Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo

This is the 2019 Booker Prize winner about the inter-connected lives of twelve black women in the UK spanning most of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

I confess I nearly gave up after the first Chapter about Amma a lesbian actor and playwright. I just didn’t find her very sympathetic. I’m really glad I persevered as I became totally engrossed in the rich inter-woven tapestry of the narrative. It was one of those rare books where you experience a sense of loss when you have finished it. There are many really harrowing accounts of the endemic racism experienced by these characters. This is told in a very matter-of-fact way without histrionics which makes it all the more powerful. I found the story of Winsome and her husband Clovis in 1950’s Plymouth particularly affecting. Both they and their children were ostracised, bullied and reviled on a daily basis. At the other end of the spectrum there is a character called Carole who gets to Oxford and inexorably distances herself from her Nigerian roots and assumes the attitudes and behaviour of the educated, moneyed white middle class.

I marvelled at the encyclopaedic mental archive the author draws on. She must have a photographic memory. I have rarely read such an authentically detailed account of the behaviour, attitudes and mores of Britain over the past hundred years or so. It is as much a social history as an absorbing novel. It reminds me a bit of Ian McEwan as a detailed chronicler and dissector of social issues.

However Evaristo is not a blinkered polemicist. She is pretty clear-eyed about the good and bad aspects of black culture and experience. 

Her writing style is idiosyncratic. She eschews the use of capitals to start sentences. Initially I thought this was an affectation but I think it does create a more free-flowing narrative. She sometimes uses a neat structure of 1,2 or 3 words in consecutive lines which adds emphasis e.g

It  

Never

Went

In

Also impressive is her ability to create a vibrancy of language without long, esoteric words. She packs a powerful verbal punch. The book has many memorable lines like…”no gun-wielding, gum-chewing, coke-sniffing, up-the-duff scumbag gangster thugs.”

Some reviewers have praised the book’s humour. It did not strike me as particularly funny although there are bits that elicit a wry smile. I liked the account of the different factions in the London squat – Marxists, hippies, vegetarians, vegans, Rastas. Krishnas, punks, gays, radical feminists, lesbian radical feminists, black radical lesbian feminists, anarchists – each with their usually conflicting demands.

The book is imbued with a deep sense of humanity and wisdom about the human condition. Particularly what it’s like to be a black woman in Britain. Tom Stoppard said it changed his thinking. It did the same for me.

Unlike several recent winners, like The Luminaries this is a very worthy recipient of the Booker prize.

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I came upon this book purely by chance as the Rickmansworth Café Nero (pre Lockdown) has a ton of books that you are able to read over a coffee and croissant. I would read a chapter, hide the book behind some others, then read the next bit a couple of weeks later. In the end, I decided I liked it enough to order it on-line!

The story is written in the Ist person, the person being the eponymous Memory, a young black albino woman from the poor end of town (Harare, I think) in Zimbabwe. She now languishes in the ‘Condemn’ section of the country’s notorious high security Chikurubi prison, able to mix only with her fellow inmates and a squad of corrupt and often squabbling female guards. The prison, like the country, is chaotic and dominated by fear and repression – superstition pervades much of their lives, and her skin condition (as it did when she was a free woman) makes life all the more difficult for her.

She stands convicted of the murder of an older white man, Lloyd, but how did he die, and what was her true role in his death? As the story unravels, we learn about her former life – much of it spent abroad – and of her relationships with those members of the former Rhodesian white elite, still hanging on to what they can of their privileges under the new world order.

The book is by turns sad, intriguing, and surprisingly funny. Gappah presents her characters extremely well, layer upon layer of description – skilfully ‘shown’ by her use of powerful dialogue and attention to the detail of her characters’ behaviour - building over time. The reader gets a vivid picture of what it was like to be a prisoner under such conditions, of the allegiances and alliances necessary to survive, of the need to cling on to one’s own sense of self, of the mundanity of the daily prison grind.

An unusual and sometimes frustrating feature of Gappah’s writing (in this book at least) is her characters’ liberal use of African languages, the meaning of which she leaves unexplained. This of course imbues the tale with authenticity, but it can leave the non-speaker with a feeling of being on the outside. Perhaps this is intentional, a device to emphasise the characters’ isolation by somehow isolating the reader? I don’t know, but it is a deliberate decision made by the author and does have a somewhat unsettling effect. However, it did not really mar my enjoyment and it does invite the reader to infer and imagine to a greater degree than is usual.

