Micro Review 12 (2024) Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize

 

Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar (Pan Macmillan)

This was my last read from the Waterstones Prize shortlist and sadly it wasn't a case that I'd left the best until last. In fact for quite some time I wasn't sure that I'd even get to the end of the book - and I rarely mark a book DNF (did not finish).

Cyrus Shams is lost.

Ever since his mother’s plane was senselessly shot down over the Persian Gulf when he was just a baby, Cyrus has been grappling with her death. Now, newly sober, he is set to learn the truth of her life.

When an encounter with a dying artist leads Cyrus towards the mysteries of his past - an uncle who rode through Iranian battlefields dressed as an Angel of Death, a haunting work of art by an exiled painter – he finds himself once again caught up in the story of his mother, who may not have been who or what she seemed. As Cyrus searches for meaning in the scattered clues of his life, a final revelation transforms everything he thought he knew.

The premise of this one was good - how does one respond when a parent has become a martyr? It was made all the more interesting as Cyrus's dad then moved them to the country responsible for his mother's death.

However for much of the book I found the descriptions of drinking and drug taking to be overwhelming and it was impossible for me to connect with the characters at all. 

Once the action moved to New York I did become more enthralled and the preconceived ideas I'd made from the blurb were challenged, and then the next ideas as to where the plot was going were also proved wrong and I found myself breathlessly turning the page to see how the story was going to resolve.

This book isn't going to be for everyone, and in a way made a nice complementary read to one of my Women In Translation books, but I am glad I did stick with it.

Women In Translation 2024

 

I am so pleased that I saw advance warning of this go by online as while I do read a lot of books in translation (40 last year and 36 already this year) I don't really pay attention to the author - it is if the book appeals to me that is important!

However as a break in my Waterstones Prize Reading I have been consciously looking through my TBR pile and pulling out the books that are translated fiction by women. I may get through a couple more by the end of August but a pile of reservations from the library are calling and a lot of these can't be renewed!

Women in Translation books read in August 2024.

Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck (translated from German by Michael Hofmann)

In the Streets of Tehran by Nila (translated from Iranian by Poupeh Missaghi)

The Book of Disappearance by Ibtisam Azem (translated from Arabic by Sinan Antoon)

Background for Love by Helen Wolff & Marion Detjen (translated from German by Tristram Wolff & Jefferson Chase)

The Third Love by Hiromi Kawakami (translated from Japanese by Ted Goossen)

Half Swimmer by Katja Oskamp (translated from German by Jo Heinrich

The Full Moon Coffee Shop by Mai Mochizuki (translated from Japanese by Jesse Kirkwood)

I have managed to read so many books in translation this month because most of them have been novellas rather than full length books, but also because in the main they have been so very good I've found it hard to put them down!

While I try to read widely and from as many different languages as possible this month has been heavily influenced by German and Japanese literature, and I have noticed that as a whole most of the books I've read translated from German in 2024 have been about dealing with life in East Germany before the Berlin Wall fell, and then how the reunification worked out for former Ossies.

Looking at my reading stats for the the year to date I can see that I've read books translated from Japanese, German, Korean, French, Arabic, Iranian, Greek (Cypriot Greek), Greek (Ancient Greek), German (Austrian), and Norwegian.

I am hoping to expand this over the next year and using the brilliant resources provided by The Women in Translation project and Norfolk Libraries!

Micro review 11 (2024) Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize

 

Greta & Valdin by Rebecca K Reilly (Cornerstone)

My shortlist reading continued with this quirky book from New Zealand and it was one that I'd been aware of for a while but kept putting off reading - due to my misconception of the book.

Siblings Greta and Valdin have, perhaps, too much in common. They're flatmates, beholden to the same near-unpronounceable surname, and both make questionable choices when it comes to love.

Valdin is in love with his ex-boyfriend Xabi, who left the country because he thought he was making Valdin sad. Greta is in love with fellow English tutor Holly, who appears to be using her for admin support. But perhaps all is not lost. Valdin is coming to realize that he might not be so unlovable, and Greta, that she might be worth more than the papers she can mark.

Helping the siblings navigate queerness, multiracial identity, and the tendency of their love interests to flee, is the Vladisavljevic family: Maori-Russian-Catalonian, and as passionate as they are eccentric.

Rebecca K. Reilly's exploration of love, family, karaoke, and the generational reverberations of colonialism will make you laugh, cry, and fall for the whole Vladisavljevic bunch.

For some reason I'd become stuck on the first paragraph of this blurb and thought the book was going to be another book in the style of Eleanor Oliphant - a tragic(ish) story with a neurodivergent main character.

The book did have elements of that, but it was more about finding your place in the world when you have mixed heritage, are queer and there are family secrets bubbling under the surface ready to trip you up.

