Books of the Year 2017

Due to life interfering, I read half as many books this year as I have in previous years. What I have read though has, on the whole, been incredibly good. I’ve selected the ten I loved the most and included five others I highly recommend at the end of the piece. If I’ve reviewed the book in full, there’s a link at the bottom of the description.

When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife – Meena Kandasamy

The story of a marriage between a young, educated woman and a university lecturer. When I Hit You is both a tale of domestic violence and of a woman becoming a writer by writing her way out of her situation. Kandasamy’s experimental style frames the experience as though the narrator is witnessing the horror brought upon her. It’s brutal, it’s thoughtful, it’s shocking. It’s incredibly relevant in 2017.

You can read my full review and watch my interview with Meena Kandasamy here.

What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky – Leslie Nnedi Arimah

Hands down the best short story collection I’ve ever read. Arimah does things with the form that shouldn’t be possible. In the first story, for example, the protagonist is held in a moment while the back story of everything that led to that point is revealed and yet the tension holds sharp. Many of the stories are concerned with the way women are shaped by/shape themselves around men, all of them carry an emotional punch.

Homegoing – Yaa Gyasi

Two sisters, Effia and Esa, born in West Africa in the 1770s are separated. One becomes the wife of a slave trader, the other is shipped to America as a slave. Gyasi follows the two lines to the present day. Each chapter focuses on the next branch of the family tree and works as a short story in its own right. Alongside this runs the story of the creation of the black race, its reasons and consequences. It’s an incredible achievement.

My full review is here.

Attrib. and Other Stories – Eley Williams

Williams’ debut short story collection is full of animals, clever word play, humour and love. While all of these elements contribute to intelligent, engaging stories, it’s the emotions at the core of the tales which elevate them to something special. The reader’s transported to the position of the narrator, feeling their anticipation at the potential lover standing next to them or their loss at the one who’s just left.

You can read my full review and watch my interview with Eley Williams here.

First Love – Gwendoline Riley

Neve is a writer in her mid-thirties, exploring her marriage to an older man, Edwyn, and the impact previous relationships, both romantic and familial, have had on who they are now. Almost everyone in Neve’s life is abusive in some form; Riley conveys this through a range of incidents told from Neve’s perspective, leading the reader to question whether or not she’s telling the truth. Searing and utterly pertinent in 2017.

My full review is here.

Vernon Subutex 1 – Virginie Despentes (translated by Frank Wynne)

Vernon Subutex once ran a legendary record shop in Paris. When his benefactor and musician friend, Alex Bleach, dies, Vernon is left homeless. Subutex moves between the houses and apartments of friends and acquaintances before ending up on the streets. Despentes gives a searing commentary on Western society’s views of a range of hot topics: social media, hijabs, the rich, sex workers and a whole lot more.

The End We Start From – Megan Hunter

An unnamed narrator gives birth to a boy as floodwaters rise in the U.K. Soon London is covered and the narrator and her new family can’t return to their flat. They move to their in-laws and then on to a refugee camp. Also works as a metaphor for the first year of motherhood. Taut and compelling.

My full review is here.

Homesick for Another World – Ottessa Moshfegh

A collection of stories about ordinary people at their worst, it’s a mirror held up to today’s society: to the misogyny, to the privilege, to the hypocrisy. Some of the characters know better but can’t be arsed to do better; some of them make an attempt but fall flat at the first hurdle. The collection’s full of characters for whom, essentially, nothing changes. Only Moshfegh could pull that off.

My full review is here.

Elmet – Fiona Mosley

“Daddy“ builds a house in a copse in the woods for himself and his teenage children, Daniel and Cathy. The land on which he builds is owned by Price, the most influential man in the area. Daddy is fully aware of the antagonism this will cause, but, as the best bare-knuckle fighter in the U.K. and Ireland, he wields his own form of power. From this moment, the two men are pitted against each other; it’s a matter of when, not if, the violent tension will explode. An exploration of gender roles and what happens if you transgress them, as well as a commentary on class and privilege.

I wrote about why Elmet is an important working class novel for OZY.

Seeing Red – Lina Meruane (translated by Megan McDowell)

At a party, Lucina feels a pain and blood begins to fill her eyes. She begins to go blind. The doctor tells her he can do nothing other than monitor the situation, leaving her to adjust to a life in which she has to rely on others to help her. She is furious and her anger increases as the story progresses. Told in flash length chapters with short, spiky, repetitive sentences. Horrifying and brilliant.

