My enormous thanks to fellow blogger Lou at Bookmarks and Stages for ensuring I received a copy of children’s book Blaze Dog Detective: The Magic Flag Mystery by Lin Anderson and Donald McKay in return for an honest review.

The first in the Blaze Dog Detective series, The Magic Flag Mystery was published on 8th April by Dunedin and is available for purchase here.

Blaze Dog Detective: The Magic Flag Mystery

When the famous fairy flag of the Clan MacLeod disappears from a locked room at Dunvegan Castle on the Isle of Skye, the police immediately call in Blaze Dog Detective.

After all his scenting skills on the island are legendary.

With his team of Rosa, Rory and wee brother Laoch, Blaze leads the chase to rescue this magical flag before it can be spirited away from the island forever.

My review

of

Blaze Dog Detective: The Magic Flag Mystery

Blaze is about to use his nose on a new adventure.

I thought I might just dip into The Magic Flag Mystery as I was between books and a children’s story would be a good filler. That was a complete underestimation of how good a story The Magic Flag Mystery is! I loved it. I might be around half a century older than the target audience but it had me spellbound.

There’s a thrilling plot of theft, baddies, danger and peril with so many exciting events along the way that the pace is fast and compelling. An undercurrent of magic enhances the mystery through Granny Beaton’s crystal ball, and through the communications between animals, and between them and humans, especially with regard to Blaze and Rosa. Circling crows give a sense of menace and secret passages and tunnels add to the atmosphere so any reader of any age will be enchanted by this narrative. Short chapters with cliffhanger endings would draw in the most reluctant reader and I wish I were about 9 reading The Magic Flag Mystery by torchlight under the bed covers because I know I’d be totally enraptured!

The characters are wonderfully drawn. Blaze’s first person narrative is utterly convincing so that although he is a dog telling the tale completely authentically, the authors create his persona in a way that makes the reader feel as in tune with him as is Rosa. Whilst the people and animals are vivid and appealing, the setting of Skye is also so powerfully depicted the place become a character too. I loved this quality in the writing.

I enjoyed The Magic Flag Mystery without reservation. It seemed to have the appeal that reminded me of my childhood addiction to Enid Blyton but with a fresh and modern feel that is unique to this setting and these characters too. I fear The Magic Flag Mystery might be a quiet book with little recognition but it deserves to be lauded and shared. It’s a cracking tale of adventure and excitement that is just what readers of all ages need in these trying times.

About Lin Anderson

Lin Anderson is best known as the creator of the forensic scientist Rhona MacLeod series of crime thriller novels, and for her part in founding the annual ‘Bloody Scotland’ crime writing festival.

For more information, follow Lin on Twitter @Lin_Anderson or visit her website. You’ll also find her on Facebook and Instagram.

You can also follow Blaze on Twitter @Blazespage and find out more here.

In the current global climate, I can think of no better title for a book than Escape Routes! My enormous thanks to Caitlin Raynor at Headline for a surprise copy of Escape Routes by Naomi Ishiguro in return for an honest review.

Published by Headline imprint Tinder Press on 6th February 2020, Escape Routes is available for purchase through the links here.

Escape Routes

Characterised by its own brand of pleasingly unsettling magic, Naomi Ishiguro’s Escape Routes matches the inventiveness of David Mitchell with the fairy-tale allure of Angela Carter.

A space-obsessed child conjures up a vortex in his mother’s airing cupboard. A musician finds her friendship with a flock of birds opens up unexpected possibilities. A rat catcher, summoned to a decaying royal palace, is plunged into a battle for the throne of a ruined kingdom. Two newlyweds find themselves inhibited by the arrival in their lives of an outsized and watchful stuffed bear.

Whether snared in traps artfully laid for them, or those of their own making, the characters in Naomi Ishiguro’s delightfully speculative debut collection yearn for freedom and flight, and find their worlds transformed beyond their wildest imaginings.

My Review of Escape Routes

A collection of innovative short stories.

It’s going to be impossible to define Escape Routes easily as Naomi Ishiguro’s writing transcends genre, blending and mixing both recognisable and intangible new elements into something fresh, innovative and bewitching. I thoroughly enjoyed this collection which took me several days to read because I found the stories intense and needed to savour and absorb them, giving them the attention they so richly merit.

Reading Escape Routes is a bit like watching the world through a distorted lens. So much of literary history and tradition seems to lurk below the surface, with echoes perhaps of Mary Shelley or Dickens, but as I read, those allusions and connections seemed transient so that it felt like a brief glimpse of a half remembered dream. I thought this effect was just brilliant. I have no idea if that is what the author intended, but it makes for an intriguing and frequently unsettling read. There’s a mystical, magical atmosphere to the stories with a layer of evil in many that echoes traditional fairy or tales or morality stories.

Each individual story, including the three part The Rat Catcher, is a total gem, being carefully crafted, peopled with vibrant and varied characters and plotted with surgical precision so that the endings are surprising and enormously entertaining. Themes of identity, loneliness and being ensnared, swirl like the frequently menacing birds that often feature too. I think the first story in Escape Routes, Wizards, was the one I enjoyed the most, partly because it sets the scene for the theme of inadequacy that so many characters feel, and partly because I felt the greatest emotional connection through Naomi Ishiguro’s wonderful writing.

