I slowed down my reading during January, trying to get more depth of engagement with what I read, relishing it more. This includes books of less than 150 pages that I would typically zip through. Recently I read three short books from Penguin, all of them full of big ideas. It took longer than I expected, and I found strong links between the three, so I’m reviewing them together.
I’m sitting in a freezing cold departure area (I can’t dignify it by calling it a lounge) at Dublin Airport, waiting for my connecting flight home. The café, which is more of a hot beverage kiosk, is closed. There is a pillar that invites travellers to use three smiley face buttons to express your satisfaction with the facilities. I might warm myself up by hammering on the red sad face button later.
Meanwhile, to pass the time, I thought I’d do this month’s Six Degrees of Separation. Continue reading
Read 29/08/2017-01/09/2017
Rating: 3 stars
I debated with myself whether to review Morality for Beautiful Girls or not. I mentioned my personal concerns about reading Alexander McCall Smith’s popular series in my review of The Heavens May Fall.
How did I come to start reading the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency books? Continue reading
Read 27/08/2017-28/08/2017
Rating: 3 stars
Read for the Reader’s Room Read Around the World Challenge
I’ve been drinking a lot of Rooibos tea lately. Continue reading
Read 26/06/2017-28/06/2017
Rating: 4 stars
Stay With Me is Ayobami Adebayo’s first novel. It was shortlisted for the 2017 Women’s Prize for Fiction. I borrowed it from my local library knowing little about it other than that it is set in Nigeria and its subject matter is full of sadness.
Yejide and Akin marry for love. For each of them, the other is all the person they need. The Yoruba are a polygamous society, but Akin is clear that he wants no wife other than Yejide. Yejide is the daughter of an additional wife, her mother died giving birth, and Yejide has no interest in being one of many. They are well suited and happy together, until Yejide fails to become pregnant and Akin’s family start to put pressure on him to marry again. Continue reading
Read 01/04/2017-07/04/2017
Rating: 3 stars
Read for the Reader’s Room March Madness Challenge
Yaa Gyasi’s debut novel is an ambitious one. It charts the lives of two half-sisters from Ghana who have very different experiences of slavery. The book sets off in the 18th century and follows the descendants of each sister to see how slavery impacted on African women depending on the form their slavery took. Continue reading
Read 22/03/2017-24/03/2017
Rating: 4 stars
Read for The Reader’s Room March Madness Challenge
When this book came up as one of the Reader’s Room March Madness Challenge reads, the description interested me. I didn’t know who Trevor Noah was. I learned that he’s the current host of The Daily Show, but I was more interested in the description of his birth being a crime. Continue reading
