By now we’ve watched many public figures dress in culturally relevant costumes. The supermarkets will slowly begin to phase out the pumpkin shaped peanut butter chocolates, replacing them with normal cup shaped versions, boring.
While the world has been distracted by prosthetics and sugar, our focus, as always has been on you dear reader. We’ve trawled the internet, bothered the bookstore owners and spoken to sample from the PS community (data - but make it literary.) From these we’ve collated your most well received books for October 2024.
Click through to read bookshop.org’s full synopsis. Reach out with your literary opinions, our inbox is always open hello@pagesstudio.net
The Empusium: A Health Resort Horror Story by Olga Tokarczuk.
A spooky, political mention.
’A mischievous fairy tale about transformation, emotion and ambiguity. These are bracing remedies for a world that too often forces us toward stasis, indifference and binaries ... As ever, Tokarczuk’s prose — and Antonia Lloyd-Jones’ glorious translation thereof from the Polish — will knock the wind out of you ... Resonant.’ - The San Francisco Chronicle
The Position of Spoons by Deborah Levy.
French existentialism saw her coming.
‘A feast of observations about everything from the particular beauty of lemons on a table, to the allure of Colette, to the streets of Paris, by the inimitable Deborah Levy.’ - Goodreads.
Rejection by Tony Tulathimutte.
Could have easily been repulsive, instead very clever.
‘Could be the year’s feel-bad book, but Tulathimutte’s inventiveness, his intellect, his sense of humor, and his precise style make his characters’ mortifications a pleasure to read ... Caustic, clever, funny, and humane.’ - The Boston Globe
Someone Like Us by Dinaw Mengstu
Slippery discomfort, a peripheral narrative.
‘To appreciate Mengestu’s work, you have to be ready to live in uncertainty, to find any truths obliquely, if at all. If you can accomplish that, the journey is well worth the discomfort ...’ - The New York Times Book Review
Satirical and claustrophobic, extreme wealth is a barbed trap.
’Alam’s observation of the attitudes and trappings of contemporary upper-middle-class American life has a delicious precision ... The tone of this novel grows darker and more claustrophobic than that of any of his previous work ... Alam chronicles Brooke’s slow poisoning so deftly it almost seems possible that she’ll turn positive thinking and fearless self-assertion into some version of the American Dream.’ - The New Yorker
Small Rain by Garth Greenwell.
Tender attention to mundane bureaucracy.
‘Each blood draw, each medical detail, is presented with documentary precision, lifted, one assumes, from life ... The narrator becomes conversant in a new language—the language of the medical system—and a new vocabulary of touch ... There is something almost showy about the formal challenge of this novel ... From a tale of great pain—a rare kind of story—it becomes one so difficult to render that it is thought to be impossible: a story of ordinary love, ordinary happiness ... Small Rain feels like a culmination, which comes with its own feeling of melancholy for the reader.’ The New Yorker
Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner
Discerning spy novel, deceptions galore.
‘Sinuous and powerfully understated ... Consolidates Kushner’s status as one of finest novelists working in the English language. You know from this book’s opening paragraphs that you are in the hands of a major writer, one who processes experience on a deep level. Kushner has a gift for almost effortless intellectual penetration ... Pointed comic observation in this novel blends with her earnestness in vinaigrette harmony.’ - The New York Times
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Selected by the Editor.
After years away from her family’s homeland, and reeling from a disastrous love affair, actress Sonia Nasir returns to Haifa to visit her older sister Haneen. This is her first trip back since the second intifada and the deaths of their grandparents: while Haneen made a life here commuting to Tel Aviv to teach at the university, Sonia stayed in London to focus on her acting career and now dissolute marriage. On her return, she finds her relationship to Palestine is fragile, both bone-deep and new.
At Haneen’s, Sonia meets the charismatic and candid Mariam, a local director, and finds herself roped into a production of Hamlet in the West Bank. Sonia is soon rehearsing Gertude’s lines in classical Arabic and spending more time in Ramallah than in Haifa, along with a dedicated group of men from all over historic Palestine who, in spite of competing egos and priorities, each want to bring Shakespeare to that side of the wall. As opening night draws closer it becomes clear just how many violent obstacles stand before a troupe of Palestinian actors. Amidst it all, the life Sonia once knew starts to give way to the daunting, exhilarating possibility of finding a new self in her ancestral home.
A stunning rendering of present-day Palestine, Enter Ghost is a story of diaspora, displacement, and the connection to be found in family and shared resistance. Timely, thoughtful, and passionate, Isabella Hammad’s highly anticipated second novel is an exquisite feat, an unforgettable story of artistry under occupation.
Synopsis by Goodreads.