So many of the characters display beautifully articulated traits that readers will recognise and empathise with. Whilst I loathed Evgeny in Accelerate, I thought his spiral into fragmentation was superbly illustrated by the writing, especially when punctuation was used sparingly so that the mechanics of the text reflected the experience of the character. Many of the characters are ever so slightly absurd too so that it is possible to laugh at them or, in fact, with them. Indeed, despite the darkness of many of the stories, there’s humour and lightness of touch too. I thought the whole collection was so well chosen and balanced, especially with the way The Rat Catcher was split into three parts across the other stories.

Imaginative, unsettling and with a magical undercurrent Escape Routes is a fascinating collection. It is wonderfully entertaining, surprising and just the right amount of. disturbing. I really recommend it.

About Naomi Ishiguro

Naomi Ishiguro studied writing at the University of East Anglia and is a former bookseller and bibliotherapist at Mr B.’s Emporium in Bath. She lives in London.

You can follow Naomi on Twitter @NaomiIshiguro.

You know, some books appeal to me entirely and it’s desperately disappointing when I can’t fit them into my reading because I’m inundated. Liz Treacher has one such book and so I simply had to ask her onto Linda’s Book Bag to stay in with me and tell me all about it.

Staying in with Liz Treacher

Welcome to Linda’s Book Bag, Liz and thank you for agreeing to stay in with me.

Thank you very much for inviting me!

Tell me, which of your books have you brought along to share this evening and why have you chosen it?

I’ve brought along The Wrong Envelope, a feel-good novel set in Devon, 1920 about a determined post lady called Evie Brunton. It’s a humorous romance, (witty rather than slushy) but it also gives a glimpse into what it was like being a young working woman just after the First World War.

It sounds utterly wonderful Liz. So, what can we expect from an evening in with The Wrong Envelope?

The novel begins when Evie’s quiet but satisfying life as a village post lady is turned upside down by the arrival of an impetuous London artist called Bernard Cavalier. Evie is initially horrified by Bernard’s wild and outrageous behaviour, but over the course of the summer, his spontaneous approach to life begins to appeal to her. However Bernard is clumsy and selfish and he brings chaos in his wake.

The Wrong Envelope is a dive into 1920’s Devon with its rugged coastline, rolling hills and high-hedged country lanes. But not everything is idyllic. 1920 was a difficult time in Britain and the shadow of the First World War still hung over everyone. Young women who had possibly lost loved ones in the war were now losing their new-found freedoms as well. Jobs which had been handed to them during the conflict were being taken away again. The novel uses humour and irony to explore how hard it was for women like Evie to chart a meaningful course through life.

I love the sound of The Wrong Envelope Liz. I’m rather fond of between the wars settings.

A fun thing about the novel is that Evie’s timid mother turns out to be the real heroine. As the story unfolds, quiet, dithery Mrs Brunton learns to stick up for herself and what she believes is the right thing to do.

Aha! The quiet ones are often the ones to look out for!

Readers say they enjoy the retro feel of the book, but also the twists and turns of the plot which will have you guessing right till the end.

I cannot wait to read The Wrong Envelope. It sounds exactly my kind of story.

What else have you brought along this evening and why have you brought it?

Two things – something to look at and something to eat!

I’ve brought along a photo of my grandmother. She was born in 1901, so she was always a year younger than the year. When this portrait was taken in 1917 she was sixteen and had just started working for the War Office.

What a simply wonderful photo. Doesn’t she look glorious? Why this photo though?

After she died, we found a suitcase full of letters written to her by a soldier during and after the First World War. The suitcase was tiny, small enough to fit into a bureau, and it was tied up carefully with a green gingham ribbon. I was fascinated by the language of the letters – the cheerfulness and bravado of a soldier trying to woo a young lady. They quickly became the inspiration for the novel.

That’s so romantic. What a wonderful catalyst for your writing.

I’d also like to bring along a plate of scones, complete with cream and jam. Evie’s mother, Mrs Brunton, is a prolific scone maker and her cream teas punctuate the novel and even propel the plot!

Oh you can come again Liz. I think I might just be addicted to cream teas. I don’t get them often so thank you for bringing them along – and for staying in with me to chat about The Wrong Envelope. You pour the tea and I’ll tell blog readers a bit more about The Wrong Envelope.

The Wrong Envelope

Summer 1920 and two different lives are about to collide.

Evie Brunton loves her job. Twice a day, she spins along the narrow lanes of Devon on her bicycle, delivering letters from a heavy post bag. When the flamboyant London artist, Bernard Cavalier, drops like a meteor into her sleepy village, everything changes. Bernard is supposed to be painting for an important exhibition, but the countryside has its own charms, in particular his young post lady…

The Wrong Envelope is available for purchase here.

About Liz Treacher

Liz is a writer and an art photographer. She lives in the Highlands of Scotland beside the sea. Her love of images influences her writing.

Her debut novel, The Wrong Envelope, is a romantic comedy, set in Devon, England, in 1920. It tells the story of Bernard, an impulsive artist and Evie, his determined post lady. Light and witty and full of twists and turns, The Wrong Envelope captures the spirit of another age – when letters could change lives.

The sequel, The Wrong Direction, follows Evie and Bernard to London, and charts their further adventures in Mayfair’s high society. Wild parties, flirtatious models, jealous friends – Bernard and Evie must negotiate many twists and turns if they are to hold on to each other.

To find out more, visit Liz’s website, follow her on Twitter @liztreacher or find her on Instagram and Facebook.

It’s always a real thrill when C. L. Taylor has a new book out and I’m delighted to be helping celebrate the release of her latest, Strangers. My enormous thanks to Sanjana Cunniah at Avon books for inviting me to participate.

