Year: 2015

International Women’s Day – I am Malala

jadetheobscure Light reading , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Happy International Women’s Day! Have you read I am Malala? If not, I strongly suggest that you do so.

I am Malala – Malala Yousafzai and Christina Lamb

malala

‘Who is Malala?’

These were the words spoken by young bearded man, in light coloured clothing, to a bus full of school girls on 9 October 2012.

‘No one said anything but several of the girls looked at me. I was the only girl with my face not covered.’

‘Don’t worry,’ she had said to her friends. ‘The Taliban have never come for a small girl.’

‘Who is Malala?’

These were the words spoken by the young bearded man, in light coloured clothing, before he lifted up a black pistol and fired three shots, one after the other, into the crowded school bus.

‘Who is Malala?’ Malala Yousafzai writes in the prologue to her inspiring life story. ‘I am Malala, and this is my story.’ 

When the Taliban took control of her home in the Swat Valley in Pakistan, Malala Yousafzai spoke out. I am Malala is the moving tale of how she fought for her right, and the right for every girl, to go to school, and came close to paying the ultimate price.

‘One year ago I left my home for school and never returned’ she begins.

In I am Malala, Malala takes the reader on an inspiring journey beginning with her happy childhood among the sweet fig trees and twittering birds in her village, in the time before the Taliban took control, when she was just a little girl, growing under the protective gaze of her adoring father.

The events which took place of 9 October 2012 changed Malala’s life forever, and has taken her on a journey half way across the world, to speak in the presence of the world’s most influential people, as she continues her fight for universal education and the empowerment of ‘the girl child’.

Malala’s story is inspiring, as well as moving and terribly tragic, as she writes of her despair at being away from the country that she loves, she is no longer at home in her beloved Pakistan, and she doesn’t know if she will ever return. Each morning when she awakes it is to the tall buildings of the Birmingham skyline.

Written in plain, moving English, I Am Malala, will take you on an extraordinary journey, move you to tears, and make you believe in the power of a single voice to inspire change in the world.

“Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.” ― Winston S. Churchill

jadetheobscure Obscure poetry , , , , , , , , , , ,

I’m feeling thoughtful today, so it seems like a good time to share my latest piece of Obscure Poetry.

This piece was published in a young writers’ poetry book by a friend of mine back in primary school. She spoke to me after reading my own poem, refreshingly over-the-moon by the fact that we were both young poets, and told me all about hers. ‘It’s a rhyming piece told from the perspective of a dead WWII soldier’ she said – ok, if I wasn’t already interested I most certainly was after hearing this. I needed to see the poem.

It didn’t take long I got my grubby mits on it, and she was even kind enough to let me share it here:

Watching

I watch the millions of crosses in a row
I watch the bright red poppies, in Flanders’ Fields’ grow
I watch the people lay their wreaths with a sigh
I watch, and as they salute I start to cry

I see the crumbling stonework carved with names
I know that terrible war is the one to blame
I hear the gunshots ringing through my ears
Their bitter sound has brought so many to tears

I watch the un-marked grave, it pains my heart
As I think of those men it tears my soul apart
Those soldiers were my friends brave, happy, kind
And as I watch that grave from heaven, I know it’s mine.

She doesn’t seem to think much of her poetic younger self. I, however, am quite fond of this little poem. It’s poignant, sombre, and really quite moving, and, indeed, made all the more so more so by how young she was when she wrote it.

May I remind you that my poem was about a cat. I am suitably humbled.

Tower_of_London_Poppy

Holi Festival of Colours! Celebrate with six colourful books

jadetheobscure Light reading, Literary thoughts , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Holi_Festival_of_Colors_Utah,_United_States_2013

Holi Festival of Colours – one of the world’s most beautiful, and, indeed colourful, celebrations is taking place today.

To mark the occasion I’ve put together a list of the most colourful books I could find. So, if you’re not celebrating this weekend by pulling out the powdered paint why not curl up with one of these instead?

Red Queen – Victoria Aveyard

17878931

The poverty stricken Reds are commoners, living under the rule of the Silvers, elite warriors with god-like powers.

To Mare Barrow, a 17-year-old Red girl from The Stilts, it looks like nothing will ever change.

Mare finds herself working in the Silver Palace, at the centre of those she hates the most. She quickly discovers that, despite her red blood, she possesses a deadly power of her own. One that threatens to destroy Silver control.

But power is a dangerous game. And in this world divided by blood, who will win?

Oranges are not the Only Fruit – Jeanette Winterson

5149lW5U2QL

This is the story of Jeanette, adopted and brought up by her mother as one of God’s elect. Zealous and passionate, she seems seems destined for life as a missionary, but then she falls for one of her converts.

At sixteen, Jeanette decides to leave the church, her home and her family, for the young woman she loves. Innovative, punchy and tender,

Oranges are not the Only Fruit is a few days ride into the bizarre outposts of religious excess and human obsession.

