fiction | The Reader's Room

Nov 11

Booker Shortlist 2024: Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood

The verdict was also unanimous on this book: Our whole panel loved it. You can read our short reviews here: Stone Yard Devotional. The Booker judges had this to say about the book…

‘Sometimes a visitor becomes a resident, and a temporary retreat becomes permanent. This happens to the narrator in Stone Yard Devotional – a woman with seemingly solid connections to the world who changes her life and settles into a monastery in rural Australia. Yet no shelter is impermeable. The past, in the form of the returning bones of an old acquaintance, comes knocking at her door; the present, in the forms of a global pandemic and a local plague of mice and rats, demands her attention. The novel thrilled and chilled the judges – it’s a book we can’t wait to put into the hands of readers.’

You can read more about the novel and an author interview on the booker prize website: here.

What does our panel think of the odds of this book being this year’s winner? Keep reading to find out

Nov 10

Booker 2024 Shortlist: The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden

Our panel reviewed the Safekeep (you can read our reviews here) favorably and it made it onto 3 of our predictions lists – Nicole, Tracy, and Lisa called it. The Booker judges had this to say about the book

‘Set in the early 1960s in the Netherlands in an isolated house, The Safekeep draws us into a world as carefully calibrated as a Dutch still-life. Every piece of crockery or silverware is accounted for here. Isa is the protagonist – a withdrawn figure who is safeguarding this inheritance. When her brother brings his new girlfriend Eva into this household the energy field changes as we sense boundaries of possession being crossed, other histories coming into the light. We loved this debut novel for its remarkable inhabitation of obsession. It navigates an emotional landscape of loss and return in an unforgettable way.’

What does our panel think of the odds of this book being this year’s winner? Keep reading to find out

Nov 8

1 Comment

Booker shortlist 2024: Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner

Our panel was very mixed on this book and so is the literary community. You can read our short reviews here: Creation Lake. The novel made it onto 2 of our predictions lists (Jen and Lisa correctly predicted it). The Booker judges had this to say about the book…

‘Sadie Smith – not her real name – is an FBI agent turned spy-for-hire, whose latest mission is to infiltrate a commune of eco-activists in rural France. She’s an extraordinary creation: sharp-minded, iron-willed, accustomed to moving fast and breaking things. As she investigates the group, she hacks into emails from their guru, a shadowy eccentric who has withdrawn from modernity into the ancient caves that dot the landscape; he has some beguiling ideas about the role of Neanderthals through history. What’s so electrifying about this novel is the way it knits contemporary politics and power with a deep counter-history of human civilisation. We found the prose thrilling, the ideas exciting, the book as a whole a profound and irresistible page-turner.’

You can read more about the novel and an author interview on the booker prize website: here.

What does our panel think of the odds of this book being this year’s winner? Keep reading to find out

Nov 1

Booker Shortlist 2024: Orbital by Samantha Harvey

Next up for our shortlist musings is Orbital by Samantha Harvey. The majority of our panel was underwhelmed by this book. You can read our short reviews here: Orbital. The novel only made it onto 2 of our predictions lists (Jen and Anita correctly predicted it). The Booker judges had this to say about the book…

‘Samantha Harvey’s compact yet beautifully expansive novel invites us to observe Earth’s splendour from the drifting perspective of six astronauts aboard the International Space Station as they navigate bereavement, loneliness and mission fatigue. Moving from the claustrophobia of their cabins to the infinitude of space, from their wide-ranging memories to their careful attention to their tasks, from searching metaphysical inquiry to the spectacle of the natural world, Orbital offers us a love letter to our planet as well as a deeply moving acknowledgement of the individual and collective value of every human life.’

You can read more about the novel and an author interview on the booker prize website: here.

What does our panel think of the odds of this book being this year’s winner? Keep reading to find out

Aug 23

4 Comments

20024 Booker Longlist: Orbital by Samantha Harvey

Up next for our panel is Samantha Harvey’s Orbital. Orbital is Harvey’s fifth novel. It has received some glowing reviews from various literary critics.

