sarahmatthews's reviews
50 reviews

Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto

Tr. Megan Backus

Read in Braille

Pub. 1988, 160pp

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This book contains a novella, Kitchen, and a short story, Moonlight Shadow, a fact I hadn’t realised before starting due to my aversion to spoilers on blurbs so when the character names changed I was a little taken aback and had to do some rereading to get back on track! Both stories were beautifully written but the voices were not particularly different and Kitchen ends rather abruptly so it’s easy enough to be a bit derailed.

Both stories are about loss, loneliness and adapting to change and I found them very relatable though of course with very different personal circumstances. In Kitchen, 20 something Mikage narrates the story. She’s alone in the world now that her beloved grandmother, who raised her, has died and is taken in by Yuishi and his mother Eriko who run the local coffee shop her grandmother frequented. The relationship between the 3 of them is very touching. Mikage starts cooking to help out in the house and becomes obsessed with it as a way to distract herself:

“I washed and bleached dish towels, and while watching them go round and round in the dryer I realised that I had become calmer. Why do I love everything that has to do with kitchens so much? It’s strange. Perhaps because to me a kitchen represents some distant longing engraved on my soul. As I stood there, I seemed to be making a new start; something was coming back.”

In the second story Satsuki is grieving for her boyfriend who we learn very early on was killed in a car accident. There are elements of magical realism in this one which I really enjoyed and the writing is gorgeous:

“It was a noon enveloped in warm sunlight—it made you think that spring would truly come.A light wind was blowing soft and gentle on the face. The trees on the street were beginning to sprout their tiny infant leaves. A thin veil of mist hung distantly in the pale blue sky far beyond the city. 

Such blossoming delectability did not make my own insides flutter; it left me unmoved. The spring scenery could not enter my heart for love or money. It was merely reflected on the surface, like on a soap bubble. Everyone out on the streets” coming and going, looking happy, the light shining through their hair. Everything was breathing, increasingly sparkling, swathed in the gentle sunlight.The pretty scene was brimming with life, but my soul was pining for the desolate streets of winter and for that river at dawn.”

Kitchen is melancholy, soothing, sad and uplifting all at the same time, a brilliant read! Written in the 1980s it’s very progressive for it’s time though some of the terms seemed a little confused at times and not how we’d write about these issues now. 

Spoiler Alert: Eriko is a transsexual character which is written about sensitively in general for a book from the 1980s. I did notice a couple of points where transsexual and transvestite seemed to be confused and a line that appeared to insinuate that she decided to transition because her wife had died and she didn’t want to be a man any more. Obviously not what we’d want to read from a 2024 perspective. Overall though Eriko’s character is written very sympathetically.

 

The Next Big Thing by Anita Brookner

reflective sad slow-paced

The Next Big Thing by Anita Brookner

Read in Braille

Viking

Pub. 2002, 247pp

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Julius is retired, his parents and brother have died and his wife has left him. He’s living alone in central London, his adopted city after his family fled from Nazi Germany. He’s looking for the next big thing in his life, pondering his past and feeling concern for his failing health. Sounds gloomy, right?! Well, the insightful writing just carries you along and pulls you in before you know it and you’re hooked on this story of loneliness and regret in later life. I found myself, like I often do with Anita Brookner, rereading sections due to the beautiful prose. Here’s an example to give you a flavour: 

“He raised his eyes to a rooffline bristling with television aerials , lowered them again to windows still blank before the evening lights were lit. The sky was already darkening; signs of spring were absent, and yet the chilly damp held a promise of greenness, of new life only just in abeyance. it was even possible to appreciate that sky; its opaque blue reminded him of certain pictures, though no picture could compete with this strange sense of immanence. With the crust of the earth ready to break into life, the roots expanding to disclose flowers, the trees graciously putting forth leaves. The impassivity of nature never ceased to amaze him. This awakening process was surely superior to anything captured on canvas, yet art made all phenomena its province.in its unceasing war with the effort of capturing moments of time art won this unequal contest, but only just. The majestic indifference of nature was there to remind one of ones place, and no doubt to serve as a corrective to the artist’s ambition. When the canvas was finished it was already a relic, outside change. And surely change was primordial; all must obey it. To ignore the process was to ignore the evidence of one’s own evolutionary cycle.’

