Category: #translationthurs

Booker international shortlist my reaction

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Here is the Shortlisted books

Not a River

Written by Selva Almada

I think this is one of my favourites to win it tackles being male in a tough world but also secrets and  set in the hinterlands,make it a wild ride.

Mater 2-10

Written by Hwang Sok-yong

I have yet to review this, but I have read it as an insight into the political past of Korea through the lens of strikers in a rail strike. My review is to come shortly. He got the idea for the story from someone that he meet.

What I’d Rather Not Think About

Written by Jente Posthuma

A sister looks back on her and her twin brother’s life as she tries to get to the heart of why he has taken his life and what brought him there and left her as the only twin.

Crooked Plow

Written by Itamar Vieira Junior

Twins the second book with twins this time twin sisters story told after they cut there tongues which lost there tongue and how do there lives and the world around them pan out after that event.

 

Kairos

Written by Jenny Erpenbeck

A love affair falls apart as the country they arelibving in the Old East Germany falls apart partly based on the writers own life.

The Details

Written by Ia Genberg

A woman remembers four relationships whilst in a fever in a fever dream state

Well I had picked

Karios

Not a river

Undiscovered

Lost on me

white nights

A dictator calls

The house on Via Gemito

Well as you see I have two books on the official shortlist. I feel one of these two will win the prize but I haven’t got much right this year. I feel this years list is aim at a young readership than me but has a great selection of autofiction , rural tales father figures and poverty all make the shortlist. I finished the last book off the longlist today and will have my reviews finished in the next week or two.

 

Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieira Junior

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Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieira Junior

Brazilian fiction

Original title – Torto Arado

Translator – Johnny Lorenz

Source – Personal copy

One does wonder with this year’s longlist as I am now writing this post with about 300 pages left of the last book. I wonder which of the titles from this year’s longlist I would have picked up without them being on the longlist. I looked at the books when they came out of them all. There were a few I had probably intended to get, the Wiener and the Kadare, as I had read books from them before and enjoyed them. This fell into a category called Published. In recent years, we have published exciting books, which has been the case with Verso. They always pick left-field books, which is a little joke, given I know they are a left-wing publisher. But their recent fiction choices always seem great, so this from the Brazilian writer Itamar Vieira Junior had been on my radar. He studied geography, getting a scholarship for people from poor Black backgrounds in Brazil. He got a doctorate in African and Ethnic studies. He works for the Brazilian state agency dealing with land reform. This was his debut novel. Before that, he had two collections of short stories.

Belonísia pulled the blade from her mouth, too, then brought her other hand up, as if trying to hold something in.Her lips reddened, and I wasn’t sure if it was from the excitement of tasting the silver blade or from wounding herself, for she was also bleeding. I swallowed as much blood as I could. My sister was wiping her mouth frantically with her hand, her eyes squinting with tears as she tried to stand the pain. I heard my grandmother’s slow steps approach, then she called out to me, to Zezé, Domingas, and Belonísia.”Bibiana, can’t you see the potatoes are burning?” I became aware of a smell of burnt potatoes mingling with the smell of metal and the blood wetting our dresses.

As the twins cut there tongues in the opening pages .

Now set in the hinterlands of Brazil, this book has one of the most exciting openings I have ever seen. Two sisters are at their Grandmother’s house, and they find a knife under a bed. Then, they decide to play and cut one another’s tongue. As a result of this, one of them ends up mute. The sisters Bibana and Belonsia are the book’s narrators, but it isn’t clear which lost their tongue and is mute for most of the book. Their father is a renowned healer as we follow them through their lives. In a way, it is clear as one sister excels at school and the other struggles with her studies  The book sometimes is a little magic realist in places, but in others, you can see this is from the work the writer has done himself with land reform, and this is shown later in the books as the sisters start to see how their world is that being an Indian in the hinterlands and this is shown as the modern threats that threaten this world in modern Brazil show there faces in last part of this book as this part feels very much about the corruption violence and struggles of many poor families in the hinterlands of Brazil.

Years after the accident that had left one of his daughters mute, my father, with Sutério’s encouragement, invited my mother’s brother to join us at Água Negra. Sutério, the manager, wanted to bring in folks who “would put their shoulder to the wheel,” who, as my father explained,”weren’t afraid of hard work and would pour their sweat into the fields.” They could build houses of mud, but not brick, nothing enduring to mark how long a family had been on the land. They could cultivate a small plot of squashes, beans, and okra, but nothing that would distract them fromthe owner’s crops because, after all, working for him was what enabled them to live on this land.

It is kept quiet which sister is the mute for peroid of the book!

I can see why this is such a hit in Brazil, but in a way, that is what serves against it so much asi felt the writer has crammed so much into this book in a way it felt like three books the start book the middle part and the end part would all be served better filled out and made into longer parts novels in themselves.. I said I love Verso books, and this is why Vieira Juniors is one of a new wave of Brazilian writers tackling the dark racist past and slave history, land corruption, etc, in Brazil’s past. We must hear his voice. He is also an heir to Jorge Amado, who wrote about the hinterlands in his early writing life, but this is a fresh take from an Afro-Brazilian writer. For me, this had part of writers like Wilson Harris, who did so well capturing the remote parts of his homeland, or Marquez with His Columbia oif the time. It has a small dash of magic realism. But also a large dash of the past and how that affects modern Brazil. In that regard, he reminds me of someone like Juan Gabriel Vasquez, who, in historical books, tackles the past as a prism to the present. Have you read this book? or have another favourite book from Brazil, if not there are 18 other books under review on the blog!

