New books to read this week

Fiction

1. The Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley is published in hardback by HarperCollins

Sending up the sporadic foolishness of the super rich is certainly de rigueur, whether in hit movies like The Menu or Parasite, or in literature like Crazy Rich Asians and Pineapple Street, with real shenanigans like the ill-fated Fyre Festival also catching the public imagination. Lucy Foley’s novel The Midnight Feast blends concepts from the works and events cited above with an old-fashioned murder mystery and elements of the supernatural as chaos descends across the opening weekend at the fictional Manor, an exclusive coastal retreat for the wealthy and well-heeled, where the rage of resentful locals and long-buried secrets threaten to ruin everything for its fashionable and unflappable founder Francesca Woodland. Excellently employing the multiple-narrator format, this twisty tale shifts between perspectives and through time to reveal the reasons why the crystal pouches left in guests’ rooms won’t necessarily save them from the darkness pouring out of the neighbouring forest.

2. Parade by Rachel Cusk is published in hardback by Faber & Faber

Rachel Cusk’s novels, notably her Outline trilogy, deviated into ‘autofiction’ long before Baby Reindeer made self-revelation a hot topic. Her latest, Parade, challenges not just novelistic fictionality but also narrative structure. Parade’s four chapters contain multiple perspectives. An artist named ‘G’ recurs, but each time differing in biography, artistic MO, gender; many sections are narrated with an obscure, authorial, regal ‘we’. Whereas Outline’s shifting cast of interlocutors slowly filled the blank canvas of Cusk’s narrator, here the array of scenarios, relationships and lives remains unanchored. If they all combine to sketch something, it is an abstract: ‘The Author’ as ‘Artist’, as ‘Mother/Child’, or perhaps as Cusk herself, though her autobiographical tendency is never entirely artless. This novel is dense with thought, but admirably light in expression. Cusk’s ideas about artistic creation and personal exposure are interwoven with her chosen form, but it is not one that readers embrace easily.

3. Clean by Alia Trabucco Zerán is published in hardback by Fourth Estate

Clean is an intriguing tale of a domestic worker telling the reader from a locked room about events that led up to the death of her wealthy employer’s young daughter. Housemaid Estela spares no detail about the seven years she worked for the family in Santiago, Chile, including disturbing events and her thoughts that explore domestic work, class and violence. The contrast between love in her own life and the cold-natured household she serves is also a poignant take away from the storytelling. Author Alia Trabucco Zerán creates an engaging dynamic between the protagonist and reader which makes the novel a unique, chilling read, albeit at times feels drawn out waiting for the climax of events.

Non-fiction

4. All That Glitters: A Story Of Friendship, Fraud And Fine Art by Orlando Whitfield is published in hardback by Profile Books

In the non-fiction book, author Orlando Whitfield reflects on regretting an old friend of Inigo Philbrick, who later admitted to defrauding people of over £80 million through arts deals and was later released early from a US prison. As Whitfield tells it, he met Philbrick when they were both at Goldsmiths, University of London, and soon became enthralled by his friendship and comfort in the art world. They do some deals together, even managing to purchase a Banksy from a building door, but as Philbrick rises and Whitfield becomes disenchanted with the art world, it painfully describes how business almost destroyed the British author’s life. All That Glitters is at its height a sad tale of male friendship gone wrong but, as is understandable from a book like this, misses some much-needed objectivity.

Children’s book of the week

5. Mayowa And The Sea of Words by Chibundu Onuzo is published in hardback by Bloomsbury Children’s Books

Mayowa And The Sea Of Words is not your typical children’s book. Chibundu Onuzo manages to include all the excitement and imagination that you would expect, while basing it around the very real world and emotive subject of immigration and refugees. It follows Mayowa, a strong, independent, intelligent girl with a big heart who wants to make a positive difference – especially when she finds out she has the secret power of book jumping, meaning she can harness the emotional core of a book and channel it into someone else. It is a very enjoyable and engaging read with lots of colourful and vivid descriptions that really makes you feel like you are part of the story, making for a great start to what promises to be an exciting trilogy.