Here is the Beehive by Sarah Crossan

Title: Here is the Beehive
Author: Sarah Crossan
Publisher: Bloomsbury Circus
ISBN: 9781526619518
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 288
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

Here is the Beehive is a story of a relationship, of love, of loss, and how the world seems when the beloved is no longer in it. At what point do you start doubting love, only because both of you were married to different people? At what point do you not trust what was said, proclamations made after sex, vows declared after being drunk, the world offered on a platter when they were in a good mood?  Here is the Beehive is a story of all of this and so much more.

I had not read any Crossan before this. With this book, I think I will break that and read everything she has written (though most of it is YA literature, if I am not mistaken). Here is the Beehive is also perhaps about every relationship that we have with others – family, friends, acquaintances, best friends, lovers, and more. Though on the surface it is about the death of a lover, and what happens after to the lover left behind, it is also about all of the other relationships and the role they play in your life.

This verse novel has so much to say and yet sometimes it says so little and does a great job of it. Connor and Ana keep telling each other that they will leave their spouses but they don’t. They break up, come back together, break apart, and repeat the cycle, till he dies, and that’s the end of the relationship. Ana is left with nothing but grief and memories. The relationship isn’t healthy. Crossan shows its toxicity in full splendour, however, there is love.

Crossan’s writing is real – the small instances of validation when in love or lust, the small instances of grief that turn big, the need to know that you were loved – and that wasn’t just something you made up in your head – all of it is tended to with great attention and eye for detail. There are no winners or losers. There is only love and what happens when you fall hard without understanding the implications. No one is right or wrong. It just is.

Such A Fun Age by Kiley Reid

Title: Such a Fun Age
Author: Kiley Reid
Publisher: Bloomsbury Circus
ISBN: 978-1526612151
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 320
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4 stars

The book took off very slowly for me, till I finished Part 1 and was instantly floored by the turn the book took, and the writing. Such a Fun Age seems so less on the surface, and it is so much more the moment you give it time, dedication, and continue reading it without stopping. At times, the book is also quite deceptive in its approach, making you believe that it is about the men and not the women, whereas it is only about the women and rightly so.

The book is about Emira Tucker, a young black woman, who is all of 25 years old, lives in Philadelphia, with two part-time jobs (typist and babysitter), with no benefits and no health insurance at all. She wants to do more in her life but is always held back for one reason or the other. In all of this, her life is brought to the forefront involving an upscale grocery store, where she is on an errand with the toddler of her employer, Alix, who is white. Alix is deeply embarrassed by the incident and takes on Emira as a project – to get to know her better and make wrongs right.

This then leads to a series of questions raised throughout the book about class, gender, race, parenthood, forgiveness, and what it takes to be a person in the twenty-first century. The plot and the semi-plots are full of nuances as created by Reid. The book is funny, and before you know it, it becomes serious talking about racial biases, and the prejudices we seem to hold onto, sometimes even unintentionally.

Reid writes from a place of awareness and experience, which adds to the many dimensions of the book. The characters aren’t all black and white, and you do not expect them to be that was well. The greyness is something that just sneaks up (Emira’s boyfriend and what happens thereof). There is a lot of engagement with the reader, in the sense of being vested, as the pages turn. I often found myself not wanting this book to end because of the way it is written.

Such a Fun Age besides being a solid book of and for our times, is a read that will leave you bedazzled and wanting more. It’s take on privilege, wealth, class, and crossing of paths of people is refreshing, and makes it a compulsive read on so many levels.

Small Days and Nights by Tishani Doshi

Title: Small Days and Nights
Author: Tishani Doshi
Publisher: Bloomsbury India
ISBN: 978-9388912709
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 272
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5 stars

Small Days and Nights had me break into a sweat for most part. I fervently turned the pages, wanting to know what would happen next to Grace and Lucia, to their dogs, and Mallika. For most part, I was on the edge of the proverbial seat so to say, and for the other part, I was mulling, thinking, pondering, and submitting to Doshi’s writing and worldview.

I recall going through the same feeling of angst, hopelessness, and some hope while devouring The Pleasure Seekers in 2010. It has been eight years now and Doshi’s writing is just as evocative, raw, and with a passion that will perhaps burn the reader.

The world Tishani Doshi builds in Small Days and Nights is a small one. Often uncomplicated even, often without layers, and is all about the day to day living of two sisters – who have discovered each other late in life. Grace stumbled upon the existence of Lucia (who is living the Down Syndrome), as she returns to Pondicherry, where her dead mother awaits cremation. Lucia has been living in a residential facility their mother helped build. Grace moves Lucia with her to a tiny coastal village in Tamil Nadu – Paramankeni, a place that is at least three hours away from most human contact. And not to forget, the year is 2010. Grace and Lucia live quiet (or so it seems) lives with Mallika, a village woman who lives on their property as a cook and a guard, also looking after the many adopted dogs.

This novel is deceptive in the sense that while it seems to be calm on the surface, a lot is taking place beneath the surface – Lost relationships that refuse to be found, parental bonds (their Italian father is in Venice, who was estranged from their mother many years ago and is acousticphobic as well) that are not quite there, a family that isn’t your typical family (but what is a typical family anyway?), and women who are cocooned in a world of their own, where men will not let them be. That theme runs throughout the novel – incidents happen on their property, men look creepily, and the sea rages in the distance.

Doshi creates a world that has its moments of grace, of kindness, of empathy beyond recognition and yet there are times through her writing where darkness makes itself known. Her characters love and also fall short of love. Her writing is razor-like and also quite a balm at most times – it soothes and cuts sharp. It seethes with anger and knows when to smile. The descriptions linger long after, the taste of the sea remains, the sound of the dogs barking, and the restlessness strike home.

