David Llewellyn’s A Simple Scale sets out to provide the reader with a profoundly humbling experience: the attainment of the understanding that all our lives are ultimately at the mercy of the tides of history and that we and our fellow men are undeniably responsible for how that history plays out. Llewellyn explores this idea Read More
Ariana Harwicz is an Argentinian playwright and novelist for whom Die, My Love was originally published in 2012 as the first of a trilogy, now translated into English and long-listed for the 2018 Man Booker International. The translators are Sarah Moses and the Scottish-based Carolina Orloff, who co-founded Charco Press through which Die, My Love Read More
‘Dear Diary, go fuck yourself’ opens I Am Not Okay With This, author and artist Charles Forsman’s latest graphic novel, a line that made me laugh with its direct belligerence. An opening like this, coupled with the comic’s cartoon art style – reminiscent to me of Bryan Lee O’Malley’s work – lured me into expecting Read More
In her latest novel, Kirsty Gunn takes a brave and original approach. Conscious of the language she uses, capable of creating memorable metaphors and telling parts of the story through characters’ distinctive dialogues, the author makes a bet. She believes that she can almost entirely remove plot from the book and make it worthwhile for Read More
As Where to Find Me opens, sweethearts bicycle along the Seine, write poetry on bus tickets, gaze on Jean Paul-Sartre at the café, dance to live Jazz. Alba Arikha’s Paris is redolent of golden sunshine, rich scents, and richer sounds. Soon, like an old photograph beset with creeping mould, the picture darkens. Their religions part Read More
Gabriel Josipovici’s The Cemetery in Barnes (2018) is a very short novel, with the story spread across a mere one hundred pages. However, this is a novel of burning intensity that leaves the reader in a constant state of uncertainty with plotline that jumps between different phases in the protagonist’s, an unnamed translator, life. These Read More
Guy Gunaratne is recognised for his work as a video artist, filmmaker, video journalist and some writing. In Our Mad and Furious City, however, is his debut novel which has garnered a lot of buzz, having already been long-listed for the Booker and short-listed for the Goldsmith and Gordon Burn prizes. Set in London, Gunaratne’s Read More
Crudo, Olivia Laing’s first novel, is performance. Laing dons the mask of radical, experimentalist Kathy Acker, in a performance of experimental writing, and in text, her main character Kathy tries to resolve her commitment issues through the performance of marriage. Laing, a non-fiction writer, steps into the guise of Acker to bring a manic and Read More
Faye, a middle-aged novelist, travels to a literary festival in an unnamed southern European city. On the plane she sits next to a man who recounts a story about his family and the trauma of burying the pet dog. Faye observes that he spoke: as if he had discovered the power and pleasure of reliving Read More