Gender Games by Juno Dawson

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Thinking about gender: The Gender Games by Juno Dawson

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The Gender Games is part-memoir, part-manifesto, covering many aspects of how gender messes up lives and society. It follows Dawson’s personal narrative around gender as a trans woman whilst also pointing out major issues with the ways in which gender is framed and how gender affects people, from being forced into looking one way or playing with that toy to being at risk of violence or lacking vital opportunities. The varied topics discussed include the north-south divide in England, issues with PE in schools, friendships (and how they are gendered), the rise of the alt-right and other internet stances of non-acceptance, transitioning, gym culture, fairy tales, and growing up.

She tells her own story in a witty, often self-deprecating way, and uses her experiences as a teacher and as a YA fiction writer as well as her own childhood to question how children are pushed into stereotypes or pushed away from what they really want to do or be. The book is full of pop culture references and relatable British jokes like her dad calling Little Chef ‘Little Thief’. It is an accessible, enjoyable read that encourages people to question gender and examine how it can be detrimental in society. It is also an important memoir that shows experiences that many people will know very little about and which can be a life line to those who do. She points out that hers is only one example, but that is the point: a personal reflection on gender from somebody who has thought a lot about it, which will inspire others to think further.

No Good Deed by John Niven

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Kill Your Friend(’s successes and revel when they fail): No Good Deed by John Niven

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No Good Deed is a satirical novel about modern day success which exposes male insecurity and friendship in the process. Alan is a food writer a comfortable upper-middle-class life and an upper-class English wife, a far cry from his Ayrshire roots and the accent he’s long since cast off. When a homeless man on the street turns out to be his old friend Craig—who dropped out of uni to become a rock star and they lost touch—Alan decides to do the good thing and help him out. However, with simmering resentment and an unequal dynamic, their friendship isn’t on the sturdiest of grounds and soon Alan’s life is thrown into ridiculous disarray.

The novel is a dark comedy about youthful friendship, adult success, class, and the modern world of success and failure. From the start, Alan’s privileged and insensitive world is highlighted through glib comments and more deep set attitudes, and it is this vein that powers No Good Deed on through its narrative, with a sense that somehow Alan also loathes himself a little bit for what he has become, but also has absolutely no desire to give up its comforts and excesses. The narrative has the predictable feel of an obvious downfall, with Niven making it clear that a simple mutually supportive friendship was never exactly what Alan and Craig had, but this suits the comedic style, a mocking look at helping out an old friend and how such a concept doesn’t really exist.

Niven places the events squarely in the modern day, with references to social media sites like Twitter and Tumblr and extended mocking of the London housing market (Alan and his wife were lucky in the nineties and then into the new millennium, allowing them an expensive house in the country in the present). Mostly these give it an up-to-date feel, though there is perhaps a bit too much comedy aimed at the easy target of hipsters and an unnecessary referencing of Trump.

I found it funnier than Niven’s earlier novel Kill Your Friends, with its continually poking fun at the lifestyles of the modern well-off middle-class being more engaging and easy to find ridiculous. In some ways it feels similar to the recent Trainspotting sequel film in that old friendships and nostalgia mix with modern technology and growing up in different ways, although Niven’s novel is less amusingly feel-good and more satirical. No Good Deed is a sharp and funny look at friendship, growing up, and the ridiculousness of wealth and class in modern society.

[Note: this is the 100th post on this blog, so thanks everyone for reading!]

The Bedlam Stacks by Natasha Pulley

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A journey into Bedlam: The Bedlam Stacks by Natasha Pulley

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The Bedlam Stacks is a strangely enticing novel set in the nineteenth century about a dangerous expedition and the lengths one man ends up going to not only succeed in his venture, but also to sustain a newfound bond. Injured expeditionary Merrick Tremayne is convinced by the India Office into one last adventure, a trip to New Bethlehem—a holy town known as Bedlam deep in Peru in areas uncharted by the British—to bring back cuttings of cinchona trees, whose bark contains quinine which will treat the malaria epidemic. Facing hostility on all sides once he reaches Peru, Tremayne discovers the secrets of the forest, makes an unlikely allegiance, and must fight to protect these and bring back the plants.

