LITERARY FICTION

LITERARY FICTION

The Fraud

Hamish Hamilton £20, 464pp

by Zadie Smith

(Hamish Hamilton £20, 464pp)

At the centre of Smith’s first historical novel is the real-life Tichborne Trial, a case that gripped Victorian Britain in which a grossly overweight butcher from Australia outrageously insisted he was heir to a baronetcy.

Observing proceedings is Scottish widow Eliza Touchet, housekeeper and cousin of novelist William Harrison Ainsworth, whose inclination for purple prose Smith has great fun with. But it’s the star witness, Andrew Bogle, a former Jamaican sugar-plantation slave, who fascinates Eliza.

Dickensian in more ways than one — the man himself crops up at intervals — this is a slyly funny, nuanced and many-stranded yarn, set against the backdrop of the slave trade.

At its heart, would-be journalist Eliza is both fascinating and enigmatic — witness blink-and-you’ll-miss-it references to her fondness for light S&M, as she conducts affairs with both William and his tragic wife. But if she ultimately remains elusive, it’s perhaps only fitting in a novel concerned not least with the endless unknowability of others.

All the little Bird-Hearts

Tinder Press £18.99, 304pp

by Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow

(Tinder Press £18.99, 304pp)

One of four debuts to be catapulted into the spotlight, thanks to this year’s Booker longlist, this is the story of Sunday Forrester — who, like Lloyd-Barlow herself, is autistic.

For single mother Sunday, every social situation is a trial, which can only be navigated with reference to an ancient etiquette guide. But when Vita and Rollo, a posh pair of spiv-like Londoners, move in next door, Sunday is instantly smitten.

Soon she and her beloved 16-year-old daughter are attending exotic dinner parties that break all of Sunday’s rules — but beneath their high-gloss veneer, the newcomers (of course) harbour sinister secrets.

While some elements seem rather sketched in — Sunday’s tragic past among them — it ultimately matters little. Bravely eschewing cosier tropes, this is a memorably authentic, at times painfully affecting, portrait of a singular woman navigating life’s challenges and still finding her way to happiness on her own terms.

No Be from Hia

Legend Press £9.99, 224pp

by Natasha Omokhodion-Kalulu Banda

(Legend Press £9.99, 224pp)

Originally self-published in Zambia, where the author was raised, this family saga follows cousins Maggie and Bupe.

While Maggie grows up in Lusaka in Zambia, home for Bupe is her Nana’s curry house in London’s Brixton — until, that is, the threat of gang violence sees her parents shipping her off to Africa for her safety.

United, the chalk-and-cheese cousins are soon excelling at their studies, but two dark secrets hang over their families — their grandmother’s mysterious death and the disappearance of Maggie’s father.

While the storytelling tends towards the summary, this is a novel of family and country in which the personal and political are truly intertwined, written with verve and feeling.

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