Sunday Sleepwalking

Sundays - a weird liminal space for me, a threshold of uncertainty hovering between ending & beginning. The weekend evaporating but Monday just out of reach. A time to sleepwalk amongst words.

I’ve a fondness for an unreliable narrator. Novels where sad girls and all the messiness of life and relationships reign supreme. I love a story which sees young women navigating uncertainty, trying to carve out their place in the worlds, negotiating precarious relationships. It reminds of a time, of feelings I know I’ve had, related to. In recent times, we’ve inhaled Sally Rooney’s novels, Meg Mason’s Sorrow and Bliss and Luster by Raven Leilani amongst many others - shout out to Liv Little’s Rosewater too. Sad girl/messy girl lit is a thing. Are we obsessed with lives unravelling and characters locked in an entanglement of self-loathing? Answers on a postcard please. Why do we like it so much ? I’d love to hear your favourites.

This week’s Sunday Sleepwalking amongst the pages of a book is dedicated to some of my latest reads where messy lives, messy loves and sad girls have won me over. I hope they win you over too.

Stepping into the spotlight

Beginning with tricky relationships, Daisy Buchanan’s Limelight tells the story of 29 year old Frankie who is awkward and overlooked, a bit of a drifter with a love-hate relationship with the spotlight. Secretly craving attention, she’s ashamed of wanting it. A lifetime of comparison to her perfect sister Bean, has left her feeling more invisible than ever so she creates a new Frankie, uploading sexy photos of herself to her small community of online fans.  When Bean is diagnosed with cancer, Frankie finds herself being thrown into the spotlight as the face (and body) of a nationwide cancer fundraiser.  As Frankie flounders in her newfound notoriety, feminists and misogynists rage at her online but the flipside sees her attracting hundreds of new subscribers. Everyone wants Frankie to explain herself. But how can she explain what she barely understands?

This is a love letter to sisters and sisterhood, sexuality and self-esteem.  

Daisy writes so beautifully about things which matter and are so relatable – Limelight is such a brilliant story of bodies, women and how we take up space.

(Daisy is also one of the most supportive and generous writers on the block - do take a look at her Creative Confidence Clinic where she shares ideas, tips, personal essays and workshops. Everything you need to give you a boost when writing or a nudge to get started. For even more book recs, Daisy is the host of brilliant bookish podcast, You’re Booked. I was delighted to be able to chat to her at The Yard Hampshire this month for the paperback launch of Limelight).

Wanting something more

I couldn’t get enough of this razor sharp prose - Madeleine Gray’s Green Dot seems to be on everyone’s TBR list too at the moment. When this proof landed on my desk, it sucked me in with its twenty something protagonist Hera, who falls for a married man at the office. The relationship is all consuming and despite warnings from friends and wrestling with her own conscience, Hera needs Arthur. He is her sustenance, the hope of something better, something more than nothing. It’s funny, tender and moving - a story which explores how we decide who we want to be. Office life is brilliantly drawn and sent up, the loving is obsessive and believable as is the pull of desire which leads to someone blowing up their own life in the pursuit of something more. Green Dot is addictive reading.

Feeling seen

If you’re looking for a novel which handles love and loss beautifully, then Chloë Ashby’s debut novel, Wet Paint is perfect. Eve has been keeping everything and everyone at bay since the death of best friend Grace. Consumed by memories and her life unravelling as she loses her job and gets thrown out of her flat share, she takes up life-modelling to pay the bills. There’s simplicity in laying bare her body as everything begins to scramble inside her head. As life threatens to spiral out of control and she risks losing Max, the one anchor she has left, Eve has to take herself back to the night that changed the course of her life. She has to face her grief and guilt.

Eve’s pain and struggle to cope is palpable. Wet Paint explores what it means to be seen and the versions of ourselves we present versus how others see us. Beautiful writing that feels like the many layers of a painting being scraped back. I’d heartily recommend Chloë’s second novel, Second Self too.

(I’ll be chatting to Chloë and debut novelist, Emily Howes, of The Painter’s Daughters, out on 29th February - at The Yard Hampshire on 5th March to explore their brilliant novels, art in fiction and how art has inspired their storytelling. You can join us - tickets here).

Delicious debut

I inhaled this one like hot toast, the kind that oozes with so much butter that it dribbles down your chin. This is a book that will have you salivating with every page. Lottie Hazell’s Piglet is a triumph. Hard to believe it’s a debut to be honest.

Everything about Piglet’s life seems perfectly curated - she’s determined to make it so. She and her fiancé, Kit, are the model of domestic bliss – the perfect home, a covetable wedding in the offing, effortless hosts, beautiful tablescapes burgeoning with food to die for.

When Kit reveals an awful truth just thirteen days before the wedding, cracks begin to appear in Piglet’s fairytale. What happens when something threatens to strip you of the life you’ve so carefully built and shared so smugly? What happens when the choice is between self-destruction or doing nothing and it costing you everything?

As the ‘big day’ looms, Piglet is torn between a growing appetite and the desire to follow the recipe, follow the rules.

The craving in this is a visceral feeling for the reader. Piglet’s appetite, her desire, her difficult relationship with food - all lead her on a journey of self revelation. An unforgettable novel that makes for a brilliant book club choice. I promise you, this is a novel you’ll devour. I don’t think I’ll ever think of a Croquemboche in the same way again. This is a brilliant car crash of novel - you don’t want to but you have to keep reading on. It’s utterly compulsive.

With my last recommendation of the week, I’m off to whip up a bowl of Pasta Puttanesca. Read Piglet and you’ll know why. Something to soothe me out of sleepwalking mode and into Monday.

Happy Reading x