I have been very slow to review the novellas I read for #NovNov25, so some quick reviews (and there’s still another bunch to come).

Brother by David Chariandy

There were elements of this book that ought to have ticked boxes for me – it’s a ‘relationship’ story (literally about two brothers growing up in a poor, immigrant neighbourhood in Toronto); and it’s also a story about grief (of the disenfranchised, and complicated kind). However, Chariandy does a lot of scene-setting, and as a result, when the plot reaches its climax, it lacked the impact I was expecting.

Part of the story included a love-interest sub-plot – a distraction from what could have been a tight focus on the role of music (specifically hip hop) in subculture and the Trinidadian immigrant experience.

2.5/5

Lady Susan by Jane Austen

What can I say about Austen that hasn’t already been said? Nothing. This epistolary novella has all the wit, charm and pointed observations that we count on Austen to deliver.

4/5

Seascraper by Benjamin Wood

I’ve mentioned many times before how it is difficult to write about water in a compelling way… But Benjamin Wood does it in Seascraper. I’m not overstating it to say that Wood’s words make fog, tides, and shifting sand absolutely gripping.

…the sea is just a faint grey runnel, two and something miles away. He rides on undulating sand that gives beneath the wheels as readily as butter. Biting wind and mizzle on his face.

The sky is like a quarry’s face, already much too dim for afternoon.

It’s a simple story but beautifully told and Wood’s gentle exploration of aspiration, loyalty, shame and hope was outstanding.

4.5/5

You Must Remember This by Sean Wilson

The story of Grace, an elderly woman with dementia, trying to get a handle on the increasingly unfamiliar world around her. Snippets of her past are gently linked to things that the reader understands to be happening in the present, and through this we learn about Grace’s difficult childhood.

Wilson has structured this novella cleverly – the chapters are out of order numerically, providing the reader clues about the jumping time frame. As a result, you are quickly drawn into Grace’s confused sense of time and place.

I found this story extremely unsettling, mainly because it was too close to the truth of my lived experience and to my day-to-day work (much of which is focused on people caring for a family member with dementia). Grace’s disorientation, the responses from those around her, and particularly the scenes in Grace’s residential care home were confronting – evidence that Wilson has done a very good job!

The story raises an issue worth highlighting – the importance of understanding a person’s history, especially trauma history, in the context of dementia. It is wrong to assume that people will ‘forget’, and it is also wrong to assume that someone with dementia will have revealed their traumas at some point in their life. Therefore, we must be mindful of how anxiety and trauma is reactivated.

3.5/5