Compulsive Reader

Compulsive Reader News
maggieball@compulsivereader.com
http://www.compulsivereader.com
Volume 24, Issue 11, 1 Nov 2022

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IN THIS ISSUE

New Reviews at Compulsive Reader
Literary News
Competition News
Sponsored By
Coming soon

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Hello readers. Here is the latest batch of reviews and interviews:

A review of Ecliptical By Hazel Smith

Ecliptical is a masterful book, full of smart details that will challenge and stretch the most dedicated of readers, but also dark, playful, often funny and always fun to read. The book is political and engaged with current affairs and events and very serious in the way it confronts violence, loss, inequities, and a wide array of impending ends, but it never takes itself too seriously. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/31/a-review-of-ecliptical-by-hazel-smith/

A review of Nothing But Light by Barbara Schwartz and Krista J.H. Leahy

Nothing But Light teems with characters such as Eve and Gaia, Judy Chicago and Hilma Klint woven into this tapestry of feminine wholeness, a wholeness that embraces rather than excludes. I love the power and playfulness of these poems that center the physical within the context of spiritual questing. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/30/a-review-of-nothing-but-light-barbara-schwartz-and-krista-j-h-leahy/

Stronger Than Fear: Poems of Empowerment, Compassion, and Social Justice edited by Carol Alexander and Stephen Massimilla

As the title Stronger than Fear suggests, the book wishes to raise spirits for justice rather than fight it out on the streets or the courtrooms, which is where most, but not all, social justice works itself out. It’s a valiant effort to tilt at windmills. (How many times have poets reminded us that poetry does nothing?). Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/23/stronger-than-fear-poems-of-empowerment-compassion-and-social-justice/

Ascent into Blue: a review of Mist in Their Eyes by William Doreski

For its imagery, lyricism and thought “Absolute Pine,” a very human poem really, is a fitting conclusion to this collection that is serious and funny, fraught with gloom and light, and good lines in memorable poems about people, places and things. A collection of poems in the distinct voice of a poet at the height of his skills. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/17/ascent-into-blue-a-review-of-mist-in-their-eyes-by-william-doreski/

Figurative in Forms: A review of The Fickle Pendulum by Paul Scully

Scully’s The Fickle Pendulum is moody, joyous and dedicated to abstraction. It is an artist’s tome, a compendium for illustrating ideas or painting religious psalms and a reader’s banquet. As the title suggests, there is no route to follow in the inside pages because, like life, it is cyclic. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/16/figurative-in-forms-a-review-of-the-fickle-pendulum-by-paul-scully

A review of The Lantern Room by Chloe Honum

It would be foolish to start this review by saying these are the most beautiful poems I have ever read, but they are beautiful. From the first infinitely delicate poem where on the eve of turning thirteen, in a revelatory Paul of Tarsus moment, Honum discovers an angel of poetry whose ancient “mottled language” she will now speak, through all the book’s poems that look closely at and identify with small creatures, including butterflies, luna moths, hornets, sparrows, spiders, and sorrows, these are beautiful poems. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/12/a-review-of-the-lantern-room-by-chloe-honum/

A review of So You Want to Live Younger Longer by Dr Norman Swan

This is a book about enjoying your life with as much vigour and health as possible by making better lifestyle choice, not about living forever through a rich-person only, ageism that requires collagen injections, placental transfusions or high colonics (even if they are the secret to Keith Richards’ longevity). Of course ageing well is a privilege. Financial security along with access to high quality food makes all the difference. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/08/a-review-of-so-you-want-to-live-younger-longer-by-dr-norman-swan/

A review of Mirabilia by Lisa Gorton

The richness in Gorton’s creativity is evident in all her poems, but in the second section of the book titled “Tongue” I was fascinated by how the poet takes the reader on trips to the past with narrative poetry that contains vivid images and keeps the reader glue to the page. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/08/a-review-of-mirabilia-by-lisa-gorton/

Homer, Euripides, and Julius Caesar as seen by Shakespeare and filmmakers Joseph Mankiewicz and Uli Edel