Winstons score

Wow that was March 2024

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  1. Star 111 by Lutz Seiler
  2. The end of August by Yu Miri
  3. The silver bone by Andrey Kurkov 
  4. what I’d rather not think about by Jente Posthuma 
  5. Undiscovered by Gabriela Wiener 
  6. A Dictator calls by Ismail Kadare 
  7. The Details Ia Genberg 

This month is the same as every year. It starts with a couple of hopeful reads for the Booker International longlist. This book from Korea was written in Japanaese about two generations of runners. Then a story of the wall coming down in Germany as one part of a family heads West and their son stays in the West, Then the Bokker international longlist came out. I started with a historical crime novel with a touch of Magic realism set In Kyiv. Then to a tale of twins what happens to the other when ones decides to take their own life .It picks apart their lives and asks why. Then what happens when you see objects taken from your homeland and then see it was a relative that brought them what does this say about your family history. Then, a slice of history is replayed. What really happened when Stalin called Boris Pasternack? Then, four friends and a woman’s interactions with them are recalled as she is getting over a fever in a fever dream of a book.

Book of the month

How this epic work of the wall falling down missed the list I don’t know. As for the long list, I am now on book 12 of the 13. Part of the reason I have blogged a little less is to push on and get them all read  I had hoped by today but I failed in that but a small insight into the longlist from me is that I had only one book I had mentioned in my longlist and had only read two books from the longlist when it came out the lowest total for a long time. For me as a reader, this list may be the one I have least enjoyed reading. not that any book is terrible, but that said, no book is a stand-alone book, possibly barring the two I had already read, Karios and Not a River. I then wonder if it is time for me to consider swapping prizes. I have questioned this the last couple of years as there is a new prize that has been around for a few years called the ERBD Book prize; now, if I hadn’t brought the books for the Booker international longlist, I could have shadowed this prize this year. I will be from next year, though, as the last few longlists of this prize have appealed to me if you are a publisher on this year’s list, I would love to review your books. So if you would like to join the SHADOW EBRD prize from next year let me know.

  • The End by Attila Bartis, translated from the Hungarian by Judith Sollosy and published by Archipelago Books
  • Niki, A Novel by Christos Chomenidis, translated from the Greek by Patricia Felisa Barbeito and published by Other Press
  • The Wounded Age and Eastern Tales by Ferit Edgü, translated from the Turkish by Aron Aji and published by New York Review Books
  • Jimi Hendrix Live in Lviv by Andrey Kurkov, translated from the Russian by Reuben Woolley and published by MacLehose Press
  • Exiled Shadow by Norman Manea, translated from the Romanian by Carla Baricz and published by Yale University Press
  • History of Ash by Khadija Marouazi, translated from the Arabic by Alexander E. Elinson and published by Hoopoe, an imprint of the American University in Cairo Press
  • Let’s Go Home, Son by Ivica Prtenjača, translated from the Croatian by David Williams and published by Istros Books
  • This Thing Called Love by Alawiya Sobh, translated from the Arabic by Max Weiss and published by Seagull Books
  • A Sensitive Person by Jáchym Topol, translated from the Czech by Alex Zucker and published by Yale University Press
  • Barcode by Krisztina Tóth, translated from the Hungarian by Peter Sherwood and published by Jantar Publishing

Non book events

as for records, I got the new album from Adrianne Lenker called Bright future,I loved the debut record from the Big Thief singer.

TV-wise, the new series of the short comedy show Mandy has come out. This surreal series is just laugh-out-loud at times as we follow the jobs Mandy gets and loses, usually in a surreal nature. I just watched a film, Cat Person from a New Yorker story, a comic horror film that is cut above most of what is around, and earlier in the month, I watched American fiction after I read Erasure, the book it is based on last month.

Next month plans.

I hope to get the booker reviews finished in the next week or two. I will move on to the backlog of new books I have and hopefully a few books from the EBRD prize I do hope get a few read. I have the book at the end of the list and have reviewed another book on the list. I also hope to review Until august the last Marquez book as well. What are your plans? what are your thoughts on the Booker international longlist?

A Dictator Calls by Ismail Kadare

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A Dictator Calls by Ismail Kadare

Albanian fiction

Original title -Kur sunduesit grinden. Rreth misterit të telefonimit Stalin-Pasternak

Translator – John Hodgson

Source – Personal copy

I initially shook my head when I saw this book on the longlist of the book it is just I think his books had bene on the longlist over the years and he is a writer  I have read several books from the year. In fact, he is a writer I liked reading over the years, but it was just that initial disappointment with this longlist.I think we all on the shadow jury felt this just the sheer number of books we had to read. This one in case is a book I’d call a shelf book it is one I wouldn’t have got but would have firstly borrowed from the library or got second-hand with the intention of reading at some point. Kadare is a writer. I’d love to read all his books over time as he is one of the few voices to break through from Albania, I know in recent years we have got a few more voices, in fact, I have two other writers under review from Albania and five books from Kadare reviewed over the years. He is near the top of the list of writers for the Nobel prizes, as he has won every other prize. He won the earlier version of the Booker International Booker, awarded for a body of work rather than an individual one. He had been on the longlist twice in the old IFFP days and once before since the prize became the booker international.