Other reviews of C. L. Taylor’s books here on the blog include The Missing, The Treatment, The Fear and Sleep.

Strangers was published by Harper Collins’ imprint Avon on 2nd April 2020 and is available for purchase through these links.

Strangers

Ursula, Gareth and Alice have never met before.

Ursula thinks she killed the love of her life.
Gareth’s been receiving strange postcards.
And Alice is being stalked.

None of them are used to relying on others – but when the three strangers’ lives unexpectedly collide, there’s only one thing for it: they have to stick together. Otherwise, one of them will die.

Three strangers, two secrets, one terrifying evening.

The million-copy bestseller returns with a gripping new novel that will keep you guessing until the end.

My Review of Strangers

Three people linked more closely than they imagine.

It’s always a real pleasure to dive into a new C. L. Taylor novel and Strangers didn’t disappoint, not least because I hadn’t read the blurb for the book and had absolutely no idea how Ursula, Gareth and Alice’s stories might come together so I was kept guessing right until the end of the story.

Whilst there’s the usual twisty, fast pace and thrilling plot that I’ve come to expect from this author, I found Strangers more poignant than her other books because, although each character is flawed, even the most conventionally wicked or unhinged among them is harbouring a sadness, a completely understandable reason for their behaviour and an underlying loneliness and pain that I found very affecting. Indeed, the title Strangers is so apposite because, C.L. Taylor makes the reader understand that no matter how well or little we think we know someone, there’s always a crucial part that is unknowable, separate and unique to them. Ursula’s strand in particular brought this home to me very effectively as I discovered the reason for her compulsion to steal.

I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the characters and felt even the most minor ones were distinct and realistic. Whilst I found some of their attitudes and actions so frustrating I wanted to shake them, I was equally concerned for them too because C.L. Taylor made me care about them. Although the three main characters of Gareth, Alice and Ursula have their own clear and distinct narratives, again it was Ursula to whom I felt closest. Her seeming self-destruction felt so poignant.

The themes of loneliness, guilt, society and the impact of social media, stalking, domestic abuse, mental health and dementia and so on that weave in and out of the plot give a texture and depth that made me contemplate not just the lives of those in the book, but of others in my life and made me wonder how well I have supported them or made assumptions about them. I found this aspect of Strangers enormously unsettling. There’s a brilliant microcosm of society presented in Strangers that is as thought provoking as it is entertaining and that underpins the action without ever over dominating because of C. L. Taylor’s skilled writing.

Strangers is a super read. Cleverly plotted, sensitively handled and exciting, I found it an absorbing and exciting narrative that I fully recommend.

About C.L. Taylor

C.L. Taylor lives in Bristol with her partner and son. She started writing fiction in 2005 and her short stories have won several awards and have been published by a variety of literary and women’s magazines.

C.L. Taylor was voted as one of the Bestselling Adult Fiction Debut Authors of 2014 in The Bookseller.

You can follow C.L. Taylor on Twitter @callytaylor and find out more about her on her web site. You’ll also find her on Facebook.

 

I very rarely return to a book here on Linda’s Book Bag but with Melanie Blake’s The Thunder Girls, a story I thoroughly enjoyed and out as a special 99p e-book this month on Kindle, I am delighted to support this blog tour and would like to thank Martina Ticic at Midas PR for inviting me to participate.

You can read my original review of The Thunder Girls (along with a brief account of a fabulous launch event I attended for the book) here.

The Thunder Girls was published by Pan Macmillan on 11th July 2019 and is available for purchase through these links and in special 99p e-book until the end of April here.

The Thunder Girls

THE

Chrissie, Roxanne, Carly and Anita, an eighties pop sensation outselling and out-classing their competition. Until it all comes to an abrupt end and three of their careers are over, and so is their friendship.

THUNDER

Thirty years later, their old record label wants the band back together for a huge money-making concert. But the wounds are deep and some need this gig more than others.

In those decades apart life was far from the dream they were living as members of The Thunder Girls. Breakdowns, bankruptcy, addiction and divorce have been a constant part of their lives. They’ve been to hell and back, and some are still there.

GIRLS

Can the past be laid to rest for a price, or is there more to this reunion than any of them could possibly know? Whilst they all hunger for a taste of success a second time around, someone is plotting their downfall in the deadliest way possible . . .

Melanie and Lockdown!

Melanie Blake has said that lockdown has turned out to be one of the most positive and life-affirming times in her life against the odds.

As one of the UK’s most successful female entrepreneurs, self-made millionaire and an agent for leading TV stars from Coronation Street, Emmerdale, Hollyoaks, EastEnders and Loose Women as well as a stable of theatre and live performers, when the lockdown started, all performance related income ceased. Having to furlough her staff and put her agency on ice until things return to normal meant the loss of nearly a million pounds overnight. On top of this, Blake and her long term partner parted ways the week before the lockdown started, so she found herself alone and single for the first time in her life.

Melanie says that the experience of losing a fortune and breaking up with her partner has completely transformed her and for the first time in her life she has been able to stop, take stock and put herself first. She is the first to admit that she was a slave to her job and has worked every single day of her life since she was 16 years old and that she could never be alone, always needing a man by her side.

The lockdown is the first time she has been able to stop work and the first time she has found herself living on her own, which she says has completely changed her for the better.

