What We Left Unsaid by Winnie M Li (Orion, £18.99)
A trio of Taiwanese-American siblings embark on a road-trip along the iconic Route 66 upon the request of their ailing mother. It’s five years since the family was last together, and resentments have only deepened since. Now in middle-age, the siblings revisit the Grand Canyon, the destination of an abandoned childhood holiday, where an incident occurred that henceforth fixed the constellations of the family.
M Li, who holds an honorary doctorate from the National University of Ireland, takes a unique slant on the Great American Road Trip. Racism, the experience of first-generation immigrants, and middle-age malaise peppers the narrative as we journey from East to West through lesser-understood (at least from a European perspective) demographics of the American interior. Slow-footed pacing lets the novel down, as does a saccharine, too tidy conclusion. Brigid O’Dea
Even Still by Celia de Fréine (Arlen House, €15)
Celia de Fréine’s first short story collection in English takes up the challenge of recounting ‘What it was really like growing up in this arsehole of a city during the fifties and sixties’. Though majoritatively Dublin-based, the stories venture across the border and around the country. The Troubles are not her subject, but they make themselves known, digging into the very seams of the collection. The dozen or so (mainly female) narrators navigate class, gender, and social barriers by retreating into their rich inner worlds, their ‘wild imaginations’. De Fréine is a remarkable world-maker; her narratives often overlap, with both themes and characters creeping between stories. At once wistful for and disdaining of the past, Even Still holds a paradox of hope and retribution in its pages. Emily Formstone
A Splintering by Dur E Aziz Amna: an unflinching portrayal of the price of ambition
Could Should Might Don’t: How We Think about the Future by Nick Foster - What type of futurist are you?
Winnie M Li takes a unique slant on the Great American Road Trip; powerful Ghassan Kanafani collection impresses
Miriam Margolyes: ‘I can do naughty stories... but I’m more than just a potty mouth’
Men in the Sun and Other Palestinian Stories by Ghassan Kanafani (Verso, £11.99)
Men in the Sun is a taut, terrifying, and tragic novella by Palestinian writer, teacher and activist Ghassan Kanafani. It tells the story of three Palestinians, Abu Qais, Marwan, and Assad, who are exiled in Iraq and arrange to be smuggled into Kuwait in a truck driven by another Palestinian so they can seek work. Further details will only spoil the plot, but a reader instantly feels a sense of dread for their fate. Just like the author’s: Kanafani was assassinated in 1972, as was his young niece Lamees, by a booby-trap car bomb left by Mossad in Beirut. He was only 36 years old, and yet is considered one of Palestine’s greatest writers. This small but powerful and unforgettable collection of writing impressively justifies that distinction. NJ McGarrigle