The telephone call had to do with a mystery that we all share in. The poet entered the stage not of his own free will but because the laws of tragedy demanded it.So, there were three: Pasternak, Stalin and Mandelstam. Two poets and the tyrant between them.The first thought was an exciting prospect: the two poets could unite to bring down the tyrant.

Both secretly despised this tyrant. Mandelstam had called him the Kremlin mountaineer. Pasternak was said to have described him as a dwarf with the body of a fourteen-year-old and the face of an old man. Now they had him in their grip, two against one, and could destroy him with all the cruelty that poets know how to use.

From Part two of the book and the event is explained

This is an odd book; if anything, it is more experimental than the other books I have read over the years from Ismail Kadare. But in other ways, he has much in common with his other books, a look at dictators, which he does in his other books, mainly Hoxha. But he had spent time in the USSR, and in 1960, he was called back to Albania. This book deals with an actual supposed event, a terse call between Josef Stalin and Boris Pasternak when a fellow Soviet writer and Poet Osip Mandelstam had been arrested. Of course, this was before Pasternak got in trouble with the regime. He tries to reconstruct the events of that call from fellow writers who may have been there in the day. As we see each retelling of the story, we know how each person’s view of the call is affected by their own position and thoughts. It is also an exciting twist of literature and politics and how they occasionally try to create artwork together and against one another.

The mystery surrounding Samoylov grew after the Pasternak scandal, when there was so much talk of the three-minute conversation with Stalin. Stul-pans said to me one day, half joking, that I was the best person to provide accurate information about that phone call. It took me a while to work out that what he meant was information that might come from Samoylov, who had been involved in the same circle as Pasternak and Akhmatova, including Lydia Chukovskaya, Zamyatin and perhaps Mandelstam himself.

I said I didn’t believe they were close enough friends to talk about such delicate matters.

How this call grew over time

This is one of those books that is hard to put down as it is basically 13 retellings of the same event from a slightly different angle and person each time. In our shadow chat, I felt that is why they’d gone for this a little in English, as it is a small nod to J B Priestley, an inspector call which uses the retelling of a life from different points of view. One of our group also pointed out the connection to Javier Cercas’ theory of a blind spot in a book, which is the turning point of a story that happens outside the book and turns the events of the book. Another thing that I felt about this book and the style it was written in is that two of his old translators, Babara Bray and David Bellios, are known for their work with the Oulipo writers. Kadare has lived in France for thirty years. He is sure to have read Oulipo’s works, and the constraint of just retelling the same event in so many ways struck me as Oulipo in style, a sort of Albanian homage to Oulipo? Anyway that is my thought on this odd book. So far, one of the better books from this year’s list. Have you read KADARE?

Winston score:  A -It’s interesting to see such an experienced writer trying something a little different with his writing.

A post about things I’ve been up to.

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I’ve been so busy recently and haven’t read as much as usual. Some of this is as I found out the other day when I went for my first eye test in a while (about ten years). It shocked me how bad my eyes were, so I went from no glasses to varifocals in one step anyway. They are due later this week, and maybe that explains why I have been reading less and less the last few months. So I decided to just not read anything till the new glasses come. I read a lot of work in the course of the job, reading from records, emails, etc. So I thought I do a quick thing been up to recently. First, we had Valentines. I was working, but we had a lovely meal on the following day of cheddar tart followed by triple-cooked chips, various green veg, prosciutto-wrapped chicken and then melted-in-the-middle puddings.

We also visited the record fair the other weekend I like a chap that has new vinyl at ten pound each. SOo i got a few.

So I got Wilco’s cover album. This was an uncut CD from many years ago that came out last year on vinyl. I had the CD as I have been subscribing to Uncut for the last 25 years. Then I got The Road with most of Nick Cave’s Albums on both CD and vinyl, apart from his soundtracks, which is next on my list to get off from him; he has done some great films. I watched the film A few years ago of The Road, but I’d love to read the book and watch the film at some point. I have been watching a few more films this year. I am trying to track them on Letterboxd. I have not been watching as much world cinema. I think this may be connected to the glasses I need, meaning I have been straining to read subtitles and part of it. I think my level of concentration is a little lower than it was a few years ago. I’m not sure how Letterbox fully works, but like Storygraph, which I am now also on, it is a move away from Amazon tracking my data; I still have GoodReads and IMDb, which I have tracked films I watched years ago. I am in the middle of diving into older films on youtube or series.Bulman is one I am watching a detective series I remember from the 80s. I also been in a rabbit hole of airplane hijack films from the years. I find there is so much on youtube from the 70s and 80s that just isn’t out there or just isn’t shown these days.

I also had a couple of my book subscriptions arrive. I had a pierene and tilted axis for a couple years and have now added Charco and Fum d stampa. I should signed up earlier but struggled to be able to afford it years ago.Anyway, that is about it. I will be back soon when I have my new glasses as it is creeping up to Booker International time. I will make a list of books I think will be on it and will be on the shadow jury again.