I think I’ll give it 4.5/ 10 with the 0.5 being that question-mark over the chunks I could not understand. I will, nevertheless, be ordering her other book, An Elegy for Easterly, on-line. Anticipating the re-opening of Café Nero’s library might be too long a wait.

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Most people will know little of the life of actor and political activist Michael Cashman but his autobiography is a fascinating insight into how someone from an East End working class background rose to such fame and indeed notoriety.

Exposed to sexual abuse and grooming from an early age he managed to escape his troubled childhood and teenage years when drama classes at school revealed a hidden talent.

The book follows his progress from being a child star and his roles in the stage production of Oliver to becoming a recognised stage performer and television actor in the soap East Enders, getting involved in politics and eventually becoming a Member of the European Parliament and a member of the House of Lords.

But it is also a fascinating insight into living the life of a gay man from the late ‘50s until the present day and all that involved. From the promiscuous lifestyle that people in the entertainment business and politics seemed to court and enjoy, to the emergence of more public acceptance of different lifestyles and that battle for true equality that continues to this day.

He had Margaret Thatcher to thank for the development of his political life. Her success in introducing the gay bashing Section 28 and its attempts to block the “promotion” of homosexuality led to him and the actor Sir Ian McLelland setting up the gay rights organisation Stonewall.

The book also touches on the emergence of the Gay Plague that was AIDS and how lifestyles had to be adapted to stay safe.

But there is a lot of humour too as his work brought him into to contact with the stars of stage and screen such as Barbara Windsor and Elton John to say nothing of the riotous times with the East Enders cast.

And of course it was Cashman as Colin in Eastenders who planted the first gay kiss on his lover Colin on a British soap.

Cashman writes with a warmth that portrays so much about his life that was good while covering those aspects that made it so difficult.

Cashman was eventually able to marry his lifetime partner Paul. Something that he could never imagined in his secretive furtive years of early sexual discovery.

A great read.
 

Score: 5 stars

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I had never read anything by Robert Harris, considering him to be the author of the sort of book I’m not interested in. Therefore, when Conclave was recommended, I was somewhat sceptical. I am very glad that my prejudices didn’t preclude it.

In the Catholic Church, Conclave is the assembly of Cardinals, in Rome, for the election of a new pope. Its more general definition is a private meeting. This story addresses the former meaning. I had always known about the election of a new pope by the Cardinals but hadn’t imagined a book dedicated to it.

Robert Harris has written a novel which is both fact and fiction. The procedures of the Conclave are factual with much interesting detail about the processes and venues, particularly the Sistine Chapel. The fictional element is the creation of more than a hundred Cardinals from around the world, with their various peccadilloes. It would have been easy to make them into caricatures but he has avoided this. Instead he has created interesting names and personalities for them.

I really enjoyed this book with its rather surprising ending. I can certainly recommend it. 

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To summarise this book it might be best to use Barak Obama’s quote about it,

‘A moving portrayal of the effects of a wrongful conviction on a young African –American couple’

This was my book club’s choice for our March read, we try to avoid chick-lit as such, instead choosing books that often raise moral discussions and cover a vast array of topics. An American Marriage was the winner of the Woman’s Prize for Fiction 2019 and came with a long list of prize nominations together with recommendations.

The main character in the novel is Roy. O. Hamilton Jnr - that O in the middle of his name turns out to be an important part of the plot! He is a young successful executive, working his way up the career ladder. Roy is newly married to Celestial, a creative soul and unconventional, her scientist father made the family wealthy after discovering a formula that was sold to Minute Maid. Roy’s background is far more humble. Both sets of parents play an important role in the story and the unravelling of their lives after Roy’s wrongful conviction. Another important character is Andre, Celestial’s childhood friend and Roy’s housemate from college. The story is told from the viewpoint of Roy, Celestial and Andre with different chapters for each. Some of the plot is also carried forward with letter exchanges.