The Yellow Wallpaper – Charlotte Perkins Gilman

gilmanchetext99ylwlp10

‘It is stripped off – the paper – in great patches…The colour is repellent… In the places where it isn’t faded and where the sun is just so – I can see a strange, provoking, formless sort of figure, that seems to skulk about…’

Based on the author’s own experiences, The Yellow Wallpaper is the chilling tale of a woman driven to the brink of insanity by the ‘rest cure’ prescribed after the birth of her child. Isolated in a crumbling colonial mansion, in a room with bars on the windows, the tortuous pattern of the yellow wallpaper winds its way into the recesses of her mind.

Green Eggs and Ham – Dr Seuss

green-eggs-and-ham

‘Do you like green eggs and ham?
I do not like them, Sam-I-am.
I do not like green eggs and ham.

Would you like them here or there?

I would not like them here or there.
I would not like them anywhere.’

When Sam-I-am persists in pestering a grumpy grouch to eat a plate of green eggs and ham, perseverance wins the day, teaching us all that we cannot know what we like until we have tried it!

A Spool of Blue Thread – Anne Tyler

22318507

‘It was a beautiful, breezy, yellow-and-green afternoon…’

This is the way Abby Whitshank always begins the story of how she and Red fell in love that day in July 1959. The whole family on the porch, relaxed, half-listening as their mother tells the same tale they have heard so many times before.

And yet this gathering is different. Abby and Red are getting older, and decisions must be made about how best to look after them and their beloved family home. They’ve all come, even Denny, who can usually be relied on only to please himself.

From that porch we spool back through three generations of the Whitshanks, witnessing the events, secrets and unguarded moments that have come to define who and what they are. And while all families like to believe they are special, round that kitchen table over all those years we also see played out our own hopes and fears, rivalries and tensions – the essential nature of family life.

The Color Purple – Alice Walker

ColorPurple

Set in the deep American South between the wars, The Color Purple is the classic tale of Celie, a young black girl born into poverty and segregation. Raped repeatedly by the man she calls ‘father’, she has two children taken away from her, is separated from her beloved sister Nettie and is trapped into an ugly marriage. But then she meets the glamorous Shug Avery, singer and magic-maker – a woman who has taken charge of her own destiny. Gradually Celie discovers the power and joy of her own spirit, freeing her from her past and reuniting her with those she loves.

Happy world book day! Ten new releases to get you started

jadetheobscure Light reading, Literary thoughts , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

World-Book-DayWorld Book Day is a celebration – a celebration of authors, illustrators, books and reading. 

Each year children across the world are brought together to celebrate reading. Schools partake in literary activities, and students and teachers dress up as their favourite book characters. Last year my nephews were Charlie and Grandpa from Charlie and the Chocolate factory, needless to say it was adorable!

The main aim of World Book Day is to encourage children to explore the pleasures of books and reading, and in the UK and Ireland this is done by providing each child with a book of their own. Schools hand out £1 book vouchers which can be used to buy a book from a huge selection of titles.

So, if you’re lucky enough to be in the UK or Ireland head on over to World Book Day to check out this years selection of books for £1.

Of course, world book day celebrations shouldn’t be limited to just children, that would hardly be fair on the rest of us now would it? So whatever you are doing to celebrate world book day, if you’ve been roped into dressing up along with the kids, or if it’s just another day in the office, here’s a list of ten new releases for you to enjoy, just in time!

The Buried Giant – Kazuo Ishiguro

030727103X

Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Adventure, Fantasy, Fiction, Historical Fantasy, Historical Fiction
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Knopf

The Romans have long since departed and Britain is steadily declining into ruin. But, at least, the wars that once ravaged the country have ceased. Axl and Beatrice, a couple of elderly Britons, decide that now is the time, finally, for them to set off across this troubled land of mist and rain to find the son they have not seen for years, the son they can scarcely remember. They know they will face many hazards—some strange and otherworldly—but they cannot foresee how their journey will reveal to them the dark and forgotten corners of their love for each other. Nor can they foresee that they will be joined on their journey by a Saxon warrior, his orphan charge, and a knight—each of them, like Axl and Beatrice, lost in some way to his own past, but drawn inexorably toward the comfort, and the burden, of the fullness of a life’s memories.

Sometimes savage, sometimes mysterious, always intensely moving, Kazuo Ishiguro’s first novel in a decade tells a luminous story about the act of forgetting and the power of memory, a resonant tale of love, vengeance, and war.

The Bookseller – Cynthia Swanson

0062333003

Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Fiction
Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Harper

A provocative and hauntingly powerful debut novel reminiscent of Sliding Doors, The Bookseller follows a woman in the 1960s who must reconcile her reality with the tantalizing alternate world of her dreams.