Cover blurb: A slender novel of epic power, Orbital deftly snapshots one day in the lives of six women and men traveling through space. Selected for one of the last space station missions of its kind before the program is dismantled, these astronauts and cosmonauts—from America, Russia, Italy, Britain, and Japan—have left their lives behind to travel at a speed of over seventeen thousand miles an hour as the earth reels below. We glimpse moments of their earthly lives through brief communications with family, their photos and talismans; we watch them whip up dehydrated meals, float in gravity-free sleep, and exercise in regimented routines to prevent atrophying muscles; we witness them form bonds that will stand between them and utter solitude. Most of all, we are with them as they behold and record their silent blue planet. Their experiences of sixteen sunrises and sunsets and the bright, blinking constellations of the galaxy are at once breathtakingly awesome and surprisingly intimate.

Profound and contemplative, Orbital is a moving elegy to our environment and planet.

You can purchase a copy of the book here.

Keep reading to find out how our panellists rated this book.

Jul 30

6 Comments

2024 Booker Prize Longlist

It’s finally arrived! The longlist was announced about 10 minutes ago. Lots of leaks this year and looks like they were correct since I had seen half the list leaked.

How did our panel do? I I predicted 3 correctly, falling in the middle of the pack for our panel. I vacillated on Wild Houses since I had read it and thought it was good but not quite good enough to make the list. I was clearly wrong. I have a lot of reading to catch up on since I’ve only read 4 of the books on the list (and am halfway through my 5th thanks to the leaks). I thankfully already have copies of 10 of the books since most of them were on my radar to read for our Booker panel.

Our winners this year were Tracy and Anita who both correctly predicted 5. Lisa predicted 3, and Nicole came in at 2 correct predictions. Now the reading begins! Follow our panel as we make our way through the longlist and post abbreviated reviews for each book. Below is the full list of the longlist books.

Jul 19

2 Comments

This Plague of Souls by Mike McCormack

This Plague of Souls by Mike McCormack
Published: October 26, 2023
Rating: ★★★★
Order it here: This Plague of Souls

Nealon has just been released from prison and arrives to an empty house. Where are his wife and son? Why was Nealon in prison? As Nealon reflects on the past, loss, loneliness, fatherhood, and life’s meaning, his reveries are interrupted by a mysterious caller who appears to have answers to Nealon’s musings. Described as a metaphysical thriller or noir, This Plague of Souls is a follow up (although can be read as a stand alone) book to Solar Bones. But is it worth the read?

Jul 11

7 Comments

Exploring the New York Times 21st Century Book List

If you’re anything like me, you’ve been immersed in the recent New York times feature on the top 100 books of the 21st century. A big thank you to my work colleague and friend, John, who turned me on to it since I had been living under a rock and had missed out on the start of it.

May 6

1 Comment

Long Island by Colm Tóibín

Colm Tóibín is one of my favorite authors and I’ve been fortunate enough to attend several of his readings. Brooklyn was perhaps one of my least favorite of his novels, although I still liked it. Long Island is a sequel to Brooklyn, picking up about 20 years after the first novel ended. As we near Booker season, I was eager to read Tóibín’s latest since his books often make the lists and thanks to Scribner, I received an advanced copy. Did I find it to be Booker worthy? Keep reading to find out.

Mar 7

3 Comments

Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

Life has forced me into a reading slump for the last several years and outside of the Booker challenge, I’ve found it increasingly more challenging to find the time or mental energy to read (which is why you’ve mostly seen Book worm post on the blog). Luckily for me, my partner is supporting my effort to read more. For the last several years we have been alternating book picks, reading together, and discussing books. The one upside of long distance relationships is that you need to be creative in finding ways to connect and share things that are important to each of you. For me, that’s reading.

This year we have decided to pick books based on monthly themes (that are pretty broad) to push us to read more widely and diversely. To be clear, we are very different readers. He prefers non-fiction and preferably history and I read mostly literary fiction. In February, it was his turn to pick for black history month and to my surprise he picked a fantasy novel. As a non-fiction reader, fantasy is pretty much on the other extreme of the spectrum from his usual genres. His choice was Marlon James’ Black Leopard, Red Wolf. So how did this pick pan out?