In Homer’s long and legendary poem The Iliad, one of the founding works of Greek and world literature, written in the eight century before the existence of Christ, a great cast of characters, conflicts, and choices seems to contain the wealth and wisdom of the ages: about the seduction and abduction of the Spartan queen Helen by a prince of Troy, and the war that follows, including a fight between the princes Achilles and Hector, there is a clash of cultures, and an exploration of heroism and hubris, that suggest the fundamentals of civilization. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/05/homer-euripides-and-julius-caesar-as-seen-by-shakespeare-and-filmmakers-joseph-mankiewicz-and-uli-edel/

A skein of geese goes creaking down the sky: An Interview with Roger Craik about In Other Days

Tiffany Troy talks with In Other Days’ Roger Craik about his new poetry collection and some of the poems, on discovering joy, imagination and memory, his writing routine, on form and meaning, the canon, his subjects and characters, and lots more. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/04/a-skein-of-geese-goes-creaking-down-the-sky-an-interview-with-roger-craik-about-in-other-days/

A review of Lesser American Boys by Zach VandeZande

VandeZande’s stories show us many troubling sights: a favourite coffee shop replaced by a slick new modern one; a house built for spite that blocks the sun; a special needs child who fails to respond to a teacher’s best effort; a recovering druggie who needs a meeting; a couple of robbers and a man trying and failing to save a dog on fire- and these are just a few examples. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/03/a-review-of-lesser-american-boys-by-zach-vandezande/

A review of All Poetry by Paulo Leminski

Ultimately, this collection brings a great new poet to light from a country that often gets overlooked in English writing. Even more though, the variety of the work shows us that Leminiski is a poet who lived through poetry. He thought, breathed, and dreamed poetically, and the reader can delve into that life by experiencing the stages of it in this collection. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/02/a-review-of-all-poetry-by-paulo-leminski/

An Interview with David Sklar

The author of Moonstone Hero talks about His own experience climbing Mount Kilimanjaro and the effect that experience had on him, how, as a medical doctor, he incorporated his expertise into Moonstone Hero, the various philosophical and moral questions that the novel dives into, how he blended aspects of several genres (adventure, romance, literary fiction) into one cohesive story, on the nature of heroism, how Moonstone Hero is a tribute to the doctors who have risked their lives for others during the Covid-19 crisis, and lots more. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2022/10/01/an-interview-with-david-sklar/

All of the reviews and interviews listed above are available at The Compulsive Reader on the front page. Older reviews and interviews are kept indefinitely in our extensive categorised archives (currently at 3,026) which can be browsed or searched from the front page of the site.

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LITERARY NEWS

In the literary news this month, Alphawood Foundation, Chicago, Ill., has won the $25,000 2022 Alice Award for its publication Reconstructing the Garrick: Adler & Sullivan’s Lost Masterpiece, edited by John Vinci with Tim Samuelson, Eric Nordstrom and Chris Ware. The Alice Award is sponsored by Furthermore, a program of the J.M. Kaplan Fund that supports nonfiction publishing. The Alice recognises and encourages the well-made illustrated book in which word and image carry equal weight.

A shortlist has been released for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction, recognizing “the funniest novels publishers over the past year, which best evokes the spirit of P.G. Wodehouse’s writing,” the Bookseller reported. This year’s winner, to be named November 22, receives a jeroboam of Bollinger Special Cuvée, a case of Bollinger La Grande Année and the complete set of the Everyman’s Library P.G. Wodehouse collection. In addition, a pig will be named after their winning book. The shortlisted titles are: Are We Having Fun Yet? by Lucy Mangan, Harrow by Joy Williams
Impossible by Sarah Lotz, Last Resort by Andrew Lipstein, One Day I Shall Astonish the World by Nina Stibbe, Our Country Friends by Gary Shteyngart, The Echo Chamber by John Boyne, The Lock In by Phoebe Luckhurst, The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris, The Trees by Percival Everett, The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman, and Again, Rachel by Marian Keyes.

