The Gap of Time by Jeanette Winterson

The Hogarth Shakespeare series is a really exciting new project you need to know about! Many of the stories of Shakespeare’s great plays originated elsewhere. He retold, reformed, remade them in brilliant, poetic, dramatic works. Now, some of our most skilled contemporary authors are doing “cover versions” by writing their own take on these stories inspired by Shakespeare’s plays. The series kicks off with Jeanette Winterson’s “The Gap of Time” – a novel inspired by The Winter’s Tale. Let me assure you that this new novel isn’t a mere creative exercise, but a vibrant and lively work of art in its own right. Honestly, I was slightly sceptical about the enterprise. Rewriting Shakespeare? It could all go wrong, right? What Winterson does is give a very personal take on Shakespeare’s play by capturing the essence of his drama and adding her own heartfelt perspective on life.

If you’re not familiar with Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale have no fear. The book opens with a summary of the play. In Winterson’s novel, the central characters are recast as contemporary figures recognizable in today’s society. Leo is a high-powered and tyrannical banker involved in the financial crisis of 2008. His wife Mimi is a well-known singer who is pregnant. Xeno is Leo’s lifelong homosexual friend who is a game coder. There is a misunderstanding fuelled by jealousy and a tragic mishap occurs: “The important things happen by chance. Only the rest gets planned.” Mimi’s child is mistakenly given away and left in a BabyHatch (a compartment at a hospital where babies can be left anonymously). Many years later the child has grown up into a sensitive singer named Perdita who was raised by a good man named Shep. The drama continues from here where Perdita eventually discovers and returns to the place where she originated. Not only is it a perfect anaphora that Winterson would cover The Winter’s Tale, but the story comes very close to home for the author who herself was a child that was given away. When the drama of this novel ends, the author steps in to confide in the reader what a personal story this is and give her enlightening thoughts about the power of Shakespeare’s writing.

A BabyHatch

As befits the title, one of Winterson’s primary concerns in this story is time. Time is its own dimension. On the subatomic level it doesn’t function the same way that it does in our understanding of reality. Nor does own personal sense of time plod along in such a linear fashion. The author understands this. Winterson writes “time that runs so steady and sure runs wild outside of the clocks. It takes so little time to change a lifetime and it takes a lifetime to understand the change.” In this novel people’s actions disrupt their sense of time. People become caught in the past and the future. They lose their sense of the present. The characters seek to radically rewrite time just like in the movies referenced such as Back to the Future and Superman where the world is spun backwards to change the course of events. Only by breaking down the boundaries between each other can they form a new understanding of time. This sounds very abstract, but it takes on an incredibly poignant meaning within the story and I found myself welling up in scenes like when Perdita must rush Shep to the hospital. A personal crisis like this can collapse anyone’s sense of time.

This Shakespeare project does in creative form what all of us do in our imaginations when reading: re-imagine the stories we’re told from our own personal perspectives. This does not disrespect the original work, but enhances it and pays tribute to it by honing in on the most essential themes and ideas to recognize their universal relevance. In the instance of The Winter’s Tale there are strong issues of friendship, jealousy, abandonment, regret, tragedy, revenge and (possibly) forgiveness. In “The Gap of Time” Winterson encapsulates the essence of Shakespeare’s drama by creating a novel which is itself poetic, bawdy, inventive and highly entertaining. I loved this tremendous novel. I’m looking forward to reading more of the forthcoming novels in the Hogarth Shakespeare series from tremendous authors such as Anne Tyler, Howard Jacobson, Gillian Flynn, Margaret Atwood and Edward St Aubyn.

Watch Jeanette Winterson talk about what attracted her to the Hogarth Shakespeare project.

I’ve teamed up with Vintage to offer you the chance at winning a signed copy of “The Gap of Time” right now. All you have to do is leave a comment on this post to enter to win. If you fancy, tell me what Shakespeare play you’d most like to see in novel form – but it’s not necessary. Just let me know your contact details (email or twitter handle) so I can contact you if you win. Good luck!

Death is a Welcome Guest by Louise Welsh

When I’m aware that a book was written as part of a series I usually only like to read them in the order that they were published. This is the case whether or not the series of books have clear character/situation cross-overs or only have thematic links. I worry about missing hidden meanings or references which link them up – plus the geeky side of me thinks things should only be read in order. There have been recent publications by Kate Atkinson and Jane Smiley which I’ve really wanted to read, but avoided because they are part of a series and I want to read the first books before reading these new ones. Unfortunately, the amount of reading time required to consume these series in total means I keep delaying starting any of them. This is also why I didn’t read Marilynn Robinson’s “Lila” when it first came out – since it’s the third book in a series in which I’ve only read “Gilead.” I still think “Lila” is one of the best books I’ve read this year which makes me glad I didn’t keep putting it off. So I’ve also taken a punt with reading “Death is a Welcome Guest” which is the second book in the Plague Times trilogy by Louise Welsh. The first book in the series “A Lovely Way to Burn” came out last year, but I never got around to reading it. I may have missed some things by reading this book first. But, from what I can tell, this dystopian novel about a plague which hits modern-day UK stands well on its own.

