Tag: Debut novels

Cinema Love – Jiaming Tang (John Murray 2024)

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This is a title I highlighted at the start of the year.  It was certainly a debut novel which grabbed my attention from its pre-publication description.

The first thing that really impresses is the quality of the writing.  The author describes himself as a queer immigrant who lives in New York and the cross-cultural elements and LGBTQ+ sensibility is evident.  Central to the novel is a location- The Workers’ Cinema in Mawei City in post-Socialist China at some point in the 1980s.  This is a down at heel venue frequented by (often married) men in order to pick up other men whilst a small selection of (often war) films play continuously which nobody (with the exception of the Projectionist) is interested in.  The novel features characters who frequented the cinema, worked at it or were affected by the behaviour of the men searching for love in the darkness.

This shadowy world is beautifully conjured up by the author who would surely have been too young to recall such venues (I did keep having the image of the Scala in King’s Cross from around the same time period creeping into my mind).

Some of the key characters from this section move to New York and struggle to adapt with poverty amongst apparent plenty, unemployment and exploitation, racism and green card marriages to deal with but over the decades the Workers’ Cinema still maintains a hold over these characters as guilt, ghosts, lust and loss permeate their daily lives. 

Things do shift around a bit time-wise and there was the odd moment when I wasn’t sure when things were happening but we very clearly move towards a section set during the Pandemic and afterwards.  There’s a short piece of first-person narrative but it’s predominantly third-person and increasingly features two women, Yan Hua and Bao Mei who briefly encountered one another at the cinema.

Writing is strong, plot-wise I felt it tailed off just slightly towards the end when I wasn’t sure about some of the older character’s motivations and it felt we were slightly being taken around in the same circles but this is an impressive debut with the author thoroughly impressing on this occasion and showing much potential for the future.

Cinema Love will be published in the UK by John Murray Press on 9th May 2024.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

Whale Fall – Elizabeth O’Connor (Picador 2024)

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A whale washed up on the beach provided the focus for two impressive debut novels I’ve read from the last couple of years, “The Whalebone Theatre” by Joanna Quinn and “The Whale Tattoo” by Jon Ransom (both 2022).  I feel such an event works well in fiction as it evokes such a sense of the out of the ordinary for the community, a sobering experience of just what the sea contains.  There’s the sadness and futility of the huge creature left to rot, excitement for children who witness this process and it often serves as an omen that things are about to change.

Another debut and another whale appearing on the beach of a sparsely populated island off the Welsh coast in 1938.  In its wake come two English researchers, a man and a woman working on a book about life on the island.  They employ 18 year old resident Manon as a translator, as a number there, including Manon’s younger sister, speak only Welsh.  There’s a sense from the mainland that things are building towards war but it is everyday survival which the islanders focus on.

This is a quiet, short novel of 178 pages which is well written and maintains the interest.  There’s a timelessness to it and the fictional location is inspired by a number of islands off the British/Irish coasts where populations and local traditions dwindled.  It impresses with its strongly created main character and the pull of the island for her.  Not that much happens but it is rich in atmosphere.  The Observer highlighted it as one of the most anticipated debuts for 2024 which has already been a strong year for first fiction.  I wonder if something so quietly assured and calm, and not to be taken as a criticism, slight, will stand out amongst much showier debuts.

Whale Fall will be published by Picador on 25th April.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

The Amendments – Niamh Mulvey (Picador 2024)

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This is a debut novel from an Irish writer who made award shortlists for her story collection “Hearts And Bones”.  This is the 9th debut novel I’ve read so far this year and the standard is high, but this is one of the best.

It is a tale of three women, main character Nell, her mother, Dolores and Martina, who is one of the mentors of a religious group Nell falls into in her teens.  Nell joins La Obra de los Hogarenos (the Work of the Homemakers), an offshoot of the Catholic Church, a movement against what was seen as increasing secularisation and in favour of home life and fostering an international brotherhood of like-minded souls.  Not quite a cult, but a group which does influence Nell with its views around the time that discussions in Ireland on increasing pro-choice rights were being discussed.

Dolores had been involved in a previous consideration of these issues with the Eighth Amendment of 1983 when she had been a member of a women’s group.  Time moves backwards and forwards for these women throughout the narrative as more of their lives are gradually revealed to us and each other.

The catalyst for this is counselling sessions for Nell, about to become a parent with her pregnant partner Adrienne and facing this future with fear and a reluctance which needs sorting.

I was really involved with the women and their lives as they move back and forth from Ireland.  Time away seems to enable them to find themselves and help clarify feelings, Dolores in London and Nell in Spain but are they able to continue with that growth when they return home?  The religious aspect I found fascinating and the theme of choice- for the characters in their own lives and from the restrictions of the legislation brings the novel together very nicely.  This is certainly a high-quality read and it’s great to discover yet another first-rate Irish author with huge potential.

