Summer Reading Reviews

Three great books here from indie presses - I really enjoyed them all.

Don't Think a Single Thought by Diana Cambridge - Louise Walters Books (Published September 2019) 

Order a copy here

1960s New York, and Emma Bowden seems to have it all – a glamorous Manhattan apartment, a loving husband, and a successful writing career. But while Emma and her husband Jonathan are on vacation at the Hamptons, a child drowns in the sea, and suspicion falls on Emma. As her picture-perfect life spirals out of control, and old wounds resurface, a persistent and monotonous voice in Emma’s head threatens to destroy all that she has worked for... 

Taut, elegant and mesmerising, Don’t Think a Single Thought lays bare a marriage, and a woman, and examines the decisions – and mistakes – that shape all of our lives. 

My review:

Elegantly written, an engaging and beguiling novel centred around Emma, the most unreliable of narrators, a woman struggling with life and the effects of a complicated childhood, full of mystery and unanswered questions. Throughout the novel I felt a little distanced from Emma, yet at the same time I was totally hooked and keen to unravel her troubled past and discover the truth.

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Finer Things by David Wharton - Sandstone Press


Buy a copy here

London: 1963. The lives of a professional shoplifter, and a young art student collide. Delia needs to atone for a terrible mistake; Tess is desperate to convince herself she really is an artist.

Elsewhere in London, the Krays are on the rise and a gang war is in the offing.
 
Tess’s relationship with her gay best friend grows unexpectedly complicated, and Delia falls for a man she’s been paid to betray. At last, the two women find a resolution together – a performance that is both Delia’s goodbye to crime and Tess’s one genuine work of art.

"Vibrant, absorbing and bursting with the unexpected, Finer Things is a sideways look at 1960s London, in which art school bohemia meets the gangster underworld. It is full of spot-on observations about the subtle power play in human interaction. I was immediately drawn into its vivid world." --Catherine Simpson

"An evocative portrait of two women navigating 1960's London."--Mahsuda Snaith

"David Wharton's novel unfolds with all the style, pace and drama of a British New Wave movie. It is a very fine thing indeed." --Jonathan Taylor 

My review:

Captivating, lively, stylish, and beautifully written, full of wonderful insights into the human psyche. David Wharton has created a layered, nuanced and totally believable world, and a lovely portrait of two young women whose different worlds collide. Delia, in particular, is a fabulous character!

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The Neverlands by Damhnait Monaghan - V Press

Buy a copy here 

"The Neverlands, a virtuoso mosaic of microfictions, tells the story of Nuala, a child caught in the crossfire of her parents' troubled marriage. This is a family epic in flash form, masterfully and movingly distilled, both devastating and hopeful. A gorgeous debut." Kathy Fish 

"The Neverlands is a heart-tugger of a collection. In pitch-perfect colloquial prose, Damhnait Monaghan waltzes us through the sorrows of a poverty-stricken Irish family, who struggle to love each other well. Funny, clever, warm and sad, this is a beautiful book." Nuala O'Connor.

My review:

Such beautiful writing, so skilfully executed. This wonderful novella-in-flash is achingly sad, yet ends with hope. It deserves to be read more than once. Such a layered and complex insight into the human condition - Mammy and Nuala will stay inside my head for a long time to come.

Review of Soul Etchings by Sandra Arnold

Sandra Arnold's flash fiction collection is out today from Retreat West Books, and it's fabulous!

ABOUT SOUL ETCHINGS

Death, motherhood, the nature of reality, and the gender expectations of cultural conditioning are woven through these biting little stories in Sandra Arnold's debut flash fiction collection. Sometimes sad, surreal and sinister, they're also shot through with love and a deep understanding of humanity.

In gorgeous, spare prose that paints a very vivid picture, Sandra Arnold gives voice to characters that are often unheard. From Daisy in Fireworks Night, willing to do whatever it takes to protect her little sister; to Martha in The Girl With Green Hair who has her body in the world we live in and her mind in the one that not many people see; and Ruby in Don't Mess With Vikings who finds strength in a diagnosis of illness to stand up to bullies. With the stories in this collection, Sandra Arnold etches marks on your soul that will last.

MY REVIEW

Sandra Arnold takes us into a different world in these vivid and haunting stories. She leads us through a landscape we think we know and recognise, but it proves to be a world that is slightly off-kilter and faintly surreal. The prose is both sparse and beautiful, yet there is nothing instant here - no quick, fleeting reward. These tales don't fizz and die like fireworks, they are slow burning tapers, fires that burn through the night. They are stories that creep up on you from behind, and once they sink their teeth in they don't let go. A crowd of images remains in wait at the edge of your vision, popping up in your mind when you least expect it. Sandra Arnold has a deep understanding of the human condition and her writing gets under your skin and stays there.  

You can buy a copy here

Summer Reading

The book post has been very kind to me this last couple of weeks, and I've enjoyed all three of these fabulous books - reviews to follow shortly!

The Cotton Grass Appreciation Society

I'm delighted to have a poem in this anthology alongside Simon Armitage, Alison Lock and many other great poets. The Cotton Grass Appreciation Society will be launched in September as part of the Marsden Walking Festival.

National Flash Fiction Day

It's National Flash Fiction Day tomorrow, and I've shared my thoughts on reading and writing flash with Cath Holland as part of Wrapped Up In Books on the Getintothis website, along with many other writers such as Sarah Hilary, Sandra Arnold and F J Morris.


You can read the full article here




AMANDA HUGGINS

‘Flash fiction is perfectly suited to the pace of the twenty-first century, and I love the way you can dip in and out, returning to certain stories time after time as you would with a poetry collection.

I know some readers say they don’t read shorts because they can’t lose themselves in the story the way they can in a novel, yet a cracking flash will leave you with something to think about for days after you’ve read it. Writing flash is both a challenge and a joy.

It’s an opportunity to try and create something as perfect as it can possibly be. When you only have a few hundred words, your language needs to be specific, concise, sparing, lean. When you impose restrictions it can often result in something surprising. I have read flash fiction that has made me cry in the space of two minutes, and stories that have made me hold my breath until I reached the end.

In flash pieces, what isn’t said is as important as what is, and I have a favourite Hemingway quote that sums it up perfectly: “If a writer of prose knows enough about what he is writing about, he may omit things … and the reader … will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them.”’ – Amanda Huggins, Costa Short Story Award 2018 -3rd Prize for Red; author of Separated From the Sea-Special Mention, Saboteur Awards 2019. New collection, Scratched Enamel Heart, Spring 2020.