Don't Look Now, by Daphne Du Maurier - A Short Story!

About a week ago a regular customer recommend I watch the 1970’s film “Don’t Look Now”. After a little research I found it was based on a short story by one of my favourite authors, Daphne Du Maurier, and of course, I had to read it first! I had been warned that reading it would spoil the ending. But oh boy, it definitely did not ruin it. 

Daphne beautifully sets the scene and characters in an instant. A sceptical husband and his anxious, grieving wife on holiday in Venice. They are there to recover some semblance of a normal relationship after losing their daughter. There is subtle humour in the way Du Maurier describes the old familiar feel of the relationship, and later when she shows the husbands shortening of temper as the holiday is gradually ruined by a couple of clairvoyant Scots. Seemingly without effort Du Maurier creates tension and weaves important little details into this intriguing tale of 50 short pages. I was paying close attention to detail, having been sold the story on the promise of a whopper of a plot twist but I was still left stunned.

No, I’m not going to give it away! You have to read it for yourself.

- Anara

Hardback, £14.99. Find it in the short stories & poetry section!

Will, by Jeroen Olyslaegers

I’d been meaning to read Will since I first saw it in 2020 – I liked the idea of a book set in Antwerp, a city I really enjoyed spending time in a few years back. Translated from the original Flemish, it’s an international bestseller and was a Times Historical Fiction Book of the Year in 2019.

It must have been a thin year.

It is told from the perspective of an elderly Wilfried Wils, looking back at his experience of Nazi occupation, a period when he worked as a police officer, pushed and pulled between collaboration and resistance, while his dangerous alter-ego, Angelo the expressionistic poet, is also looking on, waiting to reveal himself.

I didn’t like it. I didn’t like Will, the narrator, and Angelo the poet just felt pretentious and a bit obvious. I didn’t like the narrator’s tone, the way that even though he was looking back he seemed to maintain an indifference towards the Nazis, more frustrated by their smashing up of a local pub than angered by the rounding up of Jewish families. Don’t get me wrong, there were sentences and maybe even paragraphs which described the horror, but there was no emotion, nothing which made me feel what a bystander must surely have been feeling. Perhaps that was the point. Maybe he didn’t feel anything, and a banal neutrality was the essence of his response, but that only makes me dislike him even more.

At the same time, he is angry about something. The way he describes his wife, Yvette, is not entirely pleasant. Frequent use of excreta as simile had me rolling my eyes, feeling puerile, lazy, and cheap. He frequently refers to his city as ‘a whore’ - in fact lots of things are referred to as ‘whores’ with ‘open legs’, and other than Hilde, his granddaughter, his attitude and use of language about women is pretty appalling. Even the people he helps, he doesn’t seem to care about – only Hilde seems to evoke an emotional response.

What most disturbed me is that the voice of this wannabe poet, written as a frankly unpoetic stream of consciousness, felt like the voice of an author with some things to get off his chest. We’re told in the blurb that the author’s grandfather was a collaborator, so perhaps this an investigation into the mind of his own bompa, an effort to understand what leads an ordinary man to casually participate in cruel acts while at the same time just trying to keep out of trouble. Unfortunately, it reads more like the words of a pub bore reminiscing about a war he was never in.

Maybe I missed something entirely, but I’m sad that it painted a very unpleasant portrait of a city I like. If anyone can recommend a good novel set in Antwerp, let me know – I need a palette cleanser.

- Paul

Paperback, £8.99. Find it in the Fiction section! 

... or don't! 

The Girls I've Been, by Tess Sharpe

Oooooh, I'm glad I impulse bought this one!

Ever since she was old enough to say her name, Nora has been given a new one by her mother. She created a new person for Nora to become five times throughout the first sixteen years of her life. First, there was Rebecca. Then Samantha. And then Haley. Katie. And finally Ashley.

Her mother took on new names too. Why? Because she was a con artist. She targeted dangerous men, forced her way into their hearts, made her child do her bidding, and when they just started to get comfortable, her mother stole their mark's fortune and ran off into the night, dragging along whichever daughter she had created that day... month... year...

But that's all in the past. Her mother is in prison, Nora chose this name herself, and she's safe with her sister. Well, almost. But what are the odds of being held at gun point at a bank robbery with your new girlfriend and ex-boyfriend?

Surely zero, right?

Wrong.

This is a gripping read. I love when a narrative plays with timelines, and we get multiples of stories progressing side-by-side, building just the right amount of tension and suspense. Each of Nora's past selves builds a deeper and more desperate picture of who she is, and to see her in so much danger in the present tense, even when she's away from a life of swindling and deception, feels tragic. I felt a distinct urge to protect her, and to hurt any person who threatened her safety.

Our narrator is a criminal, but a reluctant one. A manipulated one. But not naïve. Oh, no. Nora knows her way around a man with a gun. We get to see how Nora uses her dangerous past; her different identities to get through this harrowing experience. And it's dark to see someone who has experienced so much pain, utilise the skills that she never should have learned in the first place. 

Just a fabulous and innovative story. Incredible characters with nuanced and beautiful connections. A true testament to the strength that comes with trauma, and that you shouldn't mess with savvy teenagers!

- Sian

CW: abuse, violence, manipulation, CPTSD, anxiety

The Swimmers, by Julia Otsuka

This is the first novel of Julie Otsuka’s that I have read, and it won't be the last. It is a stunning masterpiece about ageing, memory, and the experiences that shape a life.

