Search Results for: becoming

Becoming by Michelle Obama

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Becoming to the screen

Did you love Michelle Obama’s memoir Becoming as much as I did? The Netflix documentary based on her book and life starts today, 6th of May, on Netflix. I’ll be watching! Here’s our review of her book.

Becoming by Michelle Obama

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Becoming

A feel good memoir written with warmth, humour and self-deprecation

The memoir of a First Lady is not usually something I would run to the bookshop for, but in the case of Michelle Obama, I was intrigued. I wanted to know if she really is as kind, warm, intelligent, accomplished, empathic and eloquent as she has come across since the day she set her foot in the White House. And, if this book is to be believed, she is! A feel good book written with warmth, humour and self-deprecation.

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Service by Sarah Gilmartin

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Service

Talent and testosterone in a toxic kitchen

Daniel Costello, Irish celebrity chef and proud holder of two Michelin stars, is headed for the high court, the victim of a patently false rape claim. At least, that’s what he tells us. His distressed wife, Julie, doesn’t know what to think, and ex-waitress, Hannah, is harbouring secrets that she is not ready to share with the world. In the nuanced and compelling Service by Sarah Gilmartin, the story is told through their alternating voices. Three versions with shifting perspectives and perceived truths, provide a fascinating portrait of the frenetic restaurant scene of Dublin’s boom time and an incisive exploration of power dynamics and toxic masculinity.

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Small! by Hannah Moffatt

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Small!

Gleefully bonkers

After a series of unfortunate school-related events, culminating in setting fire to his headteacher’s trousers, Harvey Small’s exasperated mother makes a momentous decision. Harvey is to go to Madame Bogbrush’s School for Gifted Giants, a curious decision as Harvey is neither gifted nor a giant. Equipped with stilts and a sense of foreboding, Harvey is set to discover that the world is far bigger than grown-ups would have us believe. Welcome to Small! by Hannah Moffatt, a merrily riotous tale shortlisted for the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize 2023.

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Little Boxes by Cecilia Knapp

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Little Boxes

No ordinary life

Capturing the blend of magic and melancholy curiously specific to English seaside towns, Little Boxes by Cecilia Knapp takes us to a Brighton the local tourist board never reveals. During the course of a stifling and turbulent summer, we follow four twenty-something friends as their lives buckle after the death of an elderly man, beloved to them all. An evocation of council estate life in all its colours and ‘ordinary’ young people on the cusp of great change, this debut novel of secrets and survival is an engrossing read.

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The Folded Leaf by William Maxwell

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The Folded Leaf

A unique evocation of young male friendship

Revisiting novels can be a tortuous affair, sometimes bringing the painful realisation that we’ve outgrown favourite books and writers. Happily for me, The Folded Leaf by William Maxwell has provoked the opposite response. Maxwell’s nuanced and tender tale of male friendship remains a quiet triumph. Set in 1920’s Illinois, it charts the adolescence of pals Lymie Peters and Spud Latham, whose alliance hinges on Spud providing protection and social acceptance in exchange for Lymie’s devotion. In an era before male platonic love was considered questionable, their intense bond is fatally tested instead by misunderstandings, boyhood trauma, and the scarring silence of things left unsaid.

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Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley

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Nightcrawling

An exciting new voice for young black womanhood

Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley positively springs from the Booker Prize 2022 longlist, and not merely for its conspicuously pink cover. At the age of 20, Mottley is the youngest author ever to make the longlist, dazzling with a debut coming-of-age novel set on the meanest streets of Oakland, California. This is 17-year-old Kiara’s story, technically still a child, but with adult-sized problems. When a dire financial emergency pushes Kiara into prostitution, her ‘baby ho,’ status renders her irresistible to a certain type of man, some of them even sporting Oakland Police Department uniform. What follows is a blistering study of corruption, abuse of power, and young black womanhood.

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The Whale Tattoo by Jon Ransom

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The Whale Tattoo

Evocative, brutal and strangely beautiful

Death follows Joe Gunner wherever he goes. He knows this because the whale told him so. Washed up on a Norfolk beach on ‘a halo of dirty blood,’ its terrible majesty conveys a personal message. Joe must return to his childhood fishing community, where fisherman and ex-lover, Tim Fysh, still lives and memories wait to be dredged from the shifting tidal waters. A stunning debut, The Whale Tattoo by Jon Ransom gives us a vivid portrait of queer, working class life, in a community riven by repressive conformity and familial trauma.

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The Madness of Grief by Ricard Coles

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The Madness of Grief

An illuminating and moving memoir of bereavement

Briefly an 80’s pop star before becoming a vicar and beloved broadcaster, the Reverend Richard Coles was often teasingly referred to by his late partner, David, as ‘a borderline national trinket.’ It’s a rueful irony that this book has likely propelled him from trinket to treasure, for The Madness of Grief by Richard Coles is an eloquent, incredibly affecting, and often beautiful account of David’s death. Providing solace for similarly bereaved readers, this poignant memoir is also a testament to abiding love.

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The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood

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The Blind Assassin

A gripping twist and turn love story

I must admit, I am severely partial to a narrated life-story, which includes twists and turns in the forms of death and romance, transforming the readers into the detectives. The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood fulfils this criteria in the most evocative and powerful way. Carefully balanced, the author ensures the novel’s pendulum never swings too far into the excessively-narrative, nor the aloof. With Iris Chase as our narrator, we are invited to re-live the loss of her sister, Laura. This tumultuous story line is interrupted by a novel within a novel: here we are presented with a nostalgic and illusive glimpse into a perilous romance which sings of alacrity.

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