 

The Rainbow By Yasunari Kawabata

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The Rainbow By Yasunari Kawabata

Japanese literature

Original title- 虹いくたび (Niji ikutabi)

Translated by Haydn Trowell

Source -personal copy

In January, I read far more Japanese novels than I could review. This is a new translation from the Nobel prize-winning writer Yasunari Kawabata. He was the first writer from Japan to win the Nobel prize. He was given the prize for his narrative mastery, and his great sensibility expresses the essence of the Japanese mind. Is what the Nobel committee said about him as a writer. I have only reviewed one other book by him, and that was Snow Country. So when I saw this new translation of one of his works coming out from Penguin, I made sure I got a copy when I saw one. The tale of the two sisters in this book, having the same father and different mothers in postwar Japan, appealed to me.

Momoko hesitated, afraid of accidentally revealing the secret behind her new hairstyle. With her sister at home, it had become suddenly difficult for her to leave for her rendezvous.

Her emotions getting the better of her, Momoko’s voice turned brash. “Asako. Now that you’re back from Kyoto, there’s something you want to ask Father, isn’t there?” she asked, turning around. “I know. There’s no need to hide it.

It was a lie, wasn’t it, when you said you were going to see a newly married friend?”

“It wasn’t a lie.”

“Oh? So it wasn’t a lie. You went to see your friend, but that wasn’t your main reason for going, was it?”

Asako hung her head.

“Why don’t you tell me?” Momoko paused, softening her tone. “And did you find this younger sister of ours in Kyoto?” Asako stared back, taken by surprise.

The two sisters and the mention of the third out there

The book focuses on the two half-sisters living with the widow’s father. Momoko had lost her mother to suicide, and her m, mother never married after her father got her pregnant. Then n her half-sister Asako had lost her to illness. So, the pair both ended up with the architect’s father. But when Asako gathers from her father, there may even be a third sister, the daughter of a Gheisa in Koyto. In a way, the three of them are reflections of the world they are in post-war Japan. The struggles with Tradition and the future are creeping in as the traditional buildings are overshadowed by the modern city. The quest for this third sister in a way is the thread that runs through this book. The book captures the same world we see in OZus films. In some ways, the sisters could be from a film by the master himself. The two sister clash as Momoko has a boyfriend in many ways she is the most modern and this is a story of family secrets and sibling relationships.Also, how the world they have all known is moving on so quickly.

Since the end of the war, countless villas in the resort town of Atami—the properties of former princes, of former nobles, and of former industrialists—had been transformed into inns and hotels.

The Camellia House was one such villa, having belonged to a former prince who had held the honorary title of Fleet Admiral.

Asako’s father, Mizuhara Tsuneo, pointed out the window of the car as they passed by the entrance. “Do you see those two villas? They don’t really look like inns, do they? That one belonged to a prince, and the one over there belonged to a marquis. The marquis was descended from royalty, but I heard he was wounded during the war. His leg, you see.

Now they say he’s been sentenced to forced labor as a war criminal.”

The world ios changing as the villas change and become other things

I was a fan of Snow Country, and I connected with this book as well. I am a massive fan of post-war novels, wherever they may be, but especially in Japan, which in many ways saw the most significant shift in its world. This is from the same time as Tokyo’s story is set in a way. In fact, the way they all talk is similar to Momoko, who, in a way, reminds me of the son in Tokyo story caught up in the fast-moving modern world as the others are all trailing behind her and all lament the world they have seen gone more. In a way we see how Kawabata feared how quick his country was moving on this was serialised in 1950/52 a year before Tokyo story but his fear is the same as in the fear of the traditional Japan that the younger sister seems so far away from. I like his sparse still, and the world he described that is now gone, you feel. Have you read his books? Where would you go next in his book?

Winston’s score – +B Solid look at post-war Japan through two sisters and their father.

A century of books, A century in translation

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I spoke with Simon from Stuck in the books on Twitter. He had mentioned he was thinking of doing another century of books. This is something he has done a couple of times over the time I have known of his blog. In fact last time he did it I did think about doing something similar but held off well. This time I am going to review books in trnalstion for each year between 1924 – 2023. The year will be the year the book was published in there original language. I had in mind to try for 100 countries, but I feel that it may be asking too much. But I will try to read as widely as possible so I can cover as many countries as I can. I am not putting a time frame on this at the moment. So far, I have looked at the first two years, 1924 and 1925. I have one book on my shelf for 1924 I read a number of years ago and failed to review and that is Skylark by Dezső Kosztolányi it is an NYRB book and was widely reviewed when it appeared a few years ago I think that is why I didn’t review it. It is the tale of a spinster and her parents as she is sent away. I’m looking forward to reading this one again. Then, in 1925, one book jumped out at me on the list of books from that year. It was Chaka by Thomas Mofolo, one of the earliest African writers to be published. He wrote in the 20s, and this book came out in 1925. and he had spent some years working on this book, which follows the rise and fall of a Zulu warrior King. There is an online number of this book available, so I will make this my 1925 book. I think after that, I will move from decade to decade, doing a couple of years at a time rather than going year by year. I think 1960 may be the next stop and for that I have Pornografia by Witold Gombrowicz which came out last year in a new translation I think I may have the old translation as well to compare. Anyway, that is part of the journey. This is going to be fun project I loved it when I saw how Simon did it for his taste in books. I’m hoping to find as many books around the world as I can to make this a journey of discovery. Here is a link to Simon’s 2018 Century of Books a few books I have read on his list.

