BOOK OF THE WEEK
Sweet Home by Wendy Erskine is published in hardback by Picador, priced £12.99 (ebook £7.99)
THIS is one where you feel faintly exasperated at yourself for not entirely enjoying a selection of short stories, even if you can totally appreciate how well structured and written they are. And these are brilliantly composed. Each piercing tale is set in Wendy Erskine's hometown of Belfast, swerving between themes of uneasiness, loneliness, boredom, intrigue and restlessness. A woman reluctantly prepares for her mum to get out prison; a man whose daughter died takes an interest in his gardener's child; a grouchy teacher obsesses over a Gaelic football volunteer – on the surface, the narratives are somewhat mundane, but Erskine infuses them with multiplicity, and twists them with darkness. The dialogue is bruising and feels ripped straight from mouths, while the sparse description makes everything feel a little stark and rundown. Impressive and bold, even if it leaves you a little cold.
8/10
Ella Walker
The Warlow Experiment by Alix Nathan is published in hardback by Serpent's Tail, priced £12.99 (ebook £6.83)
BASED on a single short entry in The Annual Register of 1797, Alix Nathan has devised a dark tale of obsession, solitude and the human mind. Herbert Powyss, country squire and amateur scientist, advertises for a volunteer to live without human contact in his cellar for seven years. Only John Warlow, a simple labourer, comes forward, but soon proves a less predictable subject of investigation than the plants in Powyss' hothouse. Through their diverse voices, Nathan compellingly draws the increasing psychological toll on Warlow, Powyss and the other inhabitants of Moreham House, while the Revolutionary Wars with France rumble in the background. Nathan has already garnered praise from leading lights of historical fiction such as Hilary Mantel and CJ Sansom and this, her third novel, brings together a vivid cast of characters for an exploration of the vulnerable foundations of sanity, rationality and civilisation.
8/10
Joshua Pugh Ginn