The novel follows Magnus, an up-and-coming comedian who has just received a big break opening for a more famous performer at the O2 arena. After his opening night he tentatively engages in a night of drunken debauchery despite having witnessed a tragic and worrying death earlier that day. Through a terrible misunderstanding, Magnus winds up in prison. While he’s incarcerated all hell breaks loose outside. When he finally emerges back into the world with the help of his mysterious cellmate Jeb, they find a plague evocatively known as "the sweats" has swept the nation sending society into chaos. Much like some other plague-centred dystopian novels and films I’ve read/seen the first half of the story is primarily made up of a series of desperate chases as the characters try to adjust to and find a place within this radically transformed landscape. The second half follows the burgeoning formations of a new community in an isolated location and presents a series of moral conundrums as the survivors grapple to form a cohesive plan for the future. This seems to be a natural format, but it’s one where I often find the thrill of the first half to be the best part. I found this to be true with the movie 20 Days Later and I feel it’s true for “Death is a Welcome Guest” as well. Magnus and Jeb’s flight through a ravaged city filled with decaying corpses that takes them through London Underground tunnels and high-class hotels is well executed and effectively tense. But the second half becomes overtly ponderous. It’s not that I don’t find the sociological dilemmas which arise in a highly pressurized situation interesting. There’s just something about it which feels too contrived. In the case of this novel, Welsh explores issues of capital punishment, religion and suicide wrapped in a murder-mystery set on a grand country estate.

The most effective and haunting story-line of this book is Magnus’ painful memories of his cousin Hugh’s suicide. The lingering feelings of despair and resentment he holds over this loss casts an interesting colour on the events which come after the onset of the plague. Unfortunately, the social issues begin to dominate the story and take precedence over the characters’ development. Interestingly, this review by Jane Jakeman in The Independent came to the opposite conclusion. Overall, I felt it’s well written and I was sufficiently intrigued to follow the story all the way to the end. However, it doesn’t have the innovative power or focus of another recent plague novel “Station Eleven.” I wonder if the other two books in the Plague Times trilogy reflect back on the themes of “Death is a Welcome Guest” or form any satisfying narrative links between them. I’m intrigued, but I’m not sure I’m sufficiently motivated to read them to find out.

Blood Relatives by Stevan Alcock

Casting a bleak shadow over Stevan Alcock’s coming of age tale set in the late 1970s about a teenage boy named Rick, are listings of The Yorkshire Ripper’s victims. Peter Sutcliffe murdered thirteen women and attempted to murder several others. Each chapter in “Blood Relatives” is titled with the name of one of Sutcliffe’s victims. This causes the reader to feel the fear which filled the public consciousness over the five years during which these attacks and murders took place in the Yorkshire area. Adding to this understanding of Rick’s milieu is the language of his voice which recreates the regional dialect of Leeds. This makes for a fantastically evocative narrative about Rick’s development as a man who engages with the punk and gay movements of the time.

Rick works with his friend Eric on a truck that delivers soft drinks to eccentric locals. He spends time talking with these colourful characters receiving bits of local gossip and even psychic predictions about who the Ripper will strike next. He has a special affinity to the prostitutes they visit and humorously remarks at one point “I asked Eric why all our breaks were wi’ prozzies. He said prozzies make better tea.” Rick feels an affinity to the prostitutes because they are outsiders from mainstream society which is how he feels in part because of his homosexuality. He senses that they are equally vulnerable remarking “The distance between t’ prozzies and us gays didn’t seem to be much greater than between two gateposts; if it worn’t prozzies that some maniac wor killing it could just as easily be gay men, and the public reaction would be t’ same – they got what wor coming to them.”

In the “Studio 54 of t’ North” Rick and Tad dance to Thelma Houston’s ‘Don’t Leave Me This Way’

It’s unusual and refreshing to read about a gay character that is so forthright and unequivocal about his sexuality. Even if Rick can’t bring himself to come out to his mother, he boldly tries to find a place for himself within the gay community. Later on Rick reflects that “For me… I thought, ‘Brilliant, I’m different. Special.’ I thought, ‘Yeah – this is all right, really.’” There are endearing and relatable scenes where Rick seeks out gay pubs/meetings and takes on lovers. He quickly finds how fickle men can be once their lust is satiated; his unrequited romantic yearnings harden him and contribute to him creating a punk persona. He frequents clubs and a squat that includes many more vibrant and outrageous characters. Through these encounters he even uncovers a deeper understanding about the past and hidden facts about his own identity.

Inextricably intertwined with the manner of speech used in this novel are notions of the battling ideologies and commonplace racism/misogyny/homophobia of the time. Here’s an example of the language in this narrative: “She wor wearing a trowel-load of slap over t’thin vaneer of abuse doled out by hubby Don, and a pong so raking I thought I’d gag if I so much as flared a nostril.” In addition to the horrendous acts of violence perpetrated by Sutcliffe, Alcock suggests there are untold amounts of violence against women happening behind closed doors. There are also references in the story about discrimination against people of colour in the community. Asian men are seen as segregated even within the queer social groups. A gay man from Iran is shunned by his family and the English with ultimately tragic consequences. It’s remarked that “Black guys wor always getting stopped even though t’Ripper wor plainly a white man.” Rick himself experiences instances of homophobia and near violence because of his sexuality. Yet, he is also (in smaller ways) a perpetrator who attacks a man he hooks up with and when speaking with “respectable” women about prostitutes he feels “It didn’t seem like owt that a woman should know.” This all adds up to a sober understanding that Sutcliffe’s actions weren’t an anomaly, but an extreme consequence of the pervading attitudes of this time and place.

“Blood Relatives” is an extremely endearing and sensitively written story of a young man’s development. More than that it’s an intelligent dramatization that exposes the narrow-minded attitudes of a particular time and place. By evoking such a distinctive voice the reader is drawn into what it really felt like to be in Leeds during the late 70s and experience this period of rapid social change in Britain.

LonesomeReader is Two Years Old Today!

