Where to start with this slim novel? It’s brilliant. The writing is crisp. Lerner not only writes well, but with economy. Each word feels as though it belongs on the page, each action or non-action vital. Transcription is about things that matter; not a cluster of meaningless or fabulous characters or plot twists that may entertain but don’t add up to much in the end, like much of what passes as a novel in the oversaturated publishing world — as well as other social media that tell ‘stories’. Ironically, a central theme in this novel is technology, and it’s definitely exploring ‘story’: what gets told, what’s said or supposedly said, what’s remembered compared to what’s recorded (or not). The novel opens with the unnamed narrator heading by train to Providence. It’s the return of the nervous protégé to his alma mater to record the ‘final interview’ with Thomas, a famous cultural critic, who is now in his 90s. The narrator is restless, travelling backwards (which makes him nauseous), photographing his masked self in the reflection of the moving train’s window. He looks at the photo and deletes it. He begins a conversation about the morning's problems by txt. This small passage tells the reader so much. It’s sometime after the lockdowns; recording yourself and then just as easily deleting yourself on your handheld device is a common phenomena; our awareness of ourselves in place and time determined by or acted out through the technology we hold close to us (continuously). This same technology enables us to escape the present by replaying or reimaging the past, or determining a future that will never be actual. Time is a central player in the conversations in the three distinct parts of this novel, and the way in which Lerner seamlessly takes us through conversation from America in the 2020s, then to late 1990s and back to Germany in the 1940s, not layering in historical facts or particular incidents but rather by reference to cultural touchpoints, mentions of music, philosophers and writers creating what made me think of a series of vibrations. Vibrations that resonated through not only time, but the shared (and often differently interpreted) experiences of each of the main characters. Are these vibrations a transcription of a sort?

Yet it is technology that lets the narrator down. He drops his phone in the sink. It’s kaput. And, as much as he tries to suggest that the interview could be the next day, and the evening for ‘catching up’, Thomas is keen to get started, and the narrator is too cowardly to say his phone isn’t working. So the interview goes ahead without a recorded transcript. The protégé doesn’t even take notes. Or so it seems. There is the possibility that Thomas suspects there is something amiss. There is the possibility that even if the phone had worked the subsequent published interview would have been a fabrication. Ben Lerner is leaning into this idea of the real and imagined, of what is fiction? And the novel is dotted with this concept. Of how we look, how we remember, and what happens when we start to think that something is imagined or described rather than ‘real’ – whatever that may be. When his phone doesn’t work, the narrator begins to ‘notice’ everything, “The stones are stonier”.  He has no google directions. He would have used them if his phone was working even though he knows the way. Without his phone, time shifts as his head has space to imagine and remember, and he’s walking through the campus of his student days. If this sounds nostalgic or overwrought, don’t worry: it’s not. These moments are often depicted wryly, with a wink to the reader and a self-depreciating honesty.

The characters in Transcription are ordinary and real (and possibly often Lerner himself, or facets of). They are fallible and not always likable. There are no heroes, although maybe sometimes heroic, if you can call it that, attempts to deal with our contemporary world, that’s a world on the intimate as much as the wider scale. This is most telling in the passages where the narrator talks about his relationship with his daughter,  and Max (his friend from college, who also happens to be Thomas’s actual son) discusses his own daughter’s problems. Both children have issues with the world, and these issues visit upon their bodies. One through anxiety and a refusal to participate (go to school) and the other through a refusal to eat. Both these problems are overcome to some degree via mindless games and social media dross. That this distraction, although empty, can be an antidote for other more harmful problems, puts our devices, and what they deliver to us, into that ambivalent space, providing a lifeline despite appearing meaningless. How do we measure this against the ability of the book to provide a place to escape to?

Transcription is completely satisfying — it’s been a long time since I’ve read a novel that ends so well. Ben Lerner  covers so much ground in these 130 pages. Here we encounter interviewer, author, and cultural critic; here are the fathers, Thomas the elder, Max the son, and the unnamed narrator — the cultural son. There are the issues of the modern world (climate, politics, image), threaded through but never belaboured. There is memory and misremembering — what is invention? And where does fiction start?

We will be discussing Transcription at our next Talking Books session on July 14
Find out more and join in by Zoom

An appealing history of Japan in the nineteenth history, Stranger in the Shogun’s City is a tale both personal and encompassing. Tsuneno is the daughter of a priest. Growing up in a small mountainous village, the temple is central to her life and expectations. Married at 12, life seems mapped out: she will be a diligent temple wife. Yet 15 years on and with no children in sight, she is sent home again with the divorce papers—not an uncommon occurrence in the nineteenth century, where women would be remarried—a failed relationship not necessitating disaster. Two more marriages down the road and the picture for Tsuneno isn’t quite as rosy, her family are losing patience with her and she has other ideas. Seeking independence, she goes against her family’s wishes and knowledge, pawns her belongings (mostly clothes), and makes her way to the city of Edo in the care of a family acquaintance—someone she thought she could trust. In a relatively short time, Tsuneno’s world is turned upside down. Not only has the trustworthy friend betrayed her, physically and emotionally, but he has also left her in financial peril and abandoned her in the city. Living in a tiny room, at the mercy of her landlord, without money or warm clothes, bedding or utensils, she is desperate to find work. Her dreams of a good position in a Shogun household are remote, but she does get a job working long hours as a housemaid. It isn’t ideal, but it enables her to stay in Edo, a lively city with prospects. Tsuneno rises and falls alongside the city. This is the story of a woman and the story of a city, Edo, at the end of a golden age, known as the Great Peace, a time just prior to the arrival of the American gunship and Commodore Perry. As we read we fall into step beside Tsuneno, seeing the informal structures of the city — the migrant workers and peddlers — that underpins the economic structure of the more formal organisations, the geisha and the theatre performers that brighten the evenings, the temple priests, the samurai of all classes (one of whom will impact this woman’s life more than she expected) and the hierarchies of the ruling shogunate classes. Pieced together from letters (between Tsueno and her family), family records kept at the temples, combined with historical events (famine, fire, political machinations) and research, Amy Stanley creates a gripping account of a woman who chose between family and freedom, who made the most of the hand she was dealt. Rich in detail with its vivid descriptions of the environs (urban and rural), and lively portraits of Tsuneno, her family and the people of Edo, Stranger in a Shogun’s City is a compelling history of an ordinary woman in a fascinating time and place. 

