Book and AudioBook Review: The Power by Naomi Alderman, narrated by Adjoa Andoh

The Power by Naomi Alderman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

First of all probably the best narration ever by my favourite female narrator, Adjoa Andoh, it permits her full vent to her extensive range of voices and accents, English, American, Nigerian, Indian, young, old, northern, southern, Cockney etc. Just brilliant! She brings real texture, changes in speed, pitch, emotion and vocalisation to this work. 5* narration.

The book inverts the world. Bookended by the correspondence surrounding the draft of a book by a male author. The story in his book being the core, interspersed with factual pieces from history. It depicts a world where, apparently suddenly, all girls have the power to release electricity from their fingertips, and soon all women, but only women and post puberty girls. As with all speculative fiction you have to go with the premis and here it will take you on an incredible journey alongwith its princple characters - Allie, an abused American foster child who reivents herself as a faith leader building a commmunity away from men, Roxy, streetwise teenage daughter of a London gangster, Tunde a young Nigerian journalist who reports on this pehnomenon witnessing how it shifts the society's balance worldwide, and middle aged Margot, an on the rise American politican.

And it does change the world. From overturning regimes in Saudi Arabia, to freeing women from trafficking, but mainly it inverts everything as regards gender, just as Malorie Blackman's Noughts & Crosses up-ended race in her thought provoking look at prejudice, so Alderman up ends gender in an equally thought provoking manner.

In essence what this book is about is Power, what it is and how it is wielded. And as such it is not for the faint hearted - think of all the situations where power exists today from the writing of history, waging war, abuse of individuals, groups and peoples, exploitation etc, the power to cover up, the power to spread false news, the power to manipulate etc.

The book I felt started well, took a little bit of time to give us all the characers and start to bring them and itself together, and then it got The Power and thundered all fully charged. Some of the scences are horrific, but at the same time nothing that does not happen. This book does what all great speculative fiction should do, pose pretty soul searching, fundamental socio=political questions about the way we live and why. Up there with the best. The 1984 for 21st century.

Book Review: The Mermaid of Black Conch by Monique Roffey

The Mermaid of Black Conch by Monique Roffey
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Great storytelling on the themes of love, loss, loneliness and transformation. I listened to the audio version narrated by Vivienne Acheampong who reads the sections voiced by the mermaid Aycayia and Ben Onwukwe who reads the main narration by David the fisherman who rescues the mermaid caught by the tourist fishermen from Florida who see "it" as part of their catch,theirs to sell to somewhere like the Smithsonian and getting their hotos on the cover of Time Magazine. David takes Aycayia home expecting to return her to the sea, but she changes back into a woman. This basic storyline - outsider allows group to understand itself - are the stories of other islanders also suffering their own losses and lost loves. It is a beautiful read which won the Costa Book of the Year Award for 2020.

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Book Review: Ordinary People by Diana Evans

Ordinary People by Diana Evans
My rating: 1 of 5 stars


I very seldom trash a book but this has been the most boring book I have ever read. It was my in person book club choice for this month and I've managed about half way through it and that was a stretch so as a Christmas present to myself I am giving up on it! It is everything I dislike in a a novel - domesticity abounds, huge amount of dialog such that it almost reads like a script, characters I have absolutely no interest in and who have nothing interesting happening to them. It is set in a part of London I know and granted her desciptions of the area ran true - and that's my only positive about this book. I read reviews about it praising its prose and insight Guardian Review but I just don't get it, I'm just not reading the same book. For me it lived up to its title Ordinary. More enticing reads await.

Review: Six Stories and An Essay by Andrea Levy

Six Stories and An Essay by Andrea Levy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I bought the audio book of this some time ago just after reading her book Small Island and never got round to reading it. Now after watching the TV adaptation of her book The Long Song and watching an accompanying Imagine interview of her by Alan Yentob I resurrrected it.

Six stories and an essaay was first published in 2014. The essay covers much of what she covers in many of her interviews abouit her upbringing, her family, her awakening a a Black British Writer.
Each story is prefaced with an introduction by Levy. The first story "The Diary" is one she wrote whilst studying Creative Writing at City Lit in London - the classic creative Writing Prompt "You find a Diary....".

"Deborah" is a totally different voice, of a child, written in response to newspapers of the time being full of the story of child murderers .

The third story is entitled "That Polite Way That English People Have" which is readers' first introduction to the character of Hortense who is central to her novel The Small Island.

The fourth story "Loose Change" reflects on the unease felt in the relationships between immigrants of different times specifically here between a Caribbean one and an Central Asian one from different generations of migrations.

The next, is perhaps my favourite story, a short about people's fear of the Other, the inability to communicate even when speaking a common language because of the fear of the unknown, seeing only differences not commonalities in this case a common wellbeing for children as told by "The Empty Pram".

The sixth story is "February" one of Levy's stories inspired by her mother and written to order for a Waterstones diary.

Weirdly there is a seventh story, entitled "Uriah's War" on an important topic of the Caribeean men who volunteered and served in the British West Indies Regiments during the first World War, expounding their courage and discrimination.

ashramblings verdict 4* Levy is a great narrator! She makes her page words into somethingelse. The narration is a 5* one and if you are inclined to read this book I thoroughly recommend the narrated version, available via Audible.

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