The Amendments is published on 18th April by Picador.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

Manny And The Baby – Varaidzo (Sphere 2024)

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Debut novel for the single-monikered Varaidzo whose writing has appeared in anthologies and who has a background as a Digital and Arts & Culture Editor.  This is a dual narrative novel set in Bath and London at the time of the 2012 Olympics and in the mid 1930s.

Itai arrives in Bath to a flat he inherited from his father.  He did not know that his Dad had a place in Bath and further secrets are revealed when he discovers a box of cassette tapes.  The voice on the tapes is Rita, who has her tale to tell, in a transcribed narrative about Black British experience in the 1930s.  What links this woman from the past to this twenty-something Rastafarian and how is Itai’s experience in a place which feels very alien to him as a Londoner mirrored by Rita’s seventy plus years before?

Itai’s position in this new location is initially precarious as he is viewed with hostility by drug dealers in case he, a young black man from London, takes over their patch. This led me to expect something edgier than the novel turned out to be.  It settles into a tale of family, friendship and searching to belong, it feels very commercial and there’s a good sense of history of those still under-represented.  I never knew Hailie Selassie was exiled in Bath following conflict with Italy in Ethiopia and it is his presence which draws some of the characters to the city in the 1930s strand.

Characterisation is memorable in both narratives.  I developed a strong soft spot for young Josh who lives in the same flats as Itai, a future Olympic hopeful whose lack of funding leads him to selling weed to his neighbour.  The 1930s strand is rich in music and dance with Rita as part of the Hot Chocolates dance troupe and Ezekiel, a trumpeter, who is the source of Itai’s deceased father’s research as an ethnomusicologist. There’s a really useful bibliography at the end of titles the author used for research.  I’ve already highlighted a few to follow up on which shows that her fiction has certainly captivated my attention.

The title lest you think it’s a reference to a male nanny caring for an infant reflects the nicknames of Rita (The Baby) and her half-sister Emmanuella.

This is another strong debut in a year of strong debuts.  I hope this one will get the attention it deserves.

Manny And The Baby is published on 11th April by Sphere Books in the UK.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

The Library Thief- Kuchenga Shenjé (Sphere 2024)

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I’ve read a number of Gothic-tinged historical novel debuts over the last few years.  Titles that spring to mind are “The Beholders” by Hester Musson (2024), “The Animals Of Lockwood Manor”- Jane Healey (2020), “The Confessions Of Frannie Langton” – Sara Collins (2019), “Theatre Of Marvels” – Lianne Dilsworth (2022) and my favourite of all “The Wicked Cometh” by Laura Carlin (2018). These books appeal to me as a reader.  I like the darkness which gradually reveals itself from beneath a thin veneer of respectability.  They often have a nod towards the work of The Brontes, Daphne Du Maurier and/or Sarah Waters and some of these have been strong in depicting characters who would have had to operate on the fringes of society who find themselves plunged into disturbing situations.  This can mean characters offering a Black British and/or LGBTQ+ experience.

These factors are present in Kuchenga Shenjé’s debut.  It doesn’t feel quite as embedded in the history of the times as some of the above but we do have outsiders placed in an atmosphere which becomes increasingly twisted.  This is an effective and satisfying mystery novel.  Rose Hall, a large house in the Lake District sounds respectable enough and it is the place main character Florence Granger chooses to provide a temporary place of escape.  Her father is a bookbinder and she has absorbed enough of his skills to repair the book collection in Lord Belfield’s library.  Belfield’s wife Persephone died in mysterious circumstances and the grieving Lord has reduced his staff to just a cook and a manservant.   Florence joins them for a temporary live-in assignment to prepare the books for sale, but what are the secrets the houses, the staff and the Belfield family are hiding?

Good characterisation, good pace with things that we’ve encountered in those other Gothic debuts alongside fresh perspectives which makes this a very readable debut for which there should be an appreciative audience.  I actually really enjoyed the details of the bookbinding work before the delicate twists of the plot start to be revealed.

“The Library Thief” is published on 9th April 2024 by Sphere Books.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.  

Martyr! – Kaveh Akbar (Picador 2024)

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We seem to be in a time of very strong debut novels.  Often these are coming from writers who have already established themselves within the literary world as is the case here with published poet and Iowa City resident Kaveh Akbar.

Main character is Cyrus, a damaged recovering alcoholic student and poet who is contemplating a work on martyrs- believing that death should signify something.  This belief is driven by his mother, who, not long after his birth, was a passenger on a plane, which in a momentous cock-up was shot down by American military eviscerating all on board.

