A Word About Awards

AMSTERDAM by Ian McEwan   Award: Booker Winner 1998   Nomination: Dublin Longlist 2000   Date Read: June 30, 2022   As with much of McEwan’s work, Amsterdam is a dark tale of moral ambiguity. The line between right and wrong is often unclear and who better to embody that than two long-time friends. Clive and Vernon find themselves at the funeral of their ex-lover, Molly, who succumbed to an illness in a brief amount of time. Rather than view each other as ex-rivals, Clive and Vernon view one another as long-term friends.   George, Molly husband at the time of her death, stumbles on some damaging photos of another of her ex-lovers, a well-known right-wing politician on the rise (Molly got around. Damn, girl!). The photos show this politician in drag, looking at-ease in this persona, implying that perhaps this indulgence wasn’t a one-off.    Vernon is an editor at a paper on the decline. Readership is down. Their pool of stories are drying up and uninspiring to say the least. When George

BEARTOWN by Fredrik Backman   Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2019, Goodreads Finalist 2017   Date Read: June 27, 2022   “… the best way to prepare mentally for becoming a parent is to stay in a tent at a weeklong rock festival with a load of fat friends who are smoking hash. You blunder about in a permanent state of acute sleep deprivation wearing clothes covered with stains from food that is only very rarely your own, you suffer from tinnitus, you can’t go near a puddle without some giggling fool jumping in it, you can’t go to the bathroom without someone standing outside banging on the door, you get woken up in the middle of the night because someone was “just thinking about something,” and you get woken up the next morning to find someone pissing on you.” No truer words were ever written. But, of course, it leaves out the wonder and beauty that comes along with all of that.   Beartown is the story of a small hockey town that is torn apart by a rape. Beartown is actually on the decline

ADUA by Igiaba Scego   Nomination: Dublin Longlist 2019   Date Read: June 21, 2022   Adua is an interesting take on very distinct periods of time in the life of Adua and her father, Zoppo. The narrative alternates between her father’s growing up in the wilds of Africa, to him going to prison for consorting with Jews (I wasn’t very clear on this), to becoming a translator for an Italian ambassador. Additionally, chapters entitled “Talking-To” show the reasons Adua is scolded as she grows into a young woman.   Adua is raised in the traditional Somali way, being subservient to her father and being circumcised upon her coming of age. Her mother died during childbirth and the only mother Adua knows is her father’s second wife. Overall, however, Adua leads a very interesting life, moving with her father from Somalia to Italy, having a brief and exploitative movie career and marrying a younger man. The juxtaposition of her circumcision and the Italian producer discovering her stitches felt li

BABA DUNJA’S LAST LOVE    by Alina Bronsky   Nominations: Dublin Finalist 2018   Date Read: June 18, 2022   Baba Dunja’s Last Love is an interesting look into an exclusive community that lives in the fallout zone of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor meltdown, in a town called Tschernowo. Without intending to, Baba Dunja is considered the town major, checking up on everyone, making sure they have what they need, assigning housing, etc. She is cantankerous, kind and wise, her kids having grown and left long ago.   A strange collection of souls have made the decision to return to this polluted environ, creating an odd and insulated community that takes care of their own. They are frequently infiltrated by scientists wearing HAZMAT suits to test their levels of radiation, as well as the radiation of their crops and animals. Most people fear to come so close. This community lives largely in peace, providing for each other.   Their peace is shattered when a man whose wife abandoned him brings th

THE 10PM QUESTION by Kate De Goldi   Nomination: Dublin Longlist 2010   Date Read: June 14, 2022   Frankie is a twelve year old boy who carries the weight of the world on his shoulders. With a mother too terrified to leave the house, a father busy supporting his family and two other siblings, Louie and Gordana, too involved in their own lives, Frankie believes that it is his job to look after his mother and make sure she has the groceries necessary to run her cake shop from the house.   The well-worn grooves of his and his best friend’s, Gigs, lives are about to be altered with the arrival of Sydney, an exotic creature by local standards. Sydney is world wise, dreadlocked and nose pierced, living in place after place because of a nomadic mother who is easily bored by routine. She lands in New Zealand with much bravado and she manages to quickly worm her way into Frankie and Gigs’ lives.   De Goldi is brilliant at capturing the uncertainty of childhood and the attempt to understand them

CONSEQUENCES by Penelope Lively   Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2009   Date Read: June 8, 2022   Consequences is a novel about three generations of women who start out with bleak beginnings but end up leading rich, full lives. Critics have claimed that the “happy endings” for each of these women is implausible but I think in these complicated and uncertain times (another school shooting anyone? How about the war in Ukraine?), but I enjoyed the escapism Lively is peddling here.   With a rich structure and robust characters, Lively creates an intelligent and tactile experience where the reader is able to grow with these characters. Beginning with Lorna falling in love, against the wishes of her parents, with Matt, a stenographer and artist who is almost immediately sent off to war leaving Lorna pregnant and alone. Just after he leaves, Lorna is told that Matt has been killed. Molly is eventually born and Lorna falls in love, beginning again a new life.   The most memorable for me is Molly

ACCESS ROAD by Maurice Gee   Nomination: Dublin Longlist 2011   Date Read: June 6, 2022   After many years and the sibling scattering to the wind, they all flock back to their childhood home on Access Road. Rory, Lionel and Rowan. Although it’s dilapidated and in need of love, Rory and Lionel both move in, with Rowan visiting several times a week. Rory and Lionel have never partnered up; Rory being a little slow and entirely absorbed by gardening and things that grow (spectrum disorder?). Lionel was a successful dentist by is either asexual or gay but never explored that side of himself.   Ultimately, Access Road is about how, sometimes, the things that haunted you as a child can come back and haunt you as an adult. Clyde Buckley is a nightmare that just won’t go away. Sadistic and a loner as a child, Clyde enjoyed maliciously cutting the heads off birds. As a typical child, he was interested in the sexual changes happening in his own and others’ bodies. But something is definitely wro

DOG DAYS, GLENN MILLER NIGHTS by Laurie Graham   Nomination: Women's Prize Longlist 2001   Date Read: June 4, 2022   I think the wrong cover got put on this novel. Having not read the blurb before picking this one up, I thought it would be about a hard-working young nobody by day and a notable ballroom dancer by night. Instead, this is about curmudgeonly elderly woman who lives in sketchy subsidized housing. Completely different than I had anticipated.    That being said, Birdie is funny in her persnickety personality and cantankerous observations. Her age is in contrast to the youth she sees and she doesn’t understand how the world has taken the direction it has (e.g. droopy pants, drugs, young people in general, etc.). Birdie’s friends are her neighbors and although she complains about everyone, she has a heart of gold.   Her ex-husband keeps leaving dogs with Birdie and she reluctantly nurtures them until her ex appears again and whisks them away. She always misses them when the

ALLIGATOR by Lisa Moore   Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2007, Women's Prize Longlist 2007   Date Read: June 2, 2022   Alligator almost reads like a series of vignettes with characters whose lives intersect in various ways. None of these characters are particularly likeable or relatable, in my opinion. What they have in common is that they all live in St. Johns, Newfoundland. I had really looked forward to reading this and was somewhat disappointed.   Madeleine is working on a film that she is obsessed with. She wants to show the early history of Newfoundland in a manner and style that hasn’t been seen before. She wants it to have spiritual depth and spectacle. Divorced but still in close contact with her ex, Marty, she speaks with him almost every day and often regrets leaving him. Madeleine has come to the end and knows it. Her doctor advised against shooting the film because she has severe heart problems and it becomes a race to see what finishes first – her or the film.   Beverly