october reads
Although I always have a book on the go, occasionally I go through periods of intense reading. In the month of October I've been on a roll (perhaps aided by moving house = no internet), so here's a little round-up of what I've read, am reading and to read next.
read
The Pisces by Melissa Broder
I really enjoyed this, buuuuut I'm not going to tell you what it's "about" or at least what the marketing and Twitter buzz said it was about because it really skewed how I read the book. I will say it's about a woman in her late-30s after a break-up who is depressed and going to therapy for her love and sex addiction (CW: the book deals with suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts). The writing is contemporary, witty and most of the characters are a delightful mix of sympathetic and despicable.
Wild Magic by Tamora Pierce
This is one of my favourite series from my early teen years. It's about a young girl who can speak to animals and is all set in a shared magical world from Pierce's other books. It's like a young, proto-feminist Earthsea. When I fall out of love with reading I always return to a book of my youth to get me going again and this did the trick in October.
Things We Say in the Dark by Kirsty Logan
Logan's latest short story collection is her scariest and best. Like read-with-the-light-on creepy. They're also grounded in reality and the horrors that haunt us. Logan challenges herself in this book to write her deepest fears, what's at the core of what makes us human. The answers are wide-ranging, sad, terrible and awful (in both senses of the word). The meta-narrative which cleaves close to Logan's own life brings all the stories together and gives an additional layer of commentary on our fears.
The Diver's Game by Jesse Ball
I read this for my friend's book club -- it's a post-apocalyptic book set in a world where the ruling classes carry gas with them and can kill/poison/subdue any "non-citizen" who has left their designated neighbourhood. Written from three distinct points-of-view the prose is stark and minimal and blindingly violent in places. It doesn't follow narrative genre conventions, there is no uprising, no overthrowing of governments (this aint no The Hunger Games) instead it invites us to question what happens to society when "certain people (read: refugees) are designated non-human and delves into the psyche of different people to show how such thinking affects their ways of being. It manages this while being also extremely readable.
Moominvalley in November by Tove Jansson
Surprise! A Moomin book! And one I've never read. This is the last Moomin book Jansson wrote and coincided with the death of her beloved mother. The Moomins are actually absent from the book, instead the other characters, Snufkin, Mumble the Hemulin and co., along with a new character, Toft (a stand-in for Jansson) descend upon the Moomin house and try to make it into a home. A rather poor imitation of the Moomin-home to be honest. The tone here is Autumnal and elegiac. I've read a chapter before I went to bed to soothe my brain. At the end, Toft is left to welcome the Moomins alone and it very much feels like Jansson is asking to be left alone with her Moomins now in peace. She never wrote another Moomin book after this one.
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo
This is a book made up of many voices, each chapter is from a different character (all inter-connected) and each voice always grabbed me right away. The chapters look backwards and forwards across their life, skimming along the surface but always revealing character. It's a deeply contemporary book about the lives of mostly black and queer women and how they see themselves and those around them. The prose is almost like free verse, with paragraphs flowing into one another without punctuation, but rather than giving a breathless account it allows for pauses and nuances to soak in. I sobbed for a full minute when I read the last chapter.
am reading
The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber
The only Michel Faber book I haven't read, this is a biggie: 800 pages of Victorian-style writing charting the life and times of Sugar, a young sex-worker who is writing a book in which she takes revenge on all her clients; and William Rackham, a perfume business owner who becomes obsessed with her and decides to "keep" her as his private mistress. Faber skewers a lot of Victorian novel conventions in the book (interestingly using the same technique in The Diver's Game to address the reader directly as if taking them on a tour of the novel). I wouldn't normally read a book so big (Tl;DR) but I trust Faber's writing and I'm enjoying steadily working my way through this during the darkening evenings.
Varieties of Disturbance by Lydia Davis
Crimson Petal is a really big book so I needed something else to read on my commute: hence Lydia Davis, queen of the short, short, short story. Some last barely half a page. The wonder here is Davis's ability to take an everyday occurrence (dropping a rescued caterpillar on the stair, calling one's mother, a dog who may or may not have farted) and turning into an opportunity for wry, thoughtful observation. (The caterpillar becomes a meditation on what we allow ourselves to forget, the maybe farting dog on the mores of social interaction). Reading Davis is a joy of discovery.
to read next
Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe by Fannie Flag
I promised a friend I would read this along with them which I'm looking forward to doing. Aside from vaguely recalling the film and that it's got some queer lady elements in it I don't know much more than that.
Promising Young Women by Caroline O'Donoghue
Another recommendation from two friends I trust. Not my usual kind of read but I've been told it's not what it seems so looking forward to finding out just what that is.
You know I can talk endlessly about books so please tell me what you read or are reading in October -- spooky reads, Autumn reads, re-reads or prize-winners, let me know!
If you have a tiny narrative to share please get in touch at thetinynarrative@gmail.com