The novel records his attempts to cope with life.  His upbringing in America with a father unable to live in their Iranian home alongside his grief gives a powerful illustration of the immigrant experience leading to his own hovering on the edge of life and death with addiction issues and explores his relationship with Zee, a man prepared to give love and not expect that much in return.  Cyrus’ life changes when he encounters an artist on her own journey towards death which will make her a valuable addition to Cyrus’ own book of martyrs.

If this sounds bleak, there is darkness which runs throughout and there is humour and warmth as the author explores friendship and family and what actually keeps us going on with life.  Narrative switches between different characters and third to first person together with extracts from Cyrus’ intended work keeps readers on their toes.  I read this quite quickly and was drawn into the work, caring for the characters.  I think Kaveh Akbar will make a big impression with this debut producing a book which will be held in high esteem and talked about for a long time to come.

“Martyr!” is published by Picador Books in the UK on March 7th 2024.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

Blessings – Chukwuebuka Ibeh (Viking 2024)

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The coming-out tale is given a fresh slant with a Nigerian perspective in this striking debut novel.  We first meet fifteen year old Obiefuna at home in Port Harcourt in 2006 when his father brings home Aboy to be an apprentice in his hardware store and instals him in the room Obiefuna shares with his brother who is 13 months younger.  Ekene is mad on football, Obiefuna cannot play but does dance well until chastised by his father. Obiefuna finds himself drawn to Aboy, a situation his father will not tolerate and takes drastic action.

The novel follows Obiefuna’s education in school and in life up until the age of twenty-three when Nigeria, dismayed by lenient policies in the US and with unpopular politicians seeking re-election criminalises homosexuality in a bid to pander to the bigotry of religious groups.

The focus is on Obiefuna and his mother Uzoamaka, devoted to her son but pretty powerless to intervene and whose own secrets further compound the family dynamics.

This is a well-paced quick to read tale of the need to be vigilant, of grabbing moments of happiness while you can but never relaxing the need to keep looking back and being prepared to deny others the right to live the way they wish in order to be seen to be fitting in.  It’s a universal tale but the Nigerian setting gives it an extra dimension which will seem especially terrifying to a young British, European or American adult, who would seem the ideal audience for this book, used to greater freedoms.  Despite the seriousness of the issues involved this is very much a character-led narrative with the reader rooting for Obiefuna throughout.  This is a significant addition to the canon of coming out stories which still demand to be told and Chukwuebeka Ibeh tells this well.

Blessings is published on 22nd February 2024 by Viking.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

Where There Was Fire – John Manuel Arias (Picador 2024)

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I must admit to having to look up Costa Rica on a map when I began this debut novel, suggesting it is a new location for me to visit through fiction.  Set in a number of time periods in the latter half of the twentieth century this rich, impressive work features generations of a family held back by disappearances, secrets and murder.

John Manuel Arias is a poet and it shows.  I cannot remember reading a work so expressively lush since fellow poet’s Kevin Jared Hosein’s 2023 debut, the Trinidad-set “Hungry Ghosts” but there I think this aspect was maybe over-used which gave a queasy over-ripeness but the balance seems just right here imbuing this family tale with an evocative richness and depth.

Events centre around one night in 1968 when a massive fire engulfed a banana plantation, the aftermath of which left a grandmother dead, a father missing, a mother unable to cope and two young daughters, Lyra and Carmen abandoned.  It was a night when secrets were both exposed and formed.  The story moves back through the 1950s and forwards to 1995 where a party is being planned for the mother, Teresa.

Characterisation is solid, there’s a lovely cameo from triplets known as The Three Marias, born “three minutes and three shades apart,” who deserve a novel of their own and the presence of those who have passed on is evident from the ramifications of their actions and sometimes by their ghostly manifestations.  There is more than a hint of magical realism here.  It is a tale of fire, of storms, of toads and exploitation of the Costa Rican people by American big business.  It is both tragic and life-affirming and it proves a strong introduction to a writer who combines a poetic vision with real, instinctive story-telling skills.