She has started a “binge-read” book group with her street in North London. Eight of her neighbours “meet” three times a week, opening their windows and discussing their chosen books across the street with a glass of fizz. Each neighbour orders the books online and then drops them off on their neighbour’s doorstep at night. They are reading three books a week, which is why they are calling it the Binge Read Book Club.

A handbag addict, with an enviable collection of Chanel handbags, with nowhere to use them, it made her realise just how frivolous it was to have a ‘handbag room’ and she started gifting her prized – and many of them still in the box – handbags to friends who had lost their jobs or loved ones during the pandemic. She has taken down her prize display of handbags in her house and replaced them with books.

The loss of her income has made her re-evaluate what is important in life. Melanie was no stranger to a weekly £500 facial and as a blow dry addict hadn’t washed her own hair in over a decade, but now is taking pride in looking after herself at home and spending time in her own company.

Finally, she has found time to finish her second novel, she had all but given up on it, having suffered from writer’s block for six months, but has now finally found the headspace she needed to write – none of which would have been possible without finding herself in lockdown.

About Melanie Blake

At fifteen years old Melanie Blake was told by her high school career advisers that her decision to do work experience at a local record shop was an ‘embarrassment and a clear example that she wouldn’t go far in life or her career’. They were wrong. By twenty-one she was working at the BBC’s iconic Top of the Pops show and by twenty-seven she had built a reputation as one of the UK’s leading music and entertainment managers, with her own agency and a roster of award-winning artists who had sold more than 100 million records.

After a decade at the top, Melanie decided to manage a smaller client list and concentrate on her other passion, writing – first as a columnist for a national newspaper, then as a playwright and now as a novelist. They say write about what you know, and having lived and breathed every aspect of the music and entertainment industry, in The Thunder Girls she certainly has.

Find out more by following Melanie on Twitter @MelanieBlakeUK or visiting The Thunder Girls website and there’s a Thunder Girls Facebook page here too.

There’s more with these other bloggers too:

I’ve been trying to feature books for children during the current global crisis when so many parents are home schooling and would like to thank author Jeff Roland for sending me a copy of Maury the Miserable Vampire in return for an honest review.

Along with other Maury merchandise, Maury the Miserable Vampire is available for purchase here.

Maury the Miserable Vampire

Maury the Miserable Vampire lived in a cold, dark castle and he liked it that way. He never laughed, he never smiled, and he never went outside.

When his only friend, Barry the Bat, suddenly disappears, Maury must summon the courage to set out into the world for the very first time in order to find him.

Along the way, Maury meets friendly, funny monsters from across the globe and learns about other cultures, teamwork and, most importantly, the value of friendship.

My Review of Maury the Miserable Vampire

Maury is always miserable.

Maury the Miserable Vampire is a charming story for young children that not only entertains, but educates too as Maury finds himself travelling the world from Egypt to Europe in search of his friend Barry.

Maury the Miserable Vampire is written in a simple style that can be read to children or which can be read independently, with an excellent balance of text to image and white space. There’s evocative and effective onomatopoeia, ellipsis, rhetorical questions and a lovely balance of different sentence lengths to retain attention and give pace to the story.

I thoroughly enjoyed the incorporation of traditional figures from horror such as witches, vampires, mummies and werewolves as these might usually scare children but here they are seen as kind and caring individuals so that children’s fears can be dissipated. They way they are depicted in the illustrations is charming too and I appreciated the range of skin tones because it gives equality of status to all regardless of race, even when they are green!

In fact, that’s one of the themes Jeff Roland includes so well into Maury the Miserable Vampire. He celebrates difference and shows young readers that they can be friends with others who might seem very different. Themes of friendship, team work and caring come through very strongly so that children can learn how to exist alongside their peers.

Maury himself is a character many young children will empathise with. He initially struggles with the unfamiliar, and it is only when he tries and goes beyond his usual comfort zone that he succeeds and realises he needs to listen as well as speak. His experience is a valuable life lesson for children.

I thought Maury the Miserable Vampire was a thoroughly appealing and entertaining story that children will love.

About Jeff Roland

Jeff Roland works as a writer and creative producer for various film, television and marketing companies in Los Angeles, CA. He once ate four foot-long chili dogs in a row and lived.

You can follow Jeff on Twitter @JefeRolando and visit his Maury website. You’ll find Maury on Facebook too!

Whilst we’re unable to meet in person at the moment, it’s lovely to ‘stay in’ virtually with authors and I’m delighted to welcome Caro Land to spend the evening with me and tell us all about one of her books.

Staying in with Caro Land

Welcome back to Linda’s Book Bag, Caro and thank you for agreeing to stay in with me.

Thanks for having me to stay!

Tell me, which of your books have you brought along to share this evening?

Tonight I’ve brought along CONVICTIONS, the start of a legal drama series starring my feisty solicitor protagonist Natalie Bach. It’s written under my pen name Caro Land and the follow-up CONFESSIONS will be published in June this year.

How exciting to have a new series. Congratulations. And for those who don’t realise, Caro’s other author name is Caroline England and she has featured here on the blog before with a fabulous guest post to celebrate Beneath The Skin.

Why did you choose to bring CONVICTIONS?

I have brought it along because I think you’ll love Natalie Bach. Readers have described her as smart and strong but with a vulnerable side. She’s fun, likes to stick up for the underdog and practise her self-styled feminism whenever she can. The only trouble is that at times she treads a fine line between helping and hindering.

I can think of several people who tread that fine line Caro! What can we expect from an evening in with CONVICTIONS?