You can read my full review and watch my interview with Lina Meruane here.

And the highly recommended:

Tinman – Sarah Winman

Ellis and Michael are inseparable until Annie arrives in their lives and Ellis marries her. A story of hidden love, friendship, AIDS and art. Beautiful and heart-wrenching.

A Book of Untruths – Miranda Doyle

A memoir about Doyle’s family. Every chapter reveals a lie that’s been told while questioning the reliability of memory and the purpose of memoir writing.

A Manual for Heartache – Cathy Rentzenbrink

An indispensable guide for when the worst happens to you or someone close to you. My piece about it is here.

The Lonely Hearts Hotel – Heather O’Neill

The love story of performers Rose and Perrot and also a scathing commentary on patriarchal society’s treatment of women, particularly with regards to sex and shame.

My full review is here.

The Other Half of Happiness – Ayisha Malik

The sequel to Sofia Khan Is Not Obliged. Sofia’s married to Conall but there’s a whopping great secret he hasn’t told her. Has a punch the air, feminist ending.

My full review and interview with Ayisha Malik is here.

The End We Start From – Megan Hunter

As an unnamed woman gives birth to a son, floodwaters rise in London. Unable to return to their flat, the woman, her husband, R, and their baby, Z, go to R’s parents’ house. R begins to build a shed for them to live in.

Words float up the stairs like so many childhood letter magnets. Endgame, civilization, catastrophe, humanitarian.

Everyone but the narrator and Z leave to get supplies. G, her mother-in-law, doesn’t return, the explanation given is ‘pandemonium’. On the second trip to get supplies, N, her father-in-law fails to return. From that point, the narrator, R and Z are refugees, sleeping in their car before finally deciding on a camp to live in.

I try to feel the solidity of the date beneath me try to make the day and the month and the year mean something.

It is never quiet here. Z learns to cry loudly again. He is not the only one.

Hunter follows this woman cut adrift, literally and metaphorical, through a year of her life. While the narrative can be read as a dystopic version of the UK in which the effects of climate change have wrought havoc, it also works as a metaphor for the first year of motherhood. It mirrors the feelings of isolation and fear, of the loss of sense of self and sense of time.

The prose is sparse, considered. Paragraphs are short and there is plenty of white space on the page. The reader is also cut adrift, the first person narrative allowing us to only see and feel as this mother of a new-born does.

Interspersed with the narrator’s story are pieces inspired by and adapted from a range of mythical texts. These link to Hunter’s themes: ideas of creation, flooding and the quest for a better place to live. They add to the sense that the narrative is a carefully crafted jigsaw puzzle that’s been laid out in the correct order but left for someone else to slot together.

The End We Start From is powerful, taut, compelling, unsettling. A bold, beautiful work of art.

 

Thanks to Picador for the review copy.

 

 

In the Media, April 2017, Part One

In the media is a fortnightly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous fortnight and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as as traditional media are likely and the categories used are a guide, not definitives.

Photograph by Murdo MacLeod

 

Women have been dominating the prize wins for the past fortnight. Hollie McNish won the Ted Hughes Prize and Kiran Millwood Hargrave won the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize with The Girl of Ink and Stars.

While The Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction shortlist was announced. Rebecca May Johnson writes ‘Notes on . . . the Baileys Women’s Prize‘ (and reading women more generally) in the Financial Times. There are interviews with several of the longlisted writers on the prize’s site: Madeleine Thien, Naomi Alderman, Linda Grant, Yewande Omotoso, Heather O’Neill, Fiona Melrose, Eimear McBride, Emma Flint.

The best of the rest:

On or about books/writers/language:

