5 new books to read this week
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The Paper Palace is a constant backdrop in Elle’s life. A run-down holiday home resting on the shore of one of Cape Cod’s unspoilt ponds, it is where she spent her summers growing up: where she had her first kiss, found her first love and where she now takes her own children in the summer months.
But there is something darker lurking in the waters of Elle’s past, something that tore her life apart.
Over 24 hours we watch Elle’s life unfold, as she prepares for a decision that could change her world forever – to take back what she lost, or to keep living the beautiful lie she spent so long constructing.
A family drama, a forbidden love story, a childhood tragedy, The Paper Palace is a stunning literary debut that will eat you up and leave you reeling – you won’t want it to end.
A voice in Mina’s head says a lot can happen in 20 hours, as she prepares to join the crew for the first non-stop flight from London to Sydney. She was right.
What follows is a turbulent series of shocking events and a journey that keeps the reader guessing until the final chapter. Mina discovers a note after the plane takes off, threatening the life of her five-year-old daughter, who is soon to be at the centre of a violent, unfolding drama at home with her policeman father and the family’s nanny.
Chapters swing between different passengers on the flight, who have wildly different plans for visiting the Sydney Opera House. We have big expectations for the North Wales-based author’s next book, considering the supersonic storyline of Hostage.
It’s hard to distill the plot of Gunk Baby, because there really isn’t much of one. It’s told largely from the perspective of Leen, a 24-year-old Chinese Australian woman setting up her own business in the middle of a suburban mall, focusing on Eastern healing – particularly ear cleaning.
She falls in with some curious characters who have an anti-capitalist agenda, and starts dubious missions against those they deem ‘bad’. There’s a colourful cast of characters, all told from Leen’s detached perspective – including her friends who start a urine business to trick drug tests, and the militant, cultish Jean Paul.
Jamie Marina Lau’s style is captivating – you’re drawn into the stagnant world of this Australian suburbia, and everything seems bizarre and off in a way that makes you feel constantly uncomfortable – but some readers might want more action, and less repetition.
Without having read Matt Haig’s previous works, one might expect his new title The Comfort Book, to be more of a methodical, sequenced explainer of how to give oneself comfort.
Instead, the reader is met with what Haig calls ‘little islands of hope’; a collection of different stories – some spanning two pages, others simply one sentence – all written to instil a sense of ease and solace in the reader.
Due to the format, the first 50 pages can feel slightly disjointed; but once you are fully engrossed, every page of Haig’s smooth prose will inspire you to think. Whether it is about fitting in, facing one’s demons or happiness itself, each short anecdote, quote or simple sentence does just what the book aims to do: give comfort.
Daisy May Johnson - How To Be Brave
In How To Be Brave, Daisy May Johnson has created an amusing adventure full of quirks, heroes and footnotes. Calla is the daughter of Elizabeth North, who is the foremost expert on ducks – particularly one very rare species that a young and recently orphaned Elizabeth rescued and nursed back to health at her convent boarding school.
Fast forward to now and Elizabeth is given the chance to study ducks in the Amazon. Making sure Calla will be looked after, she packs her off to the same convent she attended. Instead of being the alternative nurturing environment it used to be, where students could learn to fly and maintain a small plane, a cruel headmistress has taken over and is trying to crush the girls’ spirits at every opportunity with lessons like sprout-based algebra and a diet high in kale.
It soon becomes apparent there is a hidden motive, and Elizabeth has disappeared. This twisty tale is truly marvellous.