Rachel Kushner’s essays in The Hard Crowd read both like edgy youthful memories giving us a window into a life lived on the edge of danger, as well as intelligent analyses of political structures and cultural output. From the daring of her motorcycle racing days and obsessions with classic cars (it’s not surprising the opening scene in The Flamethrowers kicks such adrenaline on the page), in the opening essay 'Girl on a Motorcycle' to her conversations about literary intrigues Marguerite Duras, Clarice Lispector and Denis Johnson to mention a few, to her knowledge of Italian 1970s politics and prison reform which play a major role respectively, in The Flamethrowers and The Mars Room, to her connections and interest in the New York art scene, the collected essays are varied in style. Some are self-effacing and gritty, in line with the popular 'personal essay' trend, yet Kushner’s memories remain dark, honest and absorbing without the cloyingness of the self-reflective and sometimes self-satisfied elements of this form. In her essays about writers, she is endlessly fascinating, almost finding her way through the writing — through description, analysis and the anecdotal to an understanding or a reflective essence of the writer and their work — giving us, the reader, an insight that makes us wish to seek out not more about the said author, but their output — to delve for ourselves into their words. There’s also a great essay with accompanying images (film stills, photographs and other ephemera), 'Made to Burn', which considers the influences and research for her novel The Flamethrowers. It’s filled with quirky snippets of information, as many of the essays are, which cast small surprises like flitting shadows and light bulb moments — observations that rub up against each other creating a texture that marries guns and art, writers and alcohol, and the adrenaline of competitive danger with fierce loyalty. And in pure juxtaposition to this hard-arse style are essays that will stop you in your tracks: a heartbreaking visit to a Palestinian refugee camp that is so established that it is functionally a dysfunctional town, and a conversation with an American prison abolitionist that raises some hard questions about incarceration. In The Hard Crowd, Kushner describes herself as the soft one, but these punchy essays make me think there are different kinds of softness, and Kushner's is one that has a core of steel, unafraid to look with intent.

If you can resist this book, you are an expert in avoiding something thrilling. Giselle Clarkson’s excellent book about all things birds is sure to engage young minds and old. Filled to the brim with intriguing information, it’s perfectly pitched with its bite-size chunks of text, excellent diagrams and illustrations, and humorous asides. Clarkson encourages us to be avian investigators: equipped with our toolkit of omnibird knowledge and our best tool — observation. Being a bird puzzle-solver has never been more lively. From poop to feathers, to all the parts of the wing, to the different styles of wings, and tails, and heads, and beaks, you’ll be spotting birds high above you, deciphering and coming up with —It’s a gull! A blackbird or possibly a thrush! A starling! There are 18 investigator notes featuring a range of birds, including ducks, gulls, corvids, chickens, flightless birds, birds of prey, and the humble sparrow. There are beautiful eggs (spot the odd one out!), a plumology lesson, an array of different nests from the carefully woven thrush work to the scattershot style of the sparrow, and an explainer on bird names — you’ll know your gymnorhina tibicen  from your griseotyrannus aurantioatrocristatus in no time! And so much more.  Clarkson’s wonderful illustrations draw you in (there’s great bird attitude here), and the text is lively — so many facts, but also humour and speculation. While there are answers to bird questions you didn’t know you had, there are also questions to ask. What does it feel like to fly? What are they saying? What bird would you be? There’s a charge to use your imagination and your detective skills (observational senses). It's a book about birds and it’s a book about noticing the natural world around us — its awesomeness. Omnibird is a gem — a book that informs, inspires and delights. 

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If you’re ready to discover new biscuit recipes and fill your tins, then Crumbs: Cookies and Sweets from Around the World will extend your knowledge and please your taste buds. Filling our tin right now are a batch of Maltese Christening Cookies/Biskuttini tar-Rahal. Both delicate and robust these aniseed and caraway seed mouthfuls are perfect with coffee in the evening and the light lemon icing makes them a refreshing choice for morning or afternoon tea. Organised geographically, this book is packed with 300 authentic recipes from 100 countries, from Azerbaijan to Laos to Wales. There are Scandanavian and Middle Eastern treats, Belgian biscuits and shortbread goodness. The introduction sets out what is a cookie, all the tools for making good biscuits, and tips and hints that will take your baking to the next cookie level. While there are American cup measurements, there are also metric weights and following these makes for the best biscuit dough (useful when using our slightly heavier flour). The food photography is reassuring. This is home cooking. The recipes are easy to follow, and while there are some recipes that might require a special ingredient, most are pantry staples. I’m ready to explore Stuffed Maghrebu Loaf Cookies from Tunisia and the ‘Snow White’ Crescent Cookies from Indonesia, as well as perfect sesame rings from the Levant which are packed with fennel or anise seeds. So whether you enjoy cinnamon spiced biscuits, crisp biscotti or chocolate-dipped morsels, there’s a world of choices and plenty of tins to fill or gifts to share. Crumbs unites the world with its similarities across borders and highlights the specific ingredients and particular methods that give each biscuit a home.