I won’t give any of the plot away, but I felt the storytelling was excellent, the relationships were so complex. A lot was made of the role/responsibilities of a father for all the characters, but also the importance of the mothers and the decisions they had made. Of course, this was also a novel about race, treatment of blacks and indeed women in America, now and in the past, I felt the novel was fast moving with a lot of twists I wasn’t expecting. The ending was tense, but satisfactory. 

This is a book I would recommend. The switching of viewpoint in each chapter sometimes had me going back to the beginning of chapter to check who it was, especially at the end when the chapters became shorter, building up the tension right until the last. I am giving it a 4/5, its just short of the 5 star rating as unfortunately, I didn’t like some of Celestial’s traits, but I suppose this added to the conflict and tension. Worth a read….

Score: 4/5 stars

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This is the novel I’ve enjoyed the most in recent years. I’d give it 5 stars plus. It is set in Russia. 

Just after the Russian Revolution an aristocrat, Count Alexander Rostov is condemned to house arrest for an indefinite period. Instead of having his usual grand suite in the Hotel Metropole in Moscow, he is given a tiny attic room with a window “the size of a chessboard.”

In the course of the next thirty years we follow his encounters with the hotel’s guests and employees. We witness the tender relationship between himself and the girl abandoned by her revolutionary parents into his care. We see how he is affected by the momentous changes in Russia under Stalin.

Although the story is focussed on a sequestered physical environment it manages to be incredibly expansive. There are many unforgettable characters both real and fictional. All human life is here in the confines of the hotel. Whilst Russia experiences decades of radical, turbulent and brutal change Count Rostov, stripped of his wealth and previous position is forced to consider who he really is. Eventually he has to work as a kind of Maître D’.

It’s a lengthy tome – 482 pages – but it manages to sustain the reader’s interest. It is exceptionally well written with an elegance of prose that matches the urbanity and gentlemanly traits of its main protagonist. It is full of carefully researched historical details. It is a highly unusual and magical novel. 

Score: 5 Stars

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This novel is the debut of actor Catherine Steadman. It was published in 2018 and became a New York Times #1 bestseller, Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick and is due to be made into a film.

I bought this as a summer holiday read on my kindle and then promptly forgot about it!

It tells the story of a newlywed seemingly perfect couple whose lives are forever changed after a grisly discovery on their honeymoon. The story unfolds with the protagonist, Erin, digging a grave to bury a body which is quickly revealed to be that that of her husband, Mark. Whilst doing so she talks to him tenderly demonstrating that she still loves him, which is a clever device to pique interest and get the story going.

It is written in the first person and explores the events that led up to the burial. With the action taking place over a few months with the chain of events taking them to a luxury resort in the south pacific and includes themes of Islamic radicalisation, Russian crime and a “diamond-geezer prison lag”.

Erin and Mark are a likeable couple; however, it becomes clear that they are very much ensconced in an upmarket lifestyle which they are reluctant to relinquish when circumstances change. It also becomes apparent that they do not always reveal everything to each other, and this forms the basis of some of their problems.

I enjoyed the dialogue between the characters, the realistic modern setting (references to Brexit, the 2008 recession and modern millennial London) which made the story believable even though the subject is out of the experience of most people. I also liked the first-person dialogue with the reader, which is very knowing and relatable.

I thought I had guessed the ending and was partially correct so that was satisfying but I was also surprised.

There were some elements that I found slightly less realistic, for example the physical strength that Erin needed to do some of the feats seemed excessive, although this could be explained by adrenaline.

I raced through the last few pages to get to the end and then re-read them. I also re-read the first few pages of the book to spot the clues of the unravelling situation.

I don’t usually read thrillers and on a number of occasions in the latter part of the book I stopped reading as it got too intense – but I am a light-weight in that respect and it definitely would not have been light beach reading for me!

I thought it was a stunning debut, well written and I would thoroughly recommend it.

Score: 4.5 stars

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F: Steinbeck wanted his readers to understand the suffering and dehumanization that migrant workers underwent as they travelled around the ranches of California, searching for work during the great depression. One message the book conveys is migrant workers are people with feelings not just cheap labour to be worked to exhaustion for the lowest possible wages. Steinbeck shows this through the marginalisation of George and Lennie, best friends traveling from ranch to ranch searching for work, to get a big stake together in order to buy their own smallholding.

