Ms. Itani has written two superb books about an Ontario community coping with the aftermath of WWI, Deafening (2003) and Tell (2011). This story is about Hanova who learns in 1958 on her 18th birthday that she was adopted as a child. Itani’s exquisite writing is subtle and expressive: the beauty of ordinariness (much like Carole Shields and Alice Munro). Her description of a trip to a dance hall is perfect. Hanora’s life during WWII and her subsequent considerable success as a writer is a major focus of the book, along with her quest for information about her birth parents. Itani’s impeccable writing covers diverse topics like art and music; she is a national literary treasure.
Category: Location / Setting
Educated – Tara Westover
This is a remarkable memoir where reality is stranger than fiction. The author was raised in the mountains of Utah. Her parents were survivalists and totally suspicious of government so she had no birth certificate and does not go to school. To say that she was home-schooled is rather generous; her learning is self-directed and spotty. Tara is the youngest of 5 children. Her life is complicated by a controlling father and a brother who bullies her both psychologically and physically. The second half of the book details her escape to university, first to Brigham Young University and then to Cambridge England. This is a compelling story of remarkable resilience but at great cost. The contradictions of memory are also a feature of a memoir that is so deeply emotional. Final comment: Westover’s parents make the parents in Jeanette Wall’s The Glass Castle seem wonderful by comparison! Thanks Erin and Amy, for this recommendation.
The Old Drift – Namwali Serpell
This delightful novel resents a sweeping saga of Africa (Zambia) from 1903 to the future (2024), covering three generations (the grandmothers, mothers and children) of black, brown and white individuals. The challenges of life in Zambia’s transition from colonialism to independence are highlighted graphically: the conflict of wealth and privilege versus poverty, the HIV catastrophe, revolutionary actions, hair, high-tech drones…. In fact, you should be wondering how these diverse topics can be inter-related!. This is a wonderful blend of historical and speculative writing with some great phrases; a married couple is described precisely – “their marriage has ceased to be conjugal; his body did not conjugate hers; there was no grammar between them”.
Akin – Emma Donoghue
An odd couple makes a trip to Nice France. Noah is a 79-year-old recently-widowed childless retired University professor; Michael is his 11-year-old great-nephew who Noah has never met. Their wildly disparate backgrounds create both considerable conflict and humour as they investigate a series of World War II photographs from Noah’s mother. This is a wondrously written story of love, loss and family.
Paris Echo – Sebastian Faulks
Faulks is a superb writer (A Week in December) and this latest novel continues his tradition of literary excellence. Above all, the story is a love letter to Paris, with two interesting and vastly dissimilar characters. Hannah is a 31-year-old American historian researching the experiences of Parisienne women during World War II. Tariq is a 19-year-old from Morocco looking for … something. There are echoes of the past in the present that are fascinating. This is a thought-provoking story with two memorable characters: highly recommended.
The Rosie Result – Graeme Simsion
The concluding book of the Don Tillman Trilogy finds Don, Rosie and their 11-year old son Hudson relocating to Melbourne. Hudson’s school observes some social troubles and requests an autism assessment. This stimulates Don’s formidable problem-solving abilities, the Hudson Project, to aid Hudson in acquiring skills to fit in. The story addresses important questions: is labelling useful in terms of identity; should people on the autism spectrum adjust their behaviour and thinking to match neuro-typical norms? And there is bullying and a confrontation with an anti-vaxxer parent. Overall, a compelling read, with humour and psychological insight into the complexity of human behaviour. Highly recommended.
Normal People – Sally Rooney
This is a superbly-written relationship book. The story covers four years in the lives of Connell and Marianne, one year at high school in the west of Ireland followed by University at Trinity College in Dublin. Rooney’s writing illustrates perfectly that relationships are complicated even between two people with undeniable chemistry, complications by miscommunication and misperception of feelings. There is also emotional paralysis by expectations of inadequacy and not belonging. Connell and Marianne are very different people from different backgrounds, resulting in feelings of isolation and disconnection. This is a great book, better than her first book Conversations With Friends.
Olive Again – Elizabeth Strout
This is a sublime sequel to Ms. Strout’s exquisite Pulitzer Prize-winning Olive Kitteredge. Olive remains a somewhat difficult, direct, honest but unfiltered and often irascible character. Her relationship with her second husband, her son from her first marriage, and the townspeople in a seaside town in Maine are, not surprisingly, complicated but entertaining. The stories show a delightful ordinariness of people. And finally, the book has a powerful treatise on ageing and (the lack of) self-awareness. A superb read.
The Diary of a Bookseller – Shawn Bythell
After buying a bookshop in the southwest corner of Scotland in 2001, the author/owner keeps a one-year diary of the bookshop activities in 2014. He is an often grumpy and irascible commentator on: his rotating staff and their idiosyncrasies, his customers, and the precarious state of independent second-hand bookshops. And his pet peeve, the Amazon juggernaut. There is lots about buying books from estates. Throughly entertaining.
What David Read 