Haunting, introspective and with a hint of dark comedy this was so good, just maybe  one to approach with caution if you’re about to retire! This novel was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2002.   

Western Lane by Chetna Maroo

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Western Lane by Chetna Maroo

Read on audio

Narrator: Maya Saroya

Picador

Pub. 2023, 176pp

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“A clean hit can stop time, sometimes it feels like the only peace there is.” Gopi is grieving for her mother and at 11 she’s the youngest of three sisters and this new world is difficult and confusing. Their father is struggling, as an electrician he’s letting his customers down and has started talking to his wife late at night. The only way he can think of to connect with his daughters at this turbulent time is to immerse them in the world of squash (which he played with his brother growing up) at their local leisure centre, Western Lane. They all train hard after school but it’s only really Gopi who shows promise. She’s soon in need of more challenging opponents than her sisters and starts playing with Ged, the son of a woman who works at Western Lane. I really enjoyed reading about their friendship: 

“In the court with Ged I had the feeling that we were making something, and it wasn’t anything we could see or touch. I hit well, I saw the ball, it was as big as a tennis ball.i couldn’t help but hit it well, I changed direction and lunged…i moved easily and without effort. It was all Ged. He wasn’t pushing me exactly, but I felt he was completely aware of me. He was also aware of the walls and the red outline, and of the glass behind us and the corridor and the whole of the sports centre building…I felt his awareness of it all becoming mixed up with mine.”

As the story moves on Gopi finds that the discipline and intensity of training at Western Lane is helping. In the evenings she stays up late with her father to watch clips of a famous Pakistani squash player, Jahangir Khan, which both motivates her and brings her closer to him. So much is unsaid, with the family being unable to express their grief with one another. A squash competition comes up that both Gopi and Ged want to enter and their training intensifies. I know nothing about squash but found it didn’t matter as this story is very much about Gopi and her relationship with those around her and how they are all coping without Ma. It’s very touching and poignant:

“I got up early in the mornings, not to be alone, but because the whole night I’d been waiting for the day to begin. I stopped thinking of Ma,. The world seemed big and luminous, with some secret that would soon be known to me.”

Gopi’s previously safe world has fallen apart and in squash and the wider life of the sports centre she finds purpose and belonging again. This was an affecting exploration of grief that was both shortlisted for The Booker Prize and longlisted for The Women’s Prize. 

A Glass of Blessings by Barbara Pym

funny reflective medium-paced

A Glass of Blessings by Barbara Pym

Read on audio

Narrator: Mary Sarah for Listening Books

Pub. 1958, 234pp

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Wilmet Forsyth is a rather disappointed woman, though she lives very comfortably with her husband Rodney and likeable mother-in-law Sybil and also spends time with her friends Mary and Rowena. Rodney, who works for the Ministry, doesn’t approve of wives working so she spends her days trying to find ‘good works’ to do in her local parish, though she doesn’t seem too successful. She attends church and is well known and liked by the various clergymen who she finds amusing and fascinating.

The assortment of characters in this delightful novel are typically Pymian in their quirky ways and, as the story is told from Wilmet’s perspective, we hear her witty and often cattish observations which made me laugh out loud! Here she is giving blood for the first time, where she encounters a demanding woman with a rare blood type:

“‘This precious blood’ she murmured, and began muttering to herself, first about her blood and then about irrelevant things that I could only half hear - a quarrel with someone about a broken milk bottle and what they had said to each other, it seemed like a ‘stream of consciousness’ novel…Virginia Woolf might have brought something away from the experience, I thought; perhaps writers always do this, from situations that merely shock and embarrass ordinary people. And after all, Miss Daunt was probably only a little odd, nevertheless, I was glad when I was lying down in another room, drinking rather too sweet tea.”

