Category: Contemporary

‘Here is the Beehive’ – Sarah Crossan

I’ve loved the YA Sarah Crossan books I’ve read, and couldn’t wait to get into this adult novel.

While the style is unquestionably Crossan, and there are some interesting moments, it didn’t capture my attention in quite the way I’d hoped it would.
Our story is of Ana, a married woman with two children, who has been having an affair with Connor. Over the course of the story we learn how the affair started, how each acted during it, some key moments within it and the part Ana played in it ending.

We focus throughout on Ana’s perspective, and see everyone through her lens. For me this meant I never felt I fully trusted what I was being told because there were so many potential alternative responses/reactions to events.

The fact that we meet Ana as she is talking with Connor’s wife to discuss his will immediately intrigued me. She is mourning someone who was a huge part of her life, but nobody knew. She is grieving, but has to hide it.

Aside from the situation she’s in, which almost compels you to feel sympathy for Ana, there was little to like about her. She befriended someone in order to try and allay her grief, and her conduct throughout the time of the affair seems pretty poor. She seems to have been oblivious to this, caught up in her own perceived suffering.

All in all, this was well-written and definitely had some emotional pull. My own feelings for the narrator unfortunately got in the way.

Thanks to the publishers and edelweiss for granting me access to this prior to publication.

 

‘Clap When You Land’ – Elizabeth Acevedo

Elizabeth Acevedo has created another story to shine a light on an experience, and to paint a picture that celebrates a certain place/culture. This is the kind of book you’ll pick up and find yourself reading…then look up to realise time has passed, you have finished and the images in your head are as vivid as the moment you read them.

The story focuses on two characters, both girls. One lives in the Dominican Republic and the other in America. Neither knows about the other. But when their father – on his way to stay with his second family – is killed in a plane crash their lives become intertwined in ways they’re not prepared for.

The verse is quite sparse, yet it conveys precisely the mood and experiences of these two girls. The depiction of grief was sensitive, yet there was a positivity to this with regard to how the girls change that I wasn’t expecting.

This was a genuine pleasure to read, and thanks to NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read it prior to publication.

 

‘My Dark Vanessa’ – Kate Elizabeth Russell

My Dark Vanessa takes place over two key years – in 2000, when Vanessa is fifteen and studying at a prestigious boarding school, and in 2017, when Vanessa is working a dead-end job at a local hotel and trying to avoid contact with a former student. The thing that unites them…Jacob Strane, Vanessa’s English teacher.

For her debut Russell takes on a story that is always going to be difficult to present without alienating readers. A sexual relationship between teacher and pupil will, rightly, never be regarded as anything other than wrong – and the attempts to examine the psychological dynamics of this relationship from Vanessa’s viewpoint did little for me other than highlight the manipulative behaviour of Strane and the damage caused to this girl, and others.

Vanessa recalls the relationship from its starting moment with unusual clarity. From the outset there’s a sense that, on some level, Vanessa recognises this is wholly inappropriate yet she seems determined to romanticise her experience of being groomed and raped by the person who was meant to be one of those protecting her. The author allows Vanessa this, but the construction of the novel means we never see it as anything other than a deceptive and manipulative grooming of a rather naive young woman.

The detail given to Vanessa’s relationship was, perhaps necessarily, explicit but it did not make for comfortable reading. Nor should it! There were so many points in this that I wanted someone to dig that little deeper or act on their evident sense of misgiving about the rumours they’d heard or things they’d seen that just felt off. So many people seemed suspicious of Vanessa’s closeness to Strane, yet did nothing. Hiding in the open seems to be quite the feature of such relationships, and it was definitely interesting to note the changes over the two time periods in how someone like Strane was regarded.

Few characters on the periphery of this relationship come out of it well, and to reflect on your own part in such an event is something people have to deal with in these situations. However, it’s Vanessa’s story so hers is the primary focus.

One of the things that I found slightly off-putting about this (apart from what felt like the gratuitous depiction of their sexual relationship) was what felt like the over-reliance on Lolita and the continual references to Literature that purported to mimic what Vanessa experiences. If you look hard enough you can probably find something to support what narrative you want to spin. For me it was just yet another nail in the coffin highlighting the various techniques used by this predatory male time and time again.

Ultimately, I felt myself feeling quite hostile at times towards Vanessa as she seemed so determined to paint herself as powerful within this experience. I’m all for recognising the growing maturity of someone of this age, and there are definitely questions to consider about the extent to which we should ignore a teen’s growing self-awareness. By the end however, as we see Vanessa start to unravel the complexity of her feelings about the relationship that formed such a monumental part of her life, I came to see her in quite a different way.

