This month is all about powerful memoirs, topical novels, and tragi-comedies...
Crudo by Olivia Laing
Kathy is a writer. Kathy is getting married. It's the summer of 2017 and the whole world is falling apart.
In a novel that manages somehow to be both micro and macro, anxiety ridden and strangely tender, Kathy (maybe Acker, maybe not) roams from a Tuscan villa to a new home, prize-givings and her own wedding with the backdrop of Brexit, Trump, and the end of the world. Laing's voice is as clear and as personable as it is in her non-fiction and and makes this a complex and engaging read.
Heartburn by Nora Ephron
The first day I did not think it was funny. I didn't think it was funny the third day either, but I managed to make a little joke about it.
At seven months pregnant Rachel is devastated to learn that her husband has fallen in love with someone else, someone horribly tall who she will be forced to spread salicious rumours about before the year is out. Woven with recipes, including one for mashed potatoes that must be eaten in bed and with generous helpings of butter, Ephron's novel shows how heartbreak is obviously painful, often ridiculous, and occasionally funny. Witty, sharp, and insightful, it's a joy to read.
Maybe Esther by Katja Petrowskaja
There is her Ukrainian grandfather, who disappeared during World War II and reappeared without explanation forty-one years later. (How was it that he then went back to normal family life, as though nothing had happened?) And there is her great-grandmother (was she really called Esther?)
Most people will have studied the World Wars and the Holocaust in school, but as there are as many stories as there are people it is always possible to be told something new, or simply the thing you thought you knew in a different way. Through her personal family history, Katja Petrowskaja trawls through the collective past of Europe, mixing her own life with the lives of many. Piecing together memories through official files but also the words of her parents and relatives ultimately she gives voice to generations who were lost in the lesser known sites of violence across the continent.
Kathy is a writer. Kathy is getting married. It's the summer of 2017 and the whole world is falling apart.
In a novel that manages somehow to be both micro and macro, anxiety ridden and strangely tender, Kathy (maybe Acker, maybe not) roams from a Tuscan villa to a new home, prize-givings and her own wedding with the backdrop of Brexit, Trump, and the end of the world. Laing's voice is as clear and as personable as it is in her non-fiction and and makes this a complex and engaging read.
The first day I did not think it was funny. I didn't think it was funny the third day either, but I managed to make a little joke about it.
At seven months pregnant Rachel is devastated to learn that her husband has fallen in love with someone else, someone horribly tall who she will be forced to spread salicious rumours about before the year is out. Woven with recipes, including one for mashed potatoes that must be eaten in bed and with generous helpings of butter, Ephron's novel shows how heartbreak is obviously painful, often ridiculous, and occasionally funny. Witty, sharp, and insightful, it's a joy to read.
There is her Ukrainian grandfather, who disappeared during World War II and reappeared without explanation forty-one years later. (How was it that he then went back to normal family life, as though nothing had happened?) And there is her great-grandmother (was she really called Esther?)
Most people will have studied the World Wars and the Holocaust in school, but as there are as many stories as there are people it is always possible to be told something new, or simply the thing you thought you knew in a different way. Through her personal family history, Katja Petrowskaja trawls through the collective past of Europe, mixing her own life with the lives of many. Piecing together memories through official files but also the words of her parents and relatives ultimately she gives voice to generations who were lost in the lesser known sites of violence across the continent.
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