Welcome to another weekly reading diary! I’ve decided to make these a permanent feature of my blog! I hope you enjoy this week’s recap, featuring Thai literature, interlocking short story collections, and brand new Ali Smith.
Disclosure: titles with an asterisk* were gifted by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. I’m an affiliate for Blackwell’s, so this post contains affiliate links to their site. If you buy a book via my links, I’ll earn a small commission at no extra cost to you – thank you!
SATURDAY
I finally had a Saturday where I actually felt like reading! Rejoice. I spent a couple of hours in the morning finishing off The Door by Magda Szabó. It took me around 2.5 hours to read the last 70 pages, which just goes to show how much my reading pace varies. The Door is a super intense character study, and as such it reads quite slowly. Despite the lull in the middle, I enjoyed it overall. Emerence evoked very conflicted feelings in me, including pity, admiration, anger, sadness and sympathy.
I also found it interesting to wonder how much of the novel was autobiographical, as the narrator is a writer who goes on to win a prestigious Hungarian literary prize. I’d definitely recommend this one to those who enjoy novels centred around intense personal relationships, not necessarily romantic ones.
After finishing that, I had lunch and then carried on with my current cross stitch for a bit. I always listen to either a podcast or audiobook while cross stitching. My current audiobook is The Gloaming by Kirsty Logan. At first I wasn’t convinced, but then something clicked and now I’m heavily invested in this mysterious tale!
Then finally it was time to embark upon the final book in the Seasonal Quartet by Ali Smith – Summer*. The feeling I get when reading the first page of an Ali Smith novel is really something, but difficult to describe. I can’t think of another author who has a keener eye for reflecting contemporary life in the UK. I’ve said it before, but these books should go down in history as the literature of Brexit and other current British political happenings. I devour almost 200 pages in the evening alone.
SUNDAY
I get a lie in on Sundays now! Adam and I get up every day at 6am to walk Mia, but we’ve started a new thing that lets us both have a lie in once a week. On Fridays I take her out on my own and on Sundays Adam does. A ‘lie in’ for me is never later than 8am though, so today I got up at 7.30 and it felt luxurious!
Then I dove right back into Summer* by Ali Smith. I wasn’t too thrilled when one of my least favourite characters reappeared in this book, but actually he was more bearable this time round! I always learn some hidden-away piece of history from these books. This time we learn about the internment camp on the Isle of Man during WWII and the films and art of Lorenza Mazzetti.
Whenever people ask me whether to read Autumn first or if they can just start anywhere in the quartet, I always suggest starting in publication order. I just can’t imagine it having the same effect if you haven’t read the first three! Characters and themes reappear and reading them in order just makes each Easter egg that bit more special.
I do wonder how much Ali Smith changed when the pandemic hit. This is the first novel I’ve read that includes the Coronavirus, and I feel like they were last-minute changes. I still loved it, but part of me wonders what Summer originally held. But this is contemporary literature at its most contemporary!
After finishing Summer* I watched A Simple Favour for the second time just because. Then I read 50 pages of Panty by Sangeeta Bandyopadhyay, translated from the Bengali by Arunava Sinha. My experience with Indian literature is severely lacking, so I’m trying to prioritise it more!
MONDAY
The start of another week and I continued with my reading of Panty in the evening. This book is made up of a novella and a short story, Hypnosis and the titular Panty. Bandyopadhyay’s work often provokes a lot of reaction when it’s originally published in Bengali, and apparently Panty is no different. Although I was confused because I saw one reviewer say Panty is the longer story, whereas in my edition (published by Penguin Books India), Hypnosis is almost twice the length of Panty. This makes me think the two editions (the other in English by Tilted Axis) might have different stories?
Regardless, it was certainly an interesting experience! Bandyopadhyay’s female protagonists in both stories know what they want when it comes to sex and usually are not afraid to go get it. I’d say Panty was my favourite, dark and surreal.
In it, a woman finds a discarded, used pair of underwear, referred to as ‘a panty’ throughout, in the wardrobe in the flat where she’s now staying. Fascinated by them, she can’t bring herself to throw them away. One day, she tries them on and suddenly her sex life and the sex life of the previous owner begin to merge and blend. To add to this, the chapters seem to have been shuffled around, adding to the choppy feel of the story.
I’m fairly certain I didn’t ‘get’ everything, but I did enjoy reading this expression of female sexuality – for the most part!
