5 new books to read in lockdown

This week’s bookcase includes reviews of The Committed by Viet Thanh Nguyen and Bright Burning Things by Lisa Harding.

Fiction

1. The Committed by Viet Thanh Nguyen is published in hardback by Corsair

€16.99 from dubraybooks.ie

In The Committed, Viet Thanh Nguyen continues the story of his 2015 Pulitzer Prize winning debut, The Sympathizer. A Vietnamese-French communist agent finds himself in chic 1980s Paris where he is plagued by the horrible deeds he perpetrated in the name of the revolution, by the existential angst of his split identity, and his growing anti-communist sympathies. The Committed ties all these strands together in a high-stakes crime thriller, as enemies made during his exile in Los Angeles return to haunt him, and he falls into running drugs for a shady figure called the Boss. Like its predecessor, the rollicking, darkly comic plot serves as a vehicle for the protagonist’s stream of consciousness musings on colonialism, racial identity, loss, love and middle age, with references to psychiatrist Frantz Fanon and poet Aime Cesaire thrown in for good measure. It’s a thrilling alternative to the Western narrative.

2. Bright Burning Things by Lisa Harding is published in hardback by Bloomsbury Publishing

€12.53 from kennys.ie

Sonya had it all – the bright lights of a career on the London stage, romance, fast cars and lovers. But then life got in the way, or rather, the latest addiction did, designed to fill the void left since her mother died when she was a child. Drawing on her life as an actress, Lisa Harding weaves together a heart-warming tale of a mother’s love and a battle against demons – some real and others the work of the mind. Keeping the pace high and the action flowing, Harding grips your attention as Sonya’s plight peaks and troughs. With dialogue as crisp as what Sonya slurps from a bottle of white, Harding serves up a hard-hitting insight into the life of a failed actress.

3. The Sanatorium by Sarah Pearse is published in hardback by Bantam Press

€15.20 from books.ie

Sarah Pearse’s The Sanatorium sets a spooky scene – from the snowy setting to the fate of the guests, right up to the final twist. Detective Elin accepts an invitation to celebrate her estranged brother’s engagement at a new hotel high in the Swiss Alps. As a storm blows in, guests start to go missing. The reader really gets behind the reluctant heroine-cum-detective who must undergo an investigation into her past if she is to solve the mystery in time. Pearse uses ‘the unknowns’ of the book to get under your skin, and her ability to build tension is second-to-none. If you like a jumpy or gruesome thriller, this is for you.

Non-fiction

1. Raceless: In Search of Family, Identity, And The Truth About Where I Belong by Georgina Lawton is published in hardback by Sphere

€25.65 from dubraybooks.ie

For more than 20 years, Georgina Lawton’s white mother and father pretended to her, themselves and anyone who asked, that she was their child, even though her skin colour indicated she was mixed-race. After her father dies, Lawton discovers the truth: her biological father was a black man. Lawton’s determination to identify her racial heritage, while her mother refuses to provide any details, is powerful and uncomfortable. It probes the damage caused by Britain’s culture of shame, almost offhand racism and white privilege. Unfortunately it is rather unevenly written: veering from pacy, engaging investigations into the importance of hair to black identity, to more rambling sections describing her anguish, which would benefit from a tighter edit. Perhaps it’s an indication the journalist’s quest to reconcile herself with the long hidden truth is not yet complete.

Children’s book of the week

1. The Runaway Girls by Jacqueline Wilson is published in hardback by Doubleday Childrens 

€11.29 from kennys.ie

Two lives collide in The Runaway Girls: a rich girl in a fancy mansion and a poor girl brought up on the streets, on the run from the police and trying to survive in Victorian London. Both have lost someone close to them, and they need a friend. Together they beg and face terrible difficulties, jail and the workhouse, never knowing who they can trust, as even the nicest seeming people can turn out to be horrible. The story shows how two completely different people can come together and make an unstoppable team – and how brave children can be. Some scenes – such as the one in the workhouse – will make your heart beat really hard. If you like Jacqueline Wilson’s stories or want to find out what life was like for children in the 1800s, you will love this book.