Coming in at only 140 pages, Megan Hunter’s fascinating experimental novel is more a prose-poem or novella, but with the intensity of a short story. The text is divided by *** and interspersed with quasi biblical quotations. Everything has been pared down to the minimum: sentences are often so short as to be almost cryptic … More Review: The end we start from

Akwaeke Emezi’s debut novel is an intriguing story about the complex psychological life of Ada, a young Nigerian woman. Her multiple personalities are envisaged as figures from Igbo mythology and Christianity, and there is constant conflict and emotional stress as these characters fight to gain control of Ada. A difficult subject dealt with in a … More Review: Freshwater

A coming of age novel set in 1950s Canada. When their mother marries Eugene, Willa and her older sister Joan are thrown together with his sons, Kenneth and Patrick, the ‘demigods’ of the title. Their mother spends her days drinking and smoking, arguing with Eugene while the girls are left to their own devices. Joan … More Review: Demigods

Between catching trains, hospital visits and hosting leaving parties for my daughter (going travelling for 6 months) I’ve only been able to write in short bursts this week. I’ve written more than I imagined… still all notes and sketches longhand, but it’s coming together slowly. Perhaps limiting myself to these constrained units of time is … More Writing update

by Tomoka Shibasaki (translated by Polly Barton) published by Pushkin Press, 2017 Winner of the Akutagawa Prize in Japan, Tomoka Shibasaki’s novella, Spring Garden, is a study in loneliness and loss, the passage of time, and the human relationship with the built environment. Taro, recently divorced and grieving for his dead father, is one of … More Is city life damaging our health? A review: Spring Garden

  The gorgeously colourful cover of The Maid’s Room hides an ugly truth. The rooms most of the 230,000 maids in Singapore can call their own are ‘bomb shelters’: concrete, airless and windowless, where the tumble dryer adds to the already intolerable humidity. In this debut novel rather than laying the indignity and unfairness on … More Review: The Maid’s Room

A rejection (of my novel) but filtered through my agent, Emily is always so much easier to take because she balanced it with the suggestion of a competition to try. Onwards and upwards… And my gloom was lifted by MsLexia accepting a short “confession” I submitted recently. But you’ll have to wait till December to … More Writing update

by Jennifer Egan published by Corsair, 2017 My rating * * * * My review After her Pulitzer Prize winning, experimental novel, A Visit from the Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan has turned to the historic novel. In Manhattan Beach she delves (both metaphorically and literally) into the murky worlds of New York gangsters of the … More Review: Manhattan Beach

Two poetry events this week: Monday at the Troubadour to celebrate 21 years of Coffee house poetry run by the indefatigable Anne-Marie Fyfe. A wonderful evening of new poets, and four poets who read in the first year. Including my wonderful tutor Mimi Khalvati, as charming as ever. Great to hear her reading her own … More Writing update