Tell Us Everything – 21/09/2024

If you have not met Olive Kitteridge and Lucy Barton yet, I am thrilled for you because of what you have lying ahead.
If you have, I am thrilled at that. There is so much to discuss.  

Now, at last, Olive and Lucy have met each other. And they keep meeting. In order to tell each other stories. In order to share the moment where they understand why a person acts as they do. In order to reach out a hand and be received in the same way.

‘When Lucy was done, they sat in a long silence together.
Olive finally said, “That’s one hell of a story, Lucy. You should write that down, you’ve written personal things before.”
“Never going to write it. You are the receptacle.” Lucy opened her hands in a gesture of giving.
“But I’m going to die, and this should be out there.”
“It’s in you, I gave it to you.” Lucy said this open-faced and calmly.
And after a long silence, Olive said quietly, “Thank you.”’

As I said last week, I can’t wait for you to tell me everything you thought about it.
Tell Me Everything came out on Thursday and already our signed copies are depleted; let me know if you’d like one of the few remaining.

Meanwhile, since the previous newsletter was all about picking out some of those BNOCs of storytelling amongst the wild publishing rush of the season, this week it is all about the Independent Presses and some names of which you may not have heard.

On 1^st October, And Other Stories publishes Fire Exit by Morgan Talty. Charles lives across the river from the Penobscot reservation. From there he can see the house in which his daughter grew up and to which she returns, unwell, as an adult. She does not know that he is her father, his identity having been concealed from her and from her Native American tribe since she would otherwise not have been enrolled. From a close and unfathomable distance, he longs to give her the gift of their story and to belong with and to her.

Mary and the Rabbit Dream by Noémi Kiss-Deáki, published by Galley Beggar Press, is based on the true story of Mary Toft who, in 1726, convinced various doctors that she was giving birth to rabbits. The story is wild. But the best thing is how it is told, partly as it unfolds and partly offering the perspective of three hundred years. The harrowing abuse of Mary is deeply moving, the ridiculous approach of the doctors brilliantly satirised and the effect the case had for modern medicine rather surprising.  

Untold Lessons by Maddalena Vaglio Tanet – translated from the Italian by Jill Foulston and published by Pushkin Press – is a labyrinthine novel set in northern Italy. Silvia grew up unafraid of nighttime in the woods, foraging at dark for porcini mushrooms with her cousins. Now a teacher, living on the edge of the city, she is devoted to her students, to one in particular who needs support even or especially as she pushes it away. On the morning that the newspaper announces the tragic death of that student, anyone passing Silvia would see no reaction as she registers the news. But no one does see her. She walks into the woods and disappears.

Earth House by Matthew Hollis: I hope it’s not too trivial to say that this is an indescribable poetry collection. Its four parts have different but connected tones. Each immerses you in different landscapes across Britain and Ireland. I’m reading it slowly, enjoying sinking into the journey. A favourite, ‘Wastwater,’ invites you to follow across three shires, the weather ‘hard at the hem of the car,’ looking down on the ‘scarp with its paper-clip turns,’ descending ‘partly cheated, half wanting to be blown/to the corners of beyond.’ Bloodaxe have produced this beautifully from the stunning cover illustration to the careful attention to placement of individual words on the page.

All That Remains by Sarah Hemings and Vanessa Clegg is a collection of poetry and paintings from Renard Press depicting the things we leave behind and the significance they hold for our loved ones. Through their different art forms these silent objects begin to speak. Vanessa Clegg’s paintings are stunning; Sarah Hemings’ poems intelligently understated – as in her poetry pamphlet which fills hushed rooms with feeling. The book itself becomes one of the transformative mute objects of its fascination.

On 22 February 2022, Jonathan Littell finished writing a book on Babyn Yar, a ravine in Kyiv with a largely unacknowledged history as the site of Nazi massacres of Jews, Romani people and prisoners of war. Two days later, Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Littell and photographer, Antoine D’Agata began the book again from a different perspective, including a focus on Bucha. An Inconvenient Place, translated by Charlotte Mandell and published by Fitzcarraldo, is the result, exploring how to write about and photograph a place where there is nothing to see.

The Many Lives of James Lovelock: Science, Secrets and Gaia Theory by Jonathan Watts, published by Canongate, examines the long and contradictory life of the inventor, academic and founder of Gaia Theory, a man whose home requires a radiation hazard sign due to the research carried out there and who answered the Queen’s question ‘What do you do?’ with ‘I can’t tell you.’ This is a fascinating biography as well as an exploration of the many interpretations of Gaia Theory, to all of which Lovelock himself seems to have subscribed at different times of his life.

New independent publisher Gemini books popped in to say hello a few weeks ago (named for the founders’ not one but TWO sets of twins.) As frequently happens, we found ourselves discussing Harriet Baker’s Rural Hours and Olivia Laing’s The Garden Against Time, leading to their announcement of publishing Where the Old Roses Grow: Vita Sackville-West and the Battle for Beauty during Wartime by Janelle McCulloch. This is the story of how Vita Sackville-West, Constance Spry and Graham Stuart Thomas saved heritage roses from extinction. Within a story bringing light during wartime, McCulloch’s sumptuous photographs of the roses at Sissinghurst bloom with extraordinary shades and texture.

Also from Gemini, who produce stunning illustrated books for all ages with impressive attention to detail, comes the board book How Wide is a Whale? by Lisa Regan and Sarah Wade. Well, so wide that the pull-out sliders have pull-out sliders of their own. A masterpiece.

What could be better than learning to count with a rhyming story? Doing so with polar bears from a book titled It Bears Repeating? Add in that you learn to count in Inuktitut as well as English and this is quite the picture book by Tanya Tagaq and Cee Pootoogook.

A Riddle For a King by Mark Forsyth, illustrated by Matthew Land, makes Mary Toft’s story look quite logical: Alice in Wonderland meets Beckett, I was told. Add in flashes of The Phantom Tollbooth and you have some idea of the humour and surrealism. Philo follows a creature through a door, finds himself in a very odd land and needs to avoid being turned into a teapot. Well, he’d always longed for something out of the ordinary to happen…

Many of the books we are reading in our book groups and the authors we are celebrating at events are also published by exceptional independent presses. Do come and make merry with us.

May your weekend afford you the chance to sit with a friend and tell each other everything,
Lizzie

Featured in the newsletter