For the first time in my life, I’ve kept a reading journal consistently! It’s helping my writing AND making my reading more thoughtful, so I’m planning to share what I’m reading and what I’ve noted down here on Substack. So far I’ve got a 100% hit rate for tracking my books… but I haven’t been taking notes or copying down quotes as consistently as I’d like. I’ve noticed that when I take the time to do both, I engage with books differently and get more from them. So hopefully this extra accountability will give me the nudge.
This month, I’ll focus on the novels I read. There’s some pretty consistent themes in here, because I’m experimenting with some ideas in my own work. Multiple POVs, marginalised stories, working class voices, and family sagas feature heavily.
Note: Future Reading Journal posts will be for paid subscribers only, but this first edition is free. If you're not a reader, feel free to skip this!
The Marriage Plot, by Jeffrey Eugenides
My rating: 3.7/5
TL;DR Literary pretension that's actually pretty great. Follows students after university grappling with life, love, and identity.
I bought this at a second-hand shop in Levin during a random adventure. I’m usually wary of books that are trying too hard to impress as literary fiction. (For those unclear on what differentiates literary fiction from genre, look for obscure references to classical literature or plots centering on angsty and intellectual university students.) While The Marriage Plot qualifies on the literary wank-o-meter - tortured artists, English majors and rich people with time for more interiority than their crises objectively deserve - I still thought it was a great read.
Eugenides is a terrific writer who constructs highly readable, straightforward prose. All the characters had a chance to be complete people, though I didn’t feel much of a connection with any of them. The protagonist, Madeleine, is dull and difficult to care about. The writer knows that and hints at her mundanity through the criticisms of people around her. I appreciated that and rated it higher for exactly that reason. Long live the unlikeable female protagonist.
Notable quote
“In Madeleine's face was a stupidity Mitchell had never seen before. It was the stupidity of all normal people. It was the stupidity of the fortunate and the beautiful, of everybody who got what they wanted in life and so remained unremarkable.”
Read if: You're a literary nerd who appreciates nuanced, flawed characters and intellectual references.
Avoid if: You have low tolerance for privileged malaise or academic pretension.
Shuggie Bain, by Douglas Stuart (re-read)
My rating: 4.7/5
TL;DR: Powerful portrayal of addiction, poverty, and family in working-class, Thatcher-era Glasgow.
This is an extraordinary book filled with emotional upheaval, dazzling character complexity, and profound humanity. It is an incredible talent to write terrible characters doing awful things in a bleak world… and yet stir so much HOPE and connection in a reader. Stuart’s treatment of Shuggies’s alcoholic mother, Agnes, is masterful. Despite all her failings, her addiction, and the shocking mistreatment of her children, we grow to love Agnes, to sympathise with her, and even to excuse her failings - just as Shuggie found himself doing. Tremendous.
I first read this novel in 2020, shortly after it won the Booker Prize. I'm exploring similar themes in my creative writing, so it definitely felt like time to revisit Shuggie Bain. I loved it even more the second time, but I was so absorbed in the re-read that I forgot I was supposed to look for technical aspects! I’ll have to read it a third time, and I’m OK with that. Douglas Stuart is a priceless gift to the world. If you haven’t read this book yet, please do it now.
Notable quote
“Shuggie heard the nurse say to a male attendant that she thought for sure Agnes was a working girl. “She is not,” said Shuggie, quite proudly. “My mother has never worked a day in her life. She’s far too good-looking for that.
Read if: You appreciate emotionally intense, character-driven narratives and don’t mind a good sob.
Avoid if: You don’t enjoy dialect (you will start speaking Glaswegian in your head!)
Mayflies, by Andrew O’Hagan
My rating: 4/5
TL;DR: Warm, nostalgic story of friendship, punk music, rebellion, and mortality.
Ooh, he’s a lovely bloody writer, that Andrew O’Hagan. I borrowed this from the library because I'd seen it everywhere. I loved how tight and intimate its scope was: two school friends navigating pivotal experiences in their youth during the punk era, later confronting illness and grief in adulthood. It captures beautifully how we carry the rebellious experience of youth into a middle-aged existence, and asks thoughtful, quiet questions about friendship, loyalty and family.
I really enjoyed this book. I grinned while the two men blasted through a ridiculous blow-out weekend watching punk bands in Manchester and shed a tear as their friendship culminated in connection, sickness, and loss 30 years later. They include important women as secondary characters, but still manage for them to have complexity and character, rather than being relegated to two-dimensional afterthoughts (unfortunately, a skill that got a bit lost in his later work… see below.) Overall: lovely, lovely, lovely.
Notable quote
"They say you know nothing at eighteen. But there are things you know at eighteen that you will never know again."
Read if: You like heartwarming nostalgia and want to catch a few feelings.
Avoid if: Punk music or male bonding stories aren't your thing.