• Claire Armistead, ‘Is Hilary Mantel’s view of historical fiction out of date?‘ in The Guardian
• Amy Bernhard, ‘Writing Behind Walls‘ on Catapult
• Catherine La Sota, ‘Reading Across America: A Scene Grows in Queens‘ on Literary Hub
• Alicia Maria Meier, ‘Marta Rojals’s “The Faithful,” and the American JASP‘ on Words Without Borders
• Megan Hunter, ‘Fiction to see the world through‘ in The TLS
• Vincent Scarpa, ‘The Uncanny Magic of Joy Williams, in a Single Paragraph‘ on Literary Hub
• Laura Waddell, ‘Is it time for a Handmaid’s Tale sequel, to reckon with the Trump era?‘ in The Guardian
• Aaron Bady, ‘Has Imbolo Mbue Written the Great American Novel?‘ on Literary Hub
• Mallory Soto, ‘Laura Kinney, Literary Fiction, and Coming-of-Age‘ on Bookriot
• Emily Temple, ‘A Brief History of Robots‘ on Literary Hub
• Terri Kapsalis, ‘Hysteria, Witches, and the Wandering Uterus: A Brief History‘ on Literary Hub
• Ayana Mathis, ‘On Impractical Urges‘ in Guernica
• Sophie Hughes, ‘Ferrante Fever and Knausgaard nuts‘ in The TLS
• Amelia Ayrelan Iuvino, ‘What Does it Mean to Set Your Novel at Harvard?‘ on Literary Hub
• Margaret Atwood, ‘on What ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ Means in the Age of Trump‘ in The New York Times
• Edmund Gordon, ‘In Which Angela Carter Gives No Fucks‘ on Literary Hub
• Sophie Gilbert, ‘The Dark Morality of Fairy-Tale Animal Brides‘ on The Atlantic
• Fiona Taylor, ‘The Handmaid’s Tale: The Lost Pence Prequel‘ in The New Yorker
• Sarah Blackwood, ‘Parenting by the Books: ‘Little Women’‘ on The Hairpin
• Emily Temple, ‘Life Advice from Adrienne Rich‘ on Literary Hub
• Danika Ellis, ‘Let’s Talk About Star-Crossed: Why We Need Bisexual Kids Books, Backlash or Not‘ on Bookriot
• Naomi Alderman, ‘Dystopian dreams: how feminist science fiction predicted the future‘ in The Guardian
• Jami Attenberg, ‘Stop Reading My Fiction as the Story of My Life‘ in The New York Times
• Salena Godden, ‘How I Did It‘ on The Poetry School
• Scarlett Thomas, ‘Why I was wrong about children’s fiction‘ in The Guardian
• Ellen Feldman, ‘A Brief Literary History of Birth Control‘ on Literary Hub
• Laura Kaye, ‘on portraying England from a foreigner’s perspective‘ on the Literary Sofa
• Valerie Derbyshire, ‘Beauty and the Beast was originally a feminist fable disguised as marriage guidance‘ on The Conversation
• Bidisha, ‘The great contradiction‘ in The TLS
• Teri Vlassopoulos, ‘When I Think About Giving Up Writing‘ on Catapult
• Alexandra Alter, ‘New Crop of Young Adult Novels Explores Race and Police Brutality‘ in The New York Times
• Jami Attenberg, ‘Topography of a Novel: All Grown Up‘ on Blunderbuss
• Kathryn Heyman, ‘Fairytales are not just harmless, innocent fun. They need to be interrogated‘ in The Guardian
• Susan Braudy, ‘‘Sisters in Misery’: What It Was Like to Interview Joan Didion at Home in 1977‘ on Jezebel

Personal essays/memoir:

• Kim McLarin, ‘Outrunning Eshu: On Finally Seeking Treatment for Depression‘ on Literary Hub
• Marissa Bate, ‘Adventures aren’t always on the other side of the world‘ on The Pool
• Daisy Buchanan, ‘I’ve been an agony aunt since I could talk‘ in The Guardian
• Laura Turner, ‘How Do You Inherit Anxiety?‘ on Catapult
• Meg Elison, ‘El Hugé‘ on Catapult
• Melissa Febos, ‘Playing Cupid for a Gay Friend on a (Mostly) Straight Cruise‘ in The New York Times
• Ethel Rohan, ‘Bringing It Back Up‘ on The Hairpin
• Sinéad Gleeson, ‘Your Chroma‘ on RTÉ
• Melinda Salisbury, ‘Was my grandmother a witch?‘ in The Guardian
• Amy Jo Burns, ‘Writing, Risk, and Moonshine‘ on Electric Literature
• Dionne Ford, ‘Don’t Call Slaves “Immigrants”‘ on Literary Hub
• Melissa Wyse, ‘Learning to Live Alone Through the Legacy of Mary Tyler Moore‘ in The Rumpus
• Whitney Templeton, ‘The Evolution of a Trigger‘ on The Rumpus
• Elisabeth Fairfield Stokes, ‘Life and Breath: On Pregnancy and the Spirit World‘ on Catapult
• Gillian Jacobs, ‘I Can’t Have Enough Mothers‘ on Lenny
• Dina Nayeri, ‘How Love Ends: Scenes from a Refugee Hotel‘ on Electric Literature
• Maria Browning, ‘Doll in Shadow‘ on Guernica
• Xialou Guo, ‘Leaving the Village: on Traumatic Uprooting‘ on Literary Hub
• Alys Fowler, ‘There is no such thing as coming out: it’s a daily negotiation‘ in The Guardian
• Eve Peyser, ‘Trump, Trolls, and Rediscovering My Jewish Identity‘ on Vice
• Porochista Khakpour, ‘Why this Persian New Year is different‘ on CNN
• Ashley Ford, ‘Seeing My Body with Fresh Eyes‘ on Cup of Jo
• Laurie Frankel, ‘We adopted by choice not necessity‘ in The Guardian
• Ella Wilson, ‘Take Care: Mothers, Daughters, and Inheriting Self-Hatred‘ on Catapult
• Daisy Buchanan, ‘I am 32, successful and I am in therapy. This is why‘ on The Pool

