The Territory by Sarah Govett

The Territory by Sarah Govett

The Territory is first in a series of three books by Sarah Govett.

It is 2059 in the UK, most of the country is underwater so space is limited. Only the smartest get to stay dry. The rest are sent off to live in the wetlands where disease and crime are rife and survival is slim. 

Noa Blake is preparing to take her exams. She is smart but that's because she studies extra hard and has the advantage of parents who can afford to send her to a good school. She is however still at a disadvantage. She is a norm. She doesn't have a node, a port in her neck that allows her to upload information straight to her brain. Noa has to study the old fashioned way. Will her hard work and determination be enough to keep her on dry land?

The story is told from Noa's perspective. I felt that the author captured the language of a 15 year old brilliantly. Teens do love their slang terms and there were plenty of those! I loved that Noa, like most 15 year olds, felt she was grown up, felt she was ready to take control of her own life and make her own decisions. As an outsider looking in we see Noa is still developing her sense of self, she is experiencing her first taste of love and trying to live as normally as she can in this harsh world, but most importantly, she still has so much to learn. Which is what makes this book so frightening... a 15 year old is not old enough to be sent away to live in such dangerous conditions, alone!!

I would have liked to get to know some of Noas friends a little better. Daisy is Noas best friend but I didn't feel a connection to her. Jack, Noas other best friend had a habit of punching walls or lashing out when things didn't go as planned which no one seemed to address until it was too late. But then again, why in a world where 15 years olds are coldy sent to die would someone be the slightest bit concerned about something as minor as anger issues and the reasons behind it? And then there's Raf, the mysterious new boy. He was my favourite of Noas friends. He was edgy and pushed the boundries but had a kind heart.

The story takes a few dark turns here and there, particularly on the subject of medical experimentation and basic human rights.

The Territory, signed copy

Prioritisation means that medication is no longer available to the wetlands. How are new medicines tested? Certainly not on the intelligent Territory folk, that's for sure. While in the book the situation is more more severe than in real life it made me think of medicines in todays world. A persons postcode can determine how quickly they are treated. A persons bank balance can determine whether they get the best treatment available.. or not. And then there's the touchy subject of how the medicines are tested. If they are not tested on humans and animals, how will we ever know if they work but what about the humans and animals that are made to suffer so that we don't have to??

This book was one of my favourite YA reads of 2018. It was exciting, heartbreaking and thought provoking.

I can't wait to pick up books 2 and 3 to see what becomes of Noa and her friends.

Thank you to Sarah Govett for sending me this copy for review.

 
 

Men Without Women - Review

Men Without Women

The vast amounts of high praise for Murakami’s unique writing style compelled me to pick up his book and see what the fuss was all about and my gosh, it blew my mind. As a newcomer to his work I didn’t know what to expect which is just as well, because the seven short stories included in this book are like no other story I have ever read.

The first story is Drive my Car. There is no plot. The story is mostly a conversation between Kafka, an actor still mourning the death of his wife, and his female driver Misaki. We listen to him open up about his relationship with his wife, how she had multiple affairs during their many years together and how he had to watch her die from the terrible illness that is cancer. Despite knowing his wife was seeing other men, he never once discussed this with her. He never let on that he knew and he never asked her why. Now he must forever live with the grief, the pain and the unanswered questions. 

I felt quite relieved once the story was over. Not because I didn’t enjoy it. Because reading the story made me feel like I was actually there, with Kafka, in the car. I felt like I was eavesdropping on deeply personal conversation. I wanted to quietly exit the car at the next set of lights and leave him to grieve in peace. 

I closed the book and just sat for a while, thinking. Going over what Kafka had said. Why didn’t he ever confront his wife? Was he frightened of what she would say? Was it easier for him to pretend it wasn’t happening and still have his wife rather than confront her and risk losing her? Had he confronted her and lost her, he would have at least had closure. Now he had lost her anyway and would forever be haunted by the what ifs and whys.

These questions and more swam around my head. Drive my car had given me no satisfactory conclusion and I needed to clear my head of all the thoughts and feelings the story had filled me with before I could even think about moving on to the next.

After reading the next couple of stories I noticed a pattern. None of the stories have a plot. Nothing much ever happens yet I couldn’t tear myself away for fear of missing the big reveal, which never ever came. Each and every time I would finish a story, switch off the light and just lay there, sleep eluding me because I had a heart full of mixed up feelings and a head full of questions I would never know the answers to.

