Book Recommendations: March

Fiction

The Girl with the Louding Voice, Abi Daré

This was just such an incredibly moving, inspiring story, executed with sensitivity and creativity. It follows a 14-year-old girl in a small village in Nigeria as she pursues education, and all the barriers that she faces in this, as well as all the kind souls who go out of their way to help her. It is at times completely heartbreaking, but the unique first-person narration – which tests the boundaries of language and meaning through its use of non-standard English and grammar – gives it character and makes its protagonist all the more endearing.

We all be speaking different because we all are having different growing-up life but we can be understanding each other if we just take the time to listen well.

What started as quite a jarring narration style became completely captivating through its self-awareness of linguistics and meaning. I became fascinated with how it explored and proved that you don’t need perfect English to communicate what you need to say, to craft a story, and even to move other people with your language. (I also laughed to myself about how daunting a task proofreading this would have been.)

Now I know that speaking good English is not the measure of intelligent mind and sharp brain. English is only a language, like Yoruba and Igbo and Hausa. Nothing about it is special, nothing about it makes anybody have sense.

Daré also provides a valuable window into another culture, a culture different, but also similar, in so many ways to our own. Not only this, but it showed how tightly our cultures are intertwined as it subtly acknowledged the effects of British colonialism on Nigeria – from Adunni’s pursuit of the English language to the white people that she sees on TV.

I didn’t too sure I understand what Ms Tia is talking about, or why she is calling her abroad peoples white and black when colours are for crayons and pencils and things. I know that not everybody is having the same colour of skin in Nigeria … but nobody is calling anybody black or white, everybody is just calling us by our name

All in all, this book moved, inspired, and educated me (as well as affirming my passion for education in general), and was definitely one of my favourite reads of recent months.

My mama say education will give me a voice. I want more than just a voice, Ms Tia. I want a louding voice … I want to enter a room and people will hear me even before I open my mouth to be speaking. I want to live in this life and help many people so that when I grow old and die, I will still be living through the people I am helping.

Such a Fun Age, Kiley Reid

It is a close race between this book and The Girl with the Louding Voice for my favourite book of the month. Such a Fun Age is articulate, subtle and just altogether very real. These are made-up characters but I can imagine them having lives off the page. Their stories, there is no doubt in my mind, continue after the end of the book.

I have seen debates online and in other reviews about whether particular characters are ‘good’ or ‘bad’, whether one of their actions can provide a redemptive arc, or whether a certain revelation about their past can justify what we know about them in their present. A character that I’ve seen this the most often about is Alix. But I don’t think this is ever the conversation that good authors want us to have. What I think Reid was trying to communicate through this work is how messy life is, how no one is as clear-cut as we would like to think, how people can think they have the best of intentions but others can interpret that completely differently.

Yes, this book was about race, class, privilege, and systemic inequality. But it is also about the messiness of life, about individual interactions, and how all of these things become blurred when they are applied to real-life personalities and real-life situations. We often think about issues of race and class in binary terms, but Reid breaks this right open and investigates the uncomfortableness of really truly navigating these aspects of lived experience. This is what I think is so successful about this work; you can’t look at any of the characters or any of the situations that unfold and 100% decide who was in the right and who was definitely wrong. There is always more than that, and it is so well articulated by Reid.

That is not to say that writing theoretically about race and privilege is a hindrance to progress, just that it is only ever half of the story. Reid brings these ideas to life with dynamism and nuance. That is, to me, why literature is so important: it bridges the gap between ideas and experience.

Such a Fun Age also investigates the pitfalls of white saviorism, of straddling the line between wanting to help someone and wanting to control them or influence them to do exactly as you would. This, again, is a messy boundary which she explores with nuance through her alternating narrators, allowing multiple perspectives to shed light on complex situations. I think what might grate on some people about this book is that it resists conclusions, of neat endings, of easily-categorised characters. But I think this is what makes it so successful.

Another thing I loved was Reid’s sheer attention to detail. Even just an observation that 'a breeze whipped Alix’s hair into her mouth and she pulled it out with two fingers’ between lines of dialogue resonated with me. I’m not even 100% sure why I was so struck by this seemingly simple line, but I think it just stood out as a fantastic example of the realness of the book, even down to these fine details. Authors who can pick up on these tiny realisms, those things that happen all the time but no one really notices or comments on them, are my favourite type of authors, because they make me step back and look at the everyday in a new light.