Nothing is as permanent as it appears…

Denver, 1962: Kitty Miller has come to terms with her unconventional single life. She loves the bookshop she runs with her best friend, Frieda, and enjoys complete control over her day-to-day existence. She can come and go as she pleases, answering to no one. There was a man once, a doctor named Kevin, but it didn’t quite work out the way Kitty had hoped.

Then the dreams begin.

Denver, 1963: Katharyn Andersson is married to Lars, the love of her life. They have beautiful children, an elegant home, and good friends. It’s everything Kitty Miller once believed she wanted—but it only exists when she sleeps.

Convinced that these dreams are simply due to her overactive imagination, Kitty enjoys her nighttime forays into this alternate world. But with each visit, the more irresistibly real Katharyn’s life becomes. Can she choose which life she wants? If so, what is the cost of staying Kitty, or becoming Katharyn?

As the lines between her worlds begin to blur, Kitty must figure out what is real and what is imagined. And how do we know where that boundary lies in our own lives?

Dark Rooms – Lili Anolik

0062345869

Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Fiction, Mystery
Hardcover: 336 pages
Publisher: William Morrow

A stunning debut coming-of-age novel set in the ambiguous and claustrophobic world of an exclusive New England prep school.

The first time I saw my sister after she died was at the Fourth of July party. I felt someone behind me and my flesh started prickling. My skin recognized her before I did, rippling once then tightening on my bones.

My sister, Nica.

Grace spent her teenage years playing catch-up with her younger but cooler sister, Nica. Chasing and yet never quite catching up. So when Nica is murdered, Grace is cast adrift until it becomes clear to

her that she must track down her sister’s killer – and in doing so, uncover the secrets she never knew her sister kept.

Know Your Beholder – Adam Rapp

0316368911

Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Fiction, Humour
Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company

As winter deepens in snowbound Pollard, Illinois, thirty-something Francis Falbo is holed up in his attic apartment, recovering from a series of traumas: his mother’s death, his beloved wife’s desertion, and his once-ascendant rock band’s irreconcilable break-up. Francis hasn’t shaved in months, hasn’t so much as changed out of his bathrobe-“the uniform of a Life in Default”-for nine days.

Other than the agoraphobia that continues to hold him hostage, all he has left is his childhood home, whose remaining rooms he rents to a cast of eccentric tenants, including a pair of former circus performers whose daughter has gone missing. The tight-knit community has already survived a blizzard, but there is more danger in store for the citizens of Pollard before summer arrives. Francis is himself caught up in these troubles as he becomes increasingly entangled in the affairs of others, with results that are by turns disastrous, hysterical, and ultimately healing.

Fusing consummate wit with the seriousness attending an adulthood gone awry, Rapp has written an uproarious and affecting novel about what we do and where we go when our lives have crumbled around us. Sharp-edged but tenderhearted, Know Your Beholder introduces us to one of the most lovably flawed characters in recent fiction, a man at last able to collect the jagged pieces of his dreams and begin anew, in both life and love. Seldom have our foibles and our efforts to persevere in spite of them been laid bare with such heart and hope.

Girl in the Dark: A Memoir – Anna Lyndsey

0385539606

Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Health, Memoir, Nonfiction
Hardcover: 272 pages
Publisher: Doubleday

Anna Lyndsey was living a normal life. She enjoyed her job; she was ambitious; she was falling in love. Then the unthinkable happened.

It began with a burning sensation on her face when she was exposed to computer screens and fluorescent lighting. Then the burning spread and the problematic light sources proliferated. Now her extreme sensitivity to light in all forms means she must spend much of her life in total darkness.

During the best times, she can venture cautiously outside at dusk and dawn, avoiding high-strength streetlamps. During the worst, she must spend months in a darkened room, listening to audiobooks, inventing word-games and fighting to keep despair at bay.

Told with great beauty, humour and honesty, Girl in the Dark is the astonishing and uplifting account of Anna’s descent into the depths of her extraordinary illness. It is the story of how, through her determination to make her impossible life possible and with the love of those around her, she has managed to find light in even the darkest of places.

Where All Light Tends to Go – David Joy

0399172777Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Fiction, Suspense, Thriller
Hardcover: 272 pages
Publisher: Putnam Adult

The area surrounding Cashiers, North Carolina, is home to people of all kinds, but the world that Jacob McNeely lives in is crueler than most. His father runs a methodically organized meth ring, with local authorities on the dime to turn a blind eye to his dealings. Having dropped out of high school and cut himself off from his peers, Jacob has been working for this father for years, all on the promise that his payday will come eventually.  The only joy he finds comes from reuniting with Maggie, his first love, and a girl clearly bound for bigger and better things than their hardscrabble town.

Jacob has always been resigned to play the cards that were dealt him, but when a fatal mistake changes everything, he’s faced with a choice: stay and appease his father, or leave the mountains with the girl he loves. In a place where blood is thicker than water and hope takes a back seat to fate, Jacob wonders if he can muster the strength to rise above the only life he’s ever known.

Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule – Jennifer Chiaverini

0525954295Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction
Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Dutton Adult

In 1844, Missouri belle Julia Dent met dazzling horseman Lieutenant Ulysses S Grant. Four years passed before their parents permitted them to wed, and the groom’s abolitionist family refused to attend the ceremony.

Since childhood, Julia owned as a slave another Julia, known as Jule. Jule guarded her mistress’s closely held twin secrets: She had perilously poor vision but was gifted with prophetic sight. So it was that Jule became Julia’s eyes to the world.

And what a world it was, marked by gathering clouds of war. The Grants vowed never to be separated, but as Ulysses rose through the ranks—becoming general in chief of the Union Army—so did the stakes of their pact. During the war, Julia would travel, often in the company of Jule and the four Grant children, facing unreliable transportation and certain danger to be at her husband’s side.

Yet Julia and Jule saw two different wars. While Julia spoke out for women—Union and Confederate—she continued to hold Jule as a slave behind Union lines. Upon the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, Jule claimed her freedom and rose to prominence as a businesswoman in her own right, taking the honorary title Madame. The two women’s paths continued to cross throughout the Grants’ White House years in Washington, DC, and later in New York City, the site of Grant’s Tomb.

Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule is the first novel to chronicle this singular relationship, bound by sight and shadow.

The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy – Rachel Joyce

0812996674Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Fiction
Hardcover: 384 pages
Publisher: Random House

When Queenie Hennessy discovers that Harold Fry is walking the length of England to save her, and all she has to do is wait, she is shocked. Her note had explained she was dying. How can she wait?

A new volunteer at the hospice suggests that Queenie should write again; only this time she must tell Harold everything. In confessing to secrets she has hidden for twenty years, she will find atonement for the past. As the volunteer points out, ‘Even though you’ve done your travelling, you’re starting a new journey too.’

Queenie thought her first letter would be the end of the story. She was wrong. It was the beginning.

Told in simple, emotionally-honest prose, with a mischievous bite, this is a novel about the journey we all must take to learn who we are; it is about loving and letting go. And most of all it is about finding joy in unexpected places and at times we least expect.

The Death of Caesar: The Story of History’s Most Famous Assassination – Barry Strauss

1451668791Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: History, Nonfiction
Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

The exciting, dramatic story of one of history’s most famous events—the death of Julius Caesar—now placed in full context of Rome’s civil wars by eminent historian Barry Strauss.

Thanks to William Shakespeare, the death of Julius Caesar is the most famous assassination in history. But what actually happened on March 15, 44 BC is even more gripping than Shakespeare’s play. In this thrilling new book, Barry Strauss tells the real story.

Shakespeare shows Caesar’s assassination to be an amateur and idealistic affair. The real killing, however, was a carefully planned paramilitary operation, a generals’ plot, put together by Caesar’s disaffected officers and designed with precision. There were even gladiators on hand to protect the assassins from vengeance by Caesar’s friends. Brutus and Cassius were indeed key players, as Shakespeare has it, but they had the help of a third man—Decimus. He was the mole in Caesar’s entourage, one of Caesar’s leading generals, and a lifelong friend. It was he, not Brutus, who truly betrayed Caesar.

Caesar’s assassins saw him as a military dictator who wanted to be king. He threatened a permanent change in the Roman way of life and in the power of senators. The assassins rallied support among the common people, but they underestimated Caesar’s soldiers, who flooded Rome. The assassins were vanquished; their beloved Republic became the Roman Empire.

An original, fresh perspective on an event that seems well known, Barry Strauss’s book sheds new light on this fascinating, pivotal moment in world history.

In Wilderness – Diane Thomas

0804176957Publication Date: March 3, 2015
Genres: Fiction, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Bantam

In the winter of 1966, Katherine Reid moves to an isolated cabin deep in Georgia’s Appalachian Mountains. There, with little more than a sleeping bag, a tin plate, and a loaded gun, she plans to spend her time in peaceful solitude. But one day, Katherine realizes the woods are not empty, and she is not alone. Someone else is near, observing  her every move.

Twenty-year-old Vietnam veteran Danny lives not far from Katherine’s cabin, in a once-grand mansion he has dubbed “Gatsby’s house.” Haunted by war and enclosed by walls of moldering books, he becomes fixated on Katherine. What starts as cautious observation grows to obsession. When these two souls collide, the passion that ignites between them is all-consuming—and increasingly dangerous. Suffused with a stunning sense of character and atmosphere, Diane Thomas’s intimate voice creates an unforgettable depiction of the transformative power of love, how we grieve and hope, and the perilous ways in which we heed and test our hearts.