Two years ago I started this blog without any expectations about what it would turn into. I didn’t even have confidence in my ability to continue updating it. I’m grateful that people have read it and appreciated what I have to say about books. Conversing about books and reading what other people say about their own reading has only fuelled my obsession for reading more. And it is an obsession. Although I read more than most people, I sometimes feel quite down about all the books I don’t have time to read. Recently someone very wise said to me that I feel this way because I want to be on the inside when there is no inside. It seems to be an inevitable state of being for me and many other readers who tend to be more introverted to perpetually feel on the outside of things.

In writing this blog, I’m continuously trying to investigate the state of loneliness. It’s a kind of loneliness that can’t be assuaged by engaging with other people. Feelings of being an outsider, disconnected from the rest of the world, lost in one’s own thoughts. They are a state of mind which can only be settled by connecting with humanity through good literature. I really appreciate the distinction Joyce Carol Oates makes in her recent excellent memoir “The Lost Landscape” that “Loneliness weakens. Aloneness empowers. Aloneness makes of us something so much more than we are in the midst of others whose claim is that they know us.” It’s a sentiment echoed in quotes by May Sarton and Marianne Moore that I’ve put in the sidebar of this blog. Because only in this state of solitude can we live unencumbered by the judgements and projections of other people. That’s not to say I want to live like a hermit on a mountain (as appealing as this sounds from time to time). But I want to find strength in my self when I am alone and faced with a book that allows an entire world to unfurl inside my head.

So my fanaticism for reading more and more hasn’t waned. It’s been fascinating reading books for the Green Carnation Prize recently as it’s made me pick up types of books and genres I wouldn’t normally gravitate towards. This encourages me to not be so methodical in my reading in the future, to let my hand grab books out of sheer curiosity as I used to when I was a teenager wandering through used bookstores. There is a perpetual sense of excitement about where a book might take me when I have no preconceived notions about the author or the subject matter or what anyone thinks of it. But I still love hearing recommendations. Some of the best books I’ve read in the past two years have come from being nudged to read something by readers of this blog or by bookish people on social media.

So what are you reading and what do you think I should read next?

The Lost and the Found by Cat Clarke

Faith is an average teenage girl struggling with typical teenage problems about self image, concerns about her popularity and the emotional complexity of having just lost her virginity. But these issues are overshadowed because her family has been caught in an extraordinary situation all of their lives. When Faith was four years old, her slightly older sister Laurel was kidnapped. Since then her family has been embroiled in a campaign to find her and bring her back. Because Laurel was pretty, blonde, white and from a middle class family her case received a lot of media attention which has had good and bad repercussions for Faith’s family. Now, at this crucial point in Faith’s teenage development, her sister Laurel suddenly returns. “The Lost and the Found” is the story this dramatic reconfiguration of a family told from Faith’s point of view.

Faith regularly makes macaroons with her father's partner Michel to sell at a weekend farmer's market

Clarke is excellent at capturing the small intimacies of family life. The reader feels alternating sensations of comfort and claustrophobia that naturally occur in a household – especially during times of turmoil and strife. For instance, when Faith wants to be alone in her bed at one point she’s aware her mother is outside because she can hear her stepping over a stair that creaks. Faith is extremely conscious of the politics you need to play to maintain harmony within the family. After years of dealing with the press she also possesses a savvy knowingness about the difference between perception and reality. It’s endearing how Faith is still subject to her own contradictory feelings and emotions which she doesn’t understand. Quite often there is a disconnect between what she thinks and what she says. I also appreciated how Faith’s family is unique in that after her parents’ divorce her father struck up a long term relationship with another man. Rather than thinking of this as unusual, Faith finds this arrangement perfectly natural and makes efforts to ensure her father’s partner Michel is included in all aspects of family life.

The reintroduction of a family member after such a harrowing long period of absence is complicated. It makes for a highly captivating story with some twists which lead to a tense conclusion. This novel reminds me of Joyce Carol Oates’ novel “My Sister, My Love” for the way it captures the sibling’s point of view for a sister who has been abducted. But it also puts me in mind of Emma Donoghue’s novel “Room” for the way it poignantly captures the confusion and fallout from a child being held in captivity. “The Lost and the Found” works both as a thriller and an emotionally-engaging young adult novel about a dramatic situation. Faith’s narrative voice is engaging, amusingly ironic and extremely relatable. This is a thoroughly enjoyable novel.

The Alphabet of Birds by SJ Naude

If you don’t feel like you belong in the place of your birth, can you ever really feel at home elsewhere? This seems to be one of the questions at the heart of SJ Naude’s book. The six long stories which make up “The Alphabet of Birds” range in characters and locations, but all describe individuals groping for a connection and an affirmation of identity somewhere “other.” Many of the protagonists are South Africans struggling with an internal battle between asserting that their country of origin is the place where they belong and trying to emphatically dig their roots in elsewhere. Some prominent characters are gay men who meet other men in distant locations as if they are both survivors. There is a consolation in coming together, but there is no suggestion that there will be a lasting fraternity or that the artistic friends’ houses, German castles or drug-fuelled night clubs they find themselves in can ever closely resemble somewhere that can be called home.

A character purchases a Noh mask in Japan which changes emotion depending on how it is tilted

Most notably the female character Ondien who appears in two stories founds a musical group that fuses together world sounds with African instruments. The group dissolves, yet she still seeks to write a music which creates unity. She embarks on a quest to visit her siblings who have settled in America, Dubai and London only to discover they are all in desperate circumstances. Their new homes have transformed into uniquely suffocating traps. She returns to South Africa to live an increasingly impoverished existence. Wherever these characters go they are accompanied by a profound sense of isolation and are plagued by loss. She discovers that “You steal from someone weaker, the stronger ones steal from you. You return to your weaker victim. Things circulate. A life cycle, an ecosystem.” The society portrayed is one founded on transactions of taking rather than exchange. Even when a woman named Sandrien in the story ‘Van’ dedicates herself to a life of philanthropy giving medical care to rural villages, her efforts are drowned in tidal waves of red tape, corruption and indifference.

