What do you do the morning after a one night stand when you cough and a decaying penis falls right out of your very own, very alive lady parts onto your shower floor?
Tag: novel
Book review: ‘The new me’ by Halle Butler
'The new me' is undoubtedly one of the most depressing novels I’ve ever read - but in a way that is refreshingly realistic. Films and books do have a habit of making the depressive romantic, exciting, or thrilling. This novel gives us none of that - instead Butler takes on an intimidating task by weaving together a book that explores tedious monotony, a self-defeatist attitude and a steady decline into depression, all while keeping the readers’ attention. If it manages to catch you, it cuts much deeper than most other texts.
Book review: ‘The Last’ by Hanna Jameson
I had SUCH high hopes for this novel. The premise sounded great. The world has ended in nuclear war? YES PLEASE. Survivors are holed up in a hotel, and a body turns up? HELLA POIROT, GIMME. The race is on to find the killer? I’M THERE. The cover and the blurb activated that little part of my brain which said ‘ooooh’ and I’d plonked it in my basket during the final four seconds of waiting in line at Waterstones. A choice I regretted almost immediately after reading the first few chapters.
Book review: ‘The Boy, the Boat and the Beast’ by Samantha M. Clark
This book is a beautifully crafted, bright and deep novel which addresses some really heavy subjects: toxic masculinity, fear, abuse, protection and growing up. And yet, it manages to deliver its lessons on the sly, distracting the reader with perilous plot and beautiful imagery until you hit the sucker-punch ending.
Book review: ‘The Whitby Witches’ by Robin Jarvis (YA)
The Whitby Witches is a book about courage, history and magic. Two orphans are suddenly re-routed to Whitby to stay with Miss Boston - a spritely 90-something year old who walks up the famous 199 steps every day to keep her mind and body active. She needs this sharpness in spades as her friends start to die mysteriously, and the town that she knows and loves starts to crumble under a dark force.
Book review: ‘Ghost Wall’ by Sarah Moss
Ghost Wall is a highly acclaimed, multiple prize-winning novel that’s been described as a ‘short, sharp shock that closes around you like a vice as you read it’. It’s a story about a modern family reliving the Iron Age; about family, about abusive situations, about friendship. But for me, it fell far short of the dazzling, ‘burnished gem’ of a book that I’d been promised.
Short story: Tripping
So many sounds that she couldn’t place. But they were coming from a place. Did the place come first, or the words? She sang them so they weren’t wriggling around in her throat like a fish. Like a plaice. She laughed and saw colours.
Short story: Joe’s secret
Spring was here, and so too, finally, was he. The group had been sat, or stood, for almost half an hour now on the front lawn. The photographer had so far been in and out of the house three times to collect more equipment. To the waiting men, the light bulbs, the stand, and the camera he was meticulously positioning looked like more of a bizarre sculpture than a setup for a single photo....
Book review: ‘My sister, the serial killer’ by Oyinkan Braithwaite
(no spoilers) ‘My sister, the serial killer’ is a story about ‘family’ - and a fucked up one at that. It speaks strongly to the age-old sibling relationship where you simultaneously hate their guts while also screaming: “Leave her alone, asswipe! I’m the only one who can kick my sister!” Korede and Ayoola are two … Continue reading Book review: ‘My sister, the serial killer’ by Oyinkan Braithwaite