The story begins with a group of swimmers who all belong to the same community pool. Each member of the group has their own story to tell, but it's Alice who becomes obsessed with a mysterious crack that appears at the bottom of the swimming pool. Some of the group are curious; others start to panic, believing this could be the end of the swimming adventures they all so enjoy.

It's towards the end of this story that Julia Otsuka's writing takes on such beauty, tenderness, and heartbreak, as Alice struggles to hold onto her sense of self. She feels she is still here, but she's viewed differently by her husband, her daughter, her friends.

Dive in and read this wonderfully heartbreaking but life-affirming book. We can all learn about the importance and value of life, being who we are meant to be. Otsuka's writing is a delight to discover, and one should savour every poetic word. You will not be disappointed.

- Milly

Hardback, £12.99. Find it in the Fiction section!

Worn, by Sofi Thanhauser

This book confronts us with the awful realities of the textile industry, uncovering a world where the people who make our clothes now are seldom paid what they deserve and are often harmed by the industry. The book has sections on linen, cotton, silk, synthetics, and wool. As Sofi explains, “… the history and reportage [this book] contains is weighted towards understanding the U.S.’s role in building a global garment trade that touches every corner of the world.” Although it's definitely U.S.-centric, part of the section on wool describes the author’s visit to Woolfest in Cumbria one year.

This is not a light read. Although the narrative is mostly about Thanhauser’s visits to factories; people’s homes; and workplaces, it is very fact-heavy and depressing reading. Cotton uses 8,500 litres of water to make 1Kg but wheat only needs 900 litres. About 24 per cent of the world’s insecticide is used for cotton farming, polluting water supplies. A pair of jeans uses 20,000 litres of water – the amount that could be used to grow the wheat needed to bake a loaf of bread every week for a year.

It's unlikely that anyone looking for cheap clothing on the UK high streets has any idea of the human activity (and suffering and exploitation). It might also be unlikely that they care.

- Colin

Hardback, £20. Find it in the History section!

Station Eleven, by Emily St. John Mandel

From her position on stage, eight-year-old Kirsten witnesses the death of a Hollywood icon during his performance as King Lear at a Toronto theatre. That same evening a deadly flu virus arrives in the city, and within days the world as we know it has collapsed. Twenty years later, Kirsten is herself an actor, touring Shakespeare with the Travelling Symphony, crossing dangerous territory to bring theatre and music to communities of survivors.

This could easily have been written during the first lockdown of 2020 but was actually published six years earlier, and other than the virulence of the disease and the vast death toll, nothing in here feels exaggerated. The reactions of the protagonists and the world around them feel very real, even down to the bulk-buying of toilet paper in an early chapter.

But this isn’t really a book about a virus, or even about the end of the world. It’s a book about human connection, even where that connection is tangential, and about the importance of the things ‘beyond survival’ that bind us together. While the narrative arcs back and forth between characters, times and places both pre- and post-pandemic, the connections are subtly and sometimes surprisingly revealed.

It's a tribute to the quality of the storytelling here that I have continued to think about elements of the story in the weeks since reading it. This is not a happy book, but it is gently reassuring, and it repeatedly reminds us that ‘Survival is Insufficient’. Being human is not merely about existing and procreating, but also, and more importantly, it’s about memory, connection, the things we carry with us and the things we leave behind.

- Paul

Paperback, £9.99. Find it in the fiction section!

Tipping the Velvet, by Sarah Waters

Purchased from Gay's the Word; the most fantastic all-LGBTQIA+ bookshop in Bloomsbury, London. Upon standing in front of the storefront, I declared to my friend: "I am in search of historical gays!" I wanted a story of incognito queers from decades; heck, CENTURIES passed. I wanted androgyny and bravery and a total disregard for strict social codes.

Oooooh boy, did Sarah Waters come THROUGH!

Tipping the Velvet follows Nancy Astley, as she falls in love with a performer at the music halls, Kitty Butler. Kitty dresses as a man in her act, and Nancy is completely enthralled by it all. Things escalate quickly and, after moving to London with Kitty, she finds that things aren't as simple as falling in love and building a life when you're both women. Nancy finds herself tumbling all over London, trying to find herself with one foot in one world, and one in another.

Nancy sees it all: cross-dressing, prostitution, rags and riches, sex, androgyny, homophobia, ostracisation, heartbreak, familial bonds - both blood and chosen - acceptance, social change... her world is a chaotic blur of over ground and underground cultures battling it out. Not once does Nancy even consider re-joining the straight-laced (pardon the pun) life she was born into, and she is heroic in her efforts to stand proudly and independently in her resolve. I admire her courage and tenacity; though I cringe at her greed and shallowness.

She is by no means a diamond in the rough, but is as scuffed and filthy as the rest of the world. And that's how she gripped me! She didn't necessarily deserve stability, sanctuary, and security any more than any other character in this book, so I just had to know whether or not she found it!

This book has a message of forgiveness; of personal growth, and understanding when to let go. It reminds us that we can build communities around us that make us feel whole and safe. As a queer individual, this is especially powerful, and I implore anyone who identifies under the LGBT+ umbrella to read this book! But no one under 18... it's a little graphic at times!

A new firm favourite; one of the best books I've read in YEARS!

- Sian

Paperback, £8.99. Find it in the fiction section!