Before bed, I read another short story from Happiness, Like Water by Chinelo Okparanta which was very good and very sad. It addressed similar fertility issues as in Stay With Me and was quite a difficult read for only 14 pages.
TUESDAY
I read the next three stories in Happiness, Like Water and Okparanta is knocking it out of the park. In these three stories she gives us a tale of harmful beauty standards, a dark tale of motherhood, and a heart-breaking story of a girl pushed to desperate measures to help her sick mother.
After finishing up work, cooking tea and walking Mia, I cracked open my next read – also a short story collection! I had pre-ordered Frying Plantain by Zalika Reid-Benta expecting it to be right up my street and I wasn’t wrong. From around 6.30pm until 10pm (with a few breaks), I sat and devoured this book cover to cover. Reid-Benta has such a beautiful, readable style.
The stories are more like vignettes, and all of them follow the same character, Kara, as she grows up in ‘Little Jamaica’ in Toronto. We see her as a child back from a holiday in Jamaica, delighting and horrifying her elementary schoolfriends with tales of slaughtering a pig which may or may not be true. Already we can see her sculpting various identities depending on who she’s with. I loved reading about the various familial relationships, as well as her friendships, which could be quite cruel.
This is a must read for anyone who’s a fan of coming-of-age stories. I’d also recommend it to those who aren’t sure if they’re a fan of short stories, as it’s such a cohesive collection it almost feels like a novel.
I did make a start on the opening pages of Bright by Duanwad Pimwana when I got into bed, but I was tired after devouring 258 pages in one sitting.
WEDNESDAY
I didn’t pick up my physical book until around 7pm as I was too busy listening to my audiobook and frantically cross-stitching. I’m really enjoying working on bookish cross-stitches, they’re so cute and fun to make! My latest audiobook is The Gloaming by Kirsty Logan, which I finished on Wednesday. It is SUCH a beautiful, sad tale with a wonderful f/f romance. I read The Gracekeepers by Logan a few years ago and it disappointed me. Thankfully The Gloaming more than made up for it!
When I did set aside my cross-stitch project, I picked up Bright. You might have seen this one in my TBR and I was really excited for it. It’s the first book written in Thai by a woman to be translated into English. Not only is it a landmark piece of literature, it’s also just a bloody good book!
It’s the story of a young boy, Kampol, who is abandoned by his parents and collectively adopted by his community. It sounds like a tragic read but it’s surprisingly heartfelt, and I found myself smiling a lot while reading. It’s a portrait of working-class Thailand, sure, but it’s also a beautiful depiction of the joys of childhood and friendship.
The translation by Mui Poopoksakul reads like a dream. She manages to convey all the emotion of the book, whether that’s joy and hope or melancholy and frustration. Definitely a highlight of the month for me!
THURSDAY
I was in a strange mood on Thursday and didn’t read much of my physical book at all. I picked up Here’s to You, Jesusa! which was a random Oxfam find last year by renowned Mexican author Elena Poniatowska. However, I didn’t feel like reading and only read the first 15 pages of the introduction.
My cross-stitch frenzy is still going strong though! So I did listen to almost half of I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown. It’s an illuminating read. I’ve not read anything from a Christian perspective so this is a new angle for me. There is a really striking passage about Brown’s experiences with white guilt and the way the white people she met kept trying to unburden their racist confessions onto her shoulders. But she found a way to turn it back around and give the burden back to them by asking well, what are you going to do about it?
I also read another short story from Happiness, Like Water which is honestly such a strong collection.
FRIDAY
With breakfast I read another story (this one about a forbidden f/f relationship) from Happiness, Like Water and I plan to read the final two today. I’ll be sad to give this one back to the library!
Hopefully I’ll make a bit more progress with Here’s To You, Jesusa! today, but I’m posting this early as I’m going to my mam’s for tea tonight (socially distanced takeaway) so I won’t be reading much this evening. Once I get into it, I think it will be a really interesting read. It’s a fictional biography of a woman who was part of the cavalry during the Mexican Revolution. I don’t know much about this period of history at all, so I’m excited to delve in and hopefully learn a little something!
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It’s so interesting that Smith included coronavirus in Summer! I think this is the first time I’ve heard of it in fiction, but I imagine we’ll see more books include it in the future. ?
I’m glad you’re enjoying your bookish cross stitching and I look forward to seeing more! I’m also interested that you said you enjoyed The Gloaming more than The Gracekeepers because I was also a little bit disappointed by Gracekeepers.