Tag: fiction

Ian McEwan states in his novel’s title a concern with ‘What We Can Know’. Clearly, this concern with the nature and limits of knowledge is central to the conduct of history including predictive history, biography and the study of the art or even counterfactual forms of those things. However, the epigram of this novel, taken from the biographer Richard Holmes, implies that biography embodies ‘human truths poised between fact and fiction’ themselves which requires the question of ‘what we can know’ but also goes on to ask ‘what we can believe, and finally what we can love’.

December 11, 2025

Ian McEwan states in his novel’s title a concern with What We Can Know. Clearly, this concern with the nature and limits of knowledge is central to the conduct of history including predictive history, biography and the study of the art or even counterfactual forms of those things. However, the epigram of this novel, taken … More Ian McEwan states in his novel’s title a concern with ‘What We Can Know’. Clearly, this concern with the nature and limits of knowledge is central to the conduct of history including predictive history, biography and the study of the art or even counterfactual forms of those things. However, the epigram of this novel, taken from the biographer Richard Holmes, implies that biography embodies ‘human truths poised between fact and fiction’ themselves which requires the question of ‘what we can know’ but also goes on to ask ‘what we can believe, and finally what we can love’.

‘For a long time, the mother thought life-changing moments were momentous. Entirely unambiguous’. This blog is a reflection of Bryan Washington (2025) ‘Palaver’ New York, Farrar, Straus & Giroux.

November 28, 2025

‘For a long time, the mother thought life-changing moments were momentous. Entirely unambiguous’.[1]  This beautiful, moving and comic line from Bryan Washington’s Palaver rhymes with one of his chosen epigrams for the novel by Akira the Hustler (ハスラーアキラ, Hasurā Akira) : ‘Our days are demarcated in the repetition of little goodbyes’. Prompt questions are so encouraging of … More ‘For a long time, the mother thought life-changing moments were momentous. Entirely unambiguous’. This blog is a reflection of Bryan Washington (2025) ‘Palaver’ New York, Farrar, Straus & Giroux.

Wear colours as if they were things and contained emotion as well as expressing it, or, ‘if I were a fairy queen, I’d wear red and green’.

November 22, 2025

Wear colours as if they were things and contained emotion as well as expressing it, or, ‘if I were a fairy queen, I’d wear red and green’. There is some contention about whether the only personality who is allowed to be seen in ‘red and green’ is a ‘fairy queen’ or an ‘Irish queen’. Unfortunately … More Wear colours as if they were things and contained emotion as well as expressing it, or, ‘if I were a fairy queen, I’d wear red and green’.

‘A pervasive pattern of instability of relationships, self-image, and affects and marked impulsivity, …’: Are DSM-5-TR Categorical Criteria means of describing a person, a character, an author, or a reading experience ever? This blog reflects on Derek Owusu (2025) ‘Borderline Fiction’, Edinburgh, Canongate.

November 12, 2025

‘A pervasive pattern of instability of relationships, self-image, and affects and marked impulsivity, …’: Are DSM-5-TR Categorical Criteria means of describing a person, a character, an author, or a reading experience ever? This blog reflects on Derek Owusu (2025) Borderline Fiction, Edinburgh,  Canongate. As yet, I have discovered no ‘professional’ critical view of this book, … More ‘A pervasive pattern of instability of relationships, self-image, and affects and marked impulsivity, …’: Are DSM-5-TR Categorical Criteria means of describing a person, a character, an author, or a reading experience ever? This blog reflects on Derek Owusu (2025) ‘Borderline Fiction’, Edinburgh, Canongate.

Never trust my Booker predictions! Yet ‘Flesh’ is a great winner of the 2025 prize.

November 11, 2025

Never trust my Booker predictions! Yet ‘Flesh’ is a great winner of the 2025 prize. In my last go at a prediction of the 2025 Booker [see this link], I placed David Szalay’s novel Flesh , 3rd out of the 6th. And now we find it has won. It is more than a worthy winner, … More Never trust my Booker predictions! Yet ‘Flesh’ is a great winner of the 2025 prize.

In a historical novel, you can ‘meet’ people supposed in those fictions to be famous AND those who are or ‘were’ so in ‘real’ life simultaneously. In Neil Blakemore’s 2025 novel ‘Objects Of Desire’, the character named Christopher Isherwood says that people want fame: ‘So that they can become monsters and make others feel bad, and no one will dare challenge them’.

November 3, 2025

In a historical novel, you can ‘meet’ people supposed in those fictions to be famous AND those who are or ‘were’ so in ‘real’ life simultaneously. In Neil Blakemore’s 2025 novel Objects Of Desire, the character named Christopher Isherwood says that people want fame: ‘So that they can become monsters and make others feel bad, … More In a historical novel, you can ‘meet’ people supposed in those fictions to be famous AND those who are or ‘were’ so in ‘real’ life simultaneously. In Neil Blakemore’s 2025 novel ‘Objects Of Desire’, the character named Christopher Isherwood says that people want fame: ‘So that they can become monsters and make others feel bad, and no one will dare challenge them’.

The 2025 Booker Shortlist – My experience & predictions for those I read

October 18, 2025

The 2025 Booker Shortlist – My experience & predictions for those I read The Longlist blog is still available – and still messy. It is here at this link, if you want to access link to blogs on books not shortlisted. Tash Aw was definitively cheated of a shortlist place with his best book ever … More The 2025 Booker Shortlist – My experience & predictions for those I read

A speculative blog on Kiran Desai’s ‘The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny’. My Booker winner.

October 17, 2025

At one point in the latter parts of The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny two women, Babita and Sonia, alone in separate rooms in a huge mansion from the Portuguese era in Goa, an era established from 1510, that has all the characteristics of a Gothic Castle of Otranto, speak between the sound-porous walls of … More A speculative blog on Kiran Desai’s ‘The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny’. My Booker winner.

‘“Twa Boabs”, the man laughs. “A matching pair!”’ You wait forever for a queer Ayrshire Scottish artist intent on rivaling the phallocentric Robert Burns, then ‘Two Roberts’ come at once. This is a blog on Damian Barr (2025) ‘The Two Roberts’.

September 21, 2025

‘“Twa Boabs”, the man laughs. “A matching pair!”’[1] You wait forever for a queer Ayrshire Scottish artist intent on rivaling the phallocentric Robert Burns, then ‘Two Roberts’ come at once. This is a blog on Damian Barr (2025) The Two Roberts, Edinburgh, Canongate. The power of Damian Barr’s novel The Two Roberts lies in its … More ‘“Twa Boabs”, the man laughs. “A matching pair!”’ You wait forever for a queer Ayrshire Scottish artist intent on rivaling the phallocentric Robert Burns, then ‘Two Roberts’ come at once. This is a blog on Damian Barr (2025) ‘The Two Roberts’.

The best piece of advice is to read Arundhati Roy’s ‘Mother Mary Comes To me’ as soon as possible. This is a blog on that with a note on re-reading Freud’s ‘A Child Is Being Beaten’.

September 18, 2025

The best piece of advice is to read Arundhati Roy’s ‘Mother Mary Comes To Me‘ as soon as possible. There is an episode in Arundhati Roy’s 2025 memoir Mother Mary Comes To Me in which her brother, having brought home a school report saying he was an ‘average student’, is seen by her taken into … More The best piece of advice is to read Arundhati Roy’s ‘Mother Mary Comes To me’ as soon as possible. This is a blog on that with a note on re-reading Freud’s ‘A Child Is Being Beaten’.