by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
This book took me by surprise. Firstly, by how vitriolic he was toward those he felt had let him down and secondly how right wing his views seem from the standpoint of the twenty first century.
What the book captures really well is how oppressive Western democracy/capitalism can be albeit in a different way to soviet communism. An interesting but long winded book. 6/10
by Patricia Lockwood
What to make of this book? First of all I needed an urban slang dictionary next to me to understand some of the language. Then, I ended the book in tears. The writing is fresh and engaging although some of the metaphors took some stretching of the imagination to work.
In the end it seemed to be an internet meets reality type of book and the writing about reality in part two wins hands down. 8/10
by JMG Le Clezio
This book is beautiful.
It follows a young woman called Lalla alongside the march of people in 1910 from South Sudan to Morocco where they were slaughtered by colonial forces. The echos of this event seem to haunt the book. There is a chapter where Lalla is walking through Marseilles after leaving her aunt which is mesmerising. The use of language-even in translation- is wonderful. 9/10