Wordless Wednesday

jadetheobscure Literary thoughts , , , , ,
By Ernest J. Rowley, via Wikimedia Commons
By Ernest J. Rowley, via Wikimedia Commons

Why you should read… and why you shouldn’t

jadetheobscure Light reading , , , , ,

Reading is good for you!

2936937247_a44e91ca09_z

I feel as though I am being inundated with pointless articles. Welcome to the internet amiright?

I’ve read, or rather glanced over, so many articles recently which highlight the benefits of reading. Sites such as Lifehack and the Huffington Post have outlined the wondrous effect that reading can have on a person’s physical and mental well-being. Urging people, who, in all honesty, probably found their site through a social network, to put down their mobile phones, get off Facebook and pick up a book.

Lifehack blogger Lana Winter-Hébert wrote one such article:

‘10 Benefits of Reading: Why You Should Read Every Day’.

‘When was the last time you read a book, or a substantial magazine article?’ She asks, ‘Do your daily reading habits center around tweets, Facebook updates, or the directions on your instant oatmeal packet? If you’re one of countless people who don’t make a habit of reading regularly, you might be missing out.’

The article listed the following ten ‘benefits’ of reading:

  1. Mental stimulation
  2. Stress reduction
  3. Knowledge
  4. Vocabulary expansion
  5. Memory improvement
  6. Stronger analytical thinking skills
  7. Improved focus and concentration
  8. Better writing skills
  9. Tranquillity
  10. Free entertainment

I have a few issues with this.

I love to read, but I’m not about to lecture anyone on why they should read. People have talked about the benefits of reading for a long time, but it is only recently that these odd attempts at quantifying the benefits of such practices have emerged.

Yes, reading can be beneficial, but so can eating organic produce, avoiding chocolate, giving up smoking, going for runs and abstaining from your morning coffee, and there are plenty of people who lack either the money, time or desire to do these things.

The article goes on: ‘There’s a reading genre for every literate person on the planet, and whether your tastes lie in classical literature, poetry, fashion magazines, biographies, religious texts, young adult books, self-help guides, street lit, or romance novels, there’s something out there to capture your curiosity and imagination.’

This is a little too presumptuous for my liking. Perhaps I am unique among book lovers in that I think there are some people who, as hard as it is to accept, just don’t like reading.

I think the main benefit to reading, and the main reason people should be reading, is because they enjoy it. Reading is a pastime, and it shouldn’t be made to feel like a chore.

If you enjoy reading, but rarely find the time to pick up a book then you could definitely do worse than to take half an hour at the end of the day to immerse yourself in a good novel. But if you don’t, then you don’t need to, and you shouldn’t feel peer pressured into doing so because of the supposed benefits.

‘These are a few of my favourite things’

jadetheobscure Light reading

I have something a little different to share with you today.

This weekend I went to stay with friends in Norwich.

First let me tell you a little bit about one of my friends. She loves stationery, I mean, she LOVES stationery. I like Paperchase as much as the next person, but my friend is literally obsessed. So when she told me she had bought me a gift from a recent trip to London it came as no surprise that it was stationery, after all it had to be stationery, it couldn’t possibly have been anything other than stationery.

Behold my new book review file:

IMG_20150301_173254528 (2)

Now I would expect anyone to be pretty chuffed with a gift like this, it’s a) adorable and b) practical, (I have been in dire need of something to keep all my book notes in) and practical gifts are always the best received.

But I like it for another reason…

Let me introduce you to Coopanda. He’s the adorable little fella on the front of the folder, and this is his story:

Coopanda loves reading a lot,
but he always feels hungry while reading.
So he have to eat chocolate cake instead,
or else he would turned a brown in a moument. 

Oh yes, Coopanda, the chocolate-cake-eating, book-loving, non-English-speaking, panda.

This story has transformed this adorable piece of stationary into something which combines three of my favourite things: reading; pandas; and Chinese which has been badly translated into English.

Now, you may think that’s a bit of a strange thing to like, in which case let me refer you to the wonders of Engrish.

Over and out.

Time magazine’s All-time 100 Novels

jadetheobscure Light reading , , , , , , ,

Time_Magazine_-_first_coverI recently stumbled, not for the first time, upon Time magazine’s All-time 100 Novels list.

If you’re unfamiliar with this (unlikely I know) in 2005 Time‘s critics Lev Grossman and Richard Lacayo picked the 100 best English-language novels published since 1923 (the beginning of TIME). If you’re wondering how they choose these books click here to find out.

Anyway, I perused the list a little, those titles in italics are ones I read before beginning Jade the Obscure, those in bold, after (you can click on there to see my reviews). I will confess to being a little embarrassed by how few I have read. Only eight out of 100!

I need to do something about this, so I’m going to head out and buy a copy of Lolita, I’ve been wanting to read it for a long time, in fact, there are several books on the list I’ve been meaning to read…

So, I’m going to make a concerted effort to try and fit this list into my pleasure reading. I’ve slipped the list into the pages at the top of my site, so you can check there to see how I’m getting on.