Wilmet’s husband, who she met while serving as a Wren in Italy during the war, isn’t the most attentive and they don’t appear to have a huge amount in common so when both Rowena’s husband Harry and brother Piers separately invite her to lunches and long walks she indulges in their attention and finds herself a bit carried away. She imagines their romantic feelings towards her, but in no way intends to do anything more disloyal than mild flirtation. The scene where she and Piers stroll by the river and contemplate the furniture repository they pass is so well written and an unlikely highlight but I always remember it. There’s a lightly comedic feel to the book overall, though Wilmet does examine her own shortcomings including her self absorbed and judgemental nature, and we see her grow in subtle ways throughout the book.

This was a reread for me and I thoroughly enjoyed revisiting Pym’s world which is always more progressive than you might imagine for a novel centred around church life; here we find a gay relationship heavily hinted at well before it was legalised. I enjoy spotting characters from Pym’s previous novels mentioned in passing; Rocky Napier, Julian Mallory and Prudence Bates all appear.

Oh, and Wilmet’s unusual name was taken from one of Charlotte M. Yonge’s novels which her mother had adored. Interestingly, I’ve just read The Ministry of Fear by Graham Greene which includes quotes from one of her novels, The Little Duke, at the start of each chapter, a nice coincidence.

 

The Cheltenham Square Murder by John Bude

mysterious medium-paced

The Cheltenham Murder by John Bude 

Read on audio 

Narrator: Gordon Griffin

Pub 1937, 256pp

Reissued by British Library Crime Classics,2016

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This book opens with a dispute between neighbours about the removal of an old elm tree which serves to neatly introduce the cast of characters who live in a quiet square of 10 houses, the focal point of the story. They’re a generally quiet upper middle class group who’re mostly retired, but resentments and distrust simmer under the surface. They include Miss Boon and her many dogs, Arthur West who has both marital and money trouble, Fitz and his young wife, doctor Pratt, the Watt sisters who live next door to Reverend Matthews and the most recent resident who’s caused a lot of upset, Captain Cotton.

They’re summed up at the end of Chapter 1:

“Thus the inhabitants of Regency Square – diverse, yet as a community, typical; outwardly harmonious, yet privately at loggerheads; temperamentally and intellectually dissimilar, yet all of  them chiselling away at the same hard block of granite which, for want of a better word, we call life.”

The unusual murder in question is the reason I read the book - someone is shot in the back of the head by an arrow through an open window! A fabulously ridiculous set up and the ensuing puzzle is a lot of fun for the reader. It turns out that 5 of the inhabitants of the square are keen and talented archers who’re members of a local club, giving a small set of clear suspects from the start. the addition of Aldous Barnet, a writer of detective stories, who contacts his friend Superintendent Meredith to begin the investigation was a nice touch though a bit more of the writer would have been my preference as the last section of the novel is very much given over to the twists and turns of the sleuthing by Meredith and Inspector Long of the local police, which I found less enjoyable than the early part where the speculation and gossip of the characters themselves was the focus. Perhaps Long was written to be an irritating character to contrast with the more senior Meredith but he did get on my nerves a bit by the end!

I guessed elements of the mystery as it progressed, including one key point that they took forever to get to, but the solution was great when it came. I enjoyed this mystery overall and would definitely read another by John Bude in this series.

I red this book on Audible and was pleased to find the introduction by Martin Edwards was included which isn’t always the case.

Read for the #1937Club hosted by Karen and Simon.   

Confusion by Elizabeth Jane Howard

emotional reflective medium-paced

Confusion by Elizabeth Jane Howard

Book 3 of 5  of The Cazalet Chronicles series

Read in Braille

Pub. 1993, 352pp

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The third book in the Cazalet Chronicles series, set in London and Sussex, was just as gripping as the previous two. It covers a longer span of time, starting in 1942 and ending on VE Day, 8 May 1945.

So much is packed into this wonderful novel with  frequent perspective changes which can sometimes catch the reader out, though that in itself serves to add to the feeling of disorientation felt by the characters. The upheaval of the war affects the family in different ways and the pressures on them all are carefully explored.

