Man Booker 2018 – Daisy Johnson’s Everything Under #review

This is a slippery, knotty, complex story which circles around the relationship between Gretel and Sarah, her aging mother who is slowly disappearing into the fog of dementia. When Gretel was a child, she and her mother had spun a closed linguistic world of their own, coining new terms to suit their lives. The most …

Man Booker 2018 – The Overstory by Richard Powers

I have to apologise for what will be quite a short review. I’ve just finished this, with only hours to spare, and I’m also cross with myself for not managing the entire shortlist in time for tonight’s announcement. I'll carry on reviewing the rest soon. I’m not sure I’m going to be able to do …

Man Booker 2018 – Washington Black by Esi Edugyan #review

Beginning on a slave plantation in 1830s Barbados, before embarking on a whirlwind adventure spanning the globe, Washington Black follows the life and travels of a young slave who has a talent for scientific observation. The eponymous hero is plucked from a life of brutality and fear to act as assistant to the liberal-thinking brother …

Man Booker 2018 – Belinda Bauer’s Snap #Review

If 2017 was the Man Booker year of debut authors (and I still maintain Fiona Mosley's Elmet should have won), the notable feature of 2018’s longlist is the challenge to literary prize conventions – well, that’s how the narrative is playing out so far in certain circles. Nick Drnaso’s graphic novel, Sabrina, is certainly a …

Man Booker 2018 – Rachel Kushner’s The Mars Room

The protagonist of Rachel Kushner’s new novel, Romy Leslie Hall, inmate W314159, has grown up in a San Francisco which, she tells us, is a different one to the San Francisco we’ve all heard about: ‘it was not about rainbow flags or beat poetry or steep crooked streets but fog and Irish bars and liquor …