This was not a hopeful book. It doesn’t particularly resolve anything, but it certainly puts the reader in a position to examine a story they may feel they’ve heard before in a different way. It certainly will get people talking, which I think is a starting point.

 

‘Swipe Right’ – Stephie Chapman

Thank you to NetGalley, Hera books and Stephanie Chapman for giving me that warm fuzzy feeling where you don’t dare hope for that ending…but really really want that ending.

Our two main characters are Ollie and Fran. Both go for an interview. It’s clear, from the off, that these two have a spark. But will it ever be more? When they both end up working in the company we do wonder. Everyone around them seems to think they make a great couple – but each has a partner.

For seemingly ages Fran and Ollie walk the line of friends who quite fancy each other. It’s all very When Harry Met Sally without the annoying leads, a lot more alcohol and no fake-orgasm scene.

There’s a warmth between the two characters that seems very genuine. They open up to each other in a way that you can’t help but envy…but nothing happens.

Hang fire. Don’t get disheartened. Sometimes you just need to wait for the right time to put everything in place. Of course, it might not happen – but that really would have been a miserable read.

 

‘Special Topics in Calamity Physics’ – Marisha Pessl

Marisha Pessl’s Special Topics in Calamity Physics is an unforgettable debut novel that combines the storytelling gifts of Donna Tartt and the suspense of Alfred Hitchcock: a darkly hilarious coming-of-age tale and a richly plotted suspense story, told with dazzling intelligence and wit.

There’s something about precociously intelligent narrators caught up in bizarre events centred around schools and a small clique with a charismatic leader that seems to cause division amongst readers. Like Tartt’s Secret History, I felt similar feelings as I read this.
Our narrator, Blue, is a rather average looking girl who has a fierce intelligence, yet who watches from the sidelines. Used to moving around when her father gets another teaching job, Blue has had a rather eclectic education. Unfortunately, her intelligence is something she tries to force on us – and it doesn’t always work.
The book focuses on Blue’s arrival at a new school where, under the guidance of the Film Studies teacher Hannah Schneider, she is taken into the fold of a special group. They clearly don’t like her, the teacher veers between inspiring and unhinged…and it’s very obvious that something odd is going on.
Drifting through her senior year and the various events taking place, Blue grows up. She starts to separate from the relationship with her father – and when the events start to actually happen (and it took a while) she is disturbed by the truths she learns.
I couldn’t say this was a book I hated, as there were aspects to it I liked, but it felt messy and in need of tightening up a little.

 

‘The Small Crimes of Tiffany Templeton’ – Richard Fifield

The Serpent King meets Girl in Pieces in this moving and darkly funny story about a teenage girl coming of age and learning how to grieve in small-town Montana.

Initially, I found this hard to warm to. I couldn’t work out why Tiffany was regarded so negatively, and I found it difficult to really develop much interest in events following on from her release from juvenile detention. Slowly, however, as we peeled back the layers of this small town and learned more about Tiffany I came to have a healthy respect for her.

I think the first thing I have to say is that the town of Gabardine really does – on first impressions – seem like the kind of place you’d want to leave and never return to. It’s dying on its feet and the characters who’ve found themselves living there are rather small in their outlook. Nobody seems to have anything marking them out in any way, but that small-town closed mentality actually came to make sense. As we learn more about the people around Tiffany it almost feels like we’re being encouraged to pay homage to the fighting spirit of people who know there’s little point to what they’re doing, but do it anyway.

Tiffany is a girl who you warm to. There’s a softness under this brash exterior, and she has a curiosity about her that suggests she’s smart enough to escape this place – but if she stays it’ll be out of love for those around her. Finding out about her ‘small crimes’ and what each actually represents was a fascinating process. While her brother and mother had a certain grotesque element to them, by the end there was a definite shift in Tiffany’s thoughts about them.

In some ways this reminded me of something by Steinbeck, but with more modern issues. It might not be to everyone’s tastes but I found myself quite charmed by it.

‘Tweet Cute’ – Emma Lord

I’m perhaps in a minority here, but I wasn’t totally won over by this in the way other readers seem to have been.

It’s a fairly stereotypical romance, with Jack and Pepper seemingly very different then spending time together and realising they quite get on. At the same time they’re developing a close relationship via an anonymous app, so it’s fairly standard that we’d expect them to get together eventually.

What’s being touted as the thing that sets this apart is the Twitter background. To cut a long story short, Pepper’s mum is behind a highly successful burger chain that has gone big after humble beginnings. Jack’s parents run a deli in New York that’s been in the family for years. Both serve a grilled cheese sandwich and it sparks a Twitter war. The whole scenario is preposterous, and it was so unrealistic that it frustrated me beyond belief.