The National Book Foundation has announced the 2022 National Book Award finalists. The winner will be announced during an awards ceremony held on November 16 in New York City. The titles for fiction are The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty (Knopf) – see our review last month, The Birdcatcher by Gayl Jones (Beacon), The Haunting of Hajji Hotak and Other Stories by Jamil Jan Kochai (Viking), All This Could Be Different by Sarah Thankam Mathews (Viking), and The Town of Babylon by Alejandro Varela (Astra House). For the full list of titles including nonfiction, poetry, translated, and young people’s literature visit: https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/awards-and-prizes/article/90499-2022-national-book-award-finalists-announced.html

Writer and activist Rebecca Solnit received the Paul Engle Prize. Presented by the Iowa City UNESCO City of Literature organization, the award “honors an individual who, like Paul Engle, represents a pioneering spirit in the world of literature through writing, editing, publishing, or teaching, and whose active participation in the larger issues of the day has contributed to the betterment of the world through the literary arts.” The winner receives $20,000 and a work of art created by Mike Sneller with M.C. Ginsberg. Prairie Lights Bookstore was on hand to sell copies of the author’s books. Solnit was recognised for her writing and activism on issues that include feminism, environmentalism, and social change. She has written more than 20 books, including Whose Story Is This?, Call Them by Their True Names, Men Explain Things to Me, The Mother of All Questions, and a memoir, Recollections of My Nonexistence.

French writer Annie Ernaux has won the Nobel Prize for Literature. At a news conference this morning announcing the win, the Swedish Academy cited her for “the courage and clinical acuity with which she uncovers the roots, estrangements and collective restraints of personal memory.” rnaux is best known for her memoir The Years, published in a translation by Alison L. Strayer by Seven Stories Press. The translation was shortlisted for the 2019 Man Booker International Prize, and received the 31st Annual French-American Translation Prize for nonfiction and the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation. In French, the book received the Françoise-Mauriac Prize of the French Academy, the Marguerite Duras Prize, the Strega European Prize, the French Language Prize and the Télégramme Readers Prize. Yale University Press is planning to publish Ernaux’s Look at the Lights, My Love. The Nobel Literature Prize awards ceremony will take place in Stockholm on December 10.

A shortlist was released for the £10,000 (about $11,420) Goldsmiths Prize, which recognizes “fiction that breaks the mold or extends the possibilities of the novel form.” The winner will be named November 10. This year’s finalists are: Somebody Loves You by Mona Arshi
Seven Steeples by Sara Baume, Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies by Maddie Mortimer
Peaces by Helen Oyeyemi, there are more things by Yara Rodrigues Fowler, and Diego Garcia by Natasha Soobramanien & Luke Williams.

inners of the 2022 ALTA Awards, sponsored by the American Literary Translators Association, are: National Translation Award in Poetry: Purgatorio by Dante Alighieri, translated from Italian by D. M. Black (NYRB Classics). National Translation Award in Prose: The Morning Star by Karl Ove Knausgaard, translated from Norwegian by Martin Aitken (Penguin Press). Lucien Stryk Asian Translation Prize: Cold Candies by Lee Young-ju, translated from Korean by Jae Kim (Black Ocean). Italian Prose in Translation Award: Penelope by Silvana La Spina, translated from Italian by Anna Chiafele and Lisa Pike (Bordighera Press). Spain-USA Foundation Translation Award: The Adventures and Misadventures of the Extraordinary and Admirable Joan Orpí, Conquistador and Founder of New Catalonia by Max Besora, translated from Catalan by Mara Faye Lethem (Open Letter Books)

The shortlist for the £50,000 2020 Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction has been announced. The winner will be announced November 17. The shortlist includes Legacy of Violence: A History of the British by Caroline Elkins, The Escape Artist: The Man Who Broke Out of Auschwitz to Warn the World by Jonathan Freedland, My Fourth Time, We Drowned: Seeking Refuge on the World’s Deadliest Migration Route by Sally Hayden, The Restless Republic: Britain Without a Crown by Anna Keay, A Fortunate Woman: A Country Doctor’s Story by Polly Morland, and Super-Infinite: The Transformations of John Donne by Katherine Rundell.

Hachette Australia and the Emerging Writers’ Festival have released a shortlist for the 2022 Richell Prize for Emerging Writers, awarded in memory of Hachette Australia’s former CEO Matt Richell, who died in a surfing accident in 2014. The winner, who will be named November 3, receives A$10,000 (about US$6,725), along with a 12-month mentorship with one of Hachette Australia’s publishers. Hachette Australia will work with the winning writer to develop their manuscript with first option to consider the finished work and shortlisted entries for publication. This year’s finalists are: Zainab’s Not Home by Hajer Al-awsi
When Trees Fall Without Warning by Susannah Begbie. Wake by Kate Harris, Place Setting by Eva Lomski, The Little Ones by Anne Myers, and The Medusa by Lisa Nan Joo.