Despite the more unusual New Zealand setting I didn't get a huge sense of place while I was reading the novel, and it didn't grip me - I was interested enough to finish the book, but I wasn't rushing back to find out what happened next, and at times towards the end I got very muddled as to what was going on.

All in all I'm glad I decided to read all of the Waterstones Prize as otherwise this book would have languished on my shelf for years but overall not a favourite.

Micro Review 10 (2024) Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize

 

Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon (Penguin Books)

As I started reading the books for the Debut Fiction Prize so late I was aware that this was the overall winner as I started it, and as I've enjoyed all the books so far (and one is one of my top reads of the year) this one had an awful lot to live up to.

Again on paper the book was right up my street:

An exhilarating, fiercely original story of brotherhood, war and art, and of daring to dream of something bigger than ourselves.

It's 412 BC, and Athens' invasion of Sicily has failed catastrophically. Thousands of Athenian soldiers are held captive in the quarries of Syracuse, starving, dejected, and hanging on by the slimmest of threads.

Lampo and Gelon are local potters, young men with no work and barely two obols to rub together. When they take to visiting the nearby quarry, they discover prisoners who will, in desperation, recite lines from the plays of Euripides for scraps of bread and a scattering of olives.

And so an idea is born: the men will put on Medea in the quarry. A proper performance to be sung of down the ages. Because after all, you can hate the Athenians for invading your territory, but still love their poetry.

But as the audacity of their enterprise dawns on them, it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish between enemies and friends. As the performance draws near, the men will find their courage tested in ways they could never have imagined...

The author is also based in Norwich so another tick in its favour...

Sadly the book wasn't quite my cup of tea, I had hoped that it was just the abridged Book at Bedtime version that wasn't for me and that the full book would connect.

I can't quite put my finger on why the book didn't work for me. The story was interesting, I knew both Euripides plays being performed and the characters/setting were strong. I also quite liked the way the characters spoke in a vernacular way, it just left me cold and I didn't find it either a comedy or a tragedy.

I'd love to have been a fly on the wall at the discussions where the winner was chosen to find out why this one won - it was good but just not a winner in my mind.

Micro Review 9 (2024) Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize

 

The Silence in Between by Josie Ferguson (Transworld)

Next from the Debut Fiction list for me was The Silence in Between and again on paper just the type of book I adore:

The Silence in Between is a historical novel based in Berlin in 1961 and during the Second World War. Lisette lives in East Berlin but brings her new-born baby to a hospital in West Berlin.

Under doctor's orders, she goes home to rest, leaving the baby in the care of the hospital. But overnight the border between East and West closes, slicing the city - and the world - in two. With a city in chaos and armed guards ordered to shoot anyone who tries to cross, her situation is desperate.

Lisette's teenage daughter, Elly, has always struggled to understand the distance between herself and her mother. Both live for music but while Elly hears notes surrounding every person she meets, for her mother - once a talented pianist - the world has gone silent. Perhaps Elly can do something to bridge the gap between them. What begins as the flicker of an idea turns into a daring plan to escape East Berlin, find her baby brother, and bring him home....

This is the 3rd book I've read this year that is set all or partially in East Berlin during the Cold War and all of them have been absolutely brilliant - with this one sneaking ahead by a whisker.

As the author says in the end notes so much of this book seems to be too far fetched to have any historical basis where as the opposite is actually the case - and Ferguson makes the facts from history books and documentaries come to life in an incredibly visceral way. 

Some of the book makes for very hard reading but from page one I was hooked and I can definitely see this one being on my 'best of' lists at the end of the year. 

(The overall winner of the prize was announced as I was reading this one and I was genuinely upset that the prize didn't go to Ferguson.)

Micro Review 8 (2024) Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize

 

Mongrel by Hanako Footman (Footnote Press)

This was my second read from the Waterstones Debut list simply because it was the next book that arrived from the library!

This, on paper, was much more the type of book that I pick up naturally: 

Mei loses her Japanese mother at age six. Growing up in suburban Surrey, she yearns to fit in, suppressing not only her heritage but her growing desire for her best friend Fran.

Yuki leaves the Japanese countryside to pursue her dream of becoming a concert violinist in London. Far from home and in an unfamiliar city, she finds herself caught up in the charms of her older teacher.

Haruka attempts to navigate Tokyo's nightlife and all of its many vices, working as a hostess in the city's sex district. She grieves a mother who hid so many secrets from her, until finally one of those secrets comes to light . . .

Shifting between three intertwining narratives, Mongrel reveals a tangled web of desire, isolation, belonging and ultimately, hope.

I did like the book as I was reading it, but I worked out the connections between the three characters quite quickly but it was an enjoyable read to work out how the stories would intertwine and how they would react if and when they met.

Much of the book is quite dark, and very adult in content and while I'm glad I read it you can't really call it enjoyable.