02/05/2026
READING! These are my April reads.
1. JAMES by Percival Everett. A devastating account of the experience of enslavement. It is described variously as playful, funny, riveting, horrifying. Won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. It tells the story of the man Jim, who is in the Mark Twain novel Huckleberry Finn. You don't need to have read that for this to draw you in and tear you apart.
2. NIGHT SWIMMERS by Roisin Maguire. Gentle, slow-moving but lyrical account of a man in the midst of grief who spends time in a Northern Ireland holiday home, just as lockdown takes hold. A testament to the power of nature, community and the NI coast.
3. LINCOLN IN THE BARDO by George Saunders. I have never read a novel like this. It is the story of the death of President Lincoln's young son, and it meditates on where we go when we die. It is written in quotes from literary books and histories and observations from the voices of the dead in the cemetery. It is the strangest experience - at times infuriating because of its strange style - but at times profoundly moving.
See you the week after next.