I liked the in-depth description of characters and the way his emotive language bought the world they lived in to life. Each character has their moral actions portrayed in a way that gripped me, this was shown when Candy, releases his anger on the dead body of Curley’s Wife when he said, “you’ve done it, didn’t you? I suppose your glad. Everybody knew you’d mess things up. You wasn’t no good and you aint no good now, you lousy tart.” He snivelled, and his voice shook. “I could of hoed in the garden and washed dishes for them guys.” This shows the greed of the some of the workers even when someone has died all they think about is them self. However, this is the opposite for a small portion of the ranch workers like Slim (The mule train leader,) where he reached down to check Curley’s wife’s pulse to see if she was still alive showing sorrow and respect for her and this shows the difference between the ranch workers as Candy was selfish and greedy thinking only about himself whereas Slim was selfless and thought of others not himself.

To improve Steinbeck could have described the characters physical appearance a bit more however I personally enjoyed the fact he briefly described their appearance because I could then make them up in my own imagination.

For the first time reading Steinbeck I thoroughly enjoyed his book and would certainly read more of his work again. I would definitely recommend this book as it is short and easily readable and so to conclude I would give it a 4/5 as there are some small things Steinbeck could possibly have done differently to improve it but on the whole it is an excellent book 

D: In Steinbeck’s own words, this work; “Is neither a novel nor a play but it is a kind of playable novel.” On reading, this is very apparent with the plot broken down into three or four acts that did go on to be a hit play on Broadway. The storey evolves around two best friends searching for their place in life. Lennie is a large, strong man with mental health issues who is looked after by his comrade George, a deeply thoughtful and caring man. together they run from Ranch to ranch escaping Lennie’s indiscretions that arise through his child like innocence.

The two are a double act, one brains one brawn who dream of a better place. They are itinerant workers in an age of depression and mechanisation and their way of life was rapidly disappearing; a throw-forward to our own times.

The story starts and finishes in a glade down by the river and this is where Steinbeck excels. His description of mother nature is an American version of Arthur Ransome at his best. There is a beautiful paragraph where a Heron lances into the water to catch and eat a water snake. The glade is a parable where at the start of the book a new world order is promised, but this very quickly degenerate into a dog eat dog world.  Nature as true life, becomes enveloped with hope, desolation, death, jealousy, a longing to better oneself and is mingled with broken dreams and promises.

Lennie loves soft things; rabbits, a dead mouse and a new born puppy.  These are his security blanket and will, despite all of Georges help lead to his downfall. Steinbeck clearly has the reader feel all of his characters emotions. He does this with vigour. However high emotions alone do not paint the best pictures of his characters. In some way they are one dimensional, caricatures of themselves. This is especially true of Curley’s Wife. She is always referred to as this Curley’s Wife and is portrayed as the typical jailbait tart. Wearing too much make-up she could be Eve in the garden of Eden. It is only briefly that Steinbeck states why she is like this; but he details her emotions in a bullet point list that doesn’t satisfy the readers hunger for a deeper knowledge of his characters. This applies to all the other protagonists. 

This is a very short novel and can be read very quickly. It holds the reader throughout and has a twist at the denouement which although inevitable is not telegraphed. This is the first Steinbeck I have read and I would certainly read more 

Score: 4 stars

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David writes:

'Freddie has been reading this book as a set piece for English at School. As an exercise I read the book too and with WW invitation to post a review we couldn’t give up the chance in these days of social shielding to work together.'

Hi Freddie from all of us at WW! Your joint review is really excellent. All the very best in your studies - we  look forward to receiving more reviews... Keep up the good reading!

Published in paperback 2018 

Genre: An autobiographical account in diary form.

Covers the period: August 2004 – December 2010

Adam Kay was a doctor working in an NHS hospital. This book is his account of life for a newly qualified doctor on the front line. Like all young doctors he is expected to take enormous responsibility when he has little experience to draw on and is required to work extremely long hours.

The form of the book is a good way to track his growing experience and confidence. The strength of the book is that Adam tells his story with searing honesty and great humanity. His account illustrates that doctors in his situation can experience the tragic and the miraculous all in one shift. There were times when I laughed out loud while reading it but also times when I read with tears in my eyes.

