Pink Fiction Club

This book has been on my TBR since the start of the year, and I have finally decided not to postpone reading it. I knew the author from before, as I have read ‘ Art and Lies’ during my uni days, but I cannot say that I remember much of it, unfortunately. Still, the premise of ‘Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit’ and the frequency by which this book was recommended, made me want to read this one as well. I must say that I enjoyed it quite a lot and will definitely be reading Winterston’s other work as well. The story follows Jeanette who is adopted by a religious zealot of a mother and is trained to become a missionary for their church. However, although at first Jeanette accepts and is even enthusiastic about this life, encounters with other young women make her discover her sexuality and want to discover her freedom and a different life is born in her. Although the author in my edition of the book claims this is not a straight up memoir, this is a story of the life of a young, religious w...

  This book has been on my 2024 hopefuls and when I was putting down my online Waterstones order for another book, I decided to get ‘Build Your House Around My Body’ as well. I have read a synopsis and it was the spatial setting of Vietnam that made him read this novel. Although it is not a particularly long book, I took a long time to read it and even longer to gather my thoughts around it. The novel seemingly follows two stories- a modern story of an American Vietnamese woman coming back to Vietnam to escape her family and the story from the 1980s of a young, rich woman that disappears without trace. However, once you dig your teeth into it a bit more, there is so much more packed in his book. In addition to Winnie and the woman from the 1980s there is a long list of characters coming in and out, some with magical abilities that are thrust on us without a lot of warning or context clues. The narrative switches the reader between the two stories, indicated at the start of the chap...