Early days, I know, but there’s already a serious contender for my non-fiction book of the year. Poet George Szirtes’ The Photographer at Sixteen is an exceptional memoir of his mother. Told backwards from the moment of her death, it takes in several of the twentieth century’s most traumatic events, including the 1956 uprising in Hungary and the Holocaust. You can read my Sunday Times review here.
When I first started reviewing for the Sunday Times I did loads of very short paperback reviews, sometimes as many as six per week. I’d finish one book and immediately pick up another, like a chain smoker lighting a new cigarette with the butt of the previous.
It’s been a while since I did a paperback review, but recently I was asked to do two of the Costa Award winners: The Cut Out Girl by Bart van Es, which won the Biography/Memoir category, and the debut novel winner, Stuart Turton’s The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle. Both of these are remarkable, and I was glad I wasn’t the one who had to pick an overall winner from the five categories.* Reviews here.
* (Actually, scratch that – I would love to judge the Costa … Or the Booker … Or the Pulitzer. Do get in touch.)
Ian Critchley 