It all sounds quite bleak and much of the striking drama in this book is undeniably solemn. Yet, Naude has a beautiful way with his prose that makes these stories feel consoling rather than harrowing. It faces up to reality rather than avoiding uncomfortable dilemmas or feelings. Sometimes the thoughtfulness of Naude’s writing grows too abstracted from the action of the story so it’s difficult to decipher what is actually happening in certain parts. Yet, through a persistent accumulation of images, scenes and feelings the reader is left with impressions of experience. This isn’t a light read, but it’s in many ways a hypnotic one. I did come across a rare passage which made me chuckle. One younger character admonishes an older one that “You should leave behind all the gym nonsense; the weight of weights settles into your muscles after a while.” What a fantastic justification to give up the gym! This appears in the final story ‘Loose’ which has a special radiance with its descriptions of dance as a way of strategically carving a way through the space of the world and expressing emotion. The title itself, one letter away from the word “lose,” suggests perhaps that a loss of self can be prevented by remaining in perpetual motion.

Don’t Let Him Know by Sandip Roy

Sometimes characters in novels begin to feel so real it hurts to let them go. This is especially true in Sandip Roy’s novel “Don’t Let Him Know” which is a story that hopscotches back and forth in time through generations of a family. By the end of the book, this multi-layered view of the lives of Avinash, his wife Romola and their son Amit became so fully realized and familiar I was disappointed the novel wasn’t longer. Each chapter focuses on a particular character at a crucial point in their lives. The story isn’t told chronologically, but I didn’t ever feel confused about where I was or who I was reading about. Rather, I felt this gave a deeper understanding of these characters while they made critical decisions about their future. It allowed both the future and the past to inform me about their present. This is a technique similar to a great novel I read some time ago named “Send Me” by Patrick Ryan. The story of “Don’t Let Him Know” also traverses nations moving back and forth between India and America as this family grows and changes through time.

Amit's great-grandmother Boroma secretly makes mango chutney to hide under her bed.

At the centre of this novel is a crucial secret which Romola discovers in a letter soon after she marries Avinash and they move to America so he can complete his studies and research. Their marriage was arranged soon after Avinash’s father death. Both feel compelled to settle for a life which is expected of them despite Romola’s dream of living in England after reading classic English literature like “Alice in Wonderland” or Avinash’s desire to pursue his prior romantic entanglement. Avinash eventually moves with his wife back to India so he can work and take care of his family (including his ingenious and endearing 94 year old grandmother). They give birth to a son named Amit who also eventually moves to America to go to university, but he decides to remain there where he meets his wife and has a son of his own. At the beginning of the novel we meet Romola in her old age when she has moved back to America to join Amit. Here Romola finds a sense of liberation when she finally feels she doesn’t have to follow the script which was written for her life. Instead “Romola felt as if she was acting in her own play.” The transgressive act of setting out to finally eat the McDonald’s hamburger she always dreamed of proceeds an even more assertive act at the novel’s end which allows her to reclaim her past and break through the boundaries of convention.

“Don’t Let Him Know” is a sensitively-told story that confidently leads you through multiple generations. It explores the ways families can both support and oppress one another. There is a fascinating way that perspective shifts between the chapters from the internal to the external. So while I felt incredibly sympathetic with Romola in a chapter about her romance with a future Bollywood star, my feelings changed to extreme anger at how she severely deals with her servant’s daughter who is accused of stealing in another chapter. In this way, the reader is given a more dynamic nuanced understanding of character than in novels which focus only on one character’s point of view. This novel also gives a unique view of the repercussions of a life lived as a closeted gay man in India. But more than anything it tells deeply immersive, funny, moving and relatable stories about characters that I grew to love and care about.

Polari First Book Prize 2015 Shortlist

Last night at the Southbank Centre in London there were a series of readings for the Polari Literary Salon which primarily featured musical ladies and sensitive men. Alex Klineberg read hilarious passages from his short book “Dear Sebastian” about his friendship with the notorious ‘Kind of Soho’ Sebastian Horsley, a truly flamboyant and uncompromising artist/raconteur. Next Andrew McMillan gave an arresting reading from his debut poetry book “Physical.” He’s a particularly effective reader with the hushed intensity of his voice. So his opening poem ‘Choke’ instantly seized the audience’s attention with the emotional power of the words and his confidential tone. Performer Celine Hispiche closed the first half of the evening with a rousing series of impersonations/tributes/songs to lost personalities and performers of London. Her instant embodiment of each past soul was far more convincing than anything Derek Acorah could pull off. Another impersonation/performance was given by female duo ‘All the Nice Girls’ who invoked the theatrical and musical escapades of Gwen Farrar and Norah Blaney in 1920s London. James Dawson finished the evening reading from his new young adult novel “All of the Above.” He spoke meaningfully about the complexity of teenage desire and confusion of sexuality. He also vigorously defended the need for sexual education in schools and scorned the snobbery surrounding novels about teenage experiences.