Winstonsdads books of the year a dozen or so

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I have picked 13 books I loved from the last 12 months. I am putting them down in no particular order. These are the cream of what I read in the last 12 months. All but one are books in translation. I avoid the Booker international books as they have had lots of attention due to being on the. longlist and shortlist, etc, and it gave me a chance to shine the spotlight on books that maybe others haven’t mentioned in the last year.

Black box by Shiori Ito translator Alison Markin Powell

A powerful work of nonfiction from an up-and-coming tv journalist that was sexual assault by an older renowned presenter, a powerful look at how sex attacks in the workplace are dealt with and how rape around the world is dealt with. After I read this, the writer finally saw justice for what had happened to her.

Balkan Bombshells various writers and translators

a collection of female writing from the Balkans showing the wide range of voices, from a woman with all she owned in a single blue bag to a woman in Belgrade and the leader died. Then elsewhere. There were creepy supernatural tales, an insight into Eastern European writing at its best.

The most secret memory of men by Mohamed Mbougar Sarr translator Lara Vergnaud

I haven’t shut up about this since I a wonderful mix of being an African writer then and now a novel that was withdrawn that parallels a real-life event and then a writer falling down a rabbit hole to find the lost writer of that book and find out what really happened makes it part road trip fiction as well.

My rivers by Faruk Šehić. translator S D Curtis

I think this will be the first time I have featured poetry in my end-of-year books, but in this cycle of poems, three of them are set around the great rivers of Europe from Berlin, then back to the Balkans and beyond. In the last cycle, he sees a man escaping the horrors of war and looking for peace and hope.

Black foam by Haji Jabir translators – Sawad Hussain and Marcia Lynx Qualey

this is a twist on the other stories IO have read of people trying to find a new life on the migrant trail it follows a man called various names Dawood, David among them a man trying to reach Israeli as a Falasha Jew but is he it shows you how fluid nationality can be and how we can change it to get by and survive.

All devils are here by David Seabrook

I blame an old Backlisted episode they replayed over the summer that just grabbed me with the description of the book, a series of essays around Rochester, the late home of Dickens, but also the artist Richard Dadd. Who was a killer in his time.  Did he inspire Dickens? This is a look at the darker side of those old seaside towns.

Karios by Jenny Erpenbeck translator Michael Hoffmann

I am on the fence with hr as a writer I am not as much of a fan as some of my fellow bloggers have been over the years but this story of a relationship that had failed was interesting enough and used some clever tricks in the book.

Wound by Oksana Vasyakina

This mixes a personal journey of a daughter taking her mother’s ashes to her home village in Siberia, but also a look at her own relationship as a lesbian in modern Russia. This is one of the first openly lesbian novels written in Russia. It is a powerful look at love, loss and memories.

Rombo by Esther Kinsky translator – Caroline Schimdt

It was a toss-up between this or the Kluge I read this year, but this collection of recollections of an earthquake in a small Italian village and how it affected seven people who were kids at the time and how it looked then and now, I love her books and this is another gem from this writer.

The Rider Tim Krabbe translator -Sam Garrett

Now if push came to show my book of the year would be this book. I loved the way he managed to get on the page about what it is like to cycle, the way you think the way he races in those big races the tactics he captured it so well no wonder he is a chess-playing cyclist and in some ways, the two share a certain amount in some cycle racing is a game of chess for the riders. one move can change the day the same as chess.

The missing word by Concita De Gregorio translator Clarissa Botsford

There is no word for a parent that have lost there children we have orphan and widower but there ins’t a word for a parent whose children have gone this follows a case where the husband takes the kids and then he is found but there is never a trace of the children he took and he won’t say hat happened to them powerful work.

Tranquillity by Attila Bartis translator – Irme Goldstein

I had this on my shelves for years and then decided to read it. I loved it, a tale of a mother and son living together as his sister got away from their mother, and he is stuck in a very Thomas Bernhard-like world. I just hope I can get his next book which came out this year but seems to have sold out and that is what spurred me to read this book.

Mothers don’t by Katixa Agirre translator – Kristin Addis

I finish with a powerful tale of two mothers one how killed her twins and the other a journalist who realises she knew this woman when they were at university together. another gem from Three Times Rebel Press.

So here are a few stats

I read 125 books this year, the longest being The End of August by Yu Muri. I just finished today. A total of 27,544 pages. I reviewed 98 books. I read 8 Japanese books this year the most from any country. I read books from 34 countries this year. I have posted 123 posts 100,000 words at an average of 812 words per a post.

How was your year ?

 

That was the month that was December 2023

~ winstonsdad ~ 2 Comments
  1. Vengeance is Mine by Marie Ndiaye 
  2. My rivers by Faruk šehić
  3. The river between Ngūgí was Thiong’o 
  4. This is Amiko,Do you copy by Natsuko Imamura
  5. Snow by Marcus Sedgwick
  6. A Girl’s Story by Annie Ernaux 
  7. The Delivery by Margarita Gracia Robayo
  8. Nothing belongs to you by Natathacha Appanah

I had wanted to get to 100 reviews on the blog for the year, but it is as it is called Twixmas, that time between Christmas and New Year when the world comes almost to a stand, so I decided to do a roundup today, and on Sunday do my books of the year. Anyway, the last. Month of the year saw me start in France with a tale lawyer hired by a man she may know to defend his wife that killed their children has many a twist and turn. Then there is Faruk’s collection of poems about rivers in places he has lived after the Bosnian war and moving on beyond the war. Then, another river,, a valley,, and a tribe divide between tradition and the modern world. Then, in Japan, we. have a young girl with Autism or some similar condition is going through her teens, and no one seems to know she has this condition. Then, a collection of essays about snow and how it affects our lives. Then we move to France and the Young Annie Ernaux, her first sexual encounter, and the summer she grew up. Then, a young woman has left her homeland only to have her. Mother arrives in a gigantic parcel and causes uproar in her world. Then OI finished with a grieving woman connecting with her past after seeing. Young boy when she was an orphan and had a different name. No new publishers or countries. I finish 98 reviews for the year.

