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A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler – readwritehead
https://readwritehead.wordpress.com/2015/03/30/a-spool-of-blue-thread-by-anne-tyler
March 30, 2015. A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler. My trusty notebook informs me that the last Anne Tyler novel I read was An Amateur Marriage in 2005. For many years I had been an ardent fan, reading everything she wrote, as she wrote it. Then I stopped. It wasn’t a conscious decision: I had liked An Amateur Marriage well enough. Tyler writes about family life and relationships, about the seemingly mundane, about you and me, about our neighbours and friends –. This is a family saga in the grand tradi...
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Crooked Heart by Lissa Evans – readwritehead
https://readwritehead.wordpress.com/2015/04/17/crooked-heart-by-lissa-evans
April 17, 2015. Crooked Heart by Lissa Evans. It is Friday afternoon, time to write my thoughts on another Bailey’s longlist title, so I open my trusty notebook at the relevant page and I find…nothing. Not a word. Only a heading,. Crooked Heart by Lissa Evans. May indeed be moving and delightful, but it is far funnier and blacker than these hastily plucked adjectives imply. It is at this point in the proceedings that I tend to say However. Yet for me there are no Howevers. The plot rattles along,...Being...
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Paola Ruocco – readwritehead
https://readwritehead.wordpress.com/author/paolaruocco
April 17, 2015. Crooked Heart by Lissa Evans. It is Friday afternoon, time to write my thoughts on another Bailey’s longlist title, so I open my trusty notebook at the relevant page and I find…nothing. Not a word. Only a heading,. Crooked Heart by Lissa Evans. May indeed be moving and delightful, but it is far funnier and blacker than these hastily plucked adjectives imply. It is at this point in the proceedings that I tend to say However. Yet for me there are no Howevers. The plot rattles along,...Being...
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Outline by Rachel Cusk – readwritehead
https://readwritehead.wordpress.com/2015/04/02/outline-by-rachel-cusk
April 2, 2015. Outline by Rachel Cusk. And so I picked up. And found myself sitting on a plane next to a small fat man who proceeded to tell me about his wives, his children, his money and his yacht. Already I was hooked. My mother once admitted that she used to be desperate for us to leave the house for school, but that once we’d gone she had no idea what to do with herself and wished that we would come back. The narrator continues with her story and when she has finished Angeliki says,. 8211; One’s exi...
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Personal and Shadow Bailey’s Panel Shortlists – readwritehead
https://readwritehead.wordpress.com/2015/04/13/personal-and-shadow-baileys-panel-shortlists
April 13, 2015. Personal and Shadow Bailey’s Panel Shortlists. A fortnight later I returned home to freezing temperatures, an empty fridge and three weeks in which to read an entire longlist. I worked out that if I followed a strict routine I could manage 15 books, but 20 would be impossible. My Bailey’s Prize Shortlist. Outline – Rachel Cusk. Elizabeth is Missing – Emma Healey. How to be Both – Ali Smith. The Shore – Sara Taylor. A Spool of Blue Thread – Anne Tyler. How to be both – Ali Smith. I think m...
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The Life of a Banana by PP Wong – readwritehead
https://readwritehead.wordpress.com/2015/04/07/the-life-of-a-banana-by-pp-wong
April 7, 2015. The Life of a Banana by PP Wong. The Life of a Banana. And so begins a year in Xing Li’s life that includes a giant tortoise, a trip to Singapore, a meeting with a ‘dead’ relative, illicit trading, a disappearance, euthanasia, exam cheating, an extreme act of violence, a deal, an expulsion and several hospitalizations. Xing Li regularly mispronounces words, and while it is amusing the first time she mangles a composer’s name, the ‘joke’ is repeated many times and soon becomes irritating.