Writer and editor Alex Hopkins read the books shortlisted for the Polari First Book Prize. I was thrilled to hear Kirsty Logan’s fantastic book of short stories “The Rental Heart” made the list. I read it at the end of last year when it was shortlisted for the Green Carnation Prize. What I appreciate so much about the Polari First Book Prize are the LGBT books it introduces me to which I wouldn’t have heard of otherwise. Bindel’s hilariously titled and rousing polemic about changes in the lesbian and gay movement sounds really powerful. I’m eager to read Al Brookes’ topical novel about assisted suicide after reading this article about it in the Guardian. I’m intrigued by the sound of La JohnJoseph’s experimental fiction. David Tait’s poems mix autobiography and love story. Below is the complete shortlist. I’ll be excited to hear who is announced as the winner next month.

Straight Expectations – Julie Bindel

The Rental Heart – Kirsty Logan

Self-portrait with The Happiness – David Tait

Everything Must Go – LaJohn Joseph

The Gift of Looking Closely – Al Brookes

The Informant – Susan Wilkins

Grief is the Thing with Feathers by Max Porter

A few years ago I read Rebecca Hunt’s moving debut novel “Mr Chartwell” about Churchill’s “black dog” of depression which is given a physical form. Similarly, Max Porter gives grief a living body of a crow in his debut. But this is an entirely different kind of book. Inspired by Ted Hughes “Crow” poems, this bird infiltrates the lives of a Dad and his Sons following the death of the Mother. It taunts them, plays games with them, offers contradictory bits of wisdom and makes dirty rhymes. The narrative switches between the three perspectives of Dad, Sons and Crow to form an impressionist picture of the years of grief following the loss of the mother. It would be difficult to classify this book. It could be called a novella or poetry/dramatic monologues or self help or a creative literary treatise. Its genre isn’t important because what “Grief is the Thing with Feathers” does is bluntly convey the fact of profound loss and the complicated ways people react to that loss.

What’s so powerful about this book is the way Porter gives the reader the merest outline of these characters lives, yet I was able to experience and relate to their loss completely. He does this with pointed details of smells or memories or bits of dialogue which draw you into the moment and the feeling. Frequently the revolving set of narrators create stories of “Once upon a time…” which evoke alternate realities in order to make sense of the harshness of the true reality they inhabit. Rather than coming across as fantastical or ridiculous, Crow’s physical presence seems natural. It’s a living form which embodies the extraneous forces which have created emotional havoc in their lives. His presence is painful but needed. Conversely, what’s unnatural is the life which persists outside this enclosed house of mourning. The people on the outside who move on in life and the passing of time without the mother are the things which are monstrous. Because the mother is still so real for the Dad and his Sons, the world’s continuation without her is an abomination.

This is a book to ponder and puzzle over, to read very slowly and cautiously despite its necessary brevity. “Grief is the Thing with Feathers” sparks with sharp humour, sensitive emotion and cutting truth.

The Man Booker Prize 2015 Shortlist Predictions

This year there is a very exciting longlist from the judges of the 2015 Man Booker Prize. What’s so striking about it is the diversity of authors and titles on the list. How thrilling it was to see The incredibly unique dystopian novel The Chimes included which I read earlier this year and adored. I’ve only read 7 out of the 13 listed, but I’m going to make a guess on the shortlist anyway. Because I’ve been so busy reading titles for the Green Carnation Prize, I haven’t been able to read as many others from the list as I’d have liked to. But interestingly, this happens to be a particularly queer year for the Booker prize. From the ones I’ve read including A Brief History of Seven Killings, Did You Ever Have a Family, The Chimes and The Green Road all have either gay/lesbian protagonists or prominent queer storylines. I’ve heard Hanya Yanagihara read from A Little Life and know it’s true for this novel as well. So big cheers for the Booker paying tribute to the fascinating diversity of queer life!

Marlon James, Marilynne Robinson and Anne Enright’s novels all have to be at the top of this list for me. They are three superb books I’ve absolutely loved. Even though I haven’t read Hanya Yanagihara’s book so many people I know and respect say this is a life changing novel that I’ll be shocked if it isn’t shortlisted as well. My last two predictions are shots in the dark. I’ve heard such good things about Laila Lalami’s book it seems like a smart choice. I also think Tom McCarthy or Andrew O’Hagan will be listed because they are literary tricksters and at least one book like this usually appears on the shortlist. I did read Satin Island and, as time has gone on, I remember less and less about it. While there was a lot I enjoyed and admired about Anne Tyler’s A Spool of Blue Thread and Bill Clegg’s Did You Ever Have a Family, I don’t think they will have the support to make it any further. So here are my six predictions and it’ll be fascinating to see what is announced on Tuesday.

A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
Lila by Marilynne Robinson
The Green Road by Anne Enright
The Illuminations by Andrew O’Hagan
The Moor’s Account by Laila Lalami

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And making an early guess, I’m going to pick "A Brief History of Seven Killings" to win the Booker this year. This is an epic novel!

Have you read any books from the longlist? Do your shortlist predictions differ from mine? Let me know what you think!

Volcano Street by David Rain

“Volcano Street” is partly like an Ibsen drama, partly like a Vincent Price creep show, but mostly it is an innovative coming-of-age story. Twelve year old Helen (who likes to be called Skip) and her teenage sister Marlo move in with their domineering aunt Noreen after their single mother is put in a mental institution. The girls have been heavily influenced by their liberal mother Karen Jane who was very anti-establishment and anti-war. Marlo emphatically reads “The Female Eunuch.” In a difficult situation the girls will ponder “What would Germaine do?” So it is quite a shock when they are moved to a small conservative town where Marlo is forced to give up school to work for her aunt. Skip’s tomboy behaviour is deeply frowned upon and criticized. Noreen and many people in the town regularly spout racist or homophobic jokes or insults. There is a fascinating clash in ideologies. As the girls grow and change, they come to know some people who have been outcast and scorned by the majority of the town. Gradually they find a place where they fit in the community and a way to go forward in the world.