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Frank doesn’t like the dark. He’s not so keen on annoying little brothers and not great at sports. He likes books and he likes Alice, his next door neighbour. Apart from Alice and her sweet dog Woof, Frank doesn’t have any friends. He’s shy. So there aren’t many guests at his birthday party, but something unexpected happens when Frank offers the small dog some cake. Woof nips Frank’s finger. The cake is devoured, despite the single drop of blood spreading through the icing. Later…Frank has a dream that he’s runing through the forest on all fours! Waking up he sees muddy footprints all over his bedroom floor. Strange! And things get stranger. Frank’s the monster. A very sweet shaggy white furry monster. One that expands in the mind of the townsfolk to a sharp-toothed, massive-clawed howling terror. Things come to a head one day when Frank heads for the beach sniffing out some delcious food and you guessed it, he’s in his monster form. A part of Frank knows he’s heading towards danger. The townsfolk are ready to capture the ‘terrible monster’, but Frank makes an escape with the help of some unexpected new friends. Here’s where the story takes an unexpected turn. There are new friends to be made, and a watchful owl to meet. A golden key and a library of surprises are sure to play a bigger part in the next two books in this charming series. Mats Strandberg is a writer of horror and mystery for adults and children, and the story moves along with pace when action demands it and as well as quiet interludes for Frank’s reflective thoughts on his situation. There are familar settings as well as the unexpected underworld, humour to keep a young reader hooked and just the right amount of ‘scary’. For anyone feeling awkward, they are sure to feel right at home. The illustrations by Sofia Falkenhem are both whimsical and detailed, and she captures the characters perfectly. Her depicition of Frank as nine year old boy reveals his awkwardness and hesitation, while Frank the shifter in his animal form is all bounding cuteness (i.e. not scary at all). Translated from the Swedish by Julia Marshall. This is a delightful ‘read to’ for 5 to 7, or ‘read alone’ up to 9. And with two more books in the series out this year, Frank the Monster is sure to become a new favourite.

A few years ago, I accidently came across a podcast called Ear Hustle when I was searching for something else. Ear Hustle is a non-fiction podcast about prison life centred around San Quentin State Prison. It’s a fascinating and honest insight into the lives of the prisoners: often sad, sometimes brutual, yet also laced with humour and pathos. It’s eye-opening, as is Asher Emanuel’s brilliant The Valley: Crime and Punishment in a New Zealand City, which shares some of the same attributes. Here, the action focuses on the criminal justice system. The courts, the Hutt Valley in particular (although this could be any district court in Aotearoa), and the systems that intertwine with these courts: social welfare, the police, bailiffs, probation officers, housing services, and rehab, to name a few. I say action, because Emanuel’s reportage style burns with immediacy; with its intimate portrayals and authentic dialogue. The book is predominantly verbatim conversation, and centres around two defendants, Nathan Morley and Rikihana Wallace, and their overworked defence lawyer Lewis Skerett. I dare you to read the first few chapters and not be hooked. The lives are real, the crimes are ordinary, but this is a world many live outside of, and often our knowledge of the justice system is only of sound-bite news items which reveal very little of substance or tend towards the sensational. The Valley avoids this dramatic nonsense, giving instead a direct and sometimes confronting view of what the criminal justice system looks like from the inside, and more importantly from the perspective of those that navigate it, whether they are the defendents, the lawyers or the special courts that attempt to mitigate the glaring problems at the heart of the justice system and the wider welfare system. Asher Emanuel draws us into this world with clarity, calmness and care. The Valley has integrity, and is vitally important. The wider issues of poverty, government policy over several decades, our degraded welfare system, issues with our addiction services, as well as housing supply, all pulse simulatneously alongside the stories of Nathan and Rikihana. If you read one book this year make it this one. (We will be discussing The Valley at our June Talking Books session).

When life is a bit tough, we all need a good book. When you’re unsure and feel like a square peg in a round hole, you need a good book even more. Ever been eleven and lonely? Or wondered why your best friend is hanging out with the mean kids? Or wished your mother didn’t sigh so much? If you answer yes to any of these questions then you need Cricket Karlsson. Ever wanted to make art? Ride a horse in the moonlight? Ever been unable to get out of bed or unable to get someone you love out of bed? Then you need Cricket Karlsson. Cricket Karlsson is eleven, has a ‘potato’ heart (which is currently mashed because her best friend Noa isn’t talking to her), is finding out about love, is visiting her aunt in the psych ward, loves to draw and doesn’t like the horse girls. And she has secrets — secrets that only a best friend, like Noa, knows! The Secrets of Cricket Karlsson from the pen of Kristina Sigunsdottir and the brush of Ester Eriksson is another standout from Gecko Press. I loved it, and it’s even better on the second reading. It has lists of not very Ugliest Words, absurd and unlikely Things Grandpa Says you Can Die From, unusual Psychiatric Illnesses I Don’t Want, and delightful Secrets I Have Only Told to Noa. Told with the keen observation of an eleven-year-old with all the concerns of childhood and changing circumstances, the words leap off the page with feistiness, humour and pathos. It lightly touches on worries and fears (climate change, mental health, sadness, regret) while embracing the best things about being that age when you’ll still a kid, but only just. Who hasn’t noticed the horse girls with their neighing and prancing, or squirmed when a boy (or a girl) is doe-eyed and you just don’t like him like that, or locked themselves in the bathroom (sometimes crying) to avoid being harassed? Cricket Karlsson finds out that life isn’t always what you expect, that loneliness passes, and that even an eleven-year-old can make a sad person happy. Black humour abounds and Cricket Karlsson is a star (with secrets and lists, a big heart and a little mischief, and her favourite food is cheese-on-cheese-in-cheese).