Adam eventually decides to specialise in Obstetrics and Gynaecology. He deals with a tremendous variety of patients in quite a short time. He says at one point that the appeal of this specialism is, in part, due to the fact that it combines medicine and surgery. He sometimes has to break bad news but is also able to achieve very good outcomes for many of his patients and their partners. 

The saddest thing perhaps is that such a talented and dedicated young doctor decides to leave the profession. He clearly felt that the NHS was under such pressure – some years ago now – that it was almost impossible to do his job to the standard he wished to achieve. He also had a particularly bad experience which turned out to be “the straw that broke the camel’s back” although he had done his very best for the patient.

Fortunately his skill as a writer and speaker/comedian have since lead him into a different career. I chose the book because I had heard what a difficult life young doctors can have and wanted to learn more. I would thoroughly recommend it and therefore give it 5. 

Score: 5 stars

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Hilary Mantel says that the moment information in historical documents dries up, the writer of historical fiction steps in, fills in the gaps, and gets to practise their expertise. In Preservation the historical document in question is, explains it author Jock Seron, ‘the lost diary of a shipwrecked mariner [William Clark] reproduced or perhaps paraphrased much later by a newspaper named the Asiatic Mirror.’ It concerns the fate, in 1797, of The Sydney Cove, a three-masted country trader shipwrecked in the Bass Strait, and that of its crew members who embarked upon the long walk to the newly established Sydney, some six hundred miles to the north. Three made it; the rest did not.

This is a story of intrigue and mystery, masterfully told by an author totally in control of his craft who uses a handful of central characters and their testimonies to slowly unfurl what happened between the ship’s sinking and the arrival of the three survivors around two months later. Unusually, each of the book’s forty-three chapters is told from one of about half a dozen different viewpoints, the true picture coming together slowly over the course of the story’s telling. In a novel move, Serong flags up a chapter’s narrator by the use of appropriate symbols at the head of the opening page: a crown for Lieutenant Joshua Grayling, of Government House; a bunch of leaves for Charlotte, his wife; an anchor motif for William Clark; a flower for the young lascar boy; and a fig leaf for the John Figge – reputedly a tea merchant from London. Each has their part to play in uncovering the mystery for the reader, each constrained in what they can, will or will not, say by rank, gender, linguistic ability or… guilt, perhaps. The colony’s authority figures are driven by a righteous desire – a duty – to find out and report on what truly happened to the missing men; Charlotte by her intuition and compassion for the character she is convinced knows the true story; the others, by guilt, fear, or both.

And can there have ever been a more detestable central character than John Figge? Through his thoughts and ruminations we are exposed to the dark recesses of his poisoned mind. Scheming, immoral and cunningly intelligent, Figge plays the supporting cast for fools in his warped game of show and tell.

Of particular delight is the author’s evocation of seamy late eighteenth century Sydney night-life: Its bars – a row of small benches projected from the far wall, lit only by a greasy lamp overhead. The reek in here was rancid tallow and piss; The bar owners – a man who looked, as if he wasn’t swaying, as if he might be the inn keeper; and its clientele – drunks, trollops; forlorn and forgotten. As the soldier, Grayling, weaves his way through the dangerous and unfamiliar territory frequented only by convicts and lesser ranks, we weave with him, looking over our shoulders every step of the way.

Serong can do hard-hitting and shocking – I have some of this man’s gore on my neck and my cheek leading me to think that I must have been close to him when it happened and out there [in Calcutta] oozes the [River] Hooghly, conveyor of half-dog and raw timbers and human shit and ashes and the dreams of holy men upstream of the ghats. Between khaki and brown, but paler than both, the discharge of a septic wound – but he can also do minutely observed, tender and sensitive as when Charlotte questions the young, lascar boy on his sickbed: The square light of the window formed a glint on his left eye, on the lower lid. The glint curved and lengthened, swelled into a tear. ‘You can tell me,’ she whispered. The tear rolled, then hung by his ear. ‘You can tell me everything.’

If approaching the book as a reader, Preservation hooks you in with the mystery of the shipwreck and the gradual unfolding of events as revealed by the various, not always reliable, narrators. And for the writer, the book offers great examples of ‘show not tell’, character development, and the dramatic interplay between a group of individuals, each of which who is, in their own way, marooned, a world away from home.