It’s a shame I got sidetracked by this part of the story because the characters themselves and the way they were presented was appealing. I liked them and hoped things would work out, but the attempt to make it more than it was (as a way of tying up some loose ends regarding their parents later) just made it all too much.

 

‘Wilderness’ – B.E. Jones

A dark and fast-paced thriller with a definite psychological edge…and one that might have you watching your nearest and dearest very closely indeed.

The story seems fairly straightforward in some ways. Young married couple move to America. Husband has an affair with a co-worker. Wife finds out and decides to forgive him…but then organises a road trip to give her errant husband the chance to show he’s changed. Things aren’t going well, and it seems the wife is going to take the opportunity to remove her husband from the situation. But things don’t quite work out like that.

Our narrator, Liv, is definitely cut from a very special kind of cloth. Initially, I felt every sympathy for her and the situation she finds herself in. However, as we learn more about her actions over time, I couldn’t believe she was still walking round free. A dangerous woman, but the level of her danger doesn’t really become clear until the end.

This is certainly a story it’s best not to know too much about before reading. It’s a fast-paced story and one that was unsettling once we knew a little more detail about the characters and the events. There’s a lot of coincidences within the story, but it was still a good read.

Thanks to NetGalley for letting me read this prior to publication.

 

‘The Happy Ever After Playlist’ – Abby Jimenez

Thank you NetGalley for offering me something a little different. I got the love story I wanted, but so much more besides.

Our main character, Sloan, is the kind of woman you probably can’t help but find intimidating. A talented artist, successful blogger, physically attractive and clearly a good person who inspires love in those who meet her…but we don’t see this immediately.

When we first meet Sloan she’s still mourning the tragic death of her husband two years ago. Her life is on hold, and though her friends are looking out for her she’s not ready to move on. Then, unexpectedly, she ends up with a dog jumping in her car. Soft-hearted she refuses to let the dog be taken to a shelter, and decides to look after it. She gets a contact number for the dog owner and leaves messages, daily, but hears nothing.

That could have been it. But, no, where would the fun be in that? The dog’s owner is a musician who’s been abroad for a few weeks. When he picks up the messages he is immediately intrigued by this woman. And so starts a most unusual courtship.

What we learn pretty early on is that the dog’s owner, Jason, is a star in the making. Totally unlikely, but there’s an immediate bond and it seems pretty deep. Can these two ride out the somewhat inevitable pitfalls to this existence? I’d like to say it’s never in doubt, but the author sure makes her characters work for it. At times it’s ugly, but at times it’s beautiful.

 

‘The Best Laid Plans’ – Cameron Lund

The Best Laid Plans is packaged as a frothy feel-good read, and there are definitely elements of the novel that fulfil that label. However, one thing this book is definitely trying to show you is that labels can be deceptive, and that not everything is easy to define.

Our story focuses on a group of seniors in a relatively small town who seem to have been together as a class for years, feel they know everything about each other and have to come to terms with the fact they’re growing up and will move on. Our main character, Keely, is fixated with the fact that she is the only virgin left in their class. She is obsessed by the fact that everyone around her seems to be so adult and in control of their lives, and is convinced that if she can lose her virginity she’ll suddenly receive the magic key to knowing how adulthood works.

The main impetus for her being so fixated by her status is the attitude of those around her to sex. Her best friend, Andrew, has a reputation as a ‘player’ and her female friends all seem to use sex and their sexuality as the way to define who they are. When Andrew hosts the party for Keely at the start of the book – the party that causes so much of the problem – and someone leaves a condom wrapper by Andrew’s parents’ bed, they jump with glee at the thought their offspring have finally got together. Everything about the attitude to sex in this book seems a little weird to me, and I felt it gave rather mixed messages to the target audience.

That aside, the novel focuses on Keely having a huge crush on an older boy, Dean. In an attempt to look more experienced, she hides the fact she’s a virgin. However, this then means she becomes preoccupied with the physical aspect of their relationship. So far, perhaps so normal – but then someone comes up with the bright idea that Keely should ask her friend, Andrew, to help…what could be weirder, eh?

For me, the entire book is focused on Andrew and Keely coming to terms with who they are, what each means to them and and how this growing awareness might impact on their current relationship. Along the way there are casualties, and characters who are clearly just used to help illustrate the point the author is trying to make.

Reading back through my thoughts, it seems quite negative. That’s not the case. This was such a quick read, and there were some genuinely funny moments. I liked the majority of the characters, and even felt they were genuinely developing as we progressed through the story. I had a feeling which way this would go, and the author definitely didn’t make this quite as easy as it might have been. It’s only afterwards that I start to consider exactly what message is being presented that I feel this isn’t quite as good as it could have been.