Short stories by an Australian author. I managed a few, but decided not to continue. The “To Read” Pile is too high…. and tempting.
Publisher page: The High Places – Fiona McFarlane
The High Places – Fiona McFarlane
Genre: Modern fiction
The Female Persuasion – Meg Wolitzer
Another slow start. The Germaine Greer parallels felt a little too blunt.
Once I got past Greer Kadetsky’s first name and Faith Frank’s character, this novel about women, friendship and feminism through the late 19th and early 20th century was a speedy and timely read.
Publisher page: The Female Persuasion – Meg Wolitzer
History of Wolves – Emily Fridlund
Minnesota teen’s account of the summer she looked after a four year old boy, Paul, who dies of cerebral oedema, his Christian Scientist parents, in particular his scientist father Leo, refusing to seek medical help.
(And no, I didn’t read this in a matter of hours on 19 May – I’d almost finished it before heading up to Penrith on Friday and needed to take a longer read with me… hence When Breath Becomes Air.)
Publisher page: History of Wolves – Emily Fridlund
How It All Began – Penelope Lively
A chance find on the Walton bookshelves, I suspect this was one of the books we inherited from Janet or John at the caravan. Just right for a blustery Bank Holiday Monday and ensuing working week.
We spend a few months in the company of multiple Londoners, born, bred and immigrant, whose lives are all affected by the random mugging of 77 year old Charlotte. An exploration of the butterfly effect and the characters that inhabit modern middle class London.
Author page: How It All Began – Penelope Lively
The Sweet Dove Died – Barbara Pym
Barbara Pym was a Kate Macdonald tip. A good one.
In The Sweet Dove Died, Pym strikes me as a more acerbic version of Tessa Hadley, Penelope Lively, Margaret Forster, with a period setting a generation or two earlier as Leonora, a lady of a certain age, dallies with two West London antiques dealers – handsome young James and his rather more portly but prosperous uncle Humphrey.
Publisher page: The Sweet Dove Died – Barbara Pym