january/february 2023 books…

Tin Man (Sarah Winman): This is the third Winman book I’ve read and I have to admit that I’ve become a huge fan. There are LOTS of reasons I loved this book, namely: a) it was set in Oxford, b) much of the ‘action’ takes place a mere half mile from where we used to live, c) the story takes place at the time when we were actually still living in Oxford, d) the two male characters were pretty well my age… but also e) it is a beautiful story. Ellis, Annie and Michael form a tight friendship and they absolutely adore one another. The novel is about sexual identity and the 1980s Aids epidemic, love, loneliness and loss (heartrending and emotional)… but also about celebrating life and even relinquished dreams. It evoked wonderful memories of our own time as students in the city at that transition stage in our lives… away from home for the first time, full of wonder at finding ourselves in beautiful Oxford, making mistakes but still feeling keen to discover new things, forming new friendships… and still naïve enough, perhaps, to think we could probably change the world. I loved this book.
Pew (Catherine Lacey): This is our next Storysmith bookgroup book. It’s a haunting, mysterious fable about a silent stranger of indeterminate age, gender and ethnicity who wakes up on a pew during Sunday morning service in a church in a small American town. The individual – who for want of a better name is called ‘Pew’ by the family who discover him/her – is unwilling to speak, has no memory of who they are or where they came from (although the opening chapter indicates something of a recent life of rough sleeping). It all takes place in a small, sinister, devout town in the Bible-belt American south and book describes the events of the next seven days in seven chapters. The family who finds Pew decides to ‘do the Christian thing’ and take him/her in. The narrow-minded townspeople can’t agree on anything about Pew (Pew isn’t really given any choice in the matter): some think he’s a child, others believe she’s a young woman… and even the colour of their skin is confusing. To complicate matters, the story takes place over a week leading up to an ominous-sounding ‘Forgiveness Festival’. The fact that Pew doesn’t correspond to community’s conservative Christianity principles presents an intolerable challenge to the town’s ‘leaders’. At times, it almost felt like reading ‘1984’ – where society was insisting on compliance to its rules by all members, without question. A sinister, disturbing and somewhat depressing read.
The Trees (Percival Everett): This is another of the shortlisted Booker Prize 2022 books. It’s potent satire of US racism involving the investigation of gruesome murders in Mississippi (more murders, it seems, than the opening frames of a Clint Eastwood ‘Spaghetti Western’?). The book is, somewhat ridiculously, brilliantly funny (and horrific). It’s set in the small town of Money in deep south Mississippi… and begins with the bizarre murders (and brutal disfigurement) of three members of a dysfunctional white family… but, as one critic points out, unit with its morose matriarch Granny C, her son Wheat Bryant, and her nephew, Junior Junior. “this time it’s the white folks’ turn to be rendered in grotesque caricature, and the actions of this feckless clan are played as broad knockabout, almost like a reverse minstrel show”. It transpires that the family had been partly responsible for the death, by lynching, of a 14-year-old black boy in 1955, after being wrongly accused by a white woman (from the family) of making suggestive remarks. The 105-year-old black grandmother character points out that “Less than 1 percent of lynchers were ever convicted of a crime. Only a fraction of those ever served a sentence… No one was interviewed. No suspects were identified. No one was arrested. No one was charged. No one cared”. The latest murders lead to a gruesome series of copy-cat murders around the country and the plot escalates as the lynched dead begin to rise up. The initial crimes are investigated by (among others) two hilariously funny black officers of the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation. It all gets very complicated(!), but the central focus of the book (taking a direct aim at racism and police violence) leaves a lasting, powerful impression.
Things Fall Apart (Chinua Achebe): This is our Blokes’ Book group’s next book selection. The novel is set in the late 19^th century (first published in 1958) and tells a story of the colonisation of Africa at the height of the ‘scramble’ for African territories by the great European powers. It focusses on Okonkwo, a proud and highly respected Igbo from Umuofia, somewhere near the Lower Niger. Okonkwo's clan are farmers, their complex society a patriarchal, democratic one and where village life has not changed substantially in generations…  but then the English arrive, with the Bible and the gun. The white man is allowed to stay, but he essentially regards the incumbents as a primitive people who need to be educated and brought to faith. The story is set against the background of Ibo culture and the complexities and traditions of Umuofian society. It represents something of an embarrassing, shameful indictment of the colonisation of Africa. It’s a stark, beautifully-written, tragic story and I found it profoundly impressive.
Ink (Alice Broadway): This is our daughter’s first book of the ‘Ink Trilogy’ (published in 2017) and, obviously I’ve previously read it (twice)! I re-read it AGAIN while recently staying at Alice’s – having finished the book I’d taken with me. The words on the book’s cover set up the story: “Imagine a world where your every action, your every deed, is marked on your skin for all to see…”. It’s a powerful, quite brilliant, YA novel (me? biased?) written in the form of a fable which in some ways, perhaps, reflects what’s happening in the world today. It’s about truth, wisdom, loyalty, justice, love… it’s about fears and taboos; it’s about greed and power; it’s about belief and conformity; it’s about integrity and honesty… Our daughter has a real gift for storytelling!