Fiction
Cuddy by Ben Myers is my favourite fiction book of the year – a biography of St Cuthbert, patron saint of the North, told through the lives of those who came after him. Mostly it is a book about the North, about Durham, and about the people who live there. It is not always an easy read – each chapter tells a different story in a different era, and Myer’s matches the story telling to the era.
By far the best sections are at the end – a sceptical Victorian professor asked to witness a miracle in a dark and scary Cathedral at the night, and a modern day tale of a young man, rectruited as a stone mason who receives an ecstatic vision of the Saint. This latter story features an enigmatic character called Chadwick, tall and gangly, who plays a key role in helping the protagonist meet his vision. I have finally become so pretentious I am actually a fictional character.
Memory Shelter by Georgi Gosporodinov is funny and baffling. A satire on European culture wars and the battle for history it starts with a Doctor creating a memory room for patients with dementia, where they can reconnect with their memories. The experiment is such a success that people without dementia start spending time their. Eventually whole nations choose to live in the past. Europe is divided again with different political factions fighting for which version of history dominates – the 80s or the 60s?
If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery, short stories based on the lives of Jamaican immigratnts to America is brilliant and got loads of nominations, but is too rich for me, maybe the central character just didn’t click with me. Much better was Sequioa Nagamatus How High We Go in The Dark - several generations of Japanese Americans live through a future defined by multiple pandemics.
White Riot by Joe Thomas looks set to be the start of a big series – an undercover detective in the late 70s is sent to inflitrate Rock Against Racism. Years later he revists his past while investigating a murder. What sets White Riot apart is the way he mixes real live events and characters with fiction, in the manner of David Peace or James Ellroy, including an appearance by Paul Weller with the Style Council.
Prophet Song by Paul Lynch, won the Booker Prize, and was the first winner in years that I actually enjoyed reading, even though it was a depressing story of a future Ireland descending into authoritarianism.
Finally I missed David Keenan’s Industry of Magic and Light at the end of 2022 – the sequel to the baffling but brilliant Memorial Device – this tells the story of the Airdrie Psychedelic scene of the late 60s through the perspective of memorabilia found in a caravan.
Non-Fiction
Doppleganger is a frustrating but brilliant read, covering ground that I have covered in my own blog, but much better; how 2 people, similar in upbringing and education, exposed to the same material on-line can have radically different reactions. Naomi Klein, the left wing author of No Logo and Shock Doctrine, is regularly confused with Naomi Wolfe, author of The Beauty Myth – similar name, similar age, published in similar newspapers. In the run up to Covid Naomi Wolfe’s career is dealt a huge blow – her book “Outrage: Sex, Censorship and the Criminalisation of Love” was found to contain enormous mistakes, so much that her publisher withdrew it. What was worse is that the problems with the books accuracy were revealed on air on BBC3. A truly nightmare
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00057k4
When lockdown happened, Naomi Wolfe became a prominent proponent of Covid conspiracy theories, which brought her into close contact with other anti-government and anti-lockdown activists on the far right. Within a few months she was a regular on far right podcasts and youtube channels. All the while people continued to confuse the 2 Naomis, with Naomi Wolfe regularly blamed for her namesakes madness. Klein traces Wolfes descent into far right weirdness.
The book is brilliant, in particular when Naomi Wolfe discovers a fake Naomi on line account, with even dafter opinions than her own, but it’s attempts to make wider points about the internet and capitalism are less engaging
While reading it, however, I also watched this very disturbing video made for the Guardian by the writer Helen Mort. She found herself the victim of a deepfake porn video, only to discover that no-one was quite sure if a crime had been committed, and if so, by who?
Whether you chose to read Doppelganger is up to you, but I would strongly recommend watching Helen Mort’s short film. Klein wrote 2 articles for the Guardian based on the book, if you would like the shorterned version:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/nov/15/naomi-klein-interview-wellness-culture-far-right
I have writted about Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism by Angus Deaton and Ann Case earlier this year – a brilliant, but tragic, assement of the declining life expectancy among non-college educated white Americans, and how the American economic system let them down. Sadly those most let down by American capitalism would rather embrace authoritarianism than consider how more left wing politics might improve their lot.
Bloodbath Nation by Paul Auster describes how American lives are shortened by a pandemic of guns. Sadly it offers no easy ways to persuade the minority of Americans who own guns to give them up.