Feminism:

• Helen Charman, ‘Literary Representations of Maternity‘ on Women Are Boring
• Heather Kirn Lanier, ‘Superbabies Don’t Cry‘ on Vela
• Jia Tolentino, ‘The Infantilizing Ways We Talk About Women’s Ambition‘ in The New Yorker
• Leslie Jamison, ‘In the Shadow of a Fairy Tale‘ in The New York Times
• Rebecca Traister, ‘Of Course Donald Trump Doesn’t Think Bill O’Reilly Did Anything Wrong‘ in The Cut
• Salimah Perkins, ‘Choosing Sides‘ on Queen Mob’s Tea House
• Minda Honey, ‘Women of Color in Wide Open Spaces‘ on Longreads
• Jess Zimmerman, ‘Why Is Male Anger So Threatening?‘ in Dame
• Jessica Valenti, ‘Mike Pence doesn’t eat alone with women. That speaks volumes‘ in The Guardian
• Phoebe Maltz Bovy, ‘It’s time to drop the vagina as a protest symbol‘ in The Washington Post
• Morgan Jerkins, ‘How America Fails Black Girls‘ in The New York Times
• Sandra Newman, ‘Why men rape‘ on Aeon
• Mia Violet, ‘Taking Selfies As A Form Of Self Care‘ on Femsplain
• Brittney McNamara, ‘White Women Are Less Likely to Protect Black Women From Sexual Assault, Study Finds‘ in Teen Vogue
• Roe McDermott, ‘There is no perfect victim. And there is no perfect way to respond to sexual assault‘ on The Pool
• Morgan M Page, ‘Trans Women Shouldn’t Have To Constantly Defend Their Own Womanhood‘ on Buzzfeed
• Cathy Young, ‘The Other Women’s Movement‘ on Foreign Policy
• David Smith, ‘Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie on transgender row: “I have nothing to apologise for”‘ in The Guardian

Society and Politics:

• Jeanette Winterson, ‘We need to be more imaginative about modern marriage‘ in The Guardian
• Taffy Brodesser-Akner, ‘The High Price of Leaving Ultra-Orthodox Life‘ in the New York Times
• Monica Mark, ‘Poor, Gifted and Black‘ on Buzzfeed
• Diana Darke, ‘A sarin attack and a swing in US policy‘ in The TLS
• Carla Bruce-Eddings, ‘Am I Going to Have Another Baby?‘ in The Cut
• Emily Holleman, ‘Is Hillary Clinton a Modern-Day Cleopatra?‘ on Literary Hub
• Hannah Goldfeld, ‘The Cool Brooklyn Dentist Who Wants Your Teeth to Look As Nice As Her Instagram Feed‘ in The Cut
• Suzanne Moore, ‘Labour is weak and immoral – as shown by Livingstone’s refusal to apologise‘ in The Guardian
• Alana Semuels, ‘Why It’s So Hard to Get Ahead in the South‘ in The Atlantic
• Zara Rahman, ‘Where Are You Really From‘ on Real Life
• Jeanne de Montbaston, ‘My Daughter’s Birth‘ on Reading Medieval Books
• Linda Besner, ‘Sleep Country‘ on Real Life
• Hilary Mantel, ‘The Tories will never confess to their social wrecking age‘ in The New Statesman
• Alana Massey, ‘Broken Links‘ on Aeon
• Sim Bajwa, ‘Multiculturalism hasn’t failed – but the rhetoric surrounding immigration has become poisonous‘ on The Pool
• Elena Passarello, ‘The Sense of an Endling‘ on Longreads
• Lisa Miller, ‘John Hinckley Left the Mental Hospital Seven Months Ago‘ in New York Magazine