A great read.

Score: 5 stars

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Here are Neil's own words, from his outline to publishers (before he'd written it, but it fits): “It's about the soul of America, really. What people brought to America; what found them when they came; and the things that lie sleeping beneath it all.”

So, imagine a contemporary, gritty road trip, often violent, with touches of horror (and cursing), across small-town America, seamlessly blended with fantastical elements. This is American Gods. 

Our 'hero' Shadow Moon is released from prison a couple of days early when his wife is killed in a car crash. On his way home, jobless and penniless, he meets the mysterious Mr. Wednesday, a hustler who offers him a job as his driver. Mr Wednesday claims to be a god, brought over to America by his people. And there are yet more old gods in America, brought there by their own peoples. Their power has waned; there are new gods now, money, media, technology and more. Mr Wednesday has a plan to unite the old gods and stand against these upstarts who have taken their place. Despite his disbelief, there is nothing left for Shadow in his home town, so he takes up Mr Wednesday's offer and they wander across America, visiting small towns, cities and other places trying to recruit the older deities to the fight.

The gods are portrayed as ordinary human beings; they hide 'in plain sight'. So we meet along the way 'Mad' Sweeney, Irish leprechaun and king; Mr Nancy, African spider god; Mr Ibis, undertaker and Egyptian god, who writes tales of how the gods first came to America. And many more. And let's not forget Laura, Shadow's dead wife who nevertheless has an important part to play.

It's a lengthy book at 635 pages. It did take me a little while to get into it, I'll admit. It's extremely American (Neil had been living there for 9 years when he began it). And it's violent, with touches of horror, lots of swearing. But he's my favourite author, and the underlying premise was so intriguing I felt myself being drawn further and further into the events. And I began to know and like the characters and ended up wanting desperately to know what happened, to Shadow and the others. And I love the writing – here's just one example: “Paths of stone that wound around and across it, forming twisty natural bridges that Eschered through and across the rock walls.” 

In conclusion; well worth reading; intriguing characters and plot. And a brilliant ending... 

Score: 5 stars

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There have been many books written about Edward VIII, Mrs Simpson, and the Abdication crisis of 1936. However, very few have explored the political detail beyond the likely resignation of Stanley Baldwin's Government should the King had remained on the throne.

Adrian Phillips has painstakingly researched newly discovered evidence in Royal and Government archives which shine a new light on this intriguing story. Once termed 'the love story of the century,' this book reveals the truth of playboy Edward's real intention toward kingship and wanting desertion from duty. 

Edward VIII was born 23 June 1894 to the Duke and Duchess of York, later George V and Queen Mary. From an early age, Edward, known to his family as David, was trained as a "King in Waiting" - he was denied serving his country during the First World War; and in the 1920s represented Britain as its chief ambassador across the British Empire. The hearts and ambitions of the nation fell heavily on his shoulders as the country suffered from social hardships and great depression. In contrast, Edward did not want the duty of service to his country. 

Behind the scenes, Edward was a playboy and thought nothing of elicit affairs and courting married women. One such indiscretion came notoriously close to placing Edward at the centre of a scandal involving a woman who had murdered a lover but later acquitted. The Government and close courtiers of Edward stepped in on that occasion to ensure a cover-up.

On 10 January 1931 at a weekend gathering at Burrough’s Court in Leicestershire, the home of Edward’s mistress Lady Thelma Furness, Edward was introduced by Thelma to Wallis Simpson. Although Edward denied any affair with Mrs Simpson right up to December 1936, it was clear in high society circles that Edward’s infatuation with Mrs Simpson took on serious proportions from January 1934. 

This book confirms that the Government and British Secret Service were tracking the affair of Edward and Mrs Simpson before 1936. Whilst Edward’s character had been long questioned as to whether he would be fit to be King, it is clear that his political and carnal indiscretions troubled the Government and indeed Clergy of the day. As for Mrs Simpson, her own indiscretions which included alleged affairs, were enough to consider her a significant threat to British security.

This is a politicalised investigation by Adrian Phillips and whilst includes some information already known to biographers, provides a highly important unique chapter to a story that never seems to be complete.

Score: 5 Stars

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