becomes blurred. #bookstodon#KeefsReads
A Spell of Good Things by Ayòbámi Adébáyò. Two interweaving stories set in Nigeria. It's extremely well done. I guess it's the 'mundane' violence that was most, er, striking. One poor person and one rich person, both of whom have limited control of their lives for different reasons. #KeefsReads#bookstodon
Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead sees our 'hero' now middle-aged and outwardly a pillar of the New York black community in the early 1970s. Although he likes (quite) a bit of crime. Some great turns of phrase and imagery here. #bookstodon#KeefsReads
Be Mine. The last of Richard Ford's five Frank Bascombe novels. Frank's a bit of a boomer dick isn't he? You can't warm to him much despite life throwing plenty of crap his way. I guess age has brought a bit more self-reflection. The glimpses into American life are as ever the best things about these books for me. I'm going to have to look up the game #cornhole now. #bookstodon#KeefsReads@bookstodon
The best of the The Best American Short Stories from 2022 were the ones where you wanted to know more. Gina Ochsner's rather bleak Soon the Light vividly brings to life a tough rural existence. Mbiu Dash by Okwiri Odour gives glimpses into the precarious life of a young poor Nigerian woman. Inevitably some stories reflect on Covid. Those did not convince as much. #bookstodon#KeefsReads @bookstodon
Given I enjoyed Okwiri Oduor's short story in that collection so much I read her novel Things They Lost. A story of dysfunctional families and love between two girls (Mbiu Dash from the short story is one of them.) Set in a strange shifting world inhabited by wraiths. Feels like visiting a strange dream. #keefsreads#bookstodon@bookstodon
#Warhol after Warhol by Richard Dorment. The story of the charlatans and grifters who ended up deciding what is and is not a Warhol. But given the artist's rather hands-off approach to his work perhaps it is fitting it ended up like this. A real page-turner. Can't remember the last time I read a book in a day. #bookstodon#KeefsReads@bookstodon
Having enjoyed Swan Song by Kelleigh Greenberg-Jephcott a while ago, couldn't resist Capote's Women by Laurence Leamer (h/t @Hey_Beth who's been immersed in the Capote world recently).
Privilege and entitlement means it's hard to empathise with the swans; but they landed then married detached sometimes cruel men. I thought about Larkin's words on parenting a few times.
If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery: a very readable collection of connected short stories through about 30 years. Particularly taken with 'Splashdown' which gently draws you in and...well. A story of an American family with Jamaican roots mainly told through the youngest son. Life often just happens rather than is lived. Humans mess up of course. #bookstodon@bookstodon#KeefsReads
Baumgartner by Paul Auster, a short book about love and loss. It's very good on both. There's a feeling of melancholy hanging over it that feels like an authentic by-product of growing old. A stock take I guess. But it doesn't really go anywhere. Perhaps it doesn't need to. #KeefsReads#bookstodon@bookstodon
I read The Nix by Nathan Hill. And after a few pages I realised I'd already read it and forgotten about it. Doh! But perhaps the moment to pick it up was well timed. It centres on student protests in Chicago in 1968. It feels like we've learnt precisely nothing along the way. If you like John Irving's work you'll get along with this. #keefsreads@bookstodon