I am so pleased to be shining the book spotlight on this book today. The Nameless by Stuart White was the 16th placed finalist in the BBNYA 2024 Award.
BBNYA is a yearly competition where book bloggers from all over the world read and score books written by indie authors, ending with 15 finalists (16 in 2024) and one overall winner.
If you want some more information about BBNYA, check out the BBNYA Website https://www.bbnya.com/ or take a peek over on Twitter @BBNYA_Official. BBNYA is brought to you in association with the book blogger support group @The_WriteReads.
The Blurb
The YA debut from award-winning author, Stuart White.
IN A NAMELESS WORLD, ONE HERO RISES BY DISCOVERING THEIR IDENTITY.
In a dystopian world dominated by genetic perfection and numbered gene pools, sixteen-year-old E820927, known as Seven, yearns for an identity beyond his assigned number.
To escape a life as a Nameless Exile, and become a citizen of the Realm, he must pass a loyalty test to prove his allegiance to the totalitarian AutokratÅr.
But as the truth unfolds, Seven faces a difficult choice between revenge, love and discovering his identity.
For dystopian fans of THE LAST OF US, THE MAZE RUNNER, and THE HUNGER GAMES.
Book Details
ISBN: 978 1739595555
Publisher: Penobi Press
Formats: e-book, hardback and paperback (currently available on Kindle Unlimited)
No. of Pages: 334
Purchase Links
About the Author
Stuart is an award-winning author and secondary school teacher. He has a Masters Degree in Creative
Writing and founded, and now runs, WriteMentor. In 2020 and 2022 he was placed on the SCWBI Undiscovered Voices longlist and named as an Hononary Mention for his novels ‘Ghosts of Mars’ and ‘Astra FireStar and the Ripples of Time’. In 2023, he won the WriteBlend award for his middle grade debut, Ghosts of Mars.
Stuart was included in The Bookseller’s 2021 list of Rising Stars in the publishing industry.
(media courtesy of The Write Reads)
(all opinions are my own)
Welcome to Question Eight of our Read Along of Aristotle for Novelists by Douglas Vigliotti.
Q How important are believable characters to you?
A I think they are absolutely essential. It is the characters that usually first engage me with a book and what keep me reading on.
What do you think?
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Welcome to Question Seven of our Read Along of Aristotle for Novelists by Douglas Vigliotti.
Q How do you feel about italicization in stories?
A Personally, I think it plays an important part in helping a reader to differentiate between thought, feeling and narrative.
What do you think?
Lanny by Max Porter
From Provence with Love by Alison Roberts
Her Mother's Secret by Rosanna Ley
The Little Penguin Bookshop by Joanna Toye
The Broken River by Chris Hammer
Family Matters at Blackberry Farm by Rosie Clarke
The Paris Bookshop for the Broken Hearted by Rebecca Raisin
Seven Dead by J. Jefferson Farjeon
The Found Things by Petr Horacek
The Night She Disappeared by Lisa Jewell
The Blurb
When ambitious city girl, Darcie Freeman is sent to the Isle of Skye to conduct research for a travel guide, she’s horrified. The prospect of having to travel to a remote island in the Scottish Highlands leaves her wondering what she’ll do.
Step in Logan Burns. Gorgeous and adventurous, he lives and breathes the island, and along with his sister Iona, who owns a rather haphazard PR company, they’re going to show Darcie everything she needs to know about Skye.
As Darcie swaps her designer shoes for her walking boots and her faux fur jacket for her raincoat, will she learn there’s more to life than the picture-perfect presence she shares on social media, or will it be the case that Skye is the limit…
Book Details
ISBN: 978 0008614355
Publisher: One More Chapter
Formats: e-book and paperback
No. of Pages: 384 (paperback)
Purchase Links
About the Author
Julie Shackman is a former journalist from Scotland, who has always wanted to write feel-good romance.
As well as being an author, Julie also writes verses and captions for greetings card companies. Julie admits to having an obsession with stationery and handbags.
She is married, has two sons and adopted a Romanian rescue puppy, Cooper.
