|
Recommended Reading at Kemp Town Bookshop
Reviews Page 2 | Prev
“Thirty Seven Stories”: From the Ambrosia Called Love to Wasabi Rush!
These charming short stories set senses tingling, heartbeats racing and leave you feeling that there is a good tale waiting to burst forth from everyone - even yourself! Created by local emerging authors in the Kemptown Bookroom Café, curiosity gives way to surprise as the stories twist and turn despite the confines of word length. Especially striking is the portrayal of the horror that revelation brings to those characters who suppress the truth. The anthology reveals the hidden talents of local writers and encourages anyone to find their inner author. The seeds of imagination that began in the Kemptown Bookshop Creative Writing Groups have been nurtured to maturity with community spirit and the guidance of the friendly and talented author, Isanna Curwen. Some of the tales are extracts of a novel that tantalise you into wanting more, others are satisfyingly packaged tales, every strand delicately woven into a sophisticated whole. Each piece is vividly described and acutely emotive allowing the mind to take flight and to experience different life scenarios from speed dating to a sub-aquatic Brighton. Through the different characters we experience the painful euphoria of the “ambrosia called love" and even the sharp blast of "wasabi rush". The collection is a romping good read for anyone and especially inspiring for those secretly contemplating trying their hand at short story writing.
Ali Smith: Accidental
The story begins with a fractured family on their “substandard holiday” in Norfolk. The group is comprised of a depressed teenage boy/hermit, a prepubescent girl that chooses to see life through her camera lens, a stepfather who is undergoing a rather poetic mid-life crisis, and a mother who spends much of her time on the floor of the garden shed with writers block. This group of misfits are joined by an unexpected guest: Amber, who proceeds to forcefully tear apart the jigsaw picture of family life leaving them to remake the scene with their new found outlooks on life. This however, is not a story of an outsider sent to cheerfully establish family harmony á la Mary Poppins. Amber is both saviour and destroyer of the family, freeing the flawed domestic boundaries and stripping the household of the ‘essentials’.
Ali Smith illustrates in this wonderful novel her ability to clearly describe situations from various different fresh viewpoints by entering the psychological workings of each character.
Review by Victoria Hepburn
Ali Smith: The Whole Story and Other Stories
This collection of stories draws the reader into potent moments in the lives of lovers, haunted old ladies, drunk women keeping warm in church on Christmas Eve, a woman that falls in love with a tree and even a fly that sits on a copy of The Great Gatsby. Each story describes the moments with such intimacy as to reveal Smith’s love affair with words and to enflame the readers’ passion for books. The task of deciphering whether we are reading about extraordinary truths or wild fantasies becomes secondary to submission to the beauty of the imagery that enfolds the mind. The characters seem equally charmed by Smith’s flights of fancy and revel in the sensory world they have been given like actors on a well furnished set.
This is a delightful celebration of books and their origins in the mind and in the earth.
Review by Victoria Hepburn
Jeanette Winterson: Art and Lies
A beautiful, abstract exploration into the nature of art, philosophy and desire. The depth of thought and well sculpted language is a rare treat, especially for contemporary fiction. Winterson allows ideas, images and beauty to flow eloquently through the pages and into the captivated mind of the reader. In Winterson’s own words: “Read me. Read me now. Words in your mouth that will modify your gut. Words that will become you.” (P.144)
Review by Victoria Hepburn
W.G. Sebald: Austerlitz
This is an engrossing tale about the labyrinthine nature of the mind evoking the internal search for truth with visual representations of webs and mazes. Austerlitz, the eponymous character, is denied his true childhood memories and name after being transported on the Kinder-transport into the care of foster parents in Wales. This is a gripping exploration into personal and international history with all the hidden traumas that war causes.
Review by Victoria Hepburn
Nigel Richardson: Breakfast in Brighton: Adventures on the Edge of Britain
“People who don’t belong are the whole world, according to Graham Greene. Being a Brightonian is the nearest you’ll get to being an insider.”(Richardson 1998. p. 160)
Nigel Richardson explores this truism, describing Brighton as the epicentre of mystery and adventure riddled with coincidence. Through eloquent prose Richardson describes the unique mix of the seedy, bizarre and the grandiose that he encounters on his beautifully detailed journey around Brighton. Richardson frequently (perhaps too frequently!) doffs his hat to Graham Greene and his seminal text Brighton Rock, bringing Pinkie and Rose along for the ride in many of his adventures. The pages are brimming with exuberant characters and curious deviations into other times, places and mystical realms always returning to the familiar bosom of Brighton.
This book is an affectionate and witty look at Brighton that is cleverly constructed and thoroughly enjoyable.
Review by Victoria Hepburn
Mick Jackson: Five Boys
This is a charming tale of childhood adventures and rural life during the war, with a very satisfying twist. The threat of war looms on the horizon, and even invades the place in the form of Bobby, a young evacuee from London, and later an imposing camp of American soldiers. The action does not centre on war however, but on the dynamics of small town living with its quirky and sometimes rather disturbing characters. The book reads like a bizarre version of the television series “Heartbeat” with the peaceful countryside being episodically interrupted by mystical characters evoking an air of adventure and magical realism. The dark tension of war is mirrored in the small town with troubling undertones that keep this book on a cliff-hanger all the way through. The busying of the townsfolk is also paralleled in a fascinating insight into the bee hives of the mysterious and unsettling bee keeper. The delinquent games that the five boys play seem harmless in comparison to the exploits of the adults of the community, particularly the memorable incident involving a pig and a coffin.
This book is a delightful mixture of hilarity, suspense and dark imagination. Jackson’s use of language is evocative and incredibly satisfying to read.
Review by Victoria Hepburn
Patricia Duncker: Hallucinating Foucalt
This is a moving tale of the strength of the relationship between writer and reader. A mystifying insight into desire, creativity and the intellectual world. Paul Michel is an intense writer who captivates the minds of his readers and researchers. The story describes the students whose lives Michel has touched, and their intricate and dangerous mission to reclaim him from the confines of a mental hospital. Duncker deals with the issues of madness, gender and sexuality in a deep and intellectually stimulating way leading the reader to question the borders of the written page.
Review by Victoria Hepburn
Kazuo Ishiguro: Never Let Me Go
Enthralling and potent throughout, this novel is expertly crafted, holding within its pages a wonderful mixture of subtlety and complexity. The main characters: Ruth, Tommy and Kath, stir a wealth of intricate emotions in each other, a heady mixture of warm nostalgia, desperate longing and bitter disappointment. Their lives are enriched and complicated by each other’s presence as they face their future shaped by their shared childhood at the utopian Hailsham School. Ishiguro skilfully leads the reader through the familiar pain and wonder of childhood memories whilst obscuring the picture with an uncanny worldview.
Review by Victoria Hepburn
Andrew Miller: The Optimists
This novel follows Clem, a journalist shocked to the core by his experiences documenting the atrocities of the world. Clem is floating through life, impulsive and detached; lost in the question of blame. He agonises over complicity and the worth of life in the aftermath of such terrible events. Life slowly reveals a new side to humanity in the guise of kindness to others, something he must learn in order to help his ailing sister.
Miller vividly describes both the inner and geographical journey of his characters but does not lead the novel to a stable and optimistic destination. Contrary to the title of the book the outlook remains bleak, which is both fresh and honest but also melancholy. The glimmer of hope and warmth that is revealed in imperfect human relationships is all that redeems the desolate world picture. This is a perplexing but honest and worthwhile read.
Review by Victoria Hepburn
Reviews Page 2 | Prev
|
