I do like autumn. This month has been mild, mostly dry and my health is finally in a good enough place to cycle the dog off on Sundays for long walks again. I’d missed our adventures.

October was socially pretty full – we went to the Great Western Brick Show, saw the Dandy Warhols and celebrated Tim’s birthday. I went to the first night of Neneh Cherry’s book tour and a folk concert of spooky music. Plus our usual film nights and pub quizzes.

I read some great books this month but the highlight was definitely Yellowface by Rebecca F Kuang. I don’t know why it took me so long to read any of her books. I’m tempted to jump straight into Babel next.

Happy November!

Books read

Enter Ghost by Isabella Hammad
Entertaining and thoughtful novel about a British Palestinian actress who joins the cast of an Arabic production of Hamlet in Ramallah. It combines depiction of modern Palestine with all the egos and melodrama you’d expect from an acting troupe.

Headshot by Rita Bullwinkel
I would never have picked up a book about boxing but this was sent to me as part of the Good Book Club subscription. And it’s actually a great read. Over two days 8 young women compete to win a national tournament. Each chapter describes one bout – describing the fight and the two competitors. It’s visceral and really gets inside the minds of girls on the brink of adulthood.

Stay With Me by Ayòbámi Adébáyò
The disintegration of the marriage of a Nigerian couple who are struggling to conceive – not the lightest fare but Adébáyò makes it gripping. Though some turns of the plot were predictable, others took me by surprise.

A Thousand Threads: a Memoir by Neneh Cherry
Swedish singer-songwriter Neneh Cherry has led a pretty amazing life. From a childhood following her artist mother and jazz musician around the world, to touring with the Slits at 15, getting married at 17, DJing in London and leading her own band – and that’s just before she turned 20. This is a warm, generous, family-focused memoir.

A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers
The second volume in the Wayfarers series, this book follows an AI trying to pass as human and her new friend whose backstory we learn included slavery and years of isolation, as they try to build a life in a community of hackers and artists. This is such an inclusive series with great characters, cool sci-fi and is generally a lot of fun.

Yellowface by Rebecca F Kuang
This is a satire about literary publishing, told from the perspective of one of the most compellingly awful narrators I’ve encountered. When failed (white) writer June witnesses the accidental death of her sort-of friend Athena Liu it should be devastating. But Athena is a bestselling superstar author who happens to have just given June first look at the draft of her new novel. June spies an opportunity. So what if her first taste of success is the result of plagiarism? So what if the PR-suggested change to her pen name is racially ambiguous? So what if one lie leads to a whole bunch more? Such an entertaining slow car crash of a tale.

New York City in 1979 by Kathy Acker
I guess you’d call this a chapbook – a mix of photographs, observations and fragments of story about inhabitants of the dirtier side of New York. This should have been right up my street but I felt like Acker was just looking for shock value rather than making artistic choices. Perhaps I won’t try her full-length books.

The End by Samuel Beckett
translated by the author
In two short stories about unnamed vagrants later in life, Beckett managed to thoroughly depress me. His writing is beautiful but there is no positive note to be found in these 54 pages.