Reviewed by Alison Burns
A web of conscious and unconscious interconnections, layered like the often invisible levels of the city’s transport system, links the dead woman with a cross-section of London’s inhabitants. In particular, Chrissie, a young and reckless hospital nurse, who happens to go missing briefly on the same night as DB27; Alan, a film-maker, who makes a TV documentary about them; and Pete, the river-haunting policeman who tries to solve the case [Read more...] in Reviews
Reviewed by Elsbeth Lindner
Atmospheric is scarcely an adequate term to describe the intensity of Lin’s evocation of the fabric of this family’s life. Clothing, terrible food, the flimsy home, its accumulated junk, the detritus in the attic – all of it is conveyed in near-palpable detail, piling on the bleakness of the novel’s mood. Even when rare good moments occur, like an evening spent in the home of a generous neighbor, Gavin is incapable of experiencing enjoyment [Read more...] in Reviews
Reviewed by Alison Burns
Author Bev Thomas has worked as a clinical psychologist and clearly knows whereof she speaks. In her hands, Hartland’s treatment sessions are small masterclasses in the art and practice of therapy; and Hartland is portrayed convincingly as a practitioner who knows very well when she has crossed the line but cannot stop herself [Read more...] in Reviews
Reviewed by Alison Burns
The vicissitudes of Midhat’s adult life are handled with great sensitivity, within a political narrative that is unusually searching. The reader is made to reflect upon and better understand divided loyalties, differing value systems, revolt against patriarchal as well as imperial patterns of behaviour. One of the betrayals in the story is academic in its purpose, but unforgiveably condescending in practice [Read more...] in Reviews
* Shortlisted for the EBRD prize
* A 2018 Notable Book
Reviewed by Rachel Hore
Although the oppression of life under Communism infuses this tender tale, Soviet Milk is principally a story about individual character, not politics. There’s no doubt that the mother is a wounded soul, who struggles and fails to be happy, but the author offers no pat answers about why. She is so delicately and warmly evoked, however, that the reader is stirred to empathy rather than impatience [Read more...] in Reviews
Reviewed by Alison Burns
Yukiko Motoya has been mentioned in dispatches for some time as a startling new voice in fiction. Her stories mix an almost deadpan ordinariness with entertaining flights of fancy that should lift the sternest critic off her feet. Magritte meets Murakami in tale after tale of the oddest things happening in the very path of daily life [Read more...] in Reviews