The MacArthur Foundation has announced its 2022 MacArthur Fellows, each of whom will receive a “genius grant” of $800,000. Among this year’s 25 fellows are several writers, including: Jennifer Carlson, author of Citizen-Protectors (Oxford University), P. Gabrielle Foreman, author of Activist Sentiments (University of Illinois), Martha Gonzalez, author of Chican@ Artivistas (University of Texas), Monica Kim, author of The Interrogation Rooms of the Korean War (Princeton University), Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass (Milkweed), J. Drew Lanham, author of The Home Place (Milkweed), Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy (Scribner), Reuben Jonathan Miller, author of Halfway Home (Little, Brown), Loretta Ross, co-author of Reproductive Justice (University of California), and Steven Ruggles, author of Prolonged Connections (University of Wisconsin). For the full list of fellows visit: https://www.macfound.org/programs/fellows/

The Canada Council for the Arts has announced finalists in 14 English- and French-language categories for this year’s Governor General’s Literary Awards. Category winners, who will be named November 16, receive C$25,000. The publisher of each winning book receives C$3,000 to support promotional activities, and finalists each receive C$1,000. A complete list of finalists is available here: https://ggbooks.ca/#finalists

The T.S. Eliot Foundation released the shortlist for the 2022 T.S. Eliot Prize, honouring the best new collection of poetry published in the U.K. or Ireland. The winning poet receives £25,000 and the shortlisted poets each get £1,500. This year’s shortlisted titles are: Quiet by Victoria Adukwei Bulley, Ephemeron by Fiona Benson, Wilder by Jemma Borg, The Thirteenth Angel by Philip Gross, Sonnets for Albert by Anthony Joseph, England’s Green by Zaffar Kunial, Slide by Mark Pajak, bandit country by James Conor Patterson, The Room Between Us by Denise Saul, and Manorism by Yomi Ṣode.

Sri Lankan author Shehan Karunatilaka was named winner of the 2022 Booker Prize for his second novel “The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida.” Karunatilaka was presented with the trophy by Her Majesty the Queen Consort Camilla in a ceremony held on October 17 in London. Published by U.K. independent press Sort of Books, Seven Moons is set in 1990 Colombo, Sri Lanka, and follows the death of a war photographer during the country’s civil war that leads to an afterlife murder investigation. Last year’s Booker winner Damon Galgut presented Karunatilaka with £50,000 and a designer-bound edition of his book. Shortlisted authors received £2,500. given to each shortlisted author.

Finalists have been named in 18 categories for the An Post Irish Book Awards, which “celebrate and promote Irish writing to the widest range of readers possible” and “recognize the very best of Irish writing talent.” Because Covid-19 restrictions have been removed, a live in-person ceremony to celebrate the winners will take place November 23 at the Convention Centre in Dublin. On December 10, a TV program will explore the six books and authors competing to be named An Post Irish Book Awards Book of the Year 2022, culminating in the reveal of this year’s overall winner. Shortlisted for the Eason Novel of the Year are Trespasses by Louise Kennedy, The Colony by Audrey Magee, Seven Steeples by Sara Baume, The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell, The Queen of Dirt Island by Donal Ryan and The Raptures by Jan Carson. Find the full shortlist here: https://www.irishbookawards.ie/

Winners have been named for the Diverse Book Awards 2022, the annual prize celebrating inclusive books by authors and publishers based in the U.K. and Ireland. The children’s book category winner was Me, My Dad and the End of the Rainbow by Benjamin Dean, illustrated by Sandhya Prabhat, with second place going to Hey You! An Empowering Celebration of Growing Up Black by Dapo Adeola and others; and third to The Very Merry Murder Club, edited by Robin Stevens and Serena Patel. In the YA category, Skin of the Sea by Natasha Bowen won, followed by Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé and You’re the One That I Want by Simon James Green. The adult category was won by Kia Abdullah’s Next of Kin, with second place going to His Only Wife by Peace Adzo Medie and third to Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson.