Do you know about our Children’s Book Subscriptions? We offer a personally curated book subscription service for all ages from age zero. Some of our subscribers have grown with us and are now well into their teens. Every month or second month we select and send a book to a child or teen. Each book is selected according to their age, reading level, and interests. We always like to choose for the individual rather than rattling out the next same bestseller to everybody. If you are interested in purchasing a book subscription for a child you know, get in touch or have a look at our packages here. We can accommodate your needs, and work to your budget, so just let us know via email if you have a special request.

Here are three new picture books that help children address change, their worries, or fears. These are books that wil resonate with young children and help them feel brave, reassured, and capable. Each can open a door to a conversation about difficult situations or the emotions we have when things are different.

In Rebecca Stead’s Anything a young child moves to a new aprtment with her father. Things are just not right! They are not the same as ‘home’. This is subtle and charming book about a new place. The cake isn’t right, the rooms smell of paint, the closet is too small to hide in, the bathtub isn’t big and blue. Daddy lets the child have three wishes; they can wish for anything! A rainbow on the bedroom wall, pizza for dinner, but a wish for home needs a good resolution, and Daddy comes up with the best journey. The illustrator Gracey Zhang’s signature style of ballpoint-pen drawing and gouache create detail and fluidity. Some pages are spare, while others have wonderful bursts of colour reflecting the ups and downs of the child’s emotions. The predominantly line-drawing style captures the uncertainity of the new apartment and the surrounding neighbourhood, while the colourful bursts reflect the chld’s imagination — her ‘anythings’ and as we move to the last few pages, the adjustment to Aprtment 3B. The colours settle into the landscape, juts as the child settles and breakfast is served. Her new favourite kind.

Another book about home — not about moving but about what is missing. A cat. In My Friend May , written and illustrated by Julie Flett, we meet a child whose everyday companion has disappeared. Margaux and May have been the best of friends and have grown up together. She is understandably distraught that her pet is missing and, no matter where they look, how many times they call, May is nowhere to be found. And not only that, but her favourite auntie Nitôsis is moving to the city. Margaux helps her pack the last of her belongings into boxes. The next day, no May, and Margaux is worried. What if she is hurt, alone or hungry? In a city far away Nitôsis, is tired and hungry after her long journey. As she settles down, unpacked boxes around her, to have some soup, she hears a faint meow. This quiet, gentle story about familial relationships hits all the rights notes. Flett is a Cree-Métis author, and the book has a bonus glossary of Cree words and cultural information about friendships.

For children who have experienced trauma, frightening situations, or violence, whether directly or as a bystander, being able to find ways to express this fear and feel safe are important. In a world where violence is a daily occurance, it’s vital we have books that do not shy away from the hard issues. I Will Not Be Scared is beautifully and clearly written by Jean-François Sénéchal and sweetly illustrated by Simone Rea. It is a picture books about freedom, war, fear, and courage. A young bunny can’t get to sleep. Something has happened at school to make him feel scared, and unsure of his safety in this new home. Mama gently waits until he is ready to talk about it. With much reassurance, and encourgement, Bunny feels able to express himself, and unpick some of the deeper emotions that underpin his fear. And in freeing himself of these feelings, be able to find the conviction to be brave. A tender story which will not only reassuire, but gives us hope for a better world.

Walls, straight roads, borders, maps, places in the landscape, a meeting place, construction on taken land, roads dismissed, control, histories overwritten, obliterated, questions of the past for the present and the future, justice, the disappeared, the unnavigable, violence, justification, denial, displacement, erasure.  In Minor Detail Adania Shibli takes us to the desert. It’s 1949 and the military have set up camp near the Egyptian border, to stake their ground, and to wipe the remaining Arabs from the new state of Israel. Told from the perspective of the officer in command of a platoon, the observation is crystal clear in his description of the landscape — the Negev both brutal and awesome, his encounter with a scorpion — the wound on his swelling leg repulsive, as are his actions towards the young Bedouin girl the soldiers have abducted and raped, and he has killed. The horror of this crime is never glazed over, and the actions of the officer are never questioned by those around him. In fact, his fellows fight to get in the queue. The horror of this event is voiced by an increasingly agitated dog. The motif of the barking or howling dog continues into the second part of this novella. A young Palestinian woman in Ramallah on discovering this event when the archives are opened is compelled to travel to the place of reckoning. Compelled by compassion, and a minor detail: her birthday is the Bedouin girl's day of death. To travel to the zone she must borrow a fellow worker’s ID, and rent the car in another’s name. As she travels with two maps overlayed, one historic showing the villages and roads that have now been almost completely obliterated, and the other the zones of the Israeli state, she drives to museums, settlement villages and towards the military-controlled zones, the new roads burn their straight lines and codes of engagement into the landscape, as well as her psyche. She is haunted by the girl, and there is always a dog pacing or howling nearby. You question her sanity in carrying out such a mission, and then question your own judgement. Should confronting an injustice be abandoned because it is dangerous? As she passes through each checkpoint, each glance at the borrowed ID, it feels as if a knife is being drawn slowly over a whetting stone, its edge sharper each time. And you realise that living under an authoritarian regime where you are a person without freedom of movement, where you are marked as unwanted, means that your last breath could be at any moment — a gun always trained on you. Shibli’s writing is sparse and evocative, the tension tautly held — there is no let up. Minor Detail is a powerful display of resistance. 

