Review: An Anonymous Girl by Hendricks and Pekkanen

Jess is a make up artist living paycheck to paycheck until she steals someone else’s windfall. While preparing a client for a night, Jess learns of the woman’s plan to skip a paid research survey for a psych professor, forfeiting the $500 payment. Armed with the client’s name and survey details, Jess takes the plunge and shows up for the appointment, and becomes Subject 52.

After answering a series of questions around the concepts of ethics and morality, and unveiling her secrets, Jess is invited back to participate in more session, with the promise of more remuneration. Her task now goes beyond answering questions, to being a player in elaborate scenarios created to test morality, or lack thereof, in unknown subjects.

As the scenarios begin to take on a familiar and ever-more-threatening theme, Jess wonders if it is possible to abandon the study with her own morals intact.

An Anonymous Girl is a beautiful but calculated dance around the concepts of good and evil, cleverly disguised as an elaborate research project. In truth, a single motivator lies behind the entire experiment, with lines firmly drawn and crossed. As the conflicting motives of the characters collide, it is up to the reader to decide whose versions of truth, love, and sacrifice are better. In a world where there is so much to gain and lose, Hendricks and Pekkanen dissect motivation, retributions, and apathy. The competing narratives of researcher and researched make for highly tense but enjoyable reading, as we are asked to divide our attention, and our loyalties, between two compelling characters. Perhaps this duality is a result of the book being penned by two authors, each with their unique insights, giving An Anonymous Girl its unique depth of character and enthralling dialogue of narratives. Hendricks and Pekkanen clearly demonstrate that every story has two sides, but that it is not always clear which is the right one.

An Anonymous Girl is a compelling and exciting read, filled with twists and subplots, which mingle to form an easy-to-read delight that will keep you up all night as you try to discover who to believe. Whose side will you choose?

An Anonymous Girl by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen is published by Macmillan, an imprint of Pan Macmillan.

Review: The Absolution by Yrsa Sigurdardottir

What started off as a normal working Sunday for Stella ended as a video of the teen apologizing while being violently beaten. What is Stella apologizing for, and why is she being tortured into doing it? That’s what the police need to find out while they hunt for the perpetrator. Before the police have had time to make any headway on the case or find Stella, another video of a bloodied and apologetic teen is doing the rounds on social media. This time, a young man is filmed from his home before he, too, disappears.

The police have no choice but to call in for backup, and for disgraced policeman Huldar, help takes the form of Freyja, a child psychologist who has assisted with cases in the past. As they try to unearth the motivation for such cruel crimes and the reasons behind them, it comes to light that the victims had both previously played the role of attacker with fellow students. Are the transgressions of these teens the motives for the brutal attacks?

There is something deeply unsettling about violence directed towards the youth, and the notion that it is in retaliation for horrid transgressions makes for reading that is impossible to stop. Themes of revenge, justice and brutality are strongly represented in Sigurdardottir’s latest offering, along with her trademark macabre touches, making this a study in human trauma.

As with her previous books, Sigurdardottir presents a dark portrait of the world, interspersed with rays of hope and redemption – an intoxicating cocktail for the thriller fan. Sigurdardottir’s ability to craft an elegant thriller is unrivaled – here is a study of suffering and the heavy shadows which it causes, waltzing quietly with horror and torture.

The Absolution is guided by Sigurdardottir’s finesse in crafting characters that are not simply confined by the pages on which they appear – flawed, relatable and smart, Freyja and Huldar are a powerful team with a delicious appeal. Added to this the author’s ability to make the gruesome seem golden, and a sprinkling of unexpected twists and shocks, and you have a winning recipe in The Absolution. Darkness that is crafted with such grace and care is both impressive and unsettling, and this makes for highly entertaining and thought-provoking reading.

The Absolution by Yrsa Sigurdardottir is published by Hodder and Stoughton, and is available in South Africa from Jonathan Ball Publishers.

Review: Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis

Rachel Hollis is a force to be reckoned with. A powerful businesswoman, a mother to four children, a wife, and a social influencer with millions of followers, she is owning it. Yet despite her fabulous aesthetic and seemingly flawless life, she remains so pure, so real. Here is a woman who uses her platform to improve the lives of others, through advice, support, conviction and empowerment.

Girl, Stop Apologizing is Hollis’ eighth book, and is a hard-hitting friend when you need it. This book is filled with truths (some harder to digest than others), tips, revelations, encouragement and so much love. Divided into three parts – excuses to address, behaviours to adopt, and skills to acquire – this book is a fun, easy to follow roadmap to personal success, whatever form that may be in your life. Step by step, Hollis takes your hand and shows you a whole new world (cue Aladdin music and anime eyes) in which you can be the best version of yourself, and encourage others to do the same. What I most admire is that despite being kind and loving, Hollis doesn’t mislead or sugar coat her message – she is the first to admit that the path to a new you is filled with obstacles, inclines, dark patches, and the occasional failure, but she is adamant that these pitfalls should not slow you down, nor stop you. That right there; priceless.