Khadija Abdalla Bajaber’s The House of Rust (Graywolf Press) won the inaugural $25,000 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction, which is “intended to recognize those writers Ursula spoke of in her 2014 National Book Awards speech–realists of a larger reality, who can imagine real grounds for hope and see alternatives to how we live now.” The jury praised Bajaber’s transcendent writing and innovative, transporting story, saying: “Scene after scene is gleaming, textured, utterly devoid of cliché and arresting in its wisdom. The novel’s structure is audacious and its use of language is to die for.” Two finalists were also named: How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu (Morrow) and The Past Is Red by Catherynne M. Valente (Tordotcom Publishing).

Finalists have been announced for the 2022 Cundill History Prize, which honors “the best history writing in English” and is administered by McGill University in Montreal, Canada. The winner, to be named December 1, receives US$75,000 and the two runners up US$10,000. This year’s finalists are: Cuba: An American History by Ada Ferrer (Scribner)
All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake by Tiya Miles (Random House) and Collapse: The Fall of the Soviet Union by Vladislav Zubok (Yale University Press).

The winners of the 2022 Kirkus Prize, sponsored by Kirkus Reviews and including a $50,000 award for each winner, are, for fiction, Trust by Hernan Diaz (Riverhead). For Nonfiction: In Sensorium: Notes for My People by Tanaïs (Harper). For Young Readers’ Literature: Himawari House by Harmony Becker (First Second/Macmillan).

A shortlist has been released for the 2022 Waterstones Book of the Year that includes 10 titles nominated by the bookstore chain’s booksellers. The winner, chosen by a Waterstones panel, will be named December 1. This year’s shortlisted titles are: The Escape Artist by Jonathan Freedland, Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, Otherlands by Thomas Halliday, The Story of Art Without Men by Katy Hessel, Babel by R.F. Kuang, Cooking by Jeremy Lee, The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell, Heartstopper Volume 1 by Alice Oseman, The Golden Mole by Katherine Rundell, illustrated by Talya Baldwin, and Skandar and the Unicorn Thief by A.F. Steadman.

Finally, The Shortlist for Dymocks 2022 Book of the Year is: Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone, Benjamin Stevenson (Penguin Random House), Book Lovers, Emily Henry (Penguin Random House), Horse, Geraldine Brooks (Hachette Australia), Carrie Soto is Back, Taylor Jenkins Reid (Penguin Random House), Ten Steps to Nanette, Hannah Gadsby (Allen & Unwin), and Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus (Penguin Random House). The Young Readers Shortlist includes Chippy Chasers: Chippy Jackpot, Sam Cotton ((Penguin Random House), Runt, Craig Silvey (Allen & Unwin), Miss Mary-Kate Martin’s Guide to Monsters 1: Karen Foxlee (Allen & Unwin Childrens’), The Happiest Boy on Earth, Eddie Jaku (Pan Macmillan Australia), Skandar and the Unicorn Thief, A.F Steadman (Simon & Schuster), and Camping, Bluey (Penguin Random House). The Book of the Year is chosen by Dymocks staff—booksellers, franchise owners, office support, who nominate books they loved reading through the year. These are compiled into a shortlist and a final vote is taken—by everyone across the business—to decide the ultimate winner.

Have a great month!

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COMPETITION NEWS

Congratulations to Carole McDonnell, who won a copy of Moonstone Hero by David Sklar.

Our new site giveaway is for a copy of The Hunt for the Peggy C: A World War II Maritime Thriller by John Winn Miller. To win To win send me an email at maggieball@compulsivereader.com with the subject line: “The Hunt for the Peggy C” and your postal address in the body of the email.

We also have a copy of The Fifth Daughter of Thorn Ranch by Julia Brewer Daily. To win end me an email at maggieball@compulsivereader.com with the subject line: “The Fifth Daughter” and your postal address in the body of the email.

To win, sign up for our Free Newsletter on the right-hand side of the site and enter via the newsletter. Winner will be chosen by the end of November from subscribers who enter via the newsletter. Good luck!

Good luck, everyone!

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