A Scottish Island Summer is Julie's twelfth novel.
You can also find Julie at:
(media courtesy of Rachel's Random Resources)
(all opinions are my own)
(bookshop.org affiliated)
Rev1-Final.jpg "The Great Race by Sun Chara and Joe Happy-Light")
.jpg "Dark Times for the Clarks Factory Girls by May Ellis")
A long long time ago, when I was a little chick, not even a chick but a pink and naked thing, a scar a scrap a scrape fallen on roots and wriggling, when I was catching my death and all I knew of sky was the feel of feathers above me, the belly of black as warm as a cloud above me...
***
The Blurb
In this darkly comic work of literary satire by New Zealand’s most acclaimed and best-selling novelist Tama, a talking magpie and social media influencer, is the sole witness to a marriage in freefall.
Tama is just a helpless chick when he is rescued by Marnie. ‘If it keeps me awake,’ says Marnie’s husband Rob, a farmer in the middle of a years-long drought, ‘I’ll have to wring its neck.’ But with Tama come new possibilities for the couple’s future. Tama’s fame is growing, and with it, his earning potential. The more Tama sees, the more the animal and the human worlds – and all the precarity, darkness and hope within them – bleed into one another. Like a stock truck filled with live cargo, the story moves inexorably towards its dramatic conclusion: the annual Axeman’s Carnival.
Part trickster, part surrogate child, part witness, Tama is the star of this story. And although what he says to humans is often nonsensical (and hilarious), the tale he tells makes disturbingly perfect sense. The Axeman’s Carnival is Catherine Chidgey at her finest – comic, profound, poetic and true.
My Review
This book is well worth the five stars I have given it. I have not read any books by this author before but I certainly intend to change that as it was a fabulous read.
What makes this book unusual is that it is narrated by a magpie named Tama. In fact, he is the main character of the book. He lives with Marnie and Rob on their sheep farm. They are struggling to make ends meet, and this, amongst other things means Rob has a very short temper. He hates Tama until he realises that the bird may have the ability to change their financial position.
It is a very powerful and sometimes dark novel. It is clear from the very beginning that the book is working towards the annual event, the titular Axeman's Carnival. As we observe Rob preparing to win the title for the tenth year running, we can feel his inner anger oozing from the pages. As readers we know that the book is creeping towards its climax of the carnival and the author has done a great job in building the tension as the story moves along.
Meantime, Tama has learned to mimic speech and as such has become a media sensation. The book has much to say about social media, for good and bad.
The bird is devoted to Marnie and there is a mutual love between them that is palpable. It demonstrates an innocence which contrasts so well with the darker aspects of the novel. Tama also injects a little humour into the story with his mischievous nature.
The book is extremely well written, and the author has bought her story alive on the page vividly. There were aspects of the book which took my breath away. Something happens at the end which had so much to say about human nature and social media and is was quite shocking.
This book is releasing tomorrow, and I cannot recommend it highly enough. I feel privileged to have read it.
Book Details
ISBN: 978 1787705517
Publisher: Europa Editions
Formats:
No. of Pages: 336 (paperback)
Preorder Links
About the Author
Catherine Chidgey’s novels have been published to international acclaim. Her first, In a Fishbone Church, won Best First Book at the NZ Book Awards and at the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize (South East Asia and South Pacific). In the UK it won the Betty Trask Award and was longlisted for the Orange Prize. Her second, Golden Deeds, was a Notable Book of the Year in the New York Times and a Best Book in the LA Times. Catherine has won the Prize in Modern Letters, the Katherine Mansfield Award, the Katherine Mansfield Fellowship and the Janet Frame Fiction Prize. She lives in NgÄruawÄhia, NZ, and lectures in Creative Writing at the University of Waikato. Her novel Remote Sympathy was shortlisted for the DUBLIN Literary Award and longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. Her novels The Wish Child and The Axeman’s Carnival both won the Acorn Prize for Fiction, NZ's most prestigious literary award.
(book courtesy of Random Things Tours)
(media courtesy of Europa Editions)
(all opinions are my own)
(bookshop.org afilliated)