David Rain describes Skip’s development so well. She’s the kind of feisty, creative character you really want to root for. Her close relationship with Marlo alters as her sister’s values change and she begins a relationship with a man. The antagonistic relationship between Skip and a local boy named Honza gradually develops into a close friendship. This shows how our connection to other people changes as we grow and find our view of the world altering. At first Skip’s perspective is fixed firmly in the moment and her immediate surroundings. But gradually this opens up to include broader points of reference so that she sees what has come before and how provincial her surroundings really are: “Dull, sensible South Australia was not all it seemed. Volcanoes had once shaken this green corner of the state; riven with fissures, faults, subterranean channels, the earth spoke of strangeness. This hole in the ground was a prehistoric pit. The park above, with its rows of roses, the town hall with its tick-ticking clock, were the merest imposition on a timeless land.” Skip learns that life in this town is fleeting and circumscribed. This shift in perspective is an essential part of development as it shows how opportunities in life need not be limited by the short experience or the small-minded views of those around us. At first we accept everything about our surroundings because it’s all we’ve known, but as we learn about history and radically other ways of living we seek out what’s different to assimilate into places and connect with people we feel a more natural kinship to. Rain’s novel skilfully articulates and beautifully plots out these remarkable stages of development.

“In any situation, ask yourself: What would Germaine do?”

There is a dramatic shift two thirds of the way through this novel when the story breaks partly away from Skip to focus on a different story. Skip has long been haunted from watching the classic Vincent Price flick House of Wax. She is sometimes shadowed by a mysterious man who turns out to be a hidden member of the community that has a fascinating story of his own. Roger was a man who grew up in the town with tremendous promise as an actor. He’s singled out by Laurence Olivier who toured through Australia alongside his wife Vivien Leigh looking for fresh talent. Roger and his lover/mentor Quentin move to London as a consequence of this to launch Roger’s performing career. But soon their relationship deteriorates into a hostile partnership trapped in a squalid room. The inequity and jealousy between the couple is terrifyingly reminiscent of playwright Joe Orton and his partner Kenneth Halliwell. I believe this change in story between Skip’s development to Roger’s rise and downfall is meant to reflect the tension between emerging into the world and retreating back to the place of our origin. While both of these stories are compelling and well-told I’m not sure they integrate fully together as the novel reaches a dramatic climax towards the end. Nevertheless, this is a novel with tremendous force, intelligence and passion. Skip is a wonderfully realized character and certain vivid scenes from “Volcano Street” will stick with me.

A Weekend Visiting Monk's House and Charleston House

Home of Leonard and Viriginia Woolf

My boyfriend surprised me last Friday evening with a weekend away as a birthday present. I was told to meet him at Charing Cross station and we’d go from there. We got on a train and it was quite dark by the time we arrived in Burwash, Sussex where we stayed at Pelham Hall, a beautiful modern B&B. It’s a 14th century house that’s been lovingly decorated by its friendly proprietors. It’s a strange feeling arriving somewhere in the dark because it was only in the morning I saw what a sprawling picturesque countryside surrounded the place. Living in overpopulated London it’s easy to forget sometimes that a short train ride away there are such rural places. A short walk away from Pelham Hall over a field is Bateman’s which was Rudyard Kipling’s Jacobean home. We hiked by to see this impressive property from the exterior, but of course I was much more interested in visiting the nearby properties inhabited by the Bloomsbury group.

Virginia's desk

The first place we visited on Saturday morning was Monk’s House, Leonard and Virginia Woolf’s long-time rural residence in the tiny village of Rodmell. Visitors are only able to walk through the ground floor rooms of this 17th century cottage including the study with Leonard’s odd collection of shells and Virginia’s favourite reading chair, a dining room, a staircase with a pile of books on every stair (apparently upon Leonard’s death there were over 6000 books in the house) and a kitchen partially screened off with a portrait of the Woolf’s cook. There is also a greenhouse at the entrance of the house which has hanging grape vines. We were able to purchase some of these grapes from the shop which only asked for a donation. At the back of the house is Virginia’s bedroom housing artwork by Vanessa Bell and a bed which has a view of the garden. The garden itself is quite large and impressive with many flowers, fruit trees and vegetables growing, a pond and a scattering of statues. One section of the garden has busts of Leonard and Virginia next to which is the tree under which her ashes were scattered. At the end of the garden is a small structure with photographs of the Woolfs and the many guests they entertained at the cottage which they inhabited from 1919 until Leonard’s death in 1969.

Virginia's bookshelf - many are Shakespeare

Guide reading from Mrs Dalloway

Pears and the door to Virginia's bedroom

Fireplace in bedroom painted by Vanessa Bell

What really brought the house alive were the many guides sat throughout the property who were brimming with enthusiasm to talk about the history of the estate and stories about the Woolfs. At one point, a volunteer gave an animated reading from Mrs Dalloway in the garden. It was amazing to learn that almost all of the furniture and decorations in the house are the originals including some famous portraits of Virginia and a shelf of Virginia’s books. What a fantastic experience to come in such close contact with the place where she spent so much time when “The Waves” is a novel which has meant so much to me throughout my life.

