There’s an aching, melancholy quality to this story, about Mr Predergast, a well-travelled elderly Anglo-Irishman, a widower, who now lives alone in his crumbling Big House with just his (drunken) gardener for company.

Jennifer Johnston is my favourite living writer and this book, her debut, first published in 1972 when she was in her 40s, earned her the Author’s Club First Novel Award. ‘The Captains and the Kings’ by Jennifer Johnstonįiction – Kindle edition Headline 152 pages 1999. Jacqui at JacquiWine’s Journal liked it too. I really enjoyed this debut and ate it up in a matter of hours. The entire novella is embued with a sense of melancholia, helped partly by the pared-back, hypnotic prose in which it’s written, but it also has a page-turning quality because the reader can’t help but wonder if the pair will ever become lovers. When a young Frenchman arrives at the guest house so he can work on his drawings (he’s a cartoonist), the narrator develops an uneasy one-sided relationship with him, acting as his tour guide and (unknown to her) muse for his art.

Her mother, who works in a nearby fish market, is critical of her daughter’s failure to get married and makes snide comments about her weight (she’s so thin you can see her ribs). She has a disinterested boyfriend, who heads to Seoul to follow his dream of becoming a model, while she remains behind in Sokcho to help run a near-empty guest house. The unnamed French-Korean narrator is a young woman in her early 20s who feels like an outsider but has no real desire to travel or live elsewhere. This intriguing novel is set in a South Korean tourist town, not far from the border with North Korea, during the offseason. Translated from the French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins ‘Winter in Sokcho’ by Elisa Shua Dusapinįiction – paperback Daunt Books 154 pages 2020.

They have been reviewed in alphabetical order by author’s surname. They are a good reflection of my eclectic reading tastes because they include a translated novel (from Korea/France), a literary novel (from Ireland), a young adult novel (by two Aboriginal writers) and a psychological thriller-cum-mystery (from England). So here are four quick reviews of books I have read recently. (I will do my books of the year post tomorrow.) As 2020 draws to a close, I’m keen to wrap-up all my reviews so that I’m not playing catch-up well into the new year.

Elisa shua dusapin books