Crudo and The Mars Room

Funny how things come all at once or not at all. Things being, for instance, buses, bad news, or – rather more happily – published pieces. I feel this blog has had rather too much bad news on it of late to add yet more, so I won’t go into that.

Here, instead are two reviews of mine published this week: of Rachel Kushner’s important novel about a woman’s prison, The Mars Room, in the FT Weekend’s Life & Arts, and Olivia Laing’s mesmerising, modern very NOW new novel Crudo, in the Spectator. (And tomorrow, look out for my feature in the FT Weekend’s House & Home section, if you get it.) Just click on the pictures below to link through to the reviews.

At least Vita and Ezra are well, and so are the husband and I – if you can call existing on such a skeleton amount of sleep – still! – ‘well’. A few weeks’ ago, when I was still trying to get Ezra to go back to sleep at 5am, rather than just admit defeat and begin the day, I blearily slipped my jeans on under my nighty, strapped him into the sling and walked up and down the thin bit of park that stretches through the middle of one of our neighbouring streets. (I took note, in Madeline Miller’s excellent and enjoyable new novel Circe, that Circe also has to do this with her son. If even the gods find motherhood tricky, and admit to running out of nappies and the rest of it, then perhaps we humble mortals can take heart.) I walked back and forth for an hour or so, for which Ezra was promisingly quiet, but remained very much awake. Eventually we sat on a bench and gave up and had a welcome picnic of milk and blueberries. I did think, however, that if I didn’t have to spend those early hours of the day entertaining a child (or even two, if Ezra wakes up Vita – and then that really does spell disaster for the day), then it wouldn’t be such a bad thing to be up with the sun (ha and the son). Blackbirds zoomed low along the path, and sparrows perched, pulling worms up from the ground. A trio of squirrels squatted beside one another on the grass, nibbling their breakfast and eyeing me with suspicion. I felt like I was glimpsing a secret London that has long gone by the time we are usually setting off for work.

I hope you enjoy the reviews.

One final request: if you can spare about 30 seconds, please sign this petition which asks for bookshops to be given cultural exemption from business rates – like pubs. Having worked in a bookshop, and spoken to many booksellers, I really feel this would make a huge difference to their future. Usually, these days, it is down to a rent increase that forces a bookshop to close its doors, rather than the dreaded Amazon.

 

 

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Tags: book review, Financial Times, Olivia Laing, Rachel Kushner, Spectator