Rachel Hollis is officially my hero, and shall henceforth be known as my personal guru. I am well aware of the cliché I’m about to unleash on you, but this book changed my life. I don’t think I have ever, with full sincerity, said that about a book before. I had to pause reading several times to attempt her challenges, to ponder, and to process. After reading this book, I felt as though someone had shined a flashlight into my brain, illuminating hidden things that so badly wanted to see the light of day. I have realized a goal I had not realized I had, and acknowledged that I am struggling with issues shared by women all over the world, only now I have the tools to begin working on them. I feel invigorated, relieved, and hopeful, and I owe that to Rachel Hollis, and the awesome publishers who decided to send me a copy of this book (which, in all honestly, I will be loaning to every woman I know and insisting that they read it).

Women (and men, we’re all friends here), please read this book. Absorb Hollis’ message that you are awesome and can do anything, and let her show you how.

Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis is published by HarperCollins Leadership, and is available in South Africa from Jonathan Ball Publishers.

Review: Machines like Me by Ian McEwan

For the first time, Charlie Friend has come into some money. Not for the first time, he’s about to get rid of it. £86000 later, he is the proud owner of Adam, one of 25 AI humanoids produced globally. While he would have preferred an Eve, the female counterpart to his purchase, he remains enthralled by Adam. Charlie plans to personalise Adam’s clean slate of a personality together with his neighbor, Miranda. In so doing, he hopes to be drawn closer to her through this, their ‘creation’.  

As can be expected, Adam’s interpretation of the world is rapid, clean cut, and impressive. He takes to any task seamlessly, and is a constant reminder of the lightning speed that is technological evolution. Through his eyes, we learn anew what it means to discover, to love, and to grieve. As the trio falls into the rhythms of a new, shared life, we can only wonder at who is truly synthetic, and within whom true humanity resides.

There are many things to like about this novel, including an exhilarating look at an alternate 1980s England in which Margaret Thatcher is still the Iron Lady, and Alan Turing is alive and as mathematically brilliant as ever. These are, however, slightly dimmed by the presence of literary irritants, such as the long soliloquies about politics and personal frustrations at the hands of a somewhat boring narrator with a penchant for deluded narcissism. All the more annoying is that one can’t help feel that Charlie was designed to be disliked; a clever tool in a brilliant creation with a brilliant and mesmerizing overall effect. Charlie’s droning serves as a stark contrast to the enigma that is Adam, sneakily hoisting upon the latter the feelings we usually lovingly heap upon human narrators.

There is something fascinating and illuminating in questioning humanity, and the boundaries between real and unreal that makes a book like this an instant classic. Paired with Ian McEwan’s ability to get under the reader’s skin and cleverly guide our thoughts and emotions, Machines like Me is a delightful contribution to the existent body of related works. What sets this novel above its peers, however, is its unexpected ending, and its vastly imaginative world rooted in stark black and white.

Machines like Me is published by Jonathan Cape, an imprint of Penguin Random House.

Review: Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

Trevor Noah is a notoriously witty comedian whose international success has led South Africans to claim him as a figurehead; a hero. However, his position in South Africa was not always as clear cut. For most of his youth, Trevor Noah was an outsider – different. A mixed raced child born to a Xhosa mother and Swiss father in the height of Apartheid, he often felt that he was never quite white enough, nor black enough, to fit in.

Born a Crime is more than a coming of age story or memoir – it’s an explanation of how circumstances can shape us, and how the world is so much more than what lies beyond our front door. In telling the story of his youth, Noah places a concept as large and foreign as Apartheid into relatable terms, a vital point of reference for today’s youth. Despite the immense setbacks that challenged his family financially, socially and economically, Noah is adamant that his life was no exception to a rule, that his circumstances were no better or worse than hundreds of other families. Born a Crime is an explanation of Noah’s history beautifully crafted in a background of South Africa’s history. This book should be recommended reading for all high school students; it is sharp, poignant, honest, and highly entertaining and thought-provoking.

This book was not something I would usually pick up to read, but I am incredibly glad I did. I have gained respect for a man I have never met, and for a generation of people that has won the right to share their stories through damn hard work, determination, and dreaming big. Noah’s book and the experiences recounted within it make you feel as though despite a climate that can be fueled by racial and political divisions, love for family and respect for others will always be cemented into our various cultures.

Despite his name on the cover, however, I cannot help but feel that Born a Crime is actually an ode to a powerful woman. Apart from marveling at Noah’s maturity, integrity and honesty (including in his retellings of crime and accidental arson), after finishing Noah’s book I was filled with a longing to meet his mother. The mother from his childhood is vibrant, strong, determined and hard-working. She is fearless, smart and loving, and shaped his life and his outlook with such love and care that she could be a role model to any South African, but particularly to the women of our country.

Thank you, Trevor Noah, for telling your story and that of your family with such style and insight, and thank you Patricia Nombuyiselo Noah, for inspiring him to do it.

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah is published by Pan Macmillan South Africa.