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Long Island Compromise by Taffy Brodesser-Akner

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Long Island Compromise

Screamingly funny satire on wealth and privilege

When Carl Fletcher, styrofoam factory owner and one of Long Island’s richer residents, is kidnapped from his driveway one morning, life changes forever for the Fletcher family. Carl is returned unhurt, at least physically, in exchange for a large pile of cash placed on a baggage carousel at La Guardia airport, but the kidnapping still reverberates decades later. His three children have turned out deeply dysfunctional, each in their own way. Long Island Compromise by Taffy Brodesser-Akner is an extremely funny satire and deep dive into privilege, Jewish identity and a spot-on comment on how we live now.

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Doppler by Erlend Loe

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Doppler

A tent, an elk, and an existential crisis

Doppler is sick of his nice life with his nice wife and nice children. Sick of toeing the line and being a passive consumer in Oslo society, chasing money in a city bloated with oil wealth. Also, his father is dead and it hurts. A bump on the head from a cycling accident prompts an epiphany, and in a clever, satirical skewering of modern life, Doppler by Erlend Loe chronicles Doppler’s desertion of his family, in exchange for a tent in the Norwegian forest, where he will take up contemplation of modern existence in the devoted company of a very small elk.

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Table for Two by Amor Towles

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Table for Two

A magnificent short story collection

Anyone wary of short stories should put their doubts to rest and dive into the utterly magnificent Table for Two by Amor Towles. I’ve been chuckling through his stories which range from a neurotic wife convinced her husband is having an affair to a Russian peasant turned opportunistic capitalist by the Russian revolution; from a high-strung Goldman Sachs banker suspicious of a fellow concert goer to the incompetent aspiring author whose skills at forging puts him on a new career path and many more. Once again, Towles’ superb storytelling skills shine.

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My Husband by Maud Ventura

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My Husband

Crazy in love

A French publishing sensation and winner of the Prix du Premier Roman, My Husband by Maud Ventura is an unnerving tale of manipulation and control. Narrated by a seemingly devoted wife, it gives us seven days in her marital life, a rollercoaster of a week as she veers between doting on her beloved husband, setting traps to test his love, and punishing him when he falls short of her lofty romantic ideals. Occasionally creepy, often crazy, Ventura’s page-turner imagines the potential pitfalls of a scenario where the intensity of one (unbalanced) spouse’s love burns as brightly as it did on their honeymoon night a full fifteen years before.

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You Are Here by David Nicholls

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You Are Here

Having just finished watching the lovable Netflix series One Day, I went straight for newly published You Are Here by David Nicholls. It’s not that Nicholls’ plots are that different from other romcom novels. Where he stands out is in his incredible skill at making it all so very relatable. It’s impossible to read his books without nodding, smiling, even shedding a tear with recognition. You Are Here, is the story of not-so-young-anymore Michael and Marnie finding love (no spoiler, it’s in the blurb) and it’s the way there that makes this such a special read. The perfect funny and uplifting summer novel.

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Berg by Ann Quin

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Berg

Darkly funny Oedipal tale

The opening scene of the brilliant Berg by Ann Quin takes us to a post-war seaside boarding house, where Alistair Berg, hair-restorer salesman and furtive masturbator, lies uneasy in his bed. In the flimsily-partitioned room next door, Berg’s father resides with his flirtatious mistress, unaware of his son’s presence. A ‘scoundrel of the first order,’ the old man deserted Berg in babyhood, and now his vengeful son has come to kill him. In Quin’s 1964 absurdist cult classic, we follow Berg as his tendency towards vacillation causes his master plan to unravel, in the face of a string of farcical events and unhinged decisions.

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Owlish by Dorothy Tse

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Owlish

Surreal and subversive tale of repression and identity

Professor Q is a somewhat dull academic, apathetically teaching literature at a middling university and uninterested in his wife, Maria. She, in turn, is just grateful that Q appears to have lost any carnal urges. Supposing that the andropause has come for him, Maria is unaware that her hitherto predictable husband is in love with a mechanical music-box ballerina. Her name is Aliss and he is willing her to life. Both a political allegory and a deep dive into the recesses of the human psyche, Owlish by Dorothy Tse is a subversive and exhilarating affair.

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A Way Of Life Like Any Other Darcy O'Brien

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A Way of Life Like Any Other

Hilarity with a dash of vinegar

The New York Review of Books Classics series is a marvellous creation, an eclectic mix of fabulously-jacketed titles, invariably accompanied by compelling intros. A recent serendipitous dip into the collection blessed us with A Way of Life Like Any Other by Darcy O’Brien, the story of a young boy in 1950’s Hollywood, his movie star parents and their sordid and absurd descent into has-been territory. Irresistibly described as ‘completely bananas’, we find out what happens after the glitter fades, in a bizarre coming-of-age novel that combines hilarity with a dash of vinegar.

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Diary of a Void by Emi Yagi

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Diary of a Void

Cleverly surreal Japanese tale of motherhood and deception

Shibata is 34-years-old and works in the paper core manufacturing industry (that’s cardboard tubes to you and me). As the only woman in her office, Shibata is eternally put-upon by her chauvinistic colleagues, who expect her to be the coffee maker and general dogsbody. One day, in a fit of pique, she falsely announces that she’s pregnant and therefore too nauseous to deal with dirty coffee cups. In Diary of a Void by Emi Yagi, we’re in for the full nine months, as Shibata learns to love sitting with her feet up, and the lies spiral out of control.

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Stone Blind by Natalie Haynes

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Stone Blind

Hugely enjoyable visit to the fickle world of the Greek Gods

An amusing journey into the world of Greek gods and semi-gods has been the highlight of my holiday reading this Christmas. Stone Blind by Natalie Hayes is frivolous fun and a welcome distraction from family gatherings and dishwasher emptying. Hayes, a respected classicist whose mission it is to make Greek myths accessible and entertaining, takes a closer look at the infamous snake-headed Medusa and her lethal stare. Was she really as bad as her reputation? Why did her stare turn people into stone? And how did she end up with snakes as hair anyway?

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