London Book Report
it's the jackets
We go home in a few days, after almost three weeks here, and I was surprised this morning to stack up the books I’ve read while here—I’ve read six, which is more than I normally read when I’m in full-time-mom mode. Maybe it’s the fresh, eye-catching jackets, maybe it’s because I’m in leaning into vacation treats, but there’s not an independent bookstore I’ve passed where I haven’t picked up a little something. This time we’ve been staying in Hampstead, and I’ve enjoyed browsing Funny Weather, Owl Bookshop, BookBar, and the Daunt on Hampstead Heath1 (Daunt also owns Owl Bookshop? Is this true??). Here’s what I’ve been reading:
Endling by Maria Reva is one of my favorite novels I’ve read in years. It concerns a young scientist trying to save endangered snails, who is signed up for a Ukrainian matchmaking agency, and a scrape she gets into with a couple of the other prospective brides as the Russian invasion begins. It also breaks form to dip in and out of the author’s own life, processing various emergencies with Ukrainian family members as she writes the novel. Anyway, I’m going to be recommending it for months/years. It was longlisted for the Booker in 2025.
The Names, by Florence Knapp. To me this is a particular kind of British novel—super commercial, super competent, super popular, and its sole purpose is to get me to cry. It’s a sliding-doors-esque story about a woman in an abusive relationship, and the three strands follow different names she chooses for her son. It was massive here, and it may have been huge back home, but I somehow hadn’t heard of it.
Whistler, by Ann Patchett. I bought it because it’s everywhere, and I know she keeps saying it’s not about a horse, but it really isn’t. It’s about a grown woman who reconnects with a man who was briefly her favorite stepfather. I liked it!
Isola by Allegra Goodman, a historical novel inspired by a 16th century French noblewoman whose guardian frittered away her inheritance, took her on an exploratory journey to Canada, and then left here there after she fell in love with his secretary. On this island she gave birth and fought polar bears, and somehow survived long enough to return. I’ve been meaning to read it, and I took it to the playground a few times. It went by fast! Highly recommend.
Happiness Forever by