I read Swimming Studies when it was released in hardback back in 2017. It’s one of those books that stays with you. I enjoy Shapton’s writing and her quirky book projects, and my first discovery was her relationship breakup novel told as an auction. Swimming Studies is a series of essays on swimming, through word and art. Whether it’s the act of swimming, Shapton’s history of competitive swimming, her daily dips, the other swimmers, or descriptions of water, the science of water, the ocean, the pool, each encounter with the act and the world of swimming is intimate and perceptive. There’s the delight of swimming in the essays, alongside immersive layers exploring memory, adolescence, drawing, obsession and solitude. Aside form Shapton’s particular eye, one of the things that lifts this book above others in the ‘swimming book’ genre is the inclusion of artworks — Shapton’s own. There are abstract watercolours of swimming places, the movements of the bodies in the water, and portraits of swimmers. And being Shapton, there are objects (she was one of the authors of Women in Clothes — out of print at the moment but a new edition looking likely in 2027) — her swimsuit collection. And of course, the stories that come with them. Luckily, Swimming Studies is available again as a lovely Daunt Books paperback with french flaps, complete with all the artworks and a new foreword by author Rita Bullwinkel.

A Skinful of Shadows is an immensely compelling novel for children and adults alike. Frances Hardinge creates wonderful characters, intriguing plots, and ideas that will stay with you long after you shut the covers. A Skinful of Shadows is set in England in the 1640s, the English Civil War is brewing, Puritans and Catholics are at loggerheads, and so are the King and parliament. In a small village called Popular, Makepeace lives with her mother. Making a piecemeal living from lace-making and odd jobs, they live in a small barren room in the home of her aunt and uncle, barely accepted by them or the village. When her mother dies, Makepeace is sent to the home of the aristocratic Fellmotte family, where she becomes a kitchen skivvy. Makepeace, an illegitimate child, has the Fellmotte gene, one that enables them to possess ghosts. The Fellmottes have dangerous and dark plans for her — ones that will consume her in their obsession to preserve the family line, the Fellmotte power and property. Not everyone is an enemy, though, and she makes plans with her half-brother James to escape Grizehayes. After many failed attempts, the chaos of the Civil War gives them the perfect opportunity to escape. When James lets her down, Makepeace finds herself in an even more precarious situation, but with the help of a bear and her overwhelming desire to survive she begins a journey across England to find a document worth more than gold, a document that will grant her freedom from the Fellmotte family and ensure their fall from grace. Like all good mysteries, there are plenty of turns and forks on the road, and those that help and those that hinder. Yet the more intriguing elements are those that involve the ghosts or the souls that are possessed, some of which are malevolent, others helpful. Makepeace is an excellent heroine and her relationship with Bear is endearing. A story about power, possession and purpose.

From the rusting hulks of the industrial era, from China to America, from the bodily functions of blood to the philosophical musings on the allegories of nature and man, Jean-Michel Rabaté’s Rust in the 'Object Lessons' series is a fascinating exploration of this chemical process. Fittingly introducing us to his subject through the most obvious - and what comes to mind immediately (for me at least) when we consider rust - Rabaté describes industrial wastelands and the slow decay of iron as it oxidises creating layers of rust. In a country where corrugated iron and steel infrastructure is synonymous with growth and decline, construction and patched sheds, placing ourselves in the world of the American Dust Bowl or the industrial decline of China or the agricultural wastelands of Australia is more a matter of scale than of foreign territory. In these discussions of rust, Rabaté draws on cultural references in literature and film: Paul Hertneky’s memoir Rust Belt Boy, Wang Bing’s documentary Rust, and an Australian novel by Paddy O'Reilly, The Fine Colour of Rust. Where the reader starts with the idea of decay and decline, Rabaté's analysis moves us to see rust also as a saviour, a surprising and not always negative keeper of time. Using the same method, the conversation moves towards the metaphoric, and here again texts illustrate the author’s thinking. Coetzee’s The Life and Times of Michael K is explored as a metaphor for renewal and the land giving, through its richness in iron, a plentiful supply of vegetables — the one the main character is most enamoured of being the red-orange (rust-coloured) pumpkin. As we are drawn into this examination of the notion of rust, oxidation, iron — the ideas of nature in flux — the text moves into deeper discussions of the works of several philosophers: Hegel and Ruskin each have chapters devoted to them, lovingly entitled 'Hegel and the Restlessness of Rust' and 'Ruskin: Nothing Blushes like Rust'. These are thoughtful, lively and witty explorations worth re-reading. Alongside these more academic musings are anecdotal tales from the author’s childhood - his pet turtle features with her rust coloured shell, as does his anaemia and the prescribed medicine of fresh horse’s blood. Another writer explored in response to the ideas of rust and decay is Kafka, and his story ‘Jackals and Arabs’, which features rusty scissors and is also an allegory for his views on the politics and machinations of Zionism and its effect upon the Arab communities of Palestine. In the final parts of the book Rabaté extends the conversation of rust to imperfection, to the flaw that makes an object exquisite — the mark of time, nature and artist — in the Japanese concept of wabi-sabi, in the sculptural works of monuments purposely made to alter over time through oxidisation, and in architecture that allows the metal to record time on its facades. The concluding chapter introduces the hopefulness of rust - the discovery of ‘green rust’, an ecological tool that can clean iron-heavy waters and that may lead to technology that will break down waste. Rust is ‘infinitely restless’ in all its guises — physically, emotionally and intellectually — and Rabaté’s musings are infinitely provocative with their eclectic amalgams. Another excellent addition to the 'Object Lessons' series. 

