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    • Reading around the world

Not what we expected? #amreading

29/11/2017

6 Comments

 
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I’m sure, like me, there are times when you’ve come to the end of a book thinking, Well, that wasn’t what I expected! Both my published novels evoked that response in a lot of readers. With my debut novel, Sugar and Snails, it was a predominantly positive kind of unexpected, as my narrator, Diana, is harbouring no ordinary secret. Yet my second novel, Underneath, seems to have divided readers into those who were delighted, and those who were disappointed, it isn’t a typical thriller, earning me my first one star review and a reminder that one can’t please everyone.


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Angels of Nigeria? Welcome to Lagos by Chibundu Onuzo

26/11/2017

4 Comments

 
Chike Ameobi has dedicated his life to the army but when, after twelve months protecting the oil barons’ interests in the Delta, his commanding officer orders the burning of an entire village, he walks out. With him is his only friend, and loyal follower, the uneducated and low-ranking Yemi. As they flee, they enlist a young rebel militant, Fineboy, to guide them to the road, while teenager Isoken, recently saved from rape by her tight jeans, comes under their protection. Boarding the bus to Lagos, Chike is seated beside Oma, the runaway wife of an abusive husband.

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Women taking stock: Mirror, Shoulder, Signal & Making Space

23/11/2017

8 Comments

 
The common theme in these two recently published novels is a woman experiencing an existential crisis, taking stock of where she’s got to in life by ordering the elements that make up her external world. Sonja, the older of the two, does this through taking driving lessons, and it’s no coincidence that she struggles to take control. Miriam, past adolescence although not yet fully fledged adult, tries to achieve something similar by jettisoning her surplus possessions, and through those of a compulsive hoarder she’s employed to help. Needless to say, neither woman’s path to a more comfortable accommodation with herself is straightforward. Curious? Read on!

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Why #Metoo conversations are everybody’s business #amreading

20/11/2017

4 Comments

 
My real-world promotion of World Toilet Day yesterday was somewhat eclipsed by a surprise conversation about #MeToo. Surprise because, having personally experienced only “mild” forms of unwanted sexual attention, I hadn’t jumped on this particular bandwagon, the conversation left me feeling I should have. After all, one doesn’t have to have experienced direct gender discrimination to be a feminist. One shouldn’t have to have experienced the trauma of rape to oppose the culture of misogyny that so often enables it.

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The importance of fictional pee and poo #WorldToiletDay

17/11/2017

4 Comments

 
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There wasn’t much traffic at a book fair I attended recently, but at least it gave me the opportunity to chat with other writers on nearby stalls. The discussion drifted to writing sex, but they thought I was joking when I moved the conversation to writing toilets. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you’ll know that safe and hygienic toilets are no laughing matter (and now those other writers know too) and the foundation of women’s emancipation and girls’ education worldwide. So I’m proud to have marked World Toilet Day on this blog every year since I started in 2013. There’s more to discover about this year’s theme Where does our poo go? if you follow the link. As I did last year, for 19th November 2017, I’m celebrating the novels I’ve read in the last twelve months that acknowledge our dependence on toilets.


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Two mythical murderous families

14/11/2017

2 Comments

 
The Greek myths bubble with revenge and betrayal, while the bloodthirsty tyrants of history are themselves made into to myths. Let me present two novels which reinterpret these legendary stories for the modern era, emphasising the human motivations behind the murder and mayhem. Both novels focus on famous families: in the first, the violence turns inwards in an orgy of self-destruction; in the second, the family will do almost anything to ensure their own survival. In both, the gods of the time are co-opted to sanction sacrifice and murder, while the women use their limited power as best they can.

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Two mysteries against a backdrop of rampage and riot

11/11/2017

12 Comments

 
These two novels are worlds apart in terms of style and genre, but both involve mysterious deaths set against real-life moments of rampage and riot in England during recent hot summers. In the first, a lone gunman on the rampage in 2010 Cumbria is integral to the story. In the second, the 2011 London riots provide the perfect backdrop for a domestic noir thriller.

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Five Fictional Depressed Mothers

8/11/2017

6 Comments

 
As illustrated in my posts, The Child in the Clothes of the Criminal and The mother and sisters in Underneath, the character of Steve, the narrator of my second novel, has been shaped by his experiences as a child with a depressed mother. This post highlights how the issue is addressed in my own and in other novels I’ve recently reviewed.

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Two translated novels with a supernatural element, and a hairy flash

5/11/2017

10 Comments

 
Allow me to introduce you to two translated novels with a supernatural element, albeit less central to the story in the second. Both also give a nod to mental health issues linked to criminality: via one of the off-stage characters in Norma; a neurological disorder thought to be Korsakoff syndrome for the unfortunate narrator of Black Moses. Plus a return to Carrot Ranch Flash Fiction Challenge. For another novel with a supernatural element, see my review of A Jigsaw of Fire and Stars.

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Two novels about writers and the real-life characters who get beneath their skin

2/11/2017

2 Comments

 
Although I’ve never been sure about novels about writers, I was keen to read these two: the first about an unpublished novelist ghostwriting a memoir and the second about a poet anticipating a different kind of creativity with her first child. Both these fictional writers are brought into close contact with an unexpected other – for the first, the character whose memoir he is writing; the second, another poet who used to live in the town to which she’s recently moved – with life-changing consequences. Both novels explore the nature of the self and the permeability of the boundary with the other (and, incidentally, feature graphic scenes of childbirth). For another novel about a writer, see my review of My Name Is Lucy Barton.
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    Annecdotal is where real life brushes up against the fictional.  
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    Annecdotist is the blogging persona of Anne Goodwin: 
    reader, writer,

    slug-slayer, tramper of moors, 
    recovering psychologist, 
    struggling soprano, 
    author of two novels.

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    My second novel published May 2017.
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