Pulley’s novel starts slowly and at first can appear an uninteresting colonialist tale, but it becomes mesmerising as Tremayne is drawn further into the Peruvian world. Part of this is due to his first person narration: initially he seems like an expeditionary gardener stuck in a British colonial viewpoint, but his sense of wonder, his attitudes towards the native people and the Quechua language, and his forging friendships there like his grandfather did before him make the novel engaging and make him a character who really becomes something special. Pulley avoids a lot of obvious plot points or ideas, instead making an unexpected and enjoyable narrative.

As with the narrative pace, at first it seems overly colonialist, focused on British forces and the East India Company, but again, as the novel progresses, it becomes clear that the focus is more upon Incan and other Peruvian culture and life in the nineteenth century, including the mysterious elements centred around Tremayne’s guide Raphael. Raphael is also the book’s most interesting character and the varied relationship between him and Tremayne is a real highlight and a crucial part of the second half of the novel.

The Bedlam Stacks is a great new novel for historical fiction fans who enjoy adventure, non-British cultures, and a mystical sense of both the past and the present. It is a book that questions belief, reinforces similarity over difference, and shows how someone who feels an outsider in society can find allies and a place in another.

‘Lyrical Ballads’: books and music

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“Would put me up on the bookshelf / With the books, and the plants?”

Adam Ant, ‘Desperate But Not Serious’

Books and music are two of my favourite things, but that’s not my whole excuse for writing about them together today. The Adam Ant lines above were the first thing that came into my head when I thought of books and songs which likely says more about the inside of my brain than their connection. Nevertheless, books and music are definitely connected.

The obvious starting point is how they’ve influenced each other. From the most famous songs influenced by books (e.g. Kate Bush’s ‘Wuthering Heights’, the reason many people know the plot, or Dire Straits’ ‘Romeo and Juliet’) to the lyrics and titles that make slightly less obvious connections (I was a proud teenager when I understood the very obvious reference in the title of Green Day’s ‘Who Wrote Holden Caulfield’, only slightly more understandable because I’m not American), there’s plenty of music that mentions or is influenced by books. And the other way round isn’t lacking either, with book titles (Coupland’s Girlfriend In A Coma comes to my mind because I’m a Smiths fan) and endless quotations and epigraphs proving authors often have music on the brain whilst writing.

Next is where my title comes in. Wordsworth and Coleridge’s 1798 book of poetry Lyrical Ballads may not be to everyone’s taste (I say as someone who somewhat agrees with Byron’s use of ‘Turdsworth’), but it’s a pretty obvious reminder of something pointed out to my class at undergrad: poetry and music are connected. Plenty of poems have been turned into music (sticking with the Romantics, Blake’s ‘And did those feet in ancient time’ is perhaps the most famous example, better known as the anthem ‘Jerusalem’). Bob Dylan won the Nobel Prize for Literature, somewhat controversially. It is difficult, especially when being pressed by an Oxford tutor who wants you to admit it could be arbitrary, to explain the difference satisfactorily.

And finally, my real excuse for writing about books and music being connected. I think that they can create the same sense of nostalgia, the same knowledge of where you were when you read/first listened to/reread/listened excessively to them. I can tell you that The Secret History is what I read whilst also trying (and succeeding, I must show off and say) to read Richardson’s 1500 page Clarissa in my second year of undergrad, that The Libertines are the band that means moving to Holloway Road and walking the same locations mentioned in the songs, that I reread Order of the Phoenix on a trampoline whilst waiting for the day of the Half-Blood Prince release. To me, there’s nothing quite like books, songs, or bands for generating memories of a specific time and what I was doing then. And I love them both for it.

The Destroyers by Christopher Bollen

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Privilege falling part on a Greek island: The Destroyers by Christopher Bollen

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The Destroyers is a tense and ominous novel about childhood friendship and about the lengths people go to protect their power and assets. Ian Bledsoe flees the death of his disliked father to the Greek island retreat of his old schoolfriend, Charlie, whose life seems untroubled by worry or money troubles, the opposite of Ian’s own. The situation on Patmos is far from idyllic, however, with social tensions and shady dealings that start coming out of the woodwork just as Ian thinks he might have found a refuge. This literary thriller becomes a complicated web of priorities as Ian tries to work out just what is going on which Charlie.