Film, Television, Music, Art, Fashion and Sport:

• Jonatha Kottler, ‘Shopping at size 24: ‘The sales assistant shakes her head at me’‘ in The Guardian
• Caitlin McDonnell, ‘On Homeland‘s Carrie Mathison, Mental Illness, & the “Ugly Cry”‘ on Weird Sister
• Sophie Atkinson, ‘Feminism and the Pursuit of Relentless Happiness‘ on Electric Literature
• Christine Vines, ‘The Damage of ‘Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’‘ on Electric Literature
• Laura McKeon, ‘Dressing Like Ladies‘ on Hazlitt
• Rachel Klein, ‘Smurfette’s Roots‘ on Hazlitt
• Lauren Schwartzberg, ‘Why Millennial Pink Refuses to Go Away‘ in The Cut
• Amy Wallace, ‘The Hollywood Exec and the Hand Transplant That Changed His Life‘ in Los Angeles Magazine
• Catherine Love, ‘Offside: the shocking moment female footballers were banned for 50 years‘ in The Guardian

The interviews/profiles:

• Durga Chew-Bose on Hazlitt
• Edna O’Brien on Kenyan Review
• Eleni Sikelianos in Numeró Cinq
• Sarah Waters in The Guardian
• Ursula K. Le Guin on Electric Literature
• Claire Fuller on Reading Women
• Julie Buntin on Electric Literature
• Ariel Levy on Electric Literature and The Fifth Sense
• Angie Thomas in The Guardian and The Cut
• Deb Olin Unferth on Electric Literature
• Elena Favilli and Francesca Cavallo in The Bookseller
• Valeria Luiselli in Brooklyn
• Aura Xilonen on Electric Literature
• Ana Marie Cox on Literary Hub
• Wioletta Greg and Eliza Marciniak on The Man Booker Prize
• Fay Weldon in The Guardian
• Brit Bennett on The Millions
• Marina Benjamin on Slate
• Maggie Nelson in The Cut
• Katie Kitamura in The LA Times
• Megan McDowell on Literary Hub
• Emma Richler on Maisonneuve
• Eve Ainsworth on Bookriot
• Anna Journey on Electric Literature
• Eileen Myles in The Irish Times
• Eula Bliss in The Los Angeles Review of Books
• Khadijah Queen on The Rumpus
• Emily Robbins on Hazlitt
• Helen McClory on Burning House Press
• Lidia Yuknavitch on Pen America
• Patty Yumi Cottrell on Literary Hub
• Nell Stevens in Vogue

The regular columnists:

• Ijeoma Oluo on The Establishment
• Lucy Mangan in Stylist
• Roxane Gay in The Guardian US
• Caitlin Moran in The Times
• Ella Risbridger in The Pool
• Sali Hughes in The Pool
• Bim Adewunmi in The Guardian
• Sophie Heawood in The Guardian
• Eva Wiseman in The Observer
• Tracey Thorn in The New Statesman
• Chimene Suleyman and Maya Goodfellow on Media Diversified
• Josie Pickens on Ebony
• Lizzy Kremer on Publishing for Humans
• Juno Dawson in Glamour
• Louise O’Neill in the Irish Examiner
• Jendella Benson on Media Diversified
• Lola Okolosie in The Guardian
• Sarah Gerard, ‘Mouthful‘ on Hazlitt
• Books by Women We’d Love to See in English on Literary Hub

Ones to Read in 2017

One of the joys of running this blog is getting to read advance copies of books I’ve been looking forward to as well as titles from new writers being published in the first half of 2017. I’ve read a whole host of books, mostly fiction – novels, novellas, short stories, and I’ve selected ten I think are must reads.

All publication dates are correct as of 2nd January 2017 for UK publication.

Homegoing – Yaa Gyasi

Effia Otcher and Esi are sisters, unaware of each other’s existence. In 1775, Effia’s mother, who beats her and is manipulative, conspires to marry her to one of the white slave traders. Effia goes to live with him in Cape Coast Castle, unaware that Esi is in the dungeon, packed tight with other women – alive and dead – waiting to be shipped to America. Gyasi then follows the two women’s timelines through to the present day. The story alternates between West Africa and America, each chapter told by one of the offspring of the previous character in that branch of the family tree and becoming a guide to the creation of black as a race. It’s an incredible piece of work. If you only read one book in 2017, make it this one.