CONVICTIONS is a side step from my Caroline England psychological thrillers Beneath the Skin, My Husband’s Lies and Betray Her as the plot has a backdrop of a solicitor’s office.

After a five year absence, Natalie returns to Manchester. Her old boss is delighted to have her back at Goldman Law, but his partner, Wesley Hughes, is less keen.

Just like old times, Jack Goldman immediately embroils Nat with cases he would prefer to keep away from prying eyes, including a criminal charge against his estranged son Julian. Nat soon gets stuck into raft of legal, ethical and moral dilemmas which, with the help of fellow lawyer Gavin Savage, she eventually untangles.

Though the story touches on aspects of the law, including crime, sexual assault, entrapment, abuse of power and attempted murder, relationships are at the fore of the narrative. And as usual with all my novels, there are twists, turns, reveals and some darkness. However, there is humour too, so I would describe it as more intriguing legal uplit than a taut thriller.

CONVICTIONS sounds brilliant. I’m thrilled I have it on my TBR to read as soon as I can Caro.

What else have you brought along and why?

Don’t worry, I haven’t brought along a legal tome from my lawyer days! Natalie and her escapades have a legal setting but they don’t dwell on the many dull aspects of the law.

That’s a relief!

I have brought along two of my three cats – Poppy and Lewie – who also happen to live with Natalie!

That’s perfect (or should that be purrfect?) Caro. I am a real cat lover. If you’d like to leave Poppy and Lewie behind when you go that would be wonderful! Thanks so much for staying in with me and chatting with me all about CONVICTIONS. Let me tell blog readers what else they need to know:

CONVICTIONS

There are two sides to every crime…

Returning home to care for her ill mother, and approaching her fortieth birthday, Natalie Bach is devastated when she’s dumped without explanation by her long-term boyfriend.

Struggling to pick herself up, she’s offered her old job at Goldman Law. Jack Goldman’s estranged son Julian has been arrested for attempted murder and he wants Natalie to find out why.

With the help of fellow solicitor Gavin Savage, Natalie sets out to investigate, but with a series of red herrings ahead, will she ever discover the truth?

And can Natalie avoid her personal problems interfering with the case?

Published by Bloodhound on 27th January 2020, CONVICTIONS is available for purchase here.

About Caro Land

Caro Land is the pen name of Caroline England.

Born in Sheffield, Caroline studied Law at the University of Manchester and stayed over the border. Caroline was a divorce and professional indemnity lawyer. She turned to writing when she deserted the law to bring up her three lovely daughters. Caroline has had short stories and poems published in a variety of literary publications and anthologies.

Caroline writes domestic psychological thrillers. Her debut novel, Beneath The Skin, known also as The Wife’s Secret in eBook, was published by Avon HarperCollins in October 2017. Her second novel, My Husband’s Lies, followed in May 2018 and became a Kindle top ten bestseller. Her latest novel, Betray Her, published by Piatkus of Little, Brown Book Group, is now available as an eBook, audiobook and paperback.

Caroline has two dark, twisty short story collections available on Amazon, both in eBook and paperback, Watching Horsepats Feed The Roses and Hanged By The Neck.

Caroline also writes under the pen name Caro Land. Her first Natalie Bach legal suspense, CONVICTIONS, was published by Bloodhound Books in January 2020. The follow up, CONFESSIONS, will publish in June 2020

You can follow Caroline on Twitter @CazEngland and find her on Instagram and  Facebook. Visit her website for further information.

I’m thrilled to feature the Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize shortlist on Linda’s Book Bag, not least because Surge by Jay Bernard, that I reviewed here, has made it through to the final six and I was lucky enough to attend the shortlist evening at the British Library last year. You can read about that evening here. Also, one of this year’s judges, Ian McMillan will, world events permitting, be one of the authors at the Deepings Literary Festival, where I live, next year.

Worth £30,000, it is one of the UK’s most prestigious literary prizes as well as the world’s largest literary prize for young writers. Awarded for the best published literary work in the English language, written by an author aged 39 or under, the Prize celebrates the international world of fiction in all its forms including poetry, novels, short stories and drama.

With life currently very different, this year the Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prizewinner will be announced at 19:00 GMT Thursday 14^th May in a virtual ceremony.

You can find all the latest news about this year’s award on Twitter by following #IDTP20 or @dylanthomprize.

The Swansea University website has all you need to know too.

Celebrating the Prize’s 15^th anniversary the Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize is this year dominated by young and experimental poets:

• Surge – Jay Bernard (Chatto & Windus)
• Flèche – Mary Jean Chan (Faber & Faber)
• Inland – Téa Obreht (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)
• If All the World and Love were Young – Stephen Sexton (Penguin Random House)
• On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous – Ocean Vuong (Jonathan Cape, Vintage)
• Lot – Bryan Washington (Atlantic Books)

From Jay Bernard whose collection Surge addresses black radical British history against the backdrop of the Grenfell and Windrush scandals, to Hong Kong-born LGBTQ+ poet Mary Jean Chan for Flèche which tackles themes of multilingualism, queerness, psychoanalysis and cultural history and Belfast poet Stephen Sexton who explores grief through his love of Super Mario Games, each are recognised for their powerful, political and deeply personal debut collections.

In fiction three incredibly talented international writers are recognised, including Vietnamese-American poet and essayist Ocean Vuong who is celebrated for his international bestselling lyrical novel On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, Belgrade-born Orange Prize winner Téa Obreht whose latest novel Inland paints a portrait of the American dream in the Wild West and Bryan Washington’s Lot which presents a collection of interlinked short stories deep-diving into his native Houston.