Bollen’s writing style is full of witty observations and the narrative becomes gripping as the strands really start to take off, all held together from the perspective of Ian. He is a classic friend figure, a fellow rich schoolfriend of Charlie’s who is now saddled with a lack of inheritance and an inferiority complex about life. The importance of Ian and Charlie’s childhood game Destroyers adds a vivid touch, a thread of danger running from the start until the imagined threat starts to appear real. The novel shows the modern world as a place divided and tense, with the refugee crisis, the collapse of the Greek economy, and the thread of extremist violence all forming the backdrop of the story. At times this seems a little irrelevant – Ian’s time in Panama is shown in perhaps too much detail – but what Bollen creates is a thriller about privilege and power that focuses more on characters and on the society that made them who they are.

Comparisons to Tartt’s The Goldfinch are easily made, though Ian does not feel similar to her protagonist and Bollen’s style isn’t as distinctive. However, the tense world evoked – one in which modern threats recreate old problems – is similar and the complicated formation of Ian and Charlie’s now-rekindled friendship feels similar to her work. The Destroyers is for anyone looking for a modern novel that looks deep at self-interest and self-presentation amongst a privileged world whilst also keeping up a tense, thriller narrative.

Crime in all shapes and sizes

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Working in a library, I see an awful lot of crime fiction. It is very popular in its various guises, from Agatha Christie to the action thriller kind where any investigation is mired in violence, but has never been something I read much of, excepting the odd mystery narrative. However, it doesn’t take much thinking for me to realise I read a lot of books with crime in them, even if they are not specifically crime fiction in some recognisable genre way. I’ve gathered up a few of my favourites for other people who either like stories with high stakes or who read crime and would like some other recommendations of something to read.

  • A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James – This is how to turn a crime story into something else, something bigger. James’ Man Booker Prize winning novel focuses on the attempted assassination of Bob Marley in the 1970s and how the events affect a range of characters mixed up in political conspiracy, rivalry, drugs, and music.
  • American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis – Quite famously about crime, but despite its infamy, it is still worth reading as a masterful and terrifying satire of 90s yuppie culture that will change the way you think about Huey Lewis and the News. Plus the way it interlinks with Easton Ellis’ other works (and how they link to Tartt’s The Secret History) is very satisfying as a reader who likes easter egg bonus content.
  • The Alchemist by Ben Jonson – An out-there choice, I know, but Jonson’s play about tricksters conning everyone in ridiculous ways is in some ways a great story of opportunity and comeuppance akin to modern gangster novels.
  • Skagboys by Irvine Welsh – I know it seems ‘edgy’ to pick the prequel to Trainspotting, but I want to emphasise how worth reading Skagboys is, both a dark and funny look at how the characters became the unforgettable personas from Trainspotting and a comment on the AIDS crisis in Scotland in the 80s. All three books about the characters are full of plenty of crime that isn’t just the prolific drug dealing and possession.
  • Loot by Joe Orton – Orton’s black comedy about two thieves trying to hide their loot around the dead body of one of their mothers is a classic example of how crime can be hilarious and also deeply twisted.
  • Caleb Williams by William Godwin – I needed at least one classic novel and Godwin’s story of revelation and persecution fits my criteria nicely, though the likelihood of convincing anyone to read it might be low. Written in the 1790s, it is about a man who finds out his employer’s secret and ends up on the run from the authorities. One to read if you like classic injustice, though the ending may surprise.

The Windfall by Diksha Basu

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Comedy of wealth: The Windfall by Diksha Basu

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The Windfall is a funny and often sweet novel set in Delhi and America about money, social pressure, and what really makes someone happy. Anil Jha has made his fortune selling his website to an American start-up and he and his wife Bindu are moving to a more expensive area of Delhi. From their small flat where the neighbours are at close quarters to their new bungalow with its own gate, it is a big jump, especially when their new neighbours are so engrained in the world of money and privilege. Mr Jha finds himself unable to do anything but compete with these neighbours in increasingly ridiculous ways, and all the while he and his wife worry about their son Rupak, who is at college in America and not doing as well as they believe.

Basu’s novel is a classic comedy of manners, with the excesses of the rich mocked whilst gently poking fun at those who attempt to imitate it. Mr Jha’s obsession with appearing to fit in with and one-up the rich people he can now compete with is both ridiculous and endearing, with the narrative never quite laughing at him too much. Mrs Jha is the novel’s heart and possibly its best character, a woman who is uncertain about their move and about the American world her beloved son now lives in, but who ultimately wants the best for her husband and son, as well as supporting her widowed friend Reema as she tries to give her life a fresh start. It is the kind of comedy that revolves around the characters and their idiosyncrasies as it depicts the ridiculousness of wealth and the way that cultures blend and change in the modern world.

