Sample Saturday is when I wade through the eleventy billion samples I have downloaded on my Kindle. I’m slowly chipping away and deciding whether it’s buy or bye.

Learning to Swim by Clare Chambers

Why I have it: Because someone in my Goodreads feed said it was the best novel they’ve ever read.

Summary: Abigail Jex never expected to see the Radley family again. In dramatic contrast to her own conventional family, the Radleys were extraordinary, transplanted from a bohemian corner of North London to outer suburbia. Thirteen years later, a chance encounter brings them back into her life.

I’m thinking: Maybe – anyone else read it?

Asylum Road by Olivia Sudjic

Why I have it: Because it was compared to Hot Milk by Deborah Levy, which I loved.

Summary: A couple drive from London to Provence. Anya feels their relationship is precarious. Luke, reserved, gives away nothing. One evening, he proposes, and they return to London engaged. But planning a wedding does little to settle Anya’s unease. As a child, she escaped from Sarajevo, and the idea of security is as alien now as it was then. The past she sought to contain resurfaces.

I’m thinking: Yes.

Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin

Why I have it: Because of Theresa’s review.

Summary: It’s winter in Sokcho, a tourist town on the border between South and North Korea. A young woman works as a receptionist in a tired guesthouse. One evening, an unexpected guest arrives: a French cartoonist determined to find inspiration in this desolate landscape. The two form an uneasy relationship, and she agrees to accompany him on trips to discover an ‘authentic’ Korea.

I’m thinking: Yes.