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You are here: Home / Archives for book review

book review

Book Review: The New Girl, by Emily Perkins

22nd September 2013 By Julianne Leave a Comment

In an unnamed town, during a hot, dry summer, Julia, Chicky and Rachel are celebrating the end of school and waiting for the exam results that will determine their futures, whilst trying to decide what to do next. Although their town is dull – so boring that they sign up to a free class at the local library – it’s a difficult place to leave. Everything they’ve ever known is here, and only Julia really thinks that she might leave, inspired by Miranda, their beautiful, charming new teacher.

But Miranda is no angel, having come to escape the city, and the mistakes she made at university. She seems like a positive influence, a breath of fresh air with big ideas and pretty dresses, but the longer she stays, the more her darker side comes out, and her presence cannot remain benign.

The main protagonists are Julia and Miranda, though the novel cycles through many other points of view. I found them both really interesting. Miranda is a narcissist dressed up in Manic Pixie Dream Girl clothing – black hair, fringe, and all. She enjoys inspiring people and getting them to adore her. She’s convinced that she knows best and doesn’t care about the emotional fallout of her actions. Julia is naïve but intelligent, and she knows that she has to leave the town if she wants to do anything really exciting with her life, though she has a strong emotional connection to her friends and family, especially Chicky, Rachel, and her mother.

I also loved reading about Julia’s mother, Mary, who had Julia when she was young, and is now a kind woman who loves her daughter and husband, but is aware of everything she missed out on by staying in the small town. She struggles with her husband’s lack of interest in their daughter, and with the possiblity that Julia might leave.

There were some characters that I would have liked to read more about, and some scenes that seemed skipped over. When Miranda first comes to the town, she goes to meet the local women, most of them mothers, at a party hosted by the woman who hired her to teach, Gretchen. We only get to read about the party before Miranda arrives, and I would have liked to have seen how it went. I would also have liked to find out more about Chicky and Rachel, especially Chicky, who is brash and brave and yet seemingly content to stay in the town.

I’d like to read more books that deal with these type of issues – books about deciding what to do next, about the mistakes new adults can make when dealing with people who have been adults for a lot longer than they have. If you like the idea of ‘New Adult’ but not the fact that most of the books sold under that category are romances, give this a try and let me know what you think, though it is literary fiction – rather than NA or YA – because the story is sometimes told from the parents’ point of view. If you have any recommendations for me, please do leave a comment!

Filed Under: Reviews Tagged With: book review, Emily Perkins, literary fiction, review, teenage protagonist in literary fiction

Book Review: Milk, Sulphate and Alby Starvation, by Martin Millar

8th September 2013 By Julianne Leave a Comment

My most mundane review photo yet?

I was still ill when I finished Persepolis. I wanted to keep reading, but I didn’t want to dive into anything too long and taxing in case my slightly-feverish brain couldn’t keep up with it. I surveyed my shelves until I spotted Milk, Sulphate and Alby Starvation, Martin Millar’s first novel. I read the book that he is  probably most well known for, The Good Fairies of New York, a couple of years ago, and have slowly been collecting more of his work. Milk, Sulphate and Alby Starvation is very short – 152 pages – and knowing that it was likely to be easy going, surreal, and silly, I decided that it was perfect for the occasion.

Alby Starvation, the main character, is a small time drug dealer living in Brixton, hiding from an assassin sent by the Milk Marketing Board. At first I thought he was just paranoid, but as the book switches viewpoint and introduces all the other characters, we find out that there is a Milk Marketing Board, and that they are pretty evil. It’s not all so unrealistic. There is also a supermarket manager who mainly just wants to buy a hot tub, and his wife, dreading it. Two men, one desperate for attention, the other a master of meditation, battle each other in the video game arcade, with a crowd of fans cheering them on.  Professor Wing is secretly hunting for the crown of Ethelred the Unready, having stolen council equipment for digging up roads. Okay, I’ll admit, that’s a weird one, but June, the Brazilian assassin, is pretty normal, except for that whole killing people business!

There is only a little magic, in the form of a nurse with healing powers, but most of the events have at least a touch of the surreal. I did find it a bit confusing at the start, as there are a lot of different characters and the narrative jumps around in time a bit, especially in the sections from Alby’s point of view. It’s very fast paced, but eventually everything falls into place.

If you like stories in which one coincidence after another pushes the characters together in ever more entertaining ways, you’ll probably love this. If you need a clear and definite plot and don’t like silliness, this won’t be the book for you, especially as it ends quite suddenly. Little is resolved, but there are clues that suggest how the characters will end up. The Good Fairies of New York has more of a plot and a more linear narrative, so if you’re not sure, try that one first.

I finished this book in a much better mood, and resolved to a) make more of an effort to track down copies of Martin Millar’s other books, and b) convince more people to try his work! I should probably hurry up and review The Good Fairies of New York already…

Filed Under: Reviews Tagged With: book review, Brixton, comedy, London, Martin Millar, review, surreal

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Hi! I'm Julianne and this is my book blog. Click my picture to read more about me.

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