No Church in the Wild, by Murray Middleton
My rating: 3.2/5
TL;DR: Ambitious critique of class, culture, education and society in inner-city Melbourne. Engaging but occasionally preachy.
I picked this up at an Australian airport months ago, again looking for fresh takes on working-class and marginalised narratives. In many ways, this book delivers that. Middleton, a former teacher, is critical of the Victorian justice and education system’s treatment of disadvantaged kids and refugees. The story was intense, revealing, and ambitious, if a bit technically uneven. There are so many points of view that it’s easy to get lost, and the grand finale event was a bit glossed over, which is more of a writing skill issue than a plot gap?
I also struggled with an occasional lecturey/ tell-not-show vibe. This would have been a more powerful story if Middleton had trusted the reader to infer some of his lessons rather than dropping them head-first into the narrative. That said, it’s still a terrific read, and it isn’t at all one-sided. Middleton fleshes out the points of view of the antagonist with empathy, despite moments of heavy-handedness, and the plot hurtles along at pace. While I might have been occasionally annoyed at the tone, the book was difficult to put down, and I gobbled it up in a day. It’s brave, it’s different, it’s tackling hard topics and telling untold stories, and it’s worth a read.
Read if: You enjoy bold, gritty, social critiques.
Avoid if: You prefer subtlety and fewer perspectives.
There There, by Tommy Orange
My rating: 4.5/5
TL;DR: Powerful, multigenerational Native American narrative, tightly woven and emotionally charged.
Wow, what a novel! 12 characters, three parts, a hurtling and interconnected plot, with no ultimate resolution needed. Tight, fast, and small. Punchy and restrained in language, description and length. An incredible feat for a debut novel.
There There tells the story of a disparate but ultimately connected group of Native American people, building to a tragic event in Oakland. Orange is clearly writing what he knows. The characters all have strong voices and speak for themselves. Like Shuggie Bain, we find ourselves empathising with flawed people who occasionally do terrible things, and that’s such a gift in a book, and such an important view to bring to the world around us. There is no judgement, no moralising, and every character gets to be fully realised, in total honesty. I adored this.
Like Homegoing (below), There There challenges and sheds new light on often-sanitised historical narratives, giving us a new lens to examine racial disparity and injustice through. Many of the books I read this month featured multiple perspectives on marginalised communities, but some pulled it off better than others. From a technical standpoint, Orange pulls off what Middleton is attempting in his book. We engage with many points of view, and the plot builds toward an event that brings all of the perspectives together in surprising ways that land like an emotional gut-punch.
Side note: After I finished this book, I went hunting for good conversations with the author to get more insight into his personal background and writing process. Much to my surprise, the best conversation in this book was with Dua Lipa, a surprisingly insightful interviewer who I now know is the founder of the media company Service95. Can’t she leave something for the rest of us? Amazing.
Notable quote:
“Some of us got this feeling stuck inside, all the time, like we’ve done something wrong. Like we ourselves are something wrong. Like who we are deep inside, that thing we want to name but can’t, it’s like we’re afraid we’ll be punished for it. So we hide, we drink alcohol, because it helps us feel we can be ourselves and not be afraid. But we punish outselves with it. The thing we most don’t want has a way of landing right on top of us.
(OOF)
Read if: You want to learn and love from a new angle.
Avoid if: Multiple POVs frustrate you.
Homegoing, by Yaa Gyasi
My rating: 4.6/5
TL;DR: Sweeping historical drama exploring the devastating legacy of slavery through generations.
This novel became controversial in America when it was included in school curriculum. I can see why it made people uncomfortable! It challenges and enlightens from a perspective rarely told in history books, and it doesn’t hold back on violence, gore, and sex. This book was an extraordinary read - part historical epic, part family drama - that offers an untold story and important insight into the brutal history and legacy of the transatlantic slave trade.
Content aside, this was an extremely ambitious novel, covering a vast expanse of time, from multiple perspectives - and the author pulls it off. Gyasi brings empathy, tenderness, and nuance, as well as incredible historical detail. The prose is beautiful, the plot rockets along, and I was gripped from start to finish. No notes.
Notable quote
“This is the problem of history. We cannot know that which we were not there to see and hear and experience for ourselves. We must rely upon the words of others.”
Read if: You love drama, history, and untold stories.
Avoid if: You’re queasy with sex and violence.
Caledonian Road, by Andrew O’Hagan
My rating: 4.5/5
TL;DR: Broad examination of contemporary British society through class, technology, and politics. Richly observed but slightly marred by simplistic portrayals of women.
I decided to read this whopper, which has been gracing plinths in bookstores everywhere, after loving Mayflies. This is a very different book - you would almost think it was by a different author. While Mayflies hints at political themes and social unrest, Caledonian Road turns the dial up to 1,000. It tackles a staggering scope of modern issues in the British context - class divisions, political cynicism, digital alienation, identity, consumerism, performative social justice, academia, poverty, gang life, immigration, Brexit, the struggle to maintain authenticity in a fragmented society, ++++ - and succeeds.