About the six shortlisted titles,who were judged by a bumper guest panel, the chair of the judges Swansea University’s Professor Dai Smith CBE said:

“The shortlist for 2020 ranges across the genres of poetry, short form fiction and the novel, and each work manages to address upfront the pressing social and personal concerns and dilemmas of our time. But what suddenly stands out in stark relief, amidst the overwhelming global nature of the crisis in which all humanity now finds itself struggling to cope, are the universal values which these disparate books highlight: compassion, empathy, courage against despair, anger against indifference, love in despite of everything. In a very dark time these six supremely talented young writers do what all such writers do: they light the way, and so must be read for all our sakes.”

Let’s take a look at each of the shortlisted works:

Surge – Jay Bernard (Chatto & Windus)

Jay Bernard’s extraordinary debut is a fearlessly original exploration of the black British archive: an enquiry into the New Cross Fire of 1981, a house fire at a birthday party in south London in which thirteen young black people were killed.

Dubbed the ‘New Cross Massacre’, the fire was initially believed to be a racist attack, and the indifference with which the tragedy was met by the state triggered a new era of race relations in Britain.

Tracing a line from New Cross to the ‘towers of blood’ of the Grenfell fire, this urgent collection speaks with, in and of the voices of the past, brought back by the incantation of dancehall rhythms and the music of Jamaican patois, to form a living presence in the absence of justice.

A ground-breaking work of excavation, memory and activism – both political and personal, witness and documentary – Surge shines a much-needed light on an unacknowledged chapter in British history, one that powerfully resonates in our present moment.

About Jay Bernard

Jay Bernard is the author of the pamphlets Your Sign is Cuckoo, Girl (Tall Lighthouse, 2008), English Breakfast (Math Paper Press, 2013) and The Red and Yellow Nothing (Ink Sweat & Tears Press, 2016), which was shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award 2017. A film programmer at BFI Flare and an archivist at Statewatch, they also participated in ‘The Complete Works II’ project in 2014, mentored by Kei Miller. Jay was a Foyle Young Poet of the Year in 2005 and a winner of SLAMbassadors UK spoken word championship. Their poems have been collected in Voice Recognition: 21 Poets for the 21st Century (Bloodaxe, 2009), The Salt Book of Younger Poets (Salt, 2011), Ten: The New Wave (Bloodaxe, 2014) and Out of Bounds: British Black & Asian Poets (Bloodaxe, 2014).

You can find out more on Jay’s website.

Flèche – Mary Jean Chan (Faber & Faber)

Much like the fencer who must constantly read and respond to her opponent’s tactics during a fencing bout, this debut collection by Mary Jean Chan deftly examines relationships at once conflictual and tender.

Flèche(the French word for ‘arrow’) is an offensive technique commonly used in épée, a competitive sport of the poet’s teenage and young adult years. This cross-linguistic pun presents the queer, non-white body as both vulnerable (‘flesh’) and weaponised (‘flèche‘) in public and private spaces. Themes of multilingualism, queerness, post-colonialism, psychoanalysis and cultural history emerge by means of an imagined personal, maternal and national biography, spoken by a polyphony of female voices. The result is a series of poems that are urgent and hard-hitting as Chan keeps her readers on their toes, dazzling and devastating them by turn.

About Mary Jean Chan

Mary Jean Chan is a London-based poet, lecturer and editor from Hong Kong. Her debut poetry collection, Flèche(Faber & Faber), is the winner of the 2019 Costa Book Award for Poetry. Chan has twice been shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem and is the recipient of a 2019 Eric Gregory Award and the 2018 Poetry Society Geoffrey Dearmer Prize. Chan currently lectures in Creative Writing at Oxford Brookes University. Visit her website or follow her on Twitter @maryjean_chan

Inland – Téa Obreht (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)

Nora is an unflinching frontierswoman awaiting the return of the men in her life, biding her time with her youngest son – who is convinced that a mysterious beast is stalking the land around their home – and her husband’s seventeen-year-old cousin, who communes with spirits.

Lurie is a former outlaw and a man haunted by ghosts. He sees lost souls who want something from him, and he finds reprieve from their longing in an unexpected relationship that inspires a momentous expedition across the West.

Mythical, lyrical, and sweeping in scope, Inland is grounded in true but little-known history. It showcases all of Téa Obreht’s talents as a writer, as she subverts and reimagines the myths of the American West, making them entirely – and unforgettably – her own.

About Téa Obreht

Téa Obreht is the author of The Tiger’s Wife, winner of the Orange Prize and a finalist for the National Book Award, and Inland. She was born in Belgrade, in the former Yugoslavia, in 1985 and has lived in the United States since the age of twelve. She currently lives in New York City. Follow her on Instagram @teaobreht.

If All the World and Love were Young – Stephen Sexton (Penguin Random House)

When Stephen Sexton was young, video games were a way to slip through the looking glass; to be in two places at once; to be two people at once. In these poems about the death of his mother, this moving, otherworldly narrative takes us through the levels of Super Mario World, whose flowered landscapes bleed into our world, and ours, strange with loss, bleed into it. His remarkable debut is a daring exploration of memory, grief and the necessity of the unreal.

About Stephen Sexton

Stephen Sexton lives in Belfast where he teaches at the Seamus Heaney Centre for Poetry. His first book, If All the World and Love Were Young, is forthcoming from Penguin. Follow him on Twitter @ssexton02.

