The Electricity of Every Living Thing by Katherine May
Friends of Dorothy by Sandi Toksvig
Frank & Red by Matt Coyne
I just read The Postcard, and it was as sleeper hit for me. I’d never heard of it at all, let alone any positive feedback, but it was so darn good. I loved the story, but also that it was the first time I’ve encountered this format – “roman vrai” – which is, roughly translated from French, “true novel.” It takes the bones of the author’s family story and fleshes them out with fiction, and the result is deeply moving.
The Electricity of Every Living Thing was a great book that takes you inside the mind of an adult who is slowly coming to terms with the fact that she may, in fact, be on the autism spectrum. But not only that, the audio is an audio drama, so it has immersive sound effects that really bring it to life and drive home the things that can be sensory nightmares if you have this kind of brain. I loved it so much.
Friends of Dorothy was one I picked up solely based on the fact that I really enjoy Sandi Toksvig and was curious. But it ended up being a brilliant blend of great story, wonderful (and stereotype-busting) characters, and lots of humour.
Frank & Red was such a lovely intergenerational friendship tale in which all the characters grew, changed and discovered family where they least expected it.
Borders by Thomas King
Hell of a Book by Jason Mott
The Trees by Percival Everett
The first two of these are graphic novels, which worked well for each one of them. Snapdragon is a story about a young girl who is having trouble at home and at school, but one day comes across an elderly neighbour in a chance encounter that will change the trajectory of her life. It’s got some gory bits (animal taxidermy), but it also deals with a lot of important topics in a gentle way that really hit for me. Borders is about a young boy who lives on a reservation (I think) in Canada, but whose sister moves to the other side of the Canada/USA border. The book does a wonderful job of bringing up the issue of traditional land use in First Nations/Indigenous tribes vs. the borders that were drawn on the map by settlers that often ran right through the middle of their traditional lands. I think a lot of us just kind of accept the way land is divided because it’s been that way for our whole lives and just feels like it’s always been that way. But this book shows how erroneous that assumption is, and how devastating these lines on a map have been for communities across North America (and probably the world).
I’m also going to group the second two because I couldn’t decide which to include. I read both around the same time, so they’re kind of linked in my mind, which doesn’t help matters. They both twist genres and reader expectations in new and interesting ways. They both deal with race and racism, and they both have shocking moments but also deeply emotional ones. Both of these books have stuck with me vividly since reading them, even though that was quite a long time ago at this point!
The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Tova Bailey
Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
I enjoyed How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water. It’s a different format than I’m used to, because the entire book is sort of an interior monologue. But somehow it works. It’s the story of a woman who has immigrated to the USA to escape a violent partner, and is now in financial trouble. The book is mostly a series of interviews with a case worker who she has to go and check in with, but ends up sharing most of her life story along the way. I liked that it made the story very immediate, and also allowed us to see her motivations and feelings from inside, which softened some of her harder edges.
The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating is just a favourite. It’s a memoir about a woman who has a debilitating long-term illness that relegates her to bed in a care facility. She can’t get up, go outside or do most things for herself, and is in a fairly dark place when we meet her. But then a friend brings her a present – a snail they found in the woods outside. She’s unsure at first – what is she supposed to do with her new roommate? But soon this snail gives her something to focus on, a living creature to share her time and space with, and a fascinating subject to begin learning about. This small creature tethers her to the world outside of her four walls, which gives her a way through what she’s struggling with. I just loved it.
And finally, a sort of bonus pick. This is definitely not one I need to shine a light on, showered as it was by awards and accolades. But Demon Copperhead surprised me with how easy it was to get invested in and get through (despite its long page count and dark subject matter) and how wonderfully Kingsolver captured her character. He’s dealing with tough things, really properly dark, but he’s also learning from what he’s going through, trying to make a better future than his past and keeps hold of a sense of humour and wonderful eloquence. I stuck with the story because I wanted to spend time with the narrator. Just brilliant.
Phew, that was more work than I normally put into my Tuesday posts! Now it’s up to you to judge my picks! Did I make you want to read any of them? Are there any you have read already – and if so, do you agree that they belong on this week’s list?
Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly link-up feature created by The Broke and the Bookish and hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. Every week TTT has a different topic, and everyone who links up has to create a link of ten items that fit that topic. To see past and upcoming topics, go here.