O’Hagan makes terrific use of language and isn’t afraid of a decadent adjective (perspicacious, lugubrious, insouciant, take your pick) but where this book really excels are it’s witty, biting observations. Part social satire, part existential angst, this book strikes the perfect balance of poking fun at everyone while disrespecting no-one, while keeping the big issues well in frame. He writes in close third person but never loses interiority, and he scatters the jam-packed plot and narrative, already bursting with ideas, with casual mic-drop insights. A couple of my favourites, slotted into the thought-process of a secondary character were ‘The middle classes collect items in order to be themselves’ or ‘But this was Britain, where the routines of civility and the habits of art are threaded with a history of brutality.’ Chefs kiss.
My only mild annoyance were the female characters, who were a bit two-dimensional and reduced to being saints or sinners, as secondary characters. This was glaringly obvious in comparison to the nuanced complexity of the all-male main character cast. This remains a problem in modern literature - Intermezzo by Sally Rooney was another shocker for this - and annoying given how well O’Hagan avoided this trap in Mayflies just a few years ealier.
Overall, the scope of this book is astonishing, and the results are utterly outstanding. The amount of research, effort, and thought that has been poured into each of the 600+ pages blew my mind. I loved it.
Read if: You love witty, sarcastic observations and are engaged with politics, technology and culture.
Avoid if: You can’t handle 600+ pages.
Wandering Stars, by Tommy Orange
My rating: 3.8/5
TL;DR: Rich continuation of There There, exploring complex family histories and identity with nuance and emotional depth.
Encouraged by my love for There There, I immediately read its sequel, Wandering Stars. This novel revisits characters and themes from the original novel with similar depth and complexity. It was another rewarding read, though didn’t have quite the same suckerpunch as the first book (always a risk with sequels.) I will read anything Tommy Orange writes, forever, so I’m OK with it.
Read if: You’ve already read There There.
Avoid if: You get disappointed by sequels.
Honorary mentions from February
I also want to highlight a few stand-out books from February. Until recently, I was on a real Irish lit-buzz, and these picks reflect that. (I’m very excited about seeing Colm Toibin at the Auckland Writer’s Festival next month!)
The Green Road and Actress, by Anne Enright
Anne Enright consistently amazes me. The Green Road beautifully captures the complexities of family relationships and the emotional geography of home, while Actress is a strange and lovely little novel about fame, feminism, mother-daughter relationships and identity. God, she’s good.
This is Happiness and The Time of the Child, by Niall Williams
These two novels by Niall Williams are exquisite. Williams's prosaic, sensory, lyrical writing overrides my usual frustration with glistening dewdrops and dazzling sunsets and has me captivated. Niall Williams and Louise Erdrich are the only highly-sensory writers I don’t roll my eyes at or skip ahead of long, wistful passages.
Both This is Happiness and The Time of the Child are tender, nostalgic stories of a small town in rural Ireland. The writing is beautiful - but don’t be fooled into thinking it’s all glistening dewdrops. Williams is a master of quiet, clever, impossibly weighty observations delivered with utter restraint. I wrote SO MANY of his turns of phrase down, squealing with delight at every second page. Here’s a very select few of my favourite tasty quotes, extracted from many underlines and exclamation marks in the margin:
Time of the Child
“The morning after intimacy is it’s own country. You go softly there.”
“It was the character of all life that the more you looked, the more you saw.”
“He had the look of an unmade bed.” - (!!!!)
This is Happiness
“Those who lived in the Last Minute had found not only was there no penalty in lateness, but often a bonus not granted the timely.”
“We lifted the teacup and performed an impeccable demonstration of how you deny reality.”
“The truth turns into a story when it grows old. We all become stories in the end,”
“There is something undoing about the dying light of mid-afternoon.”“
Substacks I’ve been reading
The Honest Broker by Ted Gioia
Cultural commentary from a music critic with his ear to the ground on all things media, technology and art. Obsessed.
Sweater Weather by Brandon Taylor
Writing advice and general musings from the author of best-selling The Late Americans. Stellar stuff.
The Common Reader by Henry Oliver
Mish mash of life advice, reading and writing things. Fan. Read this one about finding your thing, it’s excellent.
And that wraps up my first-ever Reading Journal! I’m not sure if I’ll stick to the same format in future months, so feel free to provide feedback! More importantly, please provide your book recommendations in the comments.
Til next month,
AM
So glad you're doing this - I too need to work on recording my reflections, rather than 'just' consuming the work. I may just need to follow your lead ...
love, love, love this. Thanks so much for doing the reading and rating - so I can now hone in on what to read next in the fiction space.