Tree under which Virginia's ashes were scattered

Pond next to Charleston House with reclining statue

Next we drove to nearby Charleston House which was the long-time residence of Duncan Grant and Vanessa Bell. This was a much larger establishment and it was thrilling to take the tour through the farmhouse as nearly every room is painted in Grant and Bell’s distinctive styles. The wallpaper, bookcases and furniture are covered in their own colourful designs. Of course, paintings fill nearly every wall ranging from the works of famous artists to local friends. Even the lampshades in some of the lower rooms were decorated with Vanessa’s son’s distinctive colander shades which scatter drops of the fading daylight across the ceiling. It’s easy to imagine how such a large, lively residence could be the central point for gatherings of artists. Although I’m familiar with the broad facts about Virginia’s life, I knew comparatively little about the complex relationships between Duncan and Vanessa and the many other members of the Bloomsbury group. What a complicated state of affairs! I didn’t watch the recent drama series ‘Life in Squares’ about the group, but that evening we downloaded and watched the first episode. It’s a rather silly dramatization, but good indulgent fun.

Before heading out to a pub for dinner we made a final stop at the nearby Berwick Church which contains many murals painted by Duncan and Vanessa. It was interesting to see the style of paintings – so much more realistic than many religious scenes with soldiers and likenesses of members of their immediate family included.

Murals by Duncan Grant

Berwick Church

Mural by Vanessa Bell

Old video where I explain how much I love Virginia Woolf's The Waves

I had the most fantastic weekend and it’s given me a renewed love for Virginia Woolf’s work. I hope to go back and read the Persephone Books edition of her Diaries later this year after I finish reading all the submissions for the Green Carnation Prize. I feel really lucky and grateful to have had this experience. It was an especially thoughtful present.

Have you ever visited Monk’s House or another residence of one of your favourite writers? Did it change how you read them?

Bateman's (Kipling's Home)

Butterflies on Monk's House stairwell

Inspiration for Woolf's fiction Flush

Forster & TS Eliot at Monk's House

Holding The Waves and grapes from the Woolf's garden - they tasted sweet!

Looking in the window of the Monk's house sitting room

Did You Ever Have a Family by Bill Clegg

At first I had trouble with the title of this novel. Something about it sounds too posed and self-helpish or cloyingly sentimental like The Simpson’s character Monty Burns’ hilariously-titled autobiography “Will There Ever Be a Rainbow?” The question this novel poses is taken from an Alan Shapiro poem about the catastrophic loss of a loved one. Not so much a question as an achingly painful statement of fact for a family now broken and lost. At one point in “Did You Ever Have a Family” a character directly posits this statement to another. It’s a way of contemplating the meaning of family and our connection to one another. It takes on layers of meaning over the course of reading this novel making you wonder if families can survive despite how we might tear each other apart or fail one another. Told through a variety of characters’ perspectives, this is a novel that presents points of views about how different families can be shaped and how individuals continue reforming connections even after experiencing devastation.

At the centre of Bill Clegg’s novel revolving around a single disastrous event is a chilly silence. Many of the characters have retreated from the world to grieve and think in solitude. Contemplation is needed because “grief can sometimes get loud, and when it does, we try not to speak over it.” Former art dealer June literally walked out of her life with only the possessions in her pocket and now stays in a distant isolated motel for the foreseeable future. Cleaner Lydia stops working after a dramatic confrontation with gossiping ladies. She lives frugally and her only human connection is with a scammer who calls her persistently on the phone. Lydia wilfully submits to this man who claims she’s won the lottery despite knowing it’s a con. This reminds me strongly of the wonderful debut novel “We Are Not Ourselves” in which a grieving wife Eileen participates in spiritualist sessions which demand large fees despite her awareness she’s not really connecting with her deceased husband again. (Incidentally, author Matthew Thomas is a client of literary agent Bill Clegg.) It’s a particularly insidious characteristic of con-artists to prey upon the grief-stricken who might not be fooled but feel they must offer some monetary sacrifice as penance for ways they feel they’ve failed their lost loved ones.

There are beautiful passages of reflection, but overall this is a very chatty novel. Out of a tale about a house that literally exploded come the voices and opinions of the community around this event with their judgements, sympathy and tales of their own tragedies. At first it’s all speculation and opinion about the central mystery of how this disaster which claimed five lives (including a couple shortly due to be wed) occurred. The disparate voices did at times sound like talk show guests or subjects in a Frederick Wiseman documentary as they are so firmly entrenched and certain about the rightness of their point of view. But, out of these perspectives which ricochet off one another, emerge fuller stories about a scorned wife who gave birth to an illegitimate mixed-race boy named Luke, the tragic foreshortening of his promising future and the unlikely love he found with a divorced woman estranged from her family. There is also the tale of lovers Kelly & Rebecca whose hard-won romance sees them settle into a peaceful life running a motel. Gradually the novel is taken over by the more authoritative voices of June, Lydia, Silas (a wayward stoner with a sexual infatuation with Lydia) and Cissy (a motel cleaner who offers solace to lost souls). The novel takes on real velocity in the second half where the accumulation of details pays off to form a moving conclusion.

“Did You Ever Have a Family” contains a clamour of voices with stories which at times tip into the melodramatic, but at its heart it says something very touching about overwhelming grief and the endeavour to persist because “we are supposed to stick around and play our part.” For a novel containing such sadness, I found a lot of rapturous pleasure in discovering what really happened and assembling the jigsaw puzzle of connections between the characters.

Birthday Read: Mystery Inc by Joyce Carol Oates

It’s my birthday today and, as I explained last year, it’s a personal tradition to read a book I’ve never got around to reading for one reason or another. This year I consciously saved something until today. “Mystery, Inc” by Joyce Carol Oates was published in July this year as a standalone short story by Head of Zeus Books and part of Mysterious Press’ ‘Bibliomysteries’ series. Anyone who is familiar with the bulk of Oates’ writing knows she has a predilection for the macabre and a fascinating engagement with the tradition of gothic literature. This is most evident in her "gothic series" of five novels which first begins with "Bellefleur," but also in many of her short stories and the many novels she's written under pseudonyms. 