Where There Is Fire will be published in hardback by Picador on 22nd February 2024. It is available now as an e-book. Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

The List Of Suspicious Things – Jennie Godfrey (Hutchinson Heinemann 2024)

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Junior sleuths have always been a mainstay in children’s fiction, from the crime-busting gang in all-time German classic “Emil And The Detectives”(1929) to Enid Blyton’s “Famous Five” who are referenced in this novel.  They are also a significant force in adult fiction from Mark Haddon’s  modern classic “The Curious Incident Of The Dog At Nightime” (2003), Joanna Cannon’s “Trouble With Goats And Sheep” (2014), Alan Bradleys’ Flavia De Luce series, the impressive urban Indian tale “Djinn Patrol On The Purple Line” by Deepa Anaparra (2020) and certainly not forgetting Catherine O’Flynn’s ten year old detective Kate in the outstanding “What Was Lost” (2007) for me pretty much a benchmark for this type of novel. There’s countless others I could add to this list because there is much appeal in the adolescent viewpoint of the adult world and adding to that list meet Miv, the twelve year old main character in this solid debut novel.

This sparky heroine is pitched against real life crime, the Yorkshire Ripper, and it begins in 1979.  Seeing the concerns of adults and worried if the events will drive her family from her home environment and away from best friend Sharon the girls hatch a plan to discover the identity of the Yorkshire Ripper themselves and use a notebook to record individuals who arouse their suspicions in their neighbourhood.  This is a fascinating premise- the reader can see the potential in this plot immediately.

And it is done well.  Miv’s first person narrative is interspersed with third-person viewpoints of characters who at some point appear on Miv’s list.  I must admit these switches from first to third person jar a little but it gives a valuable perspective on the youngster’s misconstruing of events.  As a character, Miv is great, on the cusp of entry into the adult world of secrets and things that should not be talked about exemplified by the difficult situation within her own family.  Early on, there’s some incidental moments which really get the feel of the times, the school playground Kiss Chase is replaced by a dark playground chase game because of the Ripper killings.  For me, it is when the novel settles into the sleuthing that it comes to feel a little one-note and I’m not sure I totally bought into the Yorkshire depicted by the author and there were a couple of questionable motives behind actions.  The darker territory the novel hovers around -the Ripper’s crimes, racial tensions and mental health issues didn’t always meld smoothly with Miv’s tale and I am aware that we are seeing much from the child’s viewpoint but I think if the darkness was a little darker and the lightness lighter we would have had something outstanding.

I certainly enjoyed this and it will win many fans and I think it would be a splendid book group choice as the setting and premise of the novel will provide much discussion.  I’m not sure, despite twists towards the end which I certainly didn’t see coming if this will continue to resonate in the way that some of the young detective novels I mentioned at the top of this review do.

The List Of Suspicious  Things is published by Hutchinson Heinemann on 15th February 2024.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

Jaded -Ela Lee (Harvill Secker 2024)

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Here it is, my first five star review of the year and it is for a debut novel.

Ela Lee is a British author with Korean and Turkish heritage and was a lawyer in the City Of London.  Main character and narrator Jade has a Korean mother and Turkish father and is a lawyer in the City.  There’s obvious elements of the “Write what you know” mantra here but I hope that most of this novel’s events come from the author’s imagination as you really wouldn’t wish the challenges and predicaments Jade faces on anybody.

Jade’s real name is Ceyda.  She refers to “Jade” as her ‘Starbucks name’ simplified so it can be called out by a barista felt-penning it onto a cup in the coffee shop.  This is one of the ongoing things she feels she has to do to fit in.  She has what would be deemed a good job within her law firm but they are worked so hard with scant respect for a personal life.  And as they are expected to work hard they are also expected to play hard when the company deems it.  At a firm’s event Jade drinks too much and cannot remember how she got home. As she begins to piece things together something feels very off.

I’ve given the issue of consent five stars before for the outstanding legal thriller by Kia Abdullah “Truth Be Told” (2020).  There the emphasis was on the handling of the case here it is focused on the reactions of one person and the rug is continually pulled away from Jade in this very impressive but so challenging work.

It starts off almost in rom-com territory and morphs into a biting examination not just of consent but of race and power within work settings and relationships and yet, even when at its darkest, the author is able to inject dark humour very effectively.  Characterisation is strong, you will totally root for Jade, even when questioning the route she seems to be following, the reader may not agree with her every decision but will be convinced as to why that decision has been made.  Her parents are vividly brought to life and their sacrifices, confusion and extreme good nature comes across so well and will linger long after the book is finished.  Also lingering long will be the quandaries the author, through her main character, puts the reader into.  So much is challenged, it makes for difficult reading at times for everyone.  As a white male I was often squirming and some may find the events depicted triggering and not get through it.

But, if you can stick with the author’s challenges, handled in such a skilful way, with understanding, often with wit, sometimes with disdain and a shrug and also with fury, in fact a range of techniques which keeps the reader totally involved and adds much richness and certainly complexity to the novel then you are in for a highly memorable reading experience.

Jaded is published on the 8th February in the UK by Harvil Secker in hardback and in an e-book version by Vintage Digital.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.