I don’t want to give any spoilers as I’m so glad I knew nothing about what was coming as I read. I’ll just say that the storylines which I found most powerful were those of Louise and Zoe. Elizabeth Jane Howard continues to get to the heart of how women of this period were feeling; the restrictions on their freedom and choices in life. I read that she was a teenager during the war and she’s brilliantly drawing on those experiences to tell this family saga. The period details are fascinating too, like how Zoe bought pretty curtain fabric from Liberty’s to make into dresses as it wasn’t rationed.

I’ve tried to explain to a friend recently how great this series is but when I try it just comes out sounding incredibly melodramatic! I guess the extraordinary circumstances faced by people during wartime and the large set of characters in these books make this somewhat inevitable. I was swept away by the writing style and in awe of her skilful pacing. 

There’s laughter, tears, lust, tragedy, deceit, hope… and a whole lot of Spam!      

The Fortnight in September: A Novel by R.C. Sherriff

reflective relaxing medium-paced

The Fortnight in September by R C Sheriff

Read on audio

Narrator: David Thorpe for RNIB 

persephone Books

Pub. 1931, 304pp

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I chose this book when I was in need of some comfort and it’s so wonderful I already know I’ll be reading it again in future. The story follows an ordinary family from Dulwich on their travels down to Bognor Regis for two weeks’ holiday, which they do every year. The routine ordinariness is the appeal and I related to many of the situations and feelings of the family, both in remembering being a child and now as a parent of a 12 year old. It’s staggering really how relevant the concerns expressed are to modern family life, given it was written in 1931. I definitely related to their anxiety about getting the train:

“There was plenty of time as there always is, if you panic sufficiently early and get it over with… there were so many little things that might happen, something forgotten that must be gone back for, a queue at the booking office window, a hich in labelling the luggage…one remote reason always haunted Mr Stephens with unreasoning and ridiculous fear; it was the possibility of a passing lady fainting or accidentally falling down. it would mean stopping and helping her up, brushing down her dress, picking up her umbrella and bag, possibly her spectacles. it was not that Mr Stephens lacked humanity or courtesy, it was simply the agonising delay that might be caused; for under such circumstances you cannot leave a lady with the cold blooded statement that you have a train to catch.”

The writing continues in this delightful way throughout their journey and, as there’s so much to say, they finally manage to get to the beach during Chapter 13!

We hear the anxieties and observations of each of the family as the story progresses and the characters are so beautifully written. the three children are growing up and there’s a melancholy atmosphere as they all reflect on their times at Bognor and wonder if this year will be their last.

I’ve been enjoying this gentle read at breakfast over the last couple of weeks and have loved every minute, I’m really going to miss it!

The Ministry of Fear: An Entertainment by Graham Greene

adventurous dark funny medium-paced

The Ministry of Fear by Graham Greene

Read in Braille

Vintage Books

Pub. 1943, 224pp

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This novel opens with a church fete, a cake and a fortune teller and, wow, does it take a turn from there! It’s a story of espionage during WW2, with a little romance thrown in and a great storyline about memory loss and trying to recover but also kind of enjoying the simple life where you’re sheltered from the horrors of the outside world.

Graham Greene evokes the bewildering everyday life of the Blitz and what’s astonishing about this book is that it was written in the middle of it all so he had no idea how the war would be resolved at the time of writing. It makes for a gripping depiction of wartime London:

“The walls suddenly caved in. They were not even aware of noise. Blast is an odd thing because it is just as likely to have the effect of an embarrassing dream as of man’s serious vengeance on man, landing you naked in the street or exposing you in your bed or on your lavatory seat to the neighbours’ gaze.” And he continues: “The awful thing about a Raid is that it goes on: your own private disaster may happen early, but the raid doesn’t stop. They were machine-gunning the flares: two broke with a sound like crashing plates and the third came to earth in Russell Square; the darkness returned coldly and comfortingly.”