Book of the month

My Rivers is a wonderfully powerful poetry collection that mixes getting over the war identity, travel, place the spirit of place and what makes us human so well. Wonderfully translated by the publisher of Istros books herself .

Non-bookish events.

I brought a few records this month, one of the P J Harvey demos, the Dry one her first album I had this on cd the orginal album and I have most of her records on CD. A little raw at times her voice is wonderful. I had held off on these, but it was cheap at the record fair. Then I got a Tom Waits at the same record fair and another of his recently reissued albums later in the month. Finally, the second National album came out last month . We also have been watching The Crown. We did watch a couple of episodes when it start but have now watch one and half seasons since just before Christmas. Im still loving the new Slow Horses series Oldman is such a greart acrtor as his Lamb character a sort of anti Smiley spy is just a wonderfully played character. I also been watching the.Monartch series. We had a few days in York at the start of the month I like wandering the city it is a lovely city walkable the christmas market was fair , I found it hadn’t much I woud want gift wise for people. The two Highlights where a christmas walk around york where the history oif the city and christmas are mixed from roman emperors through viking logs, Dickens talking in York, mince pies and of course Choclate it was a wonderful walk around the city.

Next month

Well I had plans to rush through lots of books for January in Japam. But I am now thinking I would prefer taking time I’m letting the figures get to me again. I need avoid think it is a race its not it about the journey I take. So I watched one of my favourite You tuber Ruby Granger a young student , I loved her idea of a classic once a month and that seemed to come at about the same time as Trevor showed how he had got t6he first gfive Emila Zola novels from Rougon Macquart series which I have a number of on my shelves and I’ve had them for a number of years and reading the series on my mind. But I feel I will stat with one every two months from next month.Then the other month I will read other classic novels from around the world . I had said a few years back I felt one of the failing of this blog was a lack of classics from around the world in translation. So this is the chance to fill that void slowly. I have a few books in mind. Other than that I am not sure where the month will take me as a reader. What are your January plans ?

Merry Christmas from Winstonsdad well me stu

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As is the tradition, I have found an old card from the NYPL digital collection for Christmas. I am working today, but my new job is mainly office-based, so it will be different from being on a ward. I will be having my Turkey and celebrating with Amanda. So hoping you all have a great Christmas or however you celebrate it . May you have a bookish Christmas whatever you are doing

Looking Forward 2024 reading plans

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This is the first time I can think of in all the time I have been Blogging I have done a post about the year ahead and thought that far ahead in Blogging terms. But I feel like I have been reading Water for many years, happy with the figures I get, and just doing the same year in year out about 120 posts about 90-100 reviews in a year. Well, I think next year I need to shake things up and raise the bar. I will again pass 100,000 words for the year this year. The fact is, I could easily carry on and do the same next year, but I feel the need to plan the year a little more and have firmly in my mind what I am doing throughout the year.

I have been buying lots of Japanese books for January in Japan. That is always a fun meme to join and always a good start to the year. Then I am planning to read 28 translations in February; I tried something similar last year, spurred on by Simon in Suck in the Books, that have done a few years with Novellas, where he reads one a day for a month. I loved trying to do it last year it meant I got to raid the Library for choices to read. Then we head into Booker International season. I will be reading the Longlist as I have for the last 12 years before it was the Booker International and was the old IFFP. I will then be looking at reading a few long books, getting ready for summer, and bringing back Spanish lit month in its original form, just Spanish Language literature. I’ve several books from Charco Press and other presses I want to read this month. I miss Richard, who started this with me many years ago. But I will do it Binnually with Czech lit month returning in 2025.  Then I will be doing Simon and Karen years in April. They take us back to 1937 , and what I love about this is the deep dive into the year. The books came out, finding those lost gems for every year they chose. Then we have German lit month which I didnt’ plan for this year and intend to have plans in place for next year. The hope is to increase the number of reviews to be similar to what I actually read in a year with 120 books. I said I have hit 100,0oo words in the last few years, so I aim to write 125,000 words. I will try to engage a little more on social media like I did when I first started this blog. I need to chat more; I miss the chat out there. I miss that. Well, there has been a whole lot of I, but it is me behind the blog, and it is time to step up and stop being so comfortable with the blog as we need to move on to winstonsdad the middle-age years. What are your plans for next year with your blog or just with your reading?