This is a comic novel not to be missed, a book with endearing and amusingly relatable characters that pokes light fun at money and rivalry whilst showing what it might be that actually makes people happy. It is a classic comedy of manners with a modern, globalised edge.

The Supremes Sing The Happy Heartache Blues by Edward Kelsey Moore

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Lifelong blues: The Supremes Sing The Happy Heartache Blues by Edward Kelsey Moore

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The Supremes Sing The Happy Heartache Blues is an uplifting and musical novel about a community in Plainview, Indiana, and how the arrival of an old blues singer to perform at an unexpected wedding sets off a range of consequences for those in the area. The Supremes are a group of old friends, Clarice, Barbara Jean, and Odette, who have lived in Plainview all their lives and are still dealing with issues in the past and present when aging blues guitarist El Walker ends up staying in town longer than expected. The novel follows the varied cast of characters as they deal with old bitterness, new opportunity, and local fiery spirited individuals.

The combination of personal drama in the lives of the three women and the turbulent past of Walker makes for a narrative with plenty of excitement and a few twists and turns. The characters are vibrant and individually drawn, with the three friends in particular given interesting personalities that are separate from their various husbands, children, and grandchildren. The novel is a follow-up to Moore’s previous book The Supremes At Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, but there is no requirement to have read that one to enjoy his new work, a book which celebrates the varied lives of three older women, one even older blues guitarist, and a wealth of supporting characters. Despite the large cast, it isn’t difficult to quickly get acquainted with who is who, and Moore moves between first and third person narration without confusion, leading the reader into the centre of events.

The novel is ideal for readers who enjoy vivid characters learning to deal with their lives in the past and present, with a background of music and small town gossip and past scandal. It is a light and enjoyable read, with a happy tone and characters who aren’t afraid to be themselves.

Watling Street by John Higgs

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History and anecdote along a Roman road: Watling Street: Travels Through Britain and its Ever-Present Past by John Higgs

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Watling Street is a charming and readable history book that combines British history, popular culture, and observations on modern society, all centred around the ancient road from Dover to Anglesey. Chapters follow the road up along the A2, the A5, and the M6 toll to pinpoint specific locations and match them with historical fact and anecdote. Higgs links in his own travels on and around Watling Street, from a family trip to Bletchley Park to stories about his childhood. What results is an eclectic book that blends older and modern history, references pop culture from classic literature to recent music, and remarks upon the state of the nation in the post-EU referendum time.

The introduction about Milton Keynes will immediately draw in anyone who has ever visited or lived in that infamously grid-shaped concrete hub. Indeed, the book’s particular audience is likely to be anyone who lives or regularly visits places along the road, as there is a certain excitement on finding familiar locations and their history told in Higgs’ warm and interesting style. Some of the historical stories and figures will probably be well-known to many readers, but the way that Higgs connects these with physical location and with modern references and ideals adds a different twist. He explores and questions ideas and definitions of Britain, turning what could sound from its summary like an uncomfortably nationalistic book into one that priorities the variation in the country and wonders how Brexit will affect visions of Britain like Higgs’ own.

Watling Street is part popular history and part light-hearted state of the nation book, with personal anecdotes from Alan Moore sitting alongside information on how Romans built their roads.

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy

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The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy

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The Ministry of Utmost Happiness is the eagerly-awaited follow up to The God of Small Things, a moving novel that spans decades and goes across the Indian subcontinent to show a cast of interconnected characters and how their lives are shaped by conflict, joy, and circumstance. Depicting the stories of a variety of characters, it does not have a main narrative as much as it puts pieces of different individuals together to form a woven novel showing a modern world and its battles.

The storytelling is expectedly vivid and gives detail to different episodes such as the experiences of a transgender woman, Anjum, who finds community and makes her home in a graveyard, and the complex relationships and life of Tilo, who has been loved by fighters and intelligence officers. These female characters in particular are difficult to forget, with stories that combine family, religious and ideological conflict, and love. Roy’s style suits this storytelling, leading the reader between different narratives easily and making the novel easy to follow and join up the pieces of. From the bustle of Delhi to the countryside of Kashmir, Roy’s descriptions are intricate and show a conflicted and modern world, a world with ancient conflicts in close proximity to branches of Nando’s.

The novel is unlikely to disappoint Roy’s fans who’ve been waiting for her next book. It is a fantastic story full of vivid characters whose struggles are varied and real.