I’ve been reading Ali Smith for decades. From her debut novel, Like, through her short story collections, Hotel World springs to mind, her retelling of mythologies, Girl Meets Boy and The Story of Antigone, to the discomfort of There But For The and the unexpected visitor in The Accidential, to the art of How to Be Both, Smith’s books have always been intriguing, centred on human interactions and our ability to live in the world. Yet it was the seasonal quartet: Autumn, Winter, Spring, Summer; and the books that have followed: Companion Piece, Gliff, and now Glyph; with their immediacy and provocation to act, to be part of the story that pushed her writing and the reading of her work into a realm where only Ali Smith could take us. Her ability to use language, to incorporate art, culture, and politics is invigorating, pointed and surprising.
Here are some of the things I said in my reviews at the close of reading each of the quartet novels and Gliff: “….a book that will both stun you and fill you with hope, moments of kindness, forgiveness, and a window to a better world if we dare to step through.”, “..a meditation on time, ….and the surprising things that the past can reveal to us in the present.”; “…with a hammering of words that are explosive…demands your attention. Ferocious and tender.”, “…draws richness out of desolation…and she does it with intelligence, wit and style.”, “To stay in this playfulness of words, the richness of language and story, to be suspended with curiosity, while also confronted by the urgency of our 21st century landscape must surely be a work of genius.”
In Ali Smith’s novels I have been introduced to artists, and experienced writers and mythology in new ways. I am asked to see, to shift or sharpen my perspective bringing the telescope’s lens to its best advantage, even when that clarity is frightening. Characters are brave, and also cowards. The curtains of the theatre that allow a player to be revealed, and then escape and hide, are constantly in motion. We flex our emotions. The reader is emboldened, then stunned. We remember why we should ask the most important question: Why? Ali Smith feeds our desire for story, for narrative, not at its surface level, but at its core: why narrative is important; whether that is in words, art, myth, nature, politics; and how it is used and how we can claim it. We can read the world, see it for what it is and more importantly what it could be. I think reading books is a subversive act: in reading we acquire knowing. We are in the book, and this action does not allow interference. If a book makes you curious, curious enough to ask questions, you are thinking. If you are thinking, this is a good thing. I have two new Ali Smiths on my reading pile, Glyph and So in the Spruce Forest. Autmnn will be a good reading season.

In a recent article Colm Tóibín writes on the mechanism of creating a short story, where a moment, a snippet of conversation, a chance encounter can be a trigger which, combined with memories and experiences, consciously or subconsciously, builds a whole around this small initial encounter. Lauren Groff is an excellent short story writer, who is seemingly able to pluck a moment, an idea or a character from the air and in a startling few sentences hook you, building a connection to the fate of the protagonist. I like Groff’s novels very much, (The Vaster Wilds was epic and beautiful) but I enjoy her short stories immensely. Her award-winning collection Florida was all seething swamp with its geophysical focus. Brawler is less geophysical in nature, although it does have some very specific touchpoints of place moving across various American states from New England to California. Its variety isn’t just in landscape but also across age and class, varying from the impoverished to the wealthy, the very young, with several child protagonists, as well as those in mid-life figuring prominently. The nine stories in Brawler focus, successfully, on the interior landscapes of their characters and how each reacts to circumstances, often but not always, forced on them. (Some of the protagonists make their own special hells.) What decisions will one make, and how will these decisions impact on others, especially those closest and dearest? The opening story, ‘The Wind’, is powerful. You are swept up in the narrative of a young child and their sibling as they navigate leaving home. There is a Hansel & Gretel moment as they quietly leave the house. There’s a gentle interlude, before you realise that violence underpins their actions. A violence at first abstract, before Groff shakes the very foundations you depend on, the ability to escape. It’s a story that explores trauma and its persistence as it reaches up through generations, resurfacing to cause chaos. In a recent interview Groff talks about rage, and defines it as a force for good if it’s laser-focused and if not, a miasma. For context, Lauren Groff lives in Florida, in a blue spot in the red state; and was a competitive swimmer. Many of the stories include swimming and water, the good and bad of it, from pleasurable immersion to the threat of flood, or the danger of the snow storm. The brilliant story ‘Brawler’ features a feisty teen, a brawler in every way, who is fearless in her high dives, but as we turn to her arrival home at the close of the story, she is powerless to help her mentally and physically unwell mother. Here our empathy is broken apart. Like many of the stories we are asked to question where our loyalties lie, and the answer isn’t always clear. Victims become perpetrators and vice versa, those we are wary or dismissive of gain our empathy. Ethical questions arise about what is good and what is bad, as we encounter situations that challenge our understanding and often, not always, leave us hanging with a question mark. ‘What’s the Time, Mr. Wolf?’ Is a perfect example of this quandary where we follow the boy, Chip, from childhood to middle age. The youngest sibling in a banking tycoon family, he has skimmed along on his family name and male-ness, never quite fitting, but getting by, despite the raw deal his mother and sister had been handed. While they’ve learnt to get by and succeed in their own wits, he’s not so competitively inclined. After a stint in the family bank he’s sent to the summer house to contemplate his future and dry out, although nobody really talks about the alcoholic tendencies within the family, nor the unspoken impact of the subtle violence of bullying that impregnates the interactions within this family. There is a flicker of hope, but will it be extinguished by the choices Chip makes? The nine stories in Brawler are incisive , pin-prickingly good, shocking in parts yet emotionally geared to make us sit up and see the desire in humans to do the right thing despite our fallibility. It explores the dark and light in all of us, and our battle to understand violence, to alleviate trauma, if we can — to draw on our compassion, even when this is an imperfect thing, in the aid of another, or to ensure our own survival.