 

MY reading Habits

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I been inspired t write this by the recent Mookse and Gripes episode, where Trevor and Paul talked over their habits and other bits around them as a reader. I thought I would talk a bit about my reading life and world. I am not as organized as Trevor and Paul. I never will be. My dyspraxia mind is chaotic a lot of the time. But I do have some routines, and over the years, I have blogged how me as a reader work has constantly evolved. I still manage to read over 100 books every year I may not review them all, but since I started last year to track my reading more on Goodreads, I have seen that it is about 120 books a year I read, and I think I will move the stat keeping to Storuy graph as supposedly it can give you more detail even this is a struggle at times for some that constantly will forget to update things due to my dyspraxia one of the worst things I have is this lack of constancy with doing things like this. But over the last few years, I am getting a little better. When do I read well, I am a chunk reader I am not someone who puts bits in here and there. I read the morning I hope to get between 30-45 minutes most mornings  work or not. On my days off, I try to read for a couple of hours during the day. I tend to work 3 days one week and four days the week after. I read every evening for about an hour times more if I’m nearing the end of a book, so that means I tend to read 18-20 hours a week, which sometimes is less, sometimes more. I find I read more in the winter, more so this year, since I inherited my aunt’s serious read lamp. This lamp has a natural light, and I think will add a little more reading in the evening this winter.

Paper/e-book I do have a paperwhite kindle. But I have maybe read 10 e-books in the last ten years I just don’t get on with it. I love the idea the change of font size and font is all brilliant it is just an interaction with the kindle for me never quite works.,I love seeing my progress in a  paper book. I keep the Kindle mainly for Booker International reading as I sometimes need to spend a lot on books, and the books I have read in recent years have been for Booker International. I have tried to use Netgalley but never read the e-books I try to get. So yes I am a paper books man.

Audiobooks had you asked me this a year ago, I said no. I would always say I love book-based podcasts like The Mookse and the Gripes. But I finally decided to try Audible and have since then read and listened to four books so yes, for me yes I LIKE Audio books if they will add another few books to what I read or help me tackle longer books that be great. Book length I am someone that have always preferred books under 300 pages. I have more and more in recent years been avoiding longer books in fact, this was the one tip I did get from Trevor and Paul to spread longer books court over a long time, a chapter or section of pages at a time. I will be trying this more next year. Thanks guys.  I have posted about being a single book read I have a hybrid version of this these days where I’ll read multiple, but I will tend to read chunks of books like Base Camps on Everest. This is something I have done for the last few months, and it has meant I have read more books than I used to as I tend to switch if I feel my reading of a book slowing

MyTBR I have two yellow trolleys, one in my library and the other in our lounge. One is the current TBR books. The other will be when I have a project reading like Czech Lit Month or Club 1962 etc, where I will find all the books for the said project and put them in my library trolley. This is something I have seen Simon Savidge do and I thought it was a great idea to sort them once a month as they tend to also get overloaded with books. I love project reading the year clubs Simon and Karen do are highlights of my years, as is the booker international longlist reading Czech Lit Month, German Lit Month and, of course, Spanish and Portuguese Lit Month. As for me and my mind, the focus it brings gives me clarity, and I’m sure these periods are when I read most. Where I read well I have my sofa downstairs which is by my serious light and upstairs my old reading light is next to a chair from Ikea in my library. I like listening to instrumental music and can cope with some lyrics but more on the acoustic country vibe than some of the punk, new wave industrial goth music I like, which is too distracting to read. Notes I use a few book tabs on passages I love and take pictures of pages I think I will quote, and with longer books take a few notes on index cards this is something I am doing more and more every year. I think in the process of writing my post these days, they are longer I like meaty quotes that I usually mention in the review. Well that’s me, nothing new A chaotic reader who has more order than I did when I started this blog but will be the most planned and ordered reader, but this chaos I have in my mind is what drives the wanderlust in my reading and the driving passion for books in translation as I have a very obsessional mind which is what makes me constant look for those underlooked gems and the sheer solo drive in my mind is for books in translation and world lit which will never change. I am so passionate about this as any of you who have met me will agree with it.

The Shining by Jon Fosse

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The Shining by Jon Fosse

Norweigan fiction

Original title – Kvitleik

Translator – Damion Searls

Source – Personal copy on kindle

Well, this is the first book after Fosse won the Nobel. I did a short post on the day he won the prize. I had reviewed three books from him before the Prize, the first of his septology, Aliss in the Fire and Scenes from a childhoood. I had read the other two parts of Septology and as I often do, hadn’t got to review them. As I said in my last post, my dreams of blogging more often fall short, but I am getting there, so this isn’t me moaning it is just a fact of life I read more than I can possibly ever review, but yes, this is my sixth book by Jon Fosse and to be truthful, I loved this it is a short book 48 pages in the paperback so in comparison to his other books this is actually probably the favourite I have read from him. Although at some point, I will go back and read septology in a single bite. Anyway, I was going to wait for this, and then I listened to the Mookse and the Gripes podcast with the translator about Jon Fosse, and I just had to get it so for quickness, I got it on the Kindle as it is about the length I can read on kindle.

What am I talking about, I thought. There’s the forest in front of me, it’s just a forest, I thought. All right then, this sudden urge to drive off somewhere had brought me to a for-est. And there was another way of talking, according to which something, something or an-other, led, whatever that might mean, to something else, yes, something else. I peered into the forest in front of me. Forest. Yes.Trees right next to one another, pines, pine trees.

