My Phantoms

Gwendoline Riley is just fantastic when it comes to challenging the reader to ponder complex human relationships (see First Love, nominated for the Women's Prize, the Gordon Burn Prize, the Goldsmiths Prize, etc. pp.). In "My Phantoms", she tells the story of Bridget and her mother Helen a.k.a. Hen,......more

A book largely if not entirely unrecognised by prize lists (other than a Gordon Burn Prize longlisting) but which seems to feature on multiple book of the years lists for 2021. “She’s clearly frightened of engaging. That’s a sad thing. A sad and defensive thing. Here’s a better way to put it, she......more

A fascinating character study about a mother and a daughter. What if you've always been ambivalent about your mother, or sometimes even hated her? What happens when she grows old, becomes ill, and needs you? Is it possible to find some love? My #librarianhusband read this too and had a very differen......more

This is a spare memoir-like novel full of noxious, circular dialogue between a daughter and her impenetrable and frustrating mother. The narrator is Bridget, an independent woman in her 40s as she begins her remembrance of her mother, Helen (Hen). All the exchanges are filtered through Bridget and t......more