books reviews


AFTER THE FUNERAL Tessa Hadley


(Jonathan Cape, £18.99)


Uplifting and absorbing are not words usually associated with fu- nerals, but in Tessa Hadley’s latest short story collection After The Funeral, they are offered in abun- dance. Despite the slightly sombre title, each story sparks intrigue within the pages as the characters’ hidden depths are revealed.


Tessa Hadley


Every chapter also offers a unique perspective – from After The Funeral itself, which opens the collection and details the lives of two daughters and their mother following their father’s untimely death – to the shocking conclusion of My Mother’s Wedding. The wonders of past connections devel- oped in The Other One stood out


especially brightly for me.


Some of the stories may be familiar to readers, having been printed in various publications, but this is the first time they’ve joined together; it’s also Hadley’s first short story collection since 2017, when her Bad Dreams was pub- lished.


There aren’t many authors who can convey human behaviour so clearly. Most of the stories left me wondering about the aftermath, wanting to discover more about each character’s journey, as they simmered off the page. I experi- ence a moment of joy when a new Tessa Hadley book is announced: this is yet another engaging and vivid collection.


RHIANON HOLLEY


(V&A Publishing, £30) Kate Bailey [ed.] DIVA


The Victoria & Albert Museum has been responsible for some of the UK’s – probably the world’s – most exciting blockbuster pop cul- ture/fashion exhibits this century. The newly-opened Diva comes, as usual, with an accompanying book, including contributions from Ve- ronica Castro, Sasha Geffen, Keith Lodwick, Lucy O’Brien, Miranda Sawyer and Jacqueline Springer. Though not as satisfying as seeing the actual costumes of the megastars covered, as a photobook alone, it’s worth its weight in gold for the wicked words of wisdom from Mae West, designs for Jose- phine Baker’s iconic banana skirt, or images of Mariah Carey being carried across a stage on a chaise longue.


PSYCHEDELICS Professor David Nutt (Yellow Kite, £20)


The area of research covered by David Nutt in Psychedelics is a fast-moving one: when I requested a review copy, two months before its publication date, I was told this would not be possible until Nutt had finished writing it. Accord- ingly, the book’s very first page notes the medicinal legalisation of MDMA and psilocybin – aka mag- ic mushrooms – in Australia, almost to the day Psychedelics comes out. You may know Professor Nutt


SANDERSON’S ISLE James Clarke


(Serpent’s Tail, £16.99)


While we think of the ‘diva’ as a 20th-century invention, edi- tor Kate Bailey traces it back 400 years earlier to Italy, when it had divine connotations, argued by Bailey as minimalising rather than celebrating her power. This tension between adoration and damnation stuck: we all know that diva-ish be- haviour means being highly strung. But as the book moves into the postmodern era, the term has been reclaimed. “A diva is a female version of a


hustler,” Beyoncé rapped in 2008. And, of course, not all divas are women anymore – all part of what Bailey calls a “constellation of idols and worshippers”, still evolving.


HANNAH COLLINS 44


from his first appearance in the pub- lic eye circa 2009, when his criti- cisms of UK drug policies led to him being upbraided, then sacked from his governmental advisory role by the Labour Party. In some ways, we have made substantial progress in discourse on such mat- ters since then; in others, very little. Nutt covers this period and sev- eral preceding decades, describing the history of LSD – before its hip- py-induced ban in the late 1960s – and its value, underexplored for legal reasons, in treating depression and addiction. Other mind-altering (in a non-pejorative


stances including ketamine, DMT and ayahuasca are considered, with Nutt candid about their benefits, limitations and risks. An accessi- ble pop science book that doesn’t talk down to its readership, Psych- edelics is hopefully ahead of the curve when it comes to mainstream discourse around this topic.


sense) sub- NOEL GARDNER


The website of James Clarke’s agent indicates that Sanderson’s Isle, his second novel, has already had its film rights signed off. Not that this at all guarantees a movie of the book actually being made, of course, but what a splendid idea that would be. Set at the end of the 1960s, with the schism between straight society and the substratum of psychedelic dropouts making for some uneasy culture clashing, Clarke’s pacing is shrewd and cin- ematic, his characters vivid and beguiling. Tom Speake, protagonist and is an out-of-work odd-


narrator,


job man; Joe Sanderson is a mid- dle-aged TV presenter who hosts drug-fuelled orgies in his house. The pair overcome a mutual sus- picion to work together, leaving London for the Lake District: here, Sanderson plans to research a book assisted by Speake, who happens to also be a wanted man after an altercation leaves a woman badly injured. The pair find stranger and more lawless communities than they bargained for, and get inexorably sucked into the madness. Threads from other, disparate parts of their lives intertwine, and the action hur- tles towards a deranged conclusion which, in many ways, ends incon- clusively. To this end, it upholds the filmic feel and depicts the crum- bling end of a hazy decade vividly.


NOEL GARDNER


(Atlantic, £18.99/£9.99 Ebook)


THIS IS NOT AMERICA Tomiwa Owolade


With what feels like the majority of modern political arguments be- coming extremely polarised, Tomi- wa Owolade’s This Is Not America poses a series of refreshingly bal- anced ideas on – as the book’s sub- title puts it – ‘Why Black Lives In Britain Matter’, creating a nuanced, passionate and persuasive read. Owolade challenges the American- ised lens through which we discuss race in Britain: as per the main title, the UK’s history, culture, and poli- tics differ significantly to that of the USA, so why do we discuss race in the same way?


ters on topics such as immigration, empire and mixed-race identity, Owolade sets out an empirical yet holistic representation of Black life in Britain, arguing that in order to build an anti-racist agenda “we must specifically emphasise a Brit- ish context”. In a particularly evoc- ative chapter, ‘Black And British’, the author suggests that whilst there are myriad cultural identities with- in Black British communities and in wider Britain, “Black identity is not alien to Britishness. It is encom- passed by it.” This Is Not America, though


Throughout a series of chap-


situated within an often heated and contentious political landscape, is a powerfully subtle, balanced and optimistic addition to the discourse on race in Britain that feels perfect- ly timed.


ELIZABETH MORRIS


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