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous – Ocean Vuong (Jonathan Cape, Vintage)

Brilliant, heart-breaking, tender, and highly original – poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a sweeping and shattering portrait of a family, and a testament to the redemptive power of storytelling.

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late twenties, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born – a history whose epicentre is rooted in Vietnam – and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation. At once a witness to the fraught yet undeniable love between a single mother and her son, it is also a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity. Asking questions central to the American moment, immersed as it is in addiction, violence, and trauma, but undergirded by compassion and tenderness, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is as much about the power of telling one’s own story as it is about the obliterating silence of not being heard.

With stunning urgency and grace, Ocean Vuong writes of people caught between disparate worlds, and asks how we heal and rescue one another without forsaking who we are. The question of how to survive, and how to make of it a kind of joy, powers the most important debut novel of many years.

About Ocean Vuong

Ocean Vuong is the author of the critically acclaimed poetry collection Night Sky with Exit Wounds, winner of the Whiting Award and the T.S. Eliot Prize. His writings have also been featured in The Atlantic, Harper’s, The Nation, New Republic, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. In 2019 he was awarded a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship. Born in Saigon, Vietnam, he currently lives in Northampton, Massachusetts, where he serves as an Assistant Professor of English at UMass-Amherst. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is his first novel. Visit his website for more information.

Lot – Bryan Washington (Atlantic Books)

Stories of a young man finding his place among family and community in Houston, from a powerful, emerging American voice.

In the city of Houston – a sprawling, diverse microcosm of America – the son of a black mother and a Latino father is coming of age. He’s working at his family’s restaurant, weathering his brother’s blows, resenting his older sister’s absence. And discovering he likes boys.

This boy and his family experience the tumult of living in the margins, the heartbreak of ghosts, and the braveries of the human heart. The stories of others living and thriving and dying across Houston’s myriad neighbourhoods are woven throughout to reveal a young woman’s affair detonating across an apartment complex, a rag-tag baseball team, a group of young hustlers, the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, a local drug dealer who takes a Guatemalan teen under his wing, and a reluctant chupacabra.

Bryan Washington’s brilliant, viscerally drawn world leaps off the page with energy, wit, and the infinite longing of people searching for home. With soulful insight into what makes a community, a family, and a life, Lot is about love in all its unsparing and unsteady forms.

About Bryan Washington

Bryan Washington is a National Book Award 5 Under 35 honouree and the author of the collection, Lot, and the forthcoming novel, Memorial. He has written for The New Yorker, The New York Times, the New York Times Magazine, BuzzFeed, Vulture, The Paris Review, Tin House, One Story, Bon Appétit, GQ, The Awl, and Catapult. He lives in Houston.

 

 

 

With such a feast of talent on offer this year I wouldn’t like to hazard a guess as to who will win the Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize, but whichever of these talented young writers takes the prize, they will be a worthy winner.

I have been desperately awaiting a new book from Chris Whitaker for far too long and am thrilled to be part of the launch celebrations of his latest novel We Begin At The End. My enormous thanks to Zaffre books for sending me a copy of We Begin At The End and to Tracy Fenton for inviting me to participate in this blog tour.

I adore Chris Whitaker’s writing. I reviewed his debut Tall Oaks here and his second novel, All The Wicked Girls, here. All The Wicked Girls was one of my Books of the Year in 2017 too.

We Begin At The End was published by Zaffre on 2nd April 2020 and is available for purchase here.

We Begin At The End

‘You can’t save someone that doesn’t want to be saved . . .’

Thirty years ago, Vincent King became a killer.

Now, he’s been released from prison and is back in his hometown of Cape Haven, California. Not everyone is pleased to see him. Like Star Radley, his ex-girlfriend, and sister of the girl he killed.

Duchess Radley, Star’s thirteen-year-old daughter, is part-carer, part-protector to her younger brother, Robin – and to her deeply troubled mother. But in trying to protect Star, Duchess inadvertently sets off a chain of events that will have tragic consequences not only for her family, but also the whole town.

Murder, revenge, retribution.

How far can we run from the past when the past seems doomed to repeat itself?

My Review of We Begin At The End

Sissy Radley’s death is just the start.

It’s no secret that I adore Chris Whitaker’s writing and will come as no surprise that I had probably unreasonably high expectations of We Begin At The End. Chris Whitaker has surpassed every one of those expectations, leaving me reeling and emotionally broken. At one point in my reading of We Begin At The End I genuinely had to pause because the tension was so great I was holding my breath and in danger of forgetting to exhale ever again. It felt akin to immersing myself in a modern day Steinbeck with the insight into human nature of Shakespeare. We Begin At The End is, quite simply, stunning.

Certainly, We Begin At The End is a flawlessly plotted crime thriller, with twists and turns that entertain and surprise, in a fast paced and totally absorbing fashion. I loved the attention to detail Chris Whitaker provides, making the landscape and setting just as much part of the story as the action. There’s a wonderful balance between the claustrophobic Cape Haven and the wider skies of Montana that is so satisfying, transporting the reader completely. It’s not possible to say too much about the plot without spoilers but I can’t remember the last time I finished a book and simply wanted to read it again immediately because I couldn’t quite believe how brilliant it was.