He questions his action heading down the path

The book is in the mind of a man who has, for some reason, headed down a forest track, turning off the main road. He is in his car, and then he gets stuck on the path. As he does, he thinks about the points he could have turned back. Then he initially stays in the car warm and just waits for someone to come. Then he decides to head into the forest it is turning to night but he feels to drawn into the forest. He then starts to see a glow in the distance. What is it as he is drawn to the light, the light seems to come closer and closer. But what are these lights?He seems drawn to the lights and maybe is in a moment of his life is he alive, or is this his soul drifting you are never quite sure if this is real or imagined. Then it moves on when he reaches the lights, but that would spoil a 48-page book to say more it is wonderfully evocative.

No reason at all. And so why did I drive onto the forest road then. It was purely by accident, maybe. Pure chance.Yes,you probably couldn’t call it anything else.

But chance, what’s that anyway.No, I can’t start in with that kind of silly thinking. It never goes anywhere. And what I have to do now is get my car free, yes, just that. And then I have to try to turn it around. But that.Yes it’s because I didn’t pass anywhere I could turn the car around, if I had then of course I would’ve turned around, a long time ago, because the forest road is pretty much the most boring road to drive on that you can imagine.

He is maybe in a altered state I wondered at times or has something alse happened to him ?

I loved the short nature of this after the septology it is like a  palate cleanser in a meal, it is full of Fosse but intense and just a mouthful of him. I love the otherworldly ness of the lights, and the events after the lights appear in the forest. The forest has long been a place for things happening but also the mind to wander from the tropical Jungle of Wilson Harris and the way spirits and the forest can talk to you. Through things like Twin Peaks which is what I thought of her I had to wonder if a log lady would turnup there is also a sense of the spiritual of been between worlds what has happened to draw him down the forest road and why did the car break down? Why wander off these are all questions unanswered about our narrators actions. Have you read this the first of his books to come out after his Nobel win this year.

Winstons score – A an Espresso shot of Fosse

Crimson by Niviaq Korneliussen

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Crimson by NivIaq Korneliussen

Greenlandic Fiction

Original title – Homo Sapienne

Translator -Anna Halager

Source – Library

I was shocked to find this at the library as it is a book that had completely passed me by as a reader, I look out for things from countries I haven’t read from I am not a completist for the world; I would like to get as near as I can so when this book from Greenland was on the library shelves I couldn’t say no as it is also an LGBTQ novel NivIaq Korneliussen is a writer that had initially written this in Greenlandic before translating it her own book into Danish. She was drawn into writing by a project in Greenland that encouraged young people from Greenland to write about their lives. This book follows the life of five young people in Nuuk, the largest city in Greenland well it is a city of 20000 people, and here is five people and their tales.

Peter. One man. Three years. Thousands of plans. Millions of dinner invitations. Vacuuming, dishwashing and cleaning, rushing on forever towards infinity. False smiles turning uglier. Dry kisses stiffening like desiccated fish. Bad sex should be avoided at all costs. My faked orgasms get harder to believe as time goes by. But we’re still making plans.

The days become darker. The void in me expands. My love no longer has a taste. My youth’s turning old. What keeps me alive is dying. My life has become worn, aged.

Life? What life? My heart? It’s a machine.

Fia talking about Peter as there relationship is falling apart.

The five characters are all connected. They have their own tales of growing up in Nuuk as they discover their sexual orientations as they fall out of those first relationships like Fia had just split from her relationship with  Pete, whom she grew to hate his body. But she is then drawn to Sara, and this connection leads to the title as they seem to hear the same song with the tile Crimson. after the break, she lives with her brother Inuk he is struggling with his sexual orientation, and this is at the heart of the book how do you be queer in Greenland a country with a past connected to Denmark. Inuk struggles as he wrestles with his own desires. He lives wirth a female friend ARNAQ THAT SEES Fia’s attraction to Sara and uses that to try and seduce her. This is a collection of five lives where they all criss and cross a bunch of young people growing up in a world that isn’t as wide as their worldview is. This is a novel that shows how hard it can be but also what family and friends can it mixes things like texts between the characters.  As they discover not only who they love but who they are.But also how those around them can use them and also have affairs.

Friday once again. It’s a strange week for me. I haven’t been to classes and I need to get out a bit. I decide to switch off the computer although I keep thinking of stuff I’ve found on the Internet. Romantic attraction, sexual attraction or sexual behaviour between members of the same sex or gender. Google knows everything. But I still haven’t found the answer. Doubt, ignorance and confusion make me rest-less. But even so, I don’t want to go back to my comfort zone.
My comfort zone is gone. I’ve recovered from that fucking travesty last Friday, and Arnag and I have decided to deal with our restlessness. Hope has returned from the dead, popping up like the devil. All I need is to see her briefly.
Because I need to get to grips with my desperate brain.

I loved ther Googler line how much more do people know because of google how has it expanded peoples views and ideas !!

This is a gem of a book from a country with very little translated into English. It is beautiful that it is an LGBTQ book for a country that has just started to be open about sexual identity and orientation in the last twenty years. The kernel of the book was in the short story she had written as the incentive to encourage young people to write about their lives. She is a lesbian writer, so she drew us into that small community in Nuuk and their loves and lives. It is a coming-of-age story, a book of discoveries.  This is also why I love the library it had been in the limelight a couple of years ago, but I had missed or maybe not written this book down. So it has given me a new country and a new voice to follow as well. This is a fresh voice and a part of the world we know little about. Have you read any good LGBTQ books in translation?

Winstons score -+A new voice, new place and some interesting characters