How many have you read?

  • The Adventures of Augie March – Saul Bellow
  • All the King’s Men – Robert Penn Warren
  • American Pastoral – Philip Roth
  • An American Tragedy – Theodore Dreiser
  • Animal Farm – George Orwell
  • Appointment in Samarra – John O’Hara
  • Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret – Judy Blume
  • The Assistant – Bernard Malamud
  • At Swim-Two-Birds – Flann O’ Brien
  • Atonement – Ian McEwan
  • Beloved – by Toni Morrison
  • The Berlin Stories – Christopher Isherwood
  • The Big Sleep – Raymond Chandler
  • The Blind Assassin – Margaret Atwood
  • Blood Meridian – Cormac McCarthy
  • Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh
  • The Bridge of San Luis Rey – Thornton Wilder
  • Call it Sleep – Henry Roth
  • Catch 22 – Joseph Heller
  • The Catcher in the Rye – J.D. Salinger
  • A Clockwork Orange – Anthony Burgess
  • The Confessions of Nat Turner – William Styron
  • The Corrections – Jonathan Franzen
  • The Crying of Lot 49 – Thomas Pynchon
  • A Dance to the Music of Time – Anthony Powell
  • The Day of the Locust – Nathanael West
  • Death Comes for the Archbishop – Willa Cather
  • A Death in the Family – James Agee
  • The Death of the Heart – Elizabeth Bowen
  • Deliverance – James Dickey
  • Dog Soldiers – Robert Stone
  • Falconer – John Cheever
  • The French Lieutenant’s Woman – John Fowles
  • The Golden Notebook – Doris Lessing
  • Go Tell it on the Mountain – James Baldwin
  • Gone With The Wind – Margaret Mitchell
  • The Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck
  • Gravity’s Rainbow – Thomas Pynchon
  • The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • A Handful of Dust – Evelyn Waugh
  • The Heart is a Lonely Hunter – Carson McCullers
  • The Heart of the Matter – Graham Greene
  • Herzog – Saul Bellow
  • Housekeeping – Marilynne Robinson
  • A House for Mr. Biswas – V.S. Naipaul
  • I, Claudius – Robert Graves
  • Infinite Jest – David Foster Wallace
  • Invisible Man – Ralph Ellison
  • Light in August – William Faulkner
  • The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe – C.S. Lewis
  • Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov
  • Lord of the Flies – William Golding
  • The Lord of the Rings – J.R.R. Tolkien
  • Loving – Henry Green
  • Lucky Jim – Kingsley Amis
  • The Man Who Loved Children – Christina Stead
  • Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
  • Money – Martin Amis
  • The Moviegoer – Walker Percy
  • Mrs. Dalloway – Virginia Woolf
  • Naked Lunch – William Burroughs
  • Native Son – Richard Wright
  • Neuromancer – William Gibson
  • Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro
  • 1984 – George Orwell
  • On the Road – Jack Kerouac
  • One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest – Ken Kesey
  • The Painted Bird – Jerzy Kosinski
  • Pale Fire – Vladimir Nabokov
  • A Passage to India – E.M. Forster
  • Play It As It Lays – Joan Didion
  • Portnoy’s Complaint – Philip Roth
  • Possession – A.S. Byatt
  • The Power and the Glory – Graham Greene
  • The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie – Muriel Spark
  • Rabbit, Run – John Updike
  • Ragtime – E.L. Doctorow
  • The Recognitions – William Gaddis
  • Red Harvest – Dashiell Hammett
  • Revolutionary Road – Richard Yates
  • The Sheltering Sky – Paul Bowles
  • Slaughterhouse Five – Kurt Vonnegut
  • Snow Crash – Neal Stephenson
  • The Sot-Weed Factor – John Barth
  • The Sound and the Fury – William Faulkner
  • The Sportswriter – Richard Ford
  • The Spy Who Came In From The Cold – John Le Carre
  • The Sun Also Rises – Ernest Hemingway
  • Their Eyes Were Watching God – Zora Neale Hurston
  • Things Fall Apart – Chinua Achebe
  • To Kill A Mockingbird – Harper Lee
  • To The Lighthouse – Virginia Woolf
  • Tropic of Cancer – Henry Miller
  • Ubik – Philip K. Dick
  • Under the Net – Iris Murdoch
  • Under the Volcano – Malcolm Lowry
  • Watchmen – Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
  • White Noise – Don DeLillo
  • White Teeth – Zadie Smith
  • Wide Sargasso Sea – Jean Rhys

Author spotlight and Goodreads giveaway ― N Caraway

jadetheobscure Light reading , , , , , , , , , , ,

“Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead.”  ― F. Scott Fitzgerald

I am currently helping to host a goodreads giveaway on behalf of my good friend and author N Caraway.