This is quite a disorientating read at times and I found myself rereading sections so I didn’t get lost. The writing is superb. I liked the complex character of Arthur Rowe who certainly goes on an adventure, one he fell into unexpectedly and has to make the best of. At one point he loiters in an auction house near an office as he’s in hiding, trying to figure things out and this piece of observation is great:

“The weekly auction was to take place next day, and visitors flowed in with catalogues; an unshaven chin and a wrinkled suit were not out of place here. A man with a ragged moustache and an out-at-elbows jacket, the pockets bulging with sandwiches, looked carefully through a folio volume of landscape gardening: a Bishop –or he might have been a Dean–was examining a set of the Waverley novels… Nobody here was standdardized; in tea-shops and theatres people are cut to the pattern of their environment, but in this auction-room the goods were too various to appeal to any one type. Here was pornography–eighteenth-century French with beautiful little steel engravings celebrating the copulations of elegant over-clothed people on Pompadour couches, here were all the Victorian novelists… There was a smell of neglected books, of the straw from packing cases and of clothes which had been too often rained upon.”

A funny, strange and memorable read which I very much enjoyed.

  

Marking Time by Elizabeth Jane Howard

emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

Marking Time by Elizabeth Jane Howard

Read in Braille

Pub. 1991, 617pp

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This second instalment in the Cazalet Chronicle had me just as gripped as the first and I flew through it! It kept me company during some nights when I slept badly and kept me from settling down to sleep at other times as I was enjoying it so much. It’s a brilliant epic family drama set in 1941, mainly in East Sussex and London. 

I’m not going to go into the story as this is part of a series but here’s a lovely snapshot of the writing; a great diary entry from one of the children, Clary, capturing the randomness of what we include in our journals:

“They are getting people back from France now, but there are thousands to collect and quite a lot of them are wounded, which must make it terribly difficult.they are clearing out the people who are convalescent from Mill Farm in case the beds are wanted for soldiers. M R James is rather good: he writes as though he always wears a dark suit. One cannot imagine him in shirtsleeves. The stories frighten me just the right amount. Goodness, I hate knitting!”

Elizabeth Jane Howard is just so skilled at making you care about her characters and I’ve got the third book ready to dive into now…

   

Boundary Road by Ami Rao

emotional tense medium-paced

Boundary Road by Ami Rao

Read as ebook using a mix of Braille and text-to-speech

 Everything With Words

Pub. 2023, 239pp

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I knew I was going to read this one as soon as I found out it’s about a bus journey through London. As much as I hated my various bus commutes many years ago I did at least enjoy the opportunity to indulge in a bit of people watching and the odd bit of eavesdropping, curious about all the many lives around me. So this book gave me a slice of that nostalgia!

Aron has just started a new job and is heading home on the No. 13 bus from Victoria to Boundary Road. He’s genuinely interested in other people’s lives and is an easy stranger to pass a few stops with. He takes the best seat on the bus – top left corner – and spends the ride pondering his life up to now and the possibilities for the future. His reflections on his early hopes as a talented footballer are woven in and we learn more about his family, his father’s arrival in England and struggles with alcohol, his grandmother Yvonne and mother Carol. 

In the present we meet all kinds of characters as he travels including a man who shares the story of his first love and is persuaded to visit Aron’s shop for some new clothes in a charming accidental way, and a pregnant woman carrying twins. He’s on a high from his first day at work which has given him a renewed optimism after a dark period and this could explain why he’s so open with people.

Early on a young woman enters who Aron spots before she even gets on as she’s dressed unusually, and we suspect she’ll play a larger role later on.

We learn this is Nora as the perspective shifts in the secon part of the novel. I was so invested in Aron’s story that I didn’t connect quite so well with Nora, though she meets some interesting people including an architect who shares a story about his surprising reaction to a client’s painting, and also reflects on her own upbringing, further exploring the diversity of London’s population. I enjoyed the sharp observations from her perspective concerning the reaction to Aron:

“The elderly white couple on the seats two rows behind them turn their heads around anxiously, eyes darting here and there.two black youths fist-bumping directly in front of them with only one row in between. The woman… turns around and tries to catch Nora’s eye. It is a plea of sorts, a plea, as Nora understands, seeking solidarity. Nora pointedly looks away in these matters, her loyalty is unwavering.”

The final section is gripping and brilliantly written. This is a book with a hard-hitting message and I thought it delivers it very successfully.

i red this for Karen and Lizzy’s #ReadIndies month