Published 5th January 2017 by Viking

Homesick for Another World – Ottessa Moshfegh

If you thought the title character in Eileen was despicable, wait until you meet those who populate Moshfegh’s first short story collection. From a teacher who spends her summer break slumming it with drug addicts to the old white dude who tries to hit on his young neighbour to the girl who’s convinced she needs to kill a particular person in order to go to a better place, all of Moshfegh’s characters are unlikeable in some way. But that’s also because they’re real, their lives like ours. And that’s the beauty of her work. This is a brilliant collection; Moshfegh’s rapidly establishing herself as one of the best writers of her generation.

Published 12th January 2017 by Jonathan Cape

First Love – Gwendoline Riley

Neve, a writer in her mid-thirties, is married to Edwyn, an older man. She documents their turbulent relationship alongside an earlier reacquaintance with an ex-boyfriend and the relationships she had with her mother and father. All are manipulative and abusive in different ways and to varying degrees. Riley’s writing is razor sharp. She places the reader in Neve’s position and it never feels less than real. Packs a literal and metaphorical punch, leaving space for interpretation and discussion.

Published 2nd February 2017 by Granta

 

The End We Start From – Megan Hunter

As the sea-level rises around the UK, a woman gives birth to a boy her and her husband name Z. They leave for the mountains where her husband, R, grew up. Before long, queues are forming for food and basics and the family starts to disintegrate as R mistrusts the authorities and the unnamed narrator wants to protect Z. Taut, beautifully written, this tense novella will keep you gripped. I read it in one sitting and returned to it the following day.

Published 18th May 2017 by Picador

 

Little Deaths – Emma Flint

Queens, NYC, 1965. Ruth Malone’s in a bitter custody battle with her ex-husband when her two children Frankie, five, and Cindy, four, go missing from her apartment and are later found murdered. When the police discover Malone drinks, dates and takes care of herself they’re determined to pin the murders on her. A page-turner which explores patriarchal attitudes to women who don’t play the angel. Rage-inducing but gripping.

Published 12th January 2017 by Picador. 

 

Stay With Me – Ayòbámi Adébáyò

When Yejide fails to conceive, her husband, Akin, is convinced by his mother-in-law to take a second wife who will deliver the grandson she so desperately desires. Yejide is horrified at becoming a first wife and Akin feels little better about the arrangement but it will change both of their lives and their marriage for better and for worse. Told from alternating points of view Adébáyò explores the effect of patriarchal society on women and men with thriller-like pace and twists. Gripping and thoughtful.

Published 2nd March 2017 by Canongate.

Take Courage: Anne Brontë and the Art of Life – Samantha Ellis

If you enjoyed the BBC’s To Walk Invisible over Christmas, or can only name two of the Brontë sisters and their work, or have long been a fan of Anne and are glad someone else gets it, then Samantha Ellis’ investigation into who Anne Brontë was, her work and why we know so little about her is one for you. Ellis examines Anne through those who were closest to her and her two novels Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. The Anne Brontë reassessment/revival begins here.

Published 12th January 2017 by Chatto & Windus

 

Difficult Women – Roxane Gay

Third mention for the ‘p’ word but the women in Roxane Gay’s short story collection are only difficult because they break the rules the patriarchy imposes on them. Often they’re punished for it though – from the sisters who are kidnapped to the stripper followed home by a client – and question their worth to society. Written in clear, brutal prose, Gay shows how race, class, sexuality and gender affect average women every single day.

Published 3rd January by Corsair

 

The Things We Thought We Knew – Mahsuda Snaith

Ravine Roy has chronic pain syndrome and hasn’t left her mother’s council flat since her best friend, Marianne, disappeared ten years ago. Now she’s eighteen, her mum’s determined to get her out, starting with voting in the General Election. But Ravine’s got other things to worry about such as writing to Marianne, wondering who her mother’s companion is, and the noises coming from the unoccupied flat next door. If you loved The Trouble with Goats and Sheep or My Name Is Leon, The Things We Thought We Knew is your summer 2017 read.

Published 15th June 2017 by Doubleday

See What I Have Done – Sarah Schmidt

Schmidt takes the infamous case of Lizzie Borden and explores what might have happened on the days surrounding the murder of Borden’s father and stepmother. The narrative moves between Lizzie, her sister Emma, the maid Bridget and a young man called Benjamin, unknown to all but the Borden’s Uncle John, their late-mother’s brother. Schmidt creates a claustrophobic atmosphere placing the reader in the centre of a house stifling with heat and tensions. Gripping.

Published 2nd May by Tinder Press