10409674_1437375683175728_2270036257601865586_nN Caraway was born in Cambridge in 1957 and studied at Cambridge University, where he read mediaeval and modern languages, specialising in Dostoevsky and Latin American literature. Before going to university he worked as a volunteer teacher in a rural school in Kenya, an experience which eventually set the course of his life. He has worked for a variety of development agencies mostly in Africa and Asia.

In 2002 he moved to Nairobi to work for the United Nations in South Sudan. This was during the last years of the conflict between government and rebel forces of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army. The UN operated a relief operation by air, using a network of small landing strips spread across a vast landscape without roads or electricity. This landscape provides the background for his first novel, The Humanitarian.

maneThe Manneken Pis

A lonely old man is living out the last days of his life in Brussels, a city that alternates between small-town non-entity and extreme surrealist quirkiness, symbolised by the famous statue of a small boy urinating. Increasingly confused by the effects of a heart attack, he tries to find meaning in one last rational act of kindness before he dies.

Set in the capital of a rapidly ageing Europe, the second novel by N Caraway is a tragicomic study of solitude and growing old that also provides a surprising new take on the theme of the classic Frank Capra movie, It’s a Wonderful Life.

N Caraway’s second novel, The Manneken Pis is set in Brussels, and inspired by the grotesque pageantry of the Balloon Day parade. Caraway’s protagonist, Harold Cumberlidge, suffers a heart attack after having the ‘monstrous calamity’ of a balloon fashioned to resemble the urinating Manneken Pis collapse on top of him. The event causes Harold to take a closer look at life; he begins to question his significance and that of the Europe which surrounds him. Then, befriended by an unlikely pair of characters, one of whom introduces himself as Harold’s ‘Guardian Angel’ in a scene that inevitably harks back to James Stewart contemplating suicide in Capra’s film, Harold becomes increasingly unhinged, as he obsesses over his own mortality. By the end of the novel it is up to the reader to decide for themselves exactly who, or what, is real.

The Manneken Pis serves as an analysis of the lonely life of an ageing EU bureaucrat. Harold Cumberlidge is an interesting character; a strange mix of old-world charm and grumpy bastard, who the empathetic reader will find themselves warming to very quickly. The extent to which Caraway delves into the inner workings of Harold’s increasingly frazzled mind makes one feel that the thoughts and musings of the character may be at least partly based on the authors own life experiences.

Caraway’s descriptions of Brussels, of Harold’s mindset, and the characters which surround the story are intricate, developed and well rounded. He really has a talent for descriptive writing, which shines through to the very smallest detail. Every part of the book is told as if you are the eyes within Harold’s head, down to the horrifying image of the Manneken Pis looming down on Harold, causing the heart attack which sets the rest of the book in motion:

‘There was a blinding flash as the sun caught his unguarded eyes full on and then the monstrous calamity of a giant figure tumbling down towards him, grotesque in its nakedness, leering and obscene, a gigantic naked child, milk-chocolate brown as though fashioned from an enormous turd, a canine crotte from the sullied urban pavements galvinised into monstrous life, plunging headlong down to smother him…’

The effect of description in Caraway’s prose, down to the very smallest thought which flits through Harold’s mind, is such that by the end of the book you really feel as though you know Harold on a personal level.

The story is intricate, touching and incredibly thought provoking, and touches on several exceptionally deep subjects, the most notable of which is the recognition of one’s own mortality. Caraway’s second novel is equal parts sadness and humour, which will leave the reader with several questions hanging in their minds and a deep feeling of empathy towards their fellow man.

There are four copies of The Manneken Pis up for grabs, Goodreads users can enter the giveaway by clicking here. The giveaway will run until the 2nd March.

The Humanitarian

Caraway is also offering review copies of his first novel The Humanitarian, which was featured on Jade the Obscure last summer.

51W+tDMNtgLAfter decades of civil war a peace deal is in the offing for the ravaged land of South Sudan, where the United Nations and a plethora of non-government organisations have come together to deliver emergency aid to the thousands of displaced and homeless people scattered in camps and villages across the vast wilderness of swamps and scrubland, where rogue militias, cattle raiders and bandits roam. Richards is a UN official on his final mission, leading a small team to a remote region. For him it is not just the war which is ending, but the world he has come to inhabit. Detachment and isolation from all that is around him begin to take hold and memories of another life threaten to break through the thin walls he has built around himself. As he sinks deeper into inner darkness a chance meeting with a young priest seems to offer the hope of a way back to belief in humanity and meaning, but the road is rough.

To read the review click here.

There are another four copies of The Humanitarian available to lucky winners, Goodreads users can enter the giveaway by clicking here. This giveaway will also run until the 2nd March.

While you’re at it why not visit him on Facebook and Twitter.