Grace and her parents are aware of their failings and that’s what makes them so real and at the same time quite unforgiving. You don’t feel for Grace – it is hard to, but as a reader you understand loneliness, and the right to claim life in whatever capacity. Women’s experience in public and personal places, of caring for someone with special needs, forgiveness, and the need to understand that all of us are perhaps sailing in the same boat is the heart of Small Days and Nights, and yet there is the awareness that it can all be undone quite easily.

99 Nights in Logar by Jamil Jan Kochai

Title: 99 Nights in Logar
Author: Jamil Jan Kochai
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 978-1408898420
Genre: Literary Fiction, Contemporary Fiction
Pages: 288
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4 stars

While 99 nights in Logar may seem to have been set in a culture and time alien to most readers, the universality of theme is astounding, which you only begin to realize as the pages turn. This is where the genius of Jamil Jan Kochai only begins. You don’t need a tour guide to take you through the terrains of Afghanistan or a map to get you acquainted to the landscape. You just need to go with the story and that’s enough.

I must admit though initially I did face a problem with who was whom in the family and what were the relationships and more than anything else, the confusion about names. However, that ended soon enough and from thereon it was a journey worth taking.

This debut is narrated by Marwand, a 12-year-old boy who is raised in America and takes a trip with his parents and brother to a village in Afghanistan in 2005. The American war is almost over, and no one knows what the future has in store.

The book starts with a search – Marwand, and his uncles and cousin – Gul, Dawood and Zia set out to find his uncle’s dog Budabash. The dog hasn’t been seen since he savaged Marwand’s index finger on the first day of his arrival. A lot of things happen on the course of finding the dog – people drop out of the search party for one reason or the other, stories are exchanged (which to me is the brilliance of the novel) – over a cup of chai, waiting for things to happen in the course of the search, or even while doing nothing.

Kochai tells us the story of a family and he doesn’t do it keeping the West at the fore. The images are spot-on, you feel a part of the narrative, and for most Farsi or Pashto words there is no English translation given, which is quite natural given the people in this region speak that way. Coming back to the family, Jamil Jan Kochai weaves the story back and forth in time through the stories told by everyone not just the boys – and then it only further changes hands of time.

99 nights in Logar is all about memory. Memory is at the heart of this novel and throughout the book. Whether is it recollection of stories, or even how things happened a week ago or two days ago, Kochai manages to make the story funny, filled with nostalgia, angst, and a great coming-of-age experience.

At Hawthorn Time by Melissa Harrison

Title: At Hawthorn Time
Author: Melissa Harrison
Publisher: Bloomsbury Circus
ISBN: 978-1408859056
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 288
Source: Personal Copy
Rating: 4 Stars

For the longest time I couldn’t understand books which had nature as an integral theme. I don’t know why but I couldn’t. Then I read “The Signature of All Things” by Elizabeth Gilbert and it changed my view of “nature novels” forever. I was intrigued by the genre. I had to read more about the beauty we are surrounded by (albeit what we do with it) and our close connection to the flora and the fauna to speak of.

Human beings, most of them have not understood nature and its significance. It is so out of their line of thought and vision, that it doesn’t even cross paths with their day-to-day life or routine of it. Come to think of it, it is rather sad, isn’t it? To not think of what we are surrounded by and I am also one of them. I am equally to be blamed, however I hope to change that by observing, and perhaps by saving what is left.

“At Hawthorn Time” by Melissa Harrison is not the kind of book that can be read in one sitting. Not because it is difficult to read, but because you need to ponder and mull over what is written. At times, you might even feel that this book isn’t for you, but I beg you to give it some time and you will see its beauty and what it’s worth.

Let me quickly get to the plot of the book: Howard and Kitty is an ageing couple who have moved to Lodeshill, after spending a lifetime in London and their marriage is falling apart – day by day, without a word or indication. They do not have the will to do anything about it and that’s heartbreaking. Harrison has this wonderful knack of blending the ordinary with the extraordinary moments and this is where nature plays a major role in the book. Everything happens languidly, at its own pace. I even thought that the couple’s marriage was like the turn of seasons – that carried out for 30 years and now had just given up.

Lodeshill is a fictitious village (I read this in an interview as I finished the book and was surprised to read that). Having said that, it is as real as any village could be – the mannerisms, the locales and the landscape of village life are accurately and beautifully captured by Ms. Harrison.

So there is this couple whose marriage is on the rocks (or has completely fallen off the cliff so to say) and then you have Jack, a rebellious modern-day hippie who has skipped imprisonment and all he wants is to go back home and reinvent his life, keeping his body and soul together.

And to forget that there is Jamie, a nineteen-year old man who is coming of age and doesn’t know what to do with this life. There is no direction or purpose so to speak and all he wants to do is leave Lodeshill for good. At the same time, he is taking care of his grandfather who is facing dementia and just disappears one fine day, leaving Jamie wondering what happened to him.

Before the reader knows it, there are paths that cross (but eventually) and incidents occur and life isn’t what they all thought it is. At this point, I would have to talk about nature and the big role it plays in the book – it is there – bright, dark, daunting and as varied as you’d think of nature to be. The landscape in which Harrison writes is real, not brutal but definitely bordering the lonely and the aspirational and Harrison just makes us realize the worlds we inhabit. A book you must buy, read, keep, and reread.

This book was also a shortlisted title for the 2015 Costa Novel Award.

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