We talked about possible future reads, so here are my suggestions as discussed:
M.J. Farrell The Siege of Krishnapur (1973). This won the Booker Prize in that year. Marc has read it and it’s one of my long-time favorite re-reads, always great. Set in a fictional part of India at the time of the Mutiny, it’s one of the early ‘post-colonial’ novels. I’m not giving away the plot.
Timothy Mo (half Cantonese and half English) has written Sour Sweet, The Monkey King, An Insular Possession, Brownout on Breadfruit Boulevard (the first one he had to publish himself as no publisher would take it, I can see why but still love it), The Redundancy of Courage (fictional account of an island similar to East Timor, seen through the eyes of a gay Chinese hotel-owner) Renegade or Halo2 (the son of a Philipina bargirl and a black American serviceman and his journey round the world), and finally last year Pure (a Thai transvestite film critic is forced to join the jihad). I think Pure should have had some severe editing but the two previous ones are great.
Kate Atkinson, who started out with Behind the Scenes at the Museum. She has a series of detective novels, with hero Jackson Brodie. They can be read in any order, the one I suggest is One Good Turn. Atkinson picks up every detail of the plot and resolves it, nothing is lost or wasted. Stands up to re-reading and I love Jackson Brodie.
Has anyone else read Angela Carter, Nights at the Circus? Like Farrell, she died far too young, this is really from the height of magical realism. The heroine, Fevvers, is a cockney music-hall trapeze artist who really does have wings, or does she? It was published in 1984, does it still work? For me, yes.
We talked about possible future reads, so here are my suggestions as discussed:
ReplyDeleteM.J. Farrell The Siege of Krishnapur (1973). This won the Booker Prize in that year. Marc has read it and it’s one of my long-time favorite re-reads, always great. Set in a fictional part of India at the time of the Mutiny, it’s one of the early ‘post-colonial’ novels. I’m not giving away the plot.
Timothy Mo (half Cantonese and half English) has written Sour Sweet, The Monkey King, An Insular Possession, Brownout on Breadfruit Boulevard (the first one he had to publish himself as no publisher would take it, I can see why but still love it), The Redundancy of Courage (fictional account of an island similar to East Timor, seen through the eyes of a gay Chinese hotel-owner) Renegade or Halo2 (the son of a Philipina bargirl and a black American serviceman and his journey round the world), and finally last year Pure (a Thai transvestite film critic is forced to join the jihad). I think Pure should have had some severe editing but the two previous ones are great.
Kate Atkinson, who started out with Behind the Scenes at the Museum. She has a series of detective novels, with hero Jackson Brodie. They can be read in any order, the one I suggest is One Good Turn. Atkinson picks up every detail of the plot and resolves it, nothing is lost or wasted. Stands up to re-reading and I love Jackson Brodie.
Has anyone else read Angela Carter, Nights at the Circus? Like Farrell, she died far too young, this is really from the height of magical realism. The heroine, Fevvers, is a cockney music-hall trapeze artist who really does have wings, or does she? It was published in 1984, does it still work? For me, yes.
Robin
Proposal by Caroline:
ReplyDeleteIan Mc Ewan, THE CHILDREN ACT
Book club selection in March 2016
DeleteProposal by Myriam:
ReplyDeletePer Olov Enquist, The Book About Blanche and Marie