Like your books ambitious? Becky says read these!
David Mitchell's new novel is a carnival of narrative, featuring six sections set in six distinct times and locations, and five different first-person narrators. If you like the idea of a novel in parts and multiple stories that shift between time, perspective and place (and sometimes parallel futuristic worlds) then you might also like these books....
David Mitchell's new novel is a carnival of narrative, featuring six sections set in six distinct times and locations, and five different first-person narrators. If you like the idea of a novel in parts and multiple stories that shift between time, perspective and place (and sometimes parallel futuristic worlds) then you might also like these books.
Gods Without Men by Hari Kunzru This book pans 250 years and features multiple stories that are all tethered to one mysterious spot in the Mojave Desert.
Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi by Geoff Dyer
This might be a novel in two novellas, or might be two novellas about two different men who both just happen to be called Jeff. You decide.
A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
It's a novel set in the past, present and future told through various stories and it got a Should I Read It? thumbs up in 2011.
If you prefer to do a little less time travelling within a single book, here are three reads that individual sections of The Bone Clocks brought to mind:
Maggie & Me by Damian Barr
Part One of The Bone Clocks is narrated by Holly Sykes, a lower-middle-class English teen in 1984 who argues with her mother, adores her little brother, and never uses a regular noun when a brand name is to hand.
Damian Barr's memoir about growing up in Thatcher's Britain is another '80s period piece. The young Barr shares Holly Sykes' spunk and determination, and also speaks in surround-sound 1980s British brand names.
The Rachel Papers by Martin Amis
In Part Two we meet Hugo Lamb, a posh Oxford student in 1991 with the gift of the gab and a penchant for cajoling young ladies with boyfriends into his bed. Hugo Lamb, meet Charles Highway, narrator of Martin Amis's brilliant debut novel. I think the two of you have lots in common.
City of Bohane by Kevin Barry
The final section of The Bone Clocks returns to Holly Sykes, now in her 70s and living in 2040s Ireland, where electricity has become a luxury item and keeping livestock is now essential for survival. Last year's International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award winner is set in Ireland in 2053 and shares with Mitchell's vision a return to earlier times (wind-up radios, no cars, no internet). Kevin Barry does bonkers things with language and reading this novel is a rollercoaster ride.