Last week I went to the library to browse for the first time for ages. It was wonderful! So many books! So much choice!
I finally managed to limit myself to five (not six). Although the library is still letting readers hang on to books for longer than the date stamp I wanted to be realistic and start getting back into good habits i.e. returning books without earning a fine for lateness.
A mixture of familiar and new authors, I opted to begin with Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams. I read quite a large chunk of it before deciding it was making me too uncomfortable so I stopped. It’s about a young woman whose self-esteem is so low that she allows men to abuse her. I loved her (Queenie) and really wanted to see her escape from the place she’d got herself into, but the descriptions were too graphic for me. If anyone else has read it I would love to know how things work out for Queenie!
Next up, a cosy mystery, Guilt at the Garage by Simon Brett. The author has written a number of books in the Fethering series featuring two neighbours, Jude and Carol, amateur detectives in a small seaside town with more than its fair share of murders. I’ve read all of the books in the series and think I enjoy them for their predictability. If I want an easy read, this is fine. I know what I will get: several suspicious characters, a potential love interest for Jude, something that will cause Carol to take offence, and nothing very gruesome at all. My only complaint is the way the two main characters are drawn: Jude is voluptuous, laid-back and a healer by profession; Carol is an uptight, retired civil servant, who reads the Daily Mail. We occasionally see a softer side of carol but very rarely – if ever – a bad characteristic in Jude.
Because this novel is a bit shorter than usual I’d give it 3*.
The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Dare is another story of an abused woman, but with a very take on it. Adunni is a fourteen-year-old girl in a small village in Nigeria. Her mother has died and her father sells her to be the wife of an old man in the village.
From there things go from bad to worse, but through it all Adunni’s determination and courage shine through.
The story is set today and was an eye-opener for me. I suppose if I’d thought carefully about it I’d have realised that life in small African village probably hasn’t changed that much over the centuries but I was shocked at how barbaric some of the customs seem, as well of course, as the lack of education, particularly for girls.
The story might sound grim but the character of Adunni lifts the horror. I highly recommend this book. 5*
I will start on Ivy and Abe next, interspersed with short stories from the Tom Hanks‘ collection: is it fair that one man should be so talented and so nice?