Discovering new reads to add to the stack is almost as exciting as actually breaking the spine on a new book. Besides regular visits to my local bookstore and library plus the review copies I am lucky enough to receive through my letterbox I am never without a healthy choice of new titles. This month’s stack however, came about thanks to few more tried and tested routes:
1. Advanced reviews in the Press. The FT Weekend and Monocle Reads are my top picks which this month led to Derek Owusu's Desmond Elliott Prize winning novel, That Reminds Me.
2. Books inspired by a previous read, i.e. when one book mentions or plays homage to another. Reviewing Swimming in the Dark by Tomasz Jedrowski led me to pick up James Baldwin's Giovanni's Room.
3. Following exceptional independent publishers. Inlands by Elin Willows is another title from the brilliant folk at Nordisk Books.
So what tops the August shortlist? Derek Owusu's stunning debut That Reminds Me from Stomzy's imprint #Merky. Here are some of my thoughts on the Owusu and the best of the rest this month with no spoilers…
Derek Owusu's debut is at once a simple coming of age tale and an epic drama about identity and belonging. In five briefest of chapters, framed by statements to Ghanaian deity Anansi, Owusu brings the narrator's truth to life in lyrical and rhythmic prose.
The novel blends the mundane, 'She separates the socks and tosses a bio capsule into the washing machine', with the profound, 'she trusted me to keep her alive, to deify, to render her an immortal' with the ease of a skilled storyteller. The story of K is unforgettable.
The pace is almost too fleeting in places but Owusu keeps moving forward with an urgency that pushes the limits of literary fiction. This is fresh writing that hints at even greater writing to come.
From Owusu's South London we head much further up North for another debut novel. Elin Willow's debut, Inlands, is set in a small town within the Arctic circle. For a girl from Stockholm the town holds an unexpected pull. For anyone who has ever imagined starting over this book is for you.
'Just before it lets winter in is when it's darkest'.
Willow's clipped prose and brief chapters allow us into the mundanity of life through the eyes of an outsider. The feeling of 'otherness' is pronounced by the implicit routines through which social order is maintained.It's bitterly cold for the most part yet heart-warming.
Finally this month, a novel I've wanted to read for many years.
James Baldwin broke the mould with his version of the American in Paris trope. Giovanni's Room is complex, character driven and rare as a portrait of a bisexual man and his infatuation with an Italian bartender.
In beautifully written prose, Baldwin evokes not only a specific time in the subculture of Parisian gay bars but a specific moment for masculinity in post war USA. Utterly deserving of a place on the bookshelf.
'I feel nothing now, nothing. I want to get out of this room, I want to get away from you, I want to end this terrible scene.'