“I get up and pace the room, as if I can leave my guilt behind me. But it tracks me as I walk, an ugly shadow made by myself.” ― Rosamund Lupton

jadetheobscure Light reading , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Now the Day is Over ― Marion Husband 

9781908381811-frontcover (2)

‘In my more lucid moments I know I’m dead…’ So begins Edwina’s story, a woman whose spirit remains, long after her body has decayed, trapped in the house she once inhabited. In Now the Day is Over, Edwina serves as the narrator of two stories, set in two time periods, before and after her death.

Edwina grew up in early 20th century Britain, and lived a life which spanned across the First World War. In her narration Edwina reveals her childhood, through her adolescence to her time spent serving as a wartime nurse, and later when she becomes the wife of a soldier. Through her words we learn of an unusual gift that Edwina possessed; a deep rooted empathy, the ability to sense a person’s deepest desires, which earned her a somewhat sinister reputation.

Later, in modern day Britain, Edwina takes the form of super-omniscient narrator, haunting the house which was once hers, commenting on the lives of the couple who now reside within her domain. Gaye and David Henderson are an unhappy, adulterous couple whose lives are plagued by guilt over the death of their young daughter, Emily. Through her narration, Edwina tells the story not only of Gaye and David, but also of herself, gradually revealing the horrors which tie her to the earth, as Gaye and David are tied to the past.

This was my first experience with Husband’s work, and I was completely blown away by the effect it had on me. The story itself combines two of the things I love the most; historical fiction set between the past and present, and ghost stories. I love ghosts. There is almost nothing I love more than to curl up on a dark night and indulge in ‘real’ ghost stories submitted to the likes of castleofspirits.com and reddit.com/nosleep.

we need youWhile Now the Day is Over is not a ghost story in the traditional sense Husband is still able to give the house the domineering, omniscient, icy coldness expressed by those living is ‘haunted’ houses. Gaye and David often shiver, the cat hisses and the house seems devoid of life, cold, sterile. Even the garden is tainted; Edwina’s memories of the old plum trees planted by her brother and her the year before the war carry an ominous undertone, as though the plum trees embody some kind of darkness, a living representation of the guilt which holds Edwina’s soul. And when Edwina discovers that the trees remain only in her memory, the ‘smudge’ which they carry remains in the back corner of the garden, silently watching, spoiling the scene.

Edwina’s presence in the house is significant, not only in the grief which she represents but also in the power she possesses as a narrator. David and Gaye cannot see Edwina, and this allows her to accompany them on their most personal journeys; she is able to sit with David while he bathes – ‘I touch his knee that breaks through the water, wanting to calm him.’ – and accompany Gaye to a hotel to meet her lover. But Edwina is able to do something more than just see the characters at their most vulnerable – she has carried through to her death her insight into the minds of others. As a narrator she has the ability to tell exactly how someone is feeling and what they are thinking. This gives the reader an eye into the very soul of the characters.

‘I go upstairs, to the empty attic to rattle around in the cold and dim dusk like a good ghost. I need to be alone sometimes, without the distraction of the living and the belongings they surround themselves with.’

Through Edwina’s soothing narration Husband draws the reader deep into the pages of Now the Day is Over. I was completely drawn into the storyline, desperate to discover the circumstances which prohibit Edwina from moving on, as well as to uncover the circumstances of Emily’s death. The climax does not come until very late in the book. Gaye and David keep their cards close to their hearts, slowly releasing allusions to their daughter’s death; they think of Emily often, but do not talk about her.

Eventually each character is absorbed into the tension which has so slowly built up and, completely overwhelmed by grief, makes their confession. When they begin to tell their stories their grief rushes forward in an unstoppable stream, until their words are mixed and their stories combined, with Edwina frantically flitting between the two scenes, retelling the tragic tale of Emily’s death.

Edwina’s life was steeped in death. It seems only natural that her death should be the same – a house haunted not only by Edwina herself, but the ghost of grief which follows Gaye and David. Edwina takes the form of the personification of Gaye and David’s guilt, a black cloud hanging over the family, the memory which taints their futile attempt at a fresh start. Ignoring her presence will not make her leave; it takes Gaye and David’s attempt at positive steps to move on to make the shadow of Edwina begin to fade away. It seems fitting that the book finishes with the planting of new plum trees. Fresh saplings, to commemorate a life lost, and to represent the start of a new beginning, one in which the guilt has gradually begun to fade.Plum-trees_from_South-Hungary

I enjoyed every single moment of Now the Day is Over, and do not feel I can fault it in the slightest. The intricate storyline, complex characters and stunning language combine to create a truly remarkable novel. Before beginning my review I sat down to flick back through the pages of the book to get my creative juices flowing and was instantly drawn back in. I really had to fight to stop myself reading it all over again. As much as I’d like to, there isn’t the time right now.

Special thanks go to Sacristy Press for supplying me with a free copy of Now the Day is Over in return for an honest review.