I was drawn to this novel firstly by the cover. Who can resist a typewriter? And then by the description of a story pieced together by encyclopedic entries, typewriter exercises, immigration manual snippets, and snapshot interludes. That it is also published by the interesting and excellent Transit Books and the author is Chilean all added to this one finding a place on my shelf. Ania is a woman, about 40, who is in limbo. She has quit teaching and pet-sits for a bit of cash; her father has remarried and has ‘another family’ — one which Ania feels ousts her from her place as ‘daughter’; and her boyfriend is a remote figure in this story — whether this is her perspective or a reality we never know. And this is what hooks you in — Ania always seems like she is looking in, but never really participating. Her present is something she wishes to escape from and her past haunts her yet draws her back — seems to have a hold on her. This is a story about exile and migration, about worlds cleaved between past and present but inextricably linked. It’s a tale of never quite fitting in — an exploration of what belonging is and whether it can be truly achieved if you are severed from a part of yourself (whether that be literally, as in physical space, or metaphorically, as in a mental state). When Ania's uncle Augustin dies, her father asks her to go to Argentina in his place (he is unable to leave Chile while his wife is convalescing). Crossing the mountains brings back memories of her childhood summers spent with her grandparents and extended family. Every summer she would spend months as the ‘Chilenita’ — her otherness the role cast for her. Yet she was not the only outcast. Nelida (Augustin’s mother), the young bride who came from Italy and never adjusted, spends her days in the cool of her dark room slowly subsiding into madness (or sadness). Augustin wants to escape his home but doesn’t have the courage to abandon his family, so faithfully takes his typing lessons and remains bound to his mother. He is enamoured of his friend Garigilo’s ease of being and infatuated with Ania. The reader is left to pull the threads together about the state of the relationships between these characters. It seems as though something has occurred that has had an impact on all three, yet the action, if there was one, has happened off the pages, beyond the book, and it is only a residue — an unsaid feeling — that circles beneath Ania. Returning to the town, the memories of childhood are both threatening and endearing. Here she has a role, she is the ‘Chilenita’. As she is drawn into the vortex of her own past, she thinks about her family and their life as migrants from Italy. Her childhood memories butt up against her adult knowledge. What allowed her father to find his escape, while Augustin was stuck in time and place? Why did Nelida find it so hard to adjust, and does she carry a similar burden? What is the way forward if you are an exile in your own life or mind? Costamagna’s writing effortlessly moves across characters and time. The typewriter exercise, family snapshots, and encyclopedia entries give the reader pause as well as context and are interwoven between the unfolding narrative at just the right pitch. The Touch System is a beautiful example of fine writing and intriguing themes — a novel that compulsively draws you in where you are at fingertip distance of something palpable. 

​Patrick Ness knows how to start a fire and keep it burning. In his latest foray into the world of Chaos Walking, comes a new trilogy and the next generation. Siblings Max and Ben live in New World, they are both cured of the Noise, although it didn’t quite work out perfectly for Ben, or so he thinks. Their parents are Todd and Viola, our heroes from the first trilogy. There’s a new mayor in town, not quite as evil as Prentiss but with a name like Burly you soon realise he’s no great shakes. The book starts with a roar, the roar of a burning god pursuing Max and Ben across their farmland. The god is huge, a wall of flame, a noise unbearably loud and as the siblings run towards the river they are sure they will be undone. As the god lunges for them, it falls into the water and vanishes. This is not the only strange thing happening. There’s a rock in the sky that’s getting bigger and terrible dreams are creeping into young people’s nights. While the town folk dismiss the burning god as something imagined, the Land are more circumspect. The Sky comes to visit Todd, who still has an uneasy connection with this being who nearly killed him. Yet The Sky and Todd both know they will need to work together to solve the mystery of what the gods are (we soon are confronted by many more) and what they want, and the answer lies in the young people at the heart of this story. While Ben stays in the city with his mother — he’s at school, she’s a councillor and scientist; Max sets out with his father into the Land’s territory to find Max’s grandfather, and to consult the Land who have their own stories to tell about a burning god and a rock in the sky. As more children disappear, tensions mount and accusations fly. Fear and hatred that do nothing to stop the gods storming the city, nor the rock, now believed an alien ship, from getting closer. Can Ben and Max work together or will their differences break them apart? While there are echoes from the ‘Chaos Walking’ books, and similar themes, Piper at the Gates of Dusk is freshly appealing, sliding into new territories and feels like it holds a promise of more to come in the next two books. It moves along at a rollicking place — there’s plenty of action, as well as more contemplative moments engaging you with the teens’ inner concerns and uncertainties. Like their other books, Ness seamlessly weaves in mythology and story, and explores an array of themes — including environment, gender, racism, and misinformation. As the characters battle physically and emotionally, they also confront the question of whether they are able to do what is right over what is easy. (It’s been several years since I read the ‘Chaos Walking’ trilogy, but, good news, you don’t need to read these first, as there are enough pointers to the past history of New World in this volume to cover the ground, if not the detail. This is a new series and can stand on its own.) Another excellent young adults’ novel from Patrick Ness: you will be hooked. Order now, before the April release.