I can’t imagine a better story to have saved as a special treat. This book is a fantastically-enjoyable and hypnotically-narrated short crime story. It’s also a bibliophile’s dream as it centres on a beautiful old New England bookstore and includes exhaustive lists of special editions of books that are discussed with reverence: “signed first editions by John Dickson Carr, Agatha Christie, and S.S. Van Dine… 1888 first edition of A Study in Scarlet… first edition of The Hound of the Baskervilles…Charles Dickens’s Bleak House (priced at $75,000), signed by Dickens in his strong, assured hand, in ink that has scarcely faded!” The narrator greedily wishes to obtain these volumes himself and plays with the idea of stealing them. So surprising to read in a book someone recalling with wistful feeling the thrilling rush of shoplifting in a bookshop: “Ah, those days before security cameras!” But the narrator has visited the bookstore while wearing a disguise with the much more sinister intent of poisoning the owner so that he can eventually acquire the shop himself to add to his growing chain of mystery bookshops. The story is sumptuously detailed in its descriptions of the shop, books and artworks displayed. It provoked strong feelings of warm-hearted nostalgia in me as what reader hasn’t felt the pleasure of perusing the shelves of bookstores and all the treasures they contain?

As the plot thickens, the tension rises while the narrator talks with the gregarious owner Aaron Neuhaus over mugs of cappuccino. There is a kinship between the men, but at the same time the narrator sees himself as a predator intent on disposing of Neuhaus to take his business and he even imagines himself taking Neuhaus’ wife! He’s threatened by Neuhaus’ success, particularly the lucrative online bookselling he does. However, Neuhaus has less interest in the business side of things and is more a passionate reader who has a philosophical interest in the genre of mystery. He states that “It is out of the profound mystery of life that ‘mystery books’ arise. And, in turn, ‘mystery books’ allow us to see the mystery of life more clearly, from perspectives not our own.”

Aaron Neuhaus has a print of Goya's stark & haunting painting The Dog in his bookshop

The tale turns as Neuhaus describes the history of his bookshop and the various ill-fates of the previous owners by tunnelling backwards in time like a ghost story about a cursed house. There is a shift in control as the narrator listens and it’s as if the predator has become the prey. The story ends in such a fascinatingly ambiguous way that left me unsettled and feeling a rush of wonder. This short story is in some ways like a compressed variation of the wonderful book-length thriller “Jack of Spades” which Oates published earlier this year. Anyone who is thrilled by this story will want to read this longer novel. It was such a joy reading "Mystery Inc" early this morning in my so-called "book nook" at the back of my apartment while drinking tea and listening to the airplanes somewhere over London humming by.

It felt so perfect and pleasurable reading Oates' story this morning that I felt connected to something greater. Not a higher intellectual or spiritual plane but that common ground of sharing a good story thrillingly told, taking part in that agreement between author and reader to indulge in a fantasy which plays upon the deepest murmurings of the subconscious. Like many people, I've encountered some difficult times in my life so I'm grateful for the peace offered by this solitude to read, participate in such enjoyable fiction and reflect.

Tonight I’m looking forward to seeing Sufjan Stevens perform at the Royal Festival Hall and having some dim sum with friends beforehand. Thanks to everyone who has been in touch with me over the past year to discuss books and suggested more things to read.

Skyfaring by Mark Vanhoenacker

One of the longest flights I’ve taken in my life was from London to Beijing several years ago. Flying over the vast mountains and tundra of northern Asia I was amazed how incredibly desolate it was. Looking at a blank space on a map can’t convey the hundreds of miles of inaccessible emptiness that exists when you glide over it at such a height. Flying has the potential to radically shift your spatial awareness of the world. Or it may just be an isolated amount of time to catch up on reading or watching movies. I find our relationship to flying fascinating and I once wrote an absurdist short story about passengers in an airplane watching people rise from the earth. You can listen to a recording of this story ‘Rise’ being read by the actor Matt Alford at Liars’ League NYC here. Although people have many different reactions to the experience of flying, few have given such a sustained and deeply sensitive amount of thought about it as pilot Mark Vanhoenacker has in his book “Skyfaring.” This is an extended meditation on the process of flying and the way it transforms our relationship to the world we inhabit.

Vanhoenacker has flown all over the planet having worked for around a dozen years as a commercial 747 airline pilot. In this book he combines his technical insight about the mechanics of flight with his poetic sensibility about his place in the world. He focuses on particular subjects such as 'machine', 'air', 'water' or 'night' by combining scientific knowledge with meditations upon his experiences in flight. He's like a modern Antoine de Saint-Exupery who I first read last year. Of course, Vanhoenacker references him as well as many other writers to support different points he makes or illuminate profoundly different ways of viewing the world. He draws upon a wide variety of literary sources from the poet Rumi to Emily Bronte to Joan Didion. The convergence of all these things in this book creates deep-feeling insights on the distance between the self and the world around us.

Watch Mark Vanhoenacker read from and discuss his book Skyfaring at University Bookstore in Seattle.

What's so engaging about “Skyfaring” is Vanhoenacker's beautiful style of writing which provokes deep contemplation. It exhibits both an authoritative understanding and a ceaseless wonder. Stories of his life-long journey towards becoming a pilot are combined with specific experiences he's had flying around the world. There is a curiosity and excitement he shows about the naming of places, the nature of clouds, the poignancy of anonymous encounters which is infectious and makes you want to read more. It also paints the world and skies he sees on his flights with such exquisite detail it helps you re-experience and re-view those times you spent looking out of a plane's window. This book is a deeply thoughtful and enjoyable read.