However, We Begin At The End is so much more than one of the best thrillers I’ve read. I’m struggling to find vocabulary that expresses just how emotional it is to read We Begin At The End and how sublimely beautiful the prose is. Frequently, pared down sentences convey such depth of exquisite meaning that is almost physically painful to read, especially with regard to Duchess. It’s no exaggeration to say that I think she might be the most affecting character I’ve ever encountered. Her relationships with the other people are so tenderly drawn and so desperately sad that I wasn’t sure I’d be able to contain myself. My heart broke for her and I lost count of the times I wept for her too.

Indeed all the characters, regardless of their actions, are depicted as real, flawed and totally believable. What Chris Whitaker manages to achieve is such a blurring of good and evil, of right and wrong, in the people of Cape Haven that I felt a tangible and palpable connection to every one of them. Walk in particular engendered such a range of responses in me as a reader from frustration and despair to admiration and pity that I felt I was no longer in control of my own reactions.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I am unable to do justice to We Begin At The End because there isn’t a superfluous character, moment or word that mars a totally fantastic narrative. It is an absolutely outstanding masterclass in perfect writing and I adored it. I’ve said elsewhere that I think Chris Whitaker’s writing touches a reader’s soul and in We Begin At The End he doesn’t merely touch that soul. He captures it entirely and doesn’t let go.

About Chris Whitaker

Chris Whitaker was born in London and spent ten years working as a financial trader in the city. His debut novel, Tall Oaks, won the CWA John Creasey New Blood Dagger.

Chris’s second novel, All The Wicked Girls, was published in August 2017. He lives in Hertfordshire with his wife and two young sons.

You can follow Chris on Twitter @WhittyAuthor.

There’s more with these other bloggers too:

When Martina Ticic from Midas PR got in touch to see if I’d like to be part of the launch celebrations for 8 1/ Stone by Liz Jones, I jumped at the chance and I would like to thank Martina for inviting me to participate. I am thrilled to have an extract from 8 1/2 Stone to share with you today.

Published by Matthew James, 8 1/2 Stone is available for purchase here.

8 1/2 Stone

When I reach eight and a half stone:

•  I will be able to shop in Topshop. If only I could fit in a size 10 or an 8, just walk in a shop and not even have to try it on because let’s face it I will be straight up and down, then everything would slot neatly into place, completing the easiest jigsaw puzzle in the world: all straight edges.
• I will be able to go swimming and not displace all the water and create a tsunami.
•  I will fit in changing rooms, without banging my elbows or exposing the moon of my arse through the curtain when I bend over.
•  I will be able to fit behind the narrow benches at Ronnie Scott’s to listen to jazz instead of being offered a chair, at the end.
• I will be promoted and not have my desk moved to inside the stationery cupboard.

An Extract from 8/2 Stone

Because that is what always happens after a diet. You relapse. You inflate like a hovercraft. You revert to type. You find your natural level, like Lake Victoria.

Which is why I am considering plastic surgery – after a great deal of thought and having made a list of pros and cons. Pros: I will be able to wear normal clothes, my husband might want sex with me, I might not die of a heart attack. Cons: the expense, time off work, might die. Leaps forward in technology and medical discoveries must be good for something, surely. I am thinking liposuction, and a tummy tuck to excise the strange little flap of skin that is a legacy from post-twin diet number 252. (My friend Izzy made me go to Chewton Glen in the New Forest – don’t worry, it had just been refurbed – for a week, where I was on a juice-only regimen with added boot camp and wrapped in wet bandages in a bid to rearrange my organs and reduce my equator, after a particularly invasive colonic where the therapist kept finding peas: ‘Mattar paneer,’ I told her. ‘I’m married to an Indian.’) Anyway, this skin flap is currently covering my pudenda in a generous curtain, much like the one at the Royal Opera House, only not made of red velvet. I haven’t told a soul yet that I’m considering going under The Knife, but I’m secretly browsing websites and imagining how great my new life will be.

Even on my 30th birthday night, when we returned from the sandwich bar at precisely 8.29 p.m., after my disastrous at-home spa and once Neps had lowered his eyes after raising them long enough to give me Harvey’s Bristol Cream liqueurs in a bid to give me either liver cancer or type 2 diabetes so he can at last bury me in an extra-large grave and remarry a stick insect, I had opened my own rather ancient and heavy laptop (like mother, like daughter) and started browsing websites depicting smiling supermodels who obviously never needed to go under a knife in the first place, but were still standing there, in a red, high-cut swimsuit, boobs thrust out, back curved, one knee forward, hand on non-existent hip. This could be my birthday gift to myself, to kick off a brand-new decade: major invasive surgery and anaesthetic that might just finish me off. Browsing these sites, being taken in by the promises, is exactly the same as being addicted to Rightmove.co.uk, except instead of searching for a new house, I am looking for the perfect new body to move into: downsizing, if you will. My life will be happy, once I have a utility room, a marble wet room, an eat-in kitchen and a stomach that doesn’t resemble a pair of obese buttocks. My mission, should I choose to accept it? To get down to my dream weight, a number I have not owned since I was seven.

To be eight and a half stone.

About Liz Jones

Liz Jones has millions of readers across the world and was shortlisted five times in the last six years as Columnist of the Year at the British Press Awards and Columnist of the Year 2012 at the BSME awards. Liz Jones, former editor-in-chief of Marie Claire — where she ran a high profile campaign to ban skinny models — fashion editor at the Daily Mail and now columnist at the Mail on Sunday, grew up in Essex, and suffered from eating disorders from the age of 11 until her late thirties.

You can find out more on Liz’s website, by following her on Twitter @LizJonesGoddess and finding her on Facebook.

There’s more with these other bloggers too: