A bit of sun

Brightens everything up. 


Booker Prize

I watched the long delayed Award Ceremony on Thursday evening. It was done very well from the Roundhouse and relayed via BBC 4's Front Row and BBC Arts Digital. Each Author introduced their book and then a little from their book was professionally read. Obama added a few words, emphasising the importance of fiction in encouraging empathy and I fully agree with him. 

The winner of this year’s Booker Prize is ’Shuggie Bain’ by Douglas Stuart. It was the one I would have chosen, as it is the best one of the four of the six I have read. It was a surprise choice to many, as the short list was such a diverse list and everyone assumed one of the more diverse books would win, especially in a year when diversity has been a key issue. But this is a book prize. There was quite a bit of criticism of the choice on the lines of ‘another white male’, but I feel they got it right. It has to be the best book and this was the best written and structured of them all. 

A lot of people are reading “Shuggie Bain’ now and it will be interesting to see how they get on with it. I liked it a lot, although I hesitated before starting it, thinking a book about 1980s Glasgow, Thatcher’s Britain with unemployment, poverty, lack of opportunity and alcoholism did not sound very joyful. However, I am so pleased I did read it. It is not an easy book, because of the subject matter, but it is readable and the characters soon gain the reader’s sympathy. It is bleak, but it is also full of humour, humanity, hope and love. I am not recommending it, as it is not to everyone’s taste, but it is a worthwhile read, a book that resonates  and will continue to do so.