5 Books to Read This Holiday Season



‘Elmet’ by Fiona Mozley
Not many debut novels can claim a spot on the Man Booker Prize shortlist, but that achievement is just one of the things that makes Fiona Mozley’s lyrical, noir-esque tale exceptional. The story follows Daniel, his sister Cathy, and their gargantuan, bare-knuckle-boxer father as they eke out a living off the grid in modern-day England and gradually face off against a group of landowners bent on changing their way of life. The lilting beauty of Mozley’s prose combined with the casual, matter-of-fact violence that accompanies the characters’ lives brings to mind a time when fairy tales were filled with dark forests and bloody deeds—a perfect antidote to holiday sugar-and-spice overload.

‘Pachinko’ by Min Jin Lee
This intimate saga explores the torment and small joys of life as a Korean immigrant in 20th-century Japan through the eyes of a tight-knit, fiercely loving family. Lee’s straightforward prose details the chaotic world of good but flawed people faced with agonizing decisions amidst a nation’s upheaval and the crushing force of modernity, yielding a poignant tale of survival and pride that's nearly impossible to put down. —Julie Kosin

‘Home Fire’ by Kamila Shamsie
Home Fire is a literary thriller about prejudice and the slide into radicalisation, but it is also an expansive novel about love. A modern-day Antigone set against political tensions in London, Shamsie’s latest is a haunting and arrestingly current portrait of two families forever caught in the insurmountable gap between love and country, loyalty and desire.

‘Things We Left Unsaid’ by Zoya Pirzad
Deep in an Iranian suburb, made rich by the booming oil industry, Clarice Ayvazian lives a comfortable life surrounded by the gentle bickering of her children and her gossiping friends and relatives. Happy being at the heart of her family, she devotes herself to their every need. But when an enigmatic Armenian family move in across the street, something begins to gnaw at Clarice’s contentment: a feeling that there may be more to life - and to her - than this. Set in Iran, Zoya Pirzad’s award-winning novel crafts an intimate portrait of family life – its joys and its compromises  – and how we find a happiness that endures.

‘Autumn’ by Ali Smith 
The extraordinary friendship of an elderly songwriter and the precocious child of his single-parent neighbour is at the heart of this novel that darts back and forth through the decades, from the 1960s to the era of Brexit. The first in a projected four-volume series, it’s a moving exploration of the intricacies of the imagination, a sly teasing-out of a host of big ideas and small revelations, all hovering around a timeless quandary: how to observe, how to be.

What book are you reading? I’d love to know.

No comments:

Post a Comment