The Year of the Runaways by Sunjeev Sahota

 

This is the story of the difficult lives of four Indian immigrants in Sheffield.

At times is a stressful book to read, but relevant and necessary story. Everything about the book is depressing - the characters, their desperation, the futility of their dreams and the shocking realities they find themselves in, in land they're not fully familiar with.

There is however too much description and mundane background details.

I couldn't really get into the stories of any of the main characters to any great depth and struggled care about their hardships the way I did in A Little Life.    

The Chimes by Anna Smaill

 

 I often seem to enjoy books that have a slightly science-fiction feel, where the author has imagined a whole different world. Here The Chimes is set in a reimagined London, in a world where people cannot form new memories, and the written word has been forbidden and destroyed.  In the absence of both memory and writing is music.

It was sometimes hard to follow as the author used various musical terms. 

Some issues were definitely left unresolved.

The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma

 

The story is narrated by Ben, both as a 10-year old child and an adult man looking back. Ben is the 4th son of a tightly knit Nigerian family that begins to unravel when the disciplinarian father takes a job at the Nigerian Central Bank in another city.  The story is presented as a fable, with nearly each chapter named after an animal and beginning with who that animal represents. 

I didn't enjoy the first half of the book which is heavily involved in the setting, but the second half is moving and memorable.  

Sleeping on Jupiter by Anuradha Roy

 

 This story provides a fascinating mix of characters (a young woman with a tragic past, a photographer with a violent streak, three women with winter in their hair and a pilgrimage long time coming, a tour guide coming to terms with his homosexuality when he finds himself attracted to a boy working in tea stall, and the owner of tea stall who sings songs about melancholic earth and bright paddy field) with a main narrative that covers a few days when their lives intersect, set in India. However, the excellent gripping start slows down in the middle and I struggled to finish it.

Did You Ever Have a Familyby Bill Clegg

I really enjoyed this book where the chapters are told from the point of view of different people and over the course of the book you piece together why things happened the way they did,  Each character her their own guilt and misconception,due to one moment of miscalculation or misdirection.
It is fast-paced and easy to read.
The characters are so well written you feel like you know them personally.
It is a depressing story.

Satin Island by Tom McCarthy

I loved the odd book which is a story told from the point of view of a corporate anthropologist working for a large consultancy firm which has just won a large government contract. 

I like the way book meanders along but never seems to go anywhere (which is how the main character feels).
It is a series of seemingly unrelated anecdotes -- interesting historical facts, observations of people , random musings about things.
It is quite dark.
I like the sub-chapters - makes you feel like you are reading an actual academic report.  

The Moor's Account by Laila Lalami

This is a story of \ disastrous attempt at conquest by the Spanish retold from the point of view of a Moroccan slave. It is based on a true  expedition (known as the Narvaez) which happened in 1527 – 1536.  Four survivors (out of 600) were reunited and among the survivors was a Moroccan slave known in the accounts by his enslaved name Esteban or Estebanico (whose is the fictional voice we read).

 The writing is well imagined - the brutality on both sides is evenly recited; the flora and fauna are beautifully described.
 it's well-paced.
The historical details are fascinating.


A few of the characters felt a bit flat.
At times you know it is woman writing as a man.
A couple of  the historical details are inaccurate.  

The Green Road by Anne Enright

 

Spanning thirty years and three continents, The Green Road tells the story of Rosaleen, the matriarch of the Madigan family, and her four children, two boys and two girls.   The story then follows the family throughout three decades.

Good points:
Anne Enright knows how to get inside her characters.
Some beautifully written phrases.

Bad points:
It is  similar to "A Spool of Blue Thread" in that here is a lot of whining, although the reason behind it is unclear.  
The first half was a chapter book. Each chapter about a different person in the family. The second half they come together and you see the workings of the family and that's it. Nothing. No ending no point.  

A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James

 

An absorbing, brutal novel about Jamaican Drug Gangs and Bob Marley's murder.  I hated it at the start but by the end I thought what an amazing book!

It's a really fascinating story, well-researched and well-conceived by the Jamaican author Marlon James. It combines politics, gang violence, drug wars, journalism, and the CIA.


There's lots of obscene language, much of it in Jamaican patois which is quite interesting to read.
It is quite a challenging book to read because it spans several timelines and locations, and a large and varying cast of characters.
Each chapter is told from the point of view of a different characters which at times I found confusing.Marlon James does helpfully provide the reader with a list of characters at the start, but because I was reading it on my kindle it was hard to refer to. 

A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler

 

This story is about the rivalries and tensions of families everywhere – the essential nature of family life.

Good points:
I like how the story unfolded like a spool of thread - it just unwound and unwound
You feel like you are part of the family.
Anne Tyler brings her characters to life through the smallest of details - I like how they are quirky, eccentric - realistic

Bad points:
I was waiting for a climax, but it never came.

   The chapters about Red's parents seemed like filler.

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

 

This is an amazing book, essentially a character study of the effects of childhood sexual and psychological abuse, which tells the story of decades long friendships of four men who meet in college.

It contains beautifully written prose making you feel you a living a version of the main character's life.

The topics covered makes it a hard book to read.

I loved how parts of the story where told from different perspectives.