Category: Book Reviews
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“The Leisure Seeker” by Michael Zadoorian
Ella and John have been together for more than sixty years. Now in their eighties Ella has developed terminal cancer whilst John is living with dementia. Aware that they don’t have all that much time left together they decide to leave their home in the American Midwest and take one last long road trip across…
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“There Were No Windows” by Norah Hoult
The acclaimed Irish novelist, Norah Hoult wrote There Were No Windows during the Second World War when she was living in Bayswater, London close to the ageing writer, Violet Hunt. Hoult based her novel’s protagonist, Claire Temple very closely on Violet Hunt: garnering some criticism for how recognisable Hunt was in Temple’s character. The portrait is far…
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“Flight” by Oona Frawley
Irish novelist, Oona Frawley’s debut novel Flight is a beautifully observed portrait of four lives intersecting. It’s set just outside Dublin in 2004 as a referendum on citizenship approaches. Sandrine is a pregnant Zimbabwean women who has left her husband and son at home seeking to better herself and ultimately gain citizenship for them all in Ireland.…
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“Gratitude” by Delphine De Vigan
Translated from the French by George Miller Gratitude is the sixth book by French novelist Delphine De Vigan. It’s a slender little novel, I might even call it a novella, and explores one simple idea in a really beautiful and tender way. Michka is an elderly lady living with dementia in a residential care facility. As…
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“May” by Naomi Kruger
Naomi Kruger’s beautifully written debut novel May is a story about how we remember the past, what we choose to hold on to and what must be let go. It centres around May, an elderly women living with dementia in a residential care facility. The novel is structured around a single day in May’s life. May’s own…
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“The Boiling Point for Jam” by Lynda Tavakoli
The Boiling Point for Jam is Northern Ireland-based poet, Lynda Tavakoli’s debut collection. It covers a wide range of themes including war, personal loss, ageing, the natural world and Tavakoli’s connection to both Fermanagh and Tehran. The poems are both assured and characterised by a lightness of touch which often had me re-reading lines a second…
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“Minor Monuments” by Ian Maleney
Minor Monuments is a collection of personal essays by Dublin-based writer Ian Maleney. They’re all set around his family’s small farm on the edge of a bog a few miles from the River Shannon. They explore issues around belonging, place, home, memory and nature and weave together Maleney’s personal experience with his musings on literature,…
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“Grandpa’s Great Escape” by David Walliams
I don’t make a habit of criticising other author’s work. I know how difficult it is to write a novel. I know that the beauty of a book is often in the eye of the beholder and everyone has different tastes. What gives me the right to make a value judgment about a novel? However,…
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“The Twilight Years” by Sawako Ariyoshi
Translated from the Japanese by Mildred Tahara First published in Japan in 1972, Sawako Ariyoshi’s novel, The Twilight Years was not translated into English for almost a decade. It is very much a period piece, beautifully written and faithfully translated, albeit a little dated in terms of its outlook and attitude. The novel’s main protagonist is Kyoko,…
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“The Housekeeper and The Professor” by Yogo Ogawa
Translated from the Japanese by Stephen Snyder Memory and memory loss are reoccurring themes in Japanese novelist, Yoko Ogawa’s fiction. Last year I read and thoroughly enjoyed her most recent novel, The Memory Police which is entirely focused upon the power and importance of memory. Here, in a much earlier novel, The Housekeeper and The Professor, Ogawa…