Half way through we get to An Independent Organ. The story is about fifty-two-year-old Dr Tokai told from the perspective of his gym partner. He is a cosmetic surgeon who has never been married, never had children and is quite happy to live alone, believing that he isn’t suited for married life. Dr Tokai chooses to have relations with women who were either married or already in a relationship. He feels more at ease knowing these women are unlikely to be seeking long term relationships or anything too meaningful from him.

“But one day, quite unexpectedly, he fell deeply in love. Like a clever fox suddenly finds itself caught in a trap”

The story follows his struggle with the feelings of love, his devastation when just as he feared he loses the only woman he ever loved and how his theory that all women have an independent organ which allows them to lie without any change in their voice or expression because it is not them, it’s their independent organ.

Now hang on a minute Dr Tokai…. Yes, I accept that women lie. I have lied in my lifetime and I’ll probably lie again. But surely you don’t mean to say that only women lie? Do men not have an independent organ too? Do men never lie? 

Once again, I’m laid in bed, light off, thoughts whizzing round in my head. I was still smarting after the independent organ theory. And anyway, Dr Tokai is a man who deliberately sought out dishonest women to have relations with. Would it really have been such a surprise that the woman eventually left him for a third? Why was he so frightened to go out and find real love, with a woman who was free to love him back without any complications? Oh man… I could go on for days. 

This is what Murakamis stories do to me. They give me more questions than they do answers. The stories have layers upon layers and I’m never quite sure how I’m supposed to interpret them. There are multiple ways his stories can be interpreted, and I feel like this was Murakamis intention.

He draws you in, waits until you’re invested then flips everything upside down and inside out and leaves you to make of it what you will. 

Men without women is not for everyone. Some might say the stories are dull. I might even agree. It’s the layers. I wanted peel away each one and get to the true meaning of the story. I don’t feel I came anywhere close, which is why I’ll probably read them all again. This book is like an itch, the more I scratch, the more it itches. Yet I keep on scratching…

Killer Affair - Book Review

Killer affair

Whether we like it or not, reality TV is big business. 

Reality TV in my eyes is a load of trash. That doesn’t change the fact that if I happen to be unlucky and catch an episode of Big Brother by accident, the next two months of my life are over. I get sucked in. There’s no point in fighting it, it’s just a fact of life. And don’t even talk to me about I’m a Celebrity….

So, if like me, you can’t stop watching reality TV shows even though you probably hate every celebrity on them, Killer Affair is the book for you. 

The story follows sexy Lexy, a footballers wife and reality TV Queen. There is nothing this woman wouldn’t do to stay in the public eye. She is forever courting the press and pulling off publicity stunts. 

Dowdy blogger Carline has been drafted in to ghost write Lexys autobiography. She is being paid peanuts shadow Lexy, get to know her and learn the tricks of the trade so that she can mimic her tone for the book. Caroline dreams of writing a book of her own one day. She longs to earn enough money be able to escape the dilapidated terraced house she shares with 4 other people. Could ghost writing for Lexy could be the big break she’s been waiting for?

Caroline soon learns that the most important person in Lexys life is Lexy. She has the perfect life, the perfect husband, the perfect house and Caroline thinks she needs to be brought down a peg or two.

It quickly becomes clear that Caroline’s plans go way beyond bringing Lexy down a peg or two. Caroline wants what Lexy has, the house and the fame and most of all Lexys husband Frank and she plans on using Lexys own tricks against her to get exactly that. Poor Frank is stuck in the middle and with both women being as cunning as they come, it’s not surprising that he hasn’t got a clue what’s really going on.

This book is full of revenge, bitchiness, fake friendships and steamy sex scenes. There may even be a few celebrities in this book that you recognise – names have been changed obviously!

I am fully aware that this book is a work of fiction but I have a sneaky suspicion that one or two reality tv stars could well read this and tell us that the truth isn’t that far off. 

Rebecca Chance’s writing had the same effect on me as a reality TV show. It had me well and truly hooked. Almost every character was vile and the worse they became the more I wanted to see of them. My opinion of each character changed from chapter to chapter, just like it does from episode to episode on a reality TV show. And when the story ended I was relieved to return to my ordinary life, with my ordinary friends and ordinary job, only this time I didn’t have to look at their faces on the cover of gossip magazines for weeks on end!!

This book was a giveaway win from the Trip Fiction Facebook page.