The prose shines, but this serious talent deserves better subjects.
A story collection employing a variety of techniques and narrators to draw a picture of Namibian life.
Billed as a “literary mixtape,” the collection is divided into “A-Side” and “B-Side” tales. “A-Side” follows Rambo, a young artist working (or just as often not) on the writing he hopes will make him known beyond Windhoek, Namibia. As his twenties grind on, he endures a painful breakup and the death of his mother. “B-Side” contains more traditional short stories chronicling the lives of Windhoek’s homeless or, in the powerful “Important Terminology for Military-Age Males,” revealing the cruelty of a secret white South African unit in the Namibian War of Independence by defining the war’s key terms, A (apartheid) through Z (Zulu). Ngamije has a lot of fun, and success, with his unconventional structure. The collection’s most moving passage eulogizes the narrator’s mother using the form of a shopping list (“DISHWASHING LIQUID: Sunlight or Ajax—she diluted the green ooze in the bottle and made it last longer, the hallmark of an excellent drug dealer”). The B-Sides are more impressive as stories, while the A-Sides have the deftest wordplay, as witness this comment by the second-person narrator about his shopping habits post-breakup: “You shy away from the nursery where she adopted flora to fawn over.” However, the overarching narrative struggles to make the toxic behavior of 20-something men compelling. A cup of Junot Díaz has been used where just a pinch would have been appropriate (especially in the second-person sections), and male coarseness sometimes becomes literary tastelessness; one story has too many witticisms about domestic violence. But Ngamije’s deep attention to technique mostly impresses, even if this coming-of-age story has been told before.
The prose shines, but this serious talent deserves better subjects.Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2024
ISBN: 9781668012468
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Scout Press/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2024
Suspenseful, full of incident, and not obviously necessary.
Atwood goes back to Gilead.
The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), consistently regarded as a masterpiece of 20th-century literature, has gained new attention in recent years with the success of the Hulu series as well as fresh appreciation from readers who feel like this story has new relevance in America’s current political climate. Atwood herself has spoken about how news headlines have made her dystopian fiction seem eerily plausible, and it’s not difficult to imagine her wanting to revisit Gilead as the TV show has sped past where her narrative ended. Like the novel that preceded it, this sequel is presented as found documents—first-person accounts of life inside a misogynistic theocracy from three informants. There is Agnes Jemima, a girl who rejects the marriage her family arranges for her but still has faith in God and Gilead. There’s Daisy, who learns on her 16th birthday that her whole life has been a lie. And there's Aunt Lydia, the woman responsible for turning women into Handmaids. This approach gives readers insight into different aspects of life inside and outside Gilead, but it also leads to a book that sometimes feels overstuffed. The Handmaid’s Tale combined exquisite lyricism with a powerful sense of urgency, as if a thoughtful, perceptive woman was racing against time to give witness to her experience. That narrator hinted at more than she said; Atwood seemed to trust readers to fill in the gaps. This dynamic created an atmosphere of intimacy. However curious we might be about Gilead and the resistance operating outside that country, what we learn here is that what Atwood left unsaid in the first novel generated more horror and outrage than explicit detail can. And the more we get to know Agnes, Daisy, and Aunt Lydia, the less convincing they become. It’s hard, of course, to compete with a beloved classic, so maybe the best way to read this new book is to forget about The Handmaid’s Tale and enjoy it as an artful feminist thriller.
Suspenseful, full of incident, and not obviously necessary.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-385-54378-1
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Nan A. Talese
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Uneven but fitfully amusing.
Betrayed by her husband, a severely depressed young woman gets drawn into the over-the-top festivities at a lavish wedding.
Phoebe Stone, who teaches English literature at a St. Louis college, is plotting her own demise. Her husband, Matt, has left her for another woman, and Phoebe is taking it hard. Indeed, she's determined just where and how she will end it all: at an oceanfront hotel in Newport, where she will lie on a king-sized canopy bed and take a bottle of her cat’s painkillers. At the hotel, Phoebe meets bride-to-be Lila, a headstrong rich girl presiding over her own extravagant six-day wedding celebration. Lila thought she had booked every room in the hotel, and learning of Phoebe's suicidal intentions, she forbids this stray guest from disrupting the nuptials: “No. You definitely can’t kill yourself. This is my wedding week.” After the punchy opening, a grim flashback to the meltdown of Phoebe's marriage temporarily darkens the mood, but things pick up when spoiled Lila interrupts Phoebe's preparations and sweeps her up in the wedding juggernaut. The slide from earnest drama to broad farce is somewhat jarring, but from this point on, Espach crafts an enjoyable—if overstuffed—comedy of manners. When the original maid of honor drops out, Phoebe is persuaded, against her better judgment, to take her place. There’s some fun to be had here: The wedding party—including groom-to-be Gary, a widower, and his 11-year-old daughter—takes surfing lessons; the women in the group have a session with a Sex Woman. But it all goes on too long, and the humor can seem forced, reaching a low point when someone has sex with the vintage wedding car (you don’t want to know the details). Later, when two characters have a meet-cute in a hot tub, readers will guess exactly how the marriage plot resolves.
Uneven but fitfully amusing.Pub Date: July 30, 2024
ISBN: 9781250899576
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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