Review of 'Everything I Never Told You'

Do you ever read a book that makes you think you'll want to come back to it later in life? I think that's kind of what good literature is about. Everything I Never Told You makes me feel like this. It's something that if I revisited in five years, or ten years, or as a mother, or just after losing someone dear me to, I'd read in a whole new light.

Everything I Never Told You tells the tragic tale of Lydia Lee, a Chinese-American teen living in 1970s Ohio. That is, until she turns up dead in the lake near the house. The police are leaning to ruling it as a suicide, but being an A grade student with a healthy home life and a group of friends around her, Lydia's parents quite can't believe this. 

As the book progresses, the story is told from all five members of the household: Lydia's parents, Marilyn and James, her brother Nate, younger sister and Lydia herself. We begin to see that maybe Lydia's life isn't as perfect as first thought, but no one in the family thinks that she'd end her life. Even Nate, who knows all about their troubled childhood (he lived it after all), the lies she's been telling about having friends, and her hanging out with the troublesome boy living down the road, doesn't believe it. 

The book shines a harsh light on racism, exploring how it can be internalised and passed down from parent to child. It discusses mental health issues in teens, and how they can be concealed even from those closest to you. These topics are SO important, especially as I don't find myself coming across them in adult fiction as much as I do with YA. I'd recommend this to anyone as it's an incredible piece of general adult fiction with strong writing, and an even stronger message. This does come with a trigger warning that there is discussion of suicide.

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Review of "Apple Tree Yard" by Louise Doughty

I went through a tough spate of reading not-so-great books in Autumn, and upsettingly this falls into that bracket. I'd not come across Apple Tree Yard before it was next in line for my book club read, and I had to pick it up. There's a BBC series on it that I'm pretty sure I won't watch, *but* I have heard good things about. 

Apple Tree Yard is a hybrid between a crime fiction novel and general adult fiction. Yvonne Carmichael, our protagonist, has a love-filled but uneventful marriage. Her kids are grown up and she's never quite reached the peaks that she imagines in her career as a scientific researcher. Everything plods along until she meets a stranger, and begins an affair with him. Yvonne doesn't know who he is: she doesn't even know his name, but she suspects that he may be covert for a secret (government agency) reason.

As the novel progresses, Yvonne's life is split in two: her peaceful home life, and the one she's really interested in. When her two worlds collide in a tragic way at a party for scientific researchers, Yvonne's life becomes harder and harder to control. All along, we know that the present Yvonne is on trial in the docks, but the author keeps you guessing right up until the end to show you what for.

This novel comes with a big trigger warning for rape/sexual assault. The scene that contains it is very graphic, and the aftermath of the character deciding whether or not to report the rape can also be triggering. 

The novel started off, and continued, very slowly. I'm not sure if it was a lot shorter originally, and had been padded out as the author made edits, but it really did drag in my opinion. However, all the layers of description and backstory probably made it a pretty good choice for a TV series.

The rape and aftermath were probably the strongest part of the book. It really looked into why someone might not report a rape, what kind of things you might bring into question surrounding it, and how hard it is to recover from sexual assault. Although it would have been less upsetting if the scene had been described less viscerally, it does highlight how horrifying it can be, and strips away the suggestion that it's always a woman's fault.

I really wanted to enjoy this, and there were parts that made it an interesting book. I'll be giving it 3 stars because it was thought-provoking, but I'm not sure I'd recommend it.

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Review of 'The Kite Runner' by Khaled Hosseini

I first stumbled across this book as a teen in a school library, but was advised to wait a few years until reading it. Almost a decade on, I finally took that advice and got cracking. I'm so glad I was told this, and waited until adulthood to delve in.

At it's core, The Kite Runner is a story about friendship and family. Two boys, Amir and Hassan, grow up as best friends. Amir and his Baba are well off, whilst Hassan and his father are servants in their household. They are inseparable, but Amir is always upset that his Baba likes Hassan. Hassan is everything Amir is not: sporty, brave and more like Baba that Amir could ever be. 

Kite running is what the pair most enjoy doing together. They practise every day for a massive tournament, and when they win, Amir is over the moon. Until he sees something awful happen to Hassan. And in that moment, he's pre-occupied with needing to be Baba's favourite person, not needing to be a good friend.  

Things only go downhill from there, and shortly after betraying Hassan further, Amir and his father leave Afghanistan. The power of the taliban is on the increase, and they emigrate to America as their lives are in danger.

The book speaks about the struggles of being an immigrant in a country prejudiced against you, and what it means to cling on to an identity that you're not convinced should define you. 

This is one of the best books I've read all year so far (definitely in the top three) and I would highly recommend it, especially if you want to learn more about living in Afghanistan during turbulent times.

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