The Employees is a novel written in short statements; entries based on a series of interviews to gauge worker contentment and their response to the cargo on board. Yes, it’s the future: the 22nd century to be exact and the crew of The Six-Thousand Ship are docked on planet New Discovery collecting specimens. These specimens, Objects, are having a profound effect on the crew, both the human and humanoid workers and the bureaucrats have been sent to record their statements and to gauge how the Objects are impacting the workflow and productivity of the crew—a typical corporate-world strategy: get the workers to explain themselves so a solution, probably not favourable to said workers, can be implemented. What unfolds in the 179 Statements is surprising. The Objects of New Discovery are both feared and loved; there are antagonisms, as well as attraction, between the humans and the humanoids; some of the humans are living in a nostalgic past lost in images — holographs of their children to dwell on —  and craving experiences of a long-lost Earth; and the humanoids are various, and their different upgrades have made some indistinguishable from the humans and increasingly independent, causing friction in their role, in particular, towards the Objects. Each interview and recorded statement reveals a little more to the reader, building a sense of this world. The ship has a mission and the crew set roles, yet somehow the Objects have upset this carefully tuned equilibrium. What these Objects are is never fully explained and I imagine for each reader they will present differently. Some are smooth, others colourful, yet others fine-haired, some produce eggs and are full of seeds. Are they large or small? They seem carry-able, and one of the workers describes sitting with one in his lap. The crew assume vastly different relationships with the Objects. It may be that the humanoids respond more positively, sensing some similarities in their ‘objectness’, while the humans find them more confusing, and some are repulsed by them. It is not always clear whether a statement is from a human or humanoid, adding to the obliqueness of the text. With Ravn’s choice of structure, you could imagine a staccato-like form, and while ‘business’ language and systems are apparent and the environment of the sterile ship evokes a science laboratory, the tone of the novel is more evocative than technical. She cleverly brings these recorded conversations into the realm of lyricism, with the workers' fee lings and longings exposed, along with their pleasure and anger of their purpose. From the laundry staff to the captain to the doctor, each expresses their perspective. While some refuse to speak, rebelling against the Committee, others are relieved to unburden themselves. The Employees is a fascinating look at what constitutes a human, and what might be an object — where does sentience begin? — and are we ever really autonomous?

Ernest would rather have his head in a dictionary than have to talk to anyone, go to school, or visit the shrink. His family are equally obsessive: Dad with his work, Adalyn with theatre and study, Ezra with his push-ups and going to the gym, and Arlo keeping track of his frogs. And they are all experts in tuning out of ‘Everything That Happened’ — until their mother, Beatrice, disappears. One morning she leaves home early and doesn’t return. Ernest is determined to find her. He feels responsible for her disappearance. With two unlikely helpers on his side: a dumpster-diving girl called Quinn, and a typewriter, Olivetti, they might be able to crack the puzzle. At the centre of this charming and heart-felt story is Olivetti — a typewriter who decides to break all the rules to help Beatrice and the family they have grown up with. The concept of a typewriter holding and being able to retell all the stories ever typed into it is clever and the voice of Olivetti, their frustrations (about being replaced by the laptop) and observations of the human relationships within this dynamic family unit, is both sardonic and caring. While the entire family come together, in spite of past difficulties, it is Ernest that doesn’t give up and with the unexpected help of Quinn learns to communicate outside the world of the dictionary. Will they be able to solve the puzzle of where Beatrice is? And as they unpick the stories and people in Beatrice’s life thanks to Olivetti, how well did they know their mother? And why did she run away? Millington’s children’s novel, Olivetti, is a clever: a great concept for examining illness within families, and how those closest to this ordeal deal with it, as well as a love letter to the typewriter and the telling of stories.

I’ve had this one on my ‘to read’ pile for a while. Attracted by the generic-service-station cover image, and the fact that this is published by Daunt Books, who pick up on some interesting titles not widely available outside their country of origin; a quick read of the blurb convinced me I needed to read this one. Set in the Allegheny Mountains of Appalachia, it’s the story of Jean, her life in a rundown rust belt town (which isn’t going to see better days), her use of industrial materials to make sculptural structures, her almost solitary lifestyle, and her grief at being estranged from her step-daughter, Leah. It’s also Leah’s story — her coming to terms with her feelings for Jean, as well as her anger, through their shared, if broken, history, and Jean’s ‘manglements’. The Manglements are Jean’s massive towers welded from scrap metal plate, decorated with quirky junkyard and market table finds, all holding meaning and often humour, filling the downstairs of her rundown house, pressuring the floor and breathing into that space. Weave into this Jean’s awkward and unexpected relationship with Elliot, deliberately kept ambiguous by the author, but who becomes the vehicle for reconciling Leah with Jean, post-death; and whose character represents the despair and poverty of an abandoned community, Take What You Need explores the impact people have on each other, how an environment, emotionally and physically, shapes a person, and the driven passion for art that can illuminate a life. Here are Louise Bourgeois and Agnes Martin, two fellow reclusive and determined travellers, whispering in Jean’s ear. Here is the singular passion, as well as her cantankerous nature, that allows Jean to create, to follow her own path in spite of doubt, injury and risk, and an embattled, increasingly bitter and xenophobic community. And for Leah, a reckoning — a recognition of love, the importance of our childhoods and how they shape us in spite of ourselves, and a responsibility to step outside her own perspective to see everything that is good in a life’s work.