Grown Ups, Marian Keyes

Grown Ups is a significant investment of time, coming in at over 600 pages. But sometimes the extra length pays off, and it certainly did here. What I love about longer books (done well) is that there is more time and space for character building, to see each character over a period of time and in a variety of situations, to really get to know them and feel connected with them. Marian Keyes does this well; her character arcs are well thought out, and many of her characters go against your first impression of them as the narrative goes on.

This book explores some uncomfortable themes (eating disorders and the nature of grief to name a couple), but it is a lighthearted read too, and makes some important points about social issues, such as the assumptions made about asylum seekers even by those who seek to help them.

For me, it was also a little window into some of the colloquialisms and quirks of Irish English and culture, which I really enjoyed. While I felt it was quite slow to get going, this book was a real builder and I found myself unable to put it down as I got near the end.

Little Fires Everywhere, Celeste Ng

I loved Celeste Ng’s first novel, Everything I Never Told You, so I was really excited to read this. I’m pleased to say that it didn’t disappoint.

A really interesting read with well-thought-out characters and an intriguing plot (not to mention multiple subplots). I wasn’t really sure where this book was going to take me, but I was happy to be pulled along by it. It observed how big characters navigate small-town life; Ng explored their back stories and what goes on behind closed doors in this purpose-built utopian idyll that is synonymous with middle-class suburban life in the US.

Perhaps the most interesting theme in the novel was that of motherhood. Multiple subplots revolved around ideas of motherhood, and maybe the most compelling plot in the novel (without giving away any spoilers) was a matter of contested motherhood, one that shook the foundations of my sense of morality and made me question my stance on topics such as that. I like books that can make me question myself and the way I’ve come to see the world, that can keep me guessing and thinking differently about complex situations.

In short, this book has the failsafe ingredients for a gripping read: interesting and fleshed-out characters who are not all they seem on the surface, an interesting plot with twists and turns, compelling narration, and interesting and socially relevant themes. I’m excited now to watch the TV series and see Reese Witherspoon’s take on the small-town self-proclaimed progressive mother Mrs Richardson.

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Non-Fiction

Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman

I bought this book on a whim second-hand not really knowing much about it (everyone loves a bit of democracy, right?) and was pleasantly surprised. The book documents the independent journalism of the US TV news organisation Democracy Now! and is essentially a commemoration of their work over the last 20 years (although it was written in 2015, so comes from a pre-Trump context).

But what it also provides is a very perceptive and interesting account of major moments in recent US history and journalism, including the Edward Snowden NSA whistleblowing scandal, the Iraq war, and the 99% occupy movement. It demonstrates the importance of independent journalism in preserving democracy, allowing us to remain critical of powerful (and power-led) narratives.

Each chapter represents a different theme and event, so in theory you could read this book in any order, and pick it up and put it down again whenever suits you. Essentially, it is a well-written and insightful snapshot of contemporary US history through the lens of independent journalism, which raises up the voices of the oppressed and questions those in power.

Brown Baby, Nikesh Shukla

This is everything a memoir should be, in my opinion. Not only was this beautifully sensitive and emotionally intimate (making me shed a tear multiple times, which I don’t often do with books), but it zoomed out and examined issues of race, class and gender with skill and expertise. Nikesh Shukla clearly has a way with words and how they appeal to individual emotion.

Addressed to his oldest daughter and reflective on the death of his mother, this memoir captured my heart in its emotion-led portrayal of parenting, from the micro to the macro; from sleepless nights walking the streets to how to talk to his little girl about her heritage and gender, even as she made vocal efforts to reject her own brown skin.

It also constantly subverted my expectations, keeping me interested throughout; it was unexpectedly detailed in areas you wouldn’t expect. The chapters that I thought would go into the most detail were kept brief, and those which I assumed would be short meandered and reflected in detail upon their topic.

Intimations, Zadie Smith

Written in lockdown 1.0, this is a stimulating collection of thoughts and musings about a variety of topics. As ever with Zadie Smith’s non-fiction work, her essays cover such a breadth of knowledge that I couldn’t connect with each and every one of them. But I don’t think that is a detractor to the collection.

The essays that I connected with really resonated with me, and I particularly enjoyed her exploration of the absolute nature of suffering. This really hit the nail on the head when it comes to the pandemic situation, where everyone’s individual suffering was compounded by their isolation from wider society and normal social connections which can so often provide a grounding perspective.

Smith has once again produced an elegant (and eloquent) collection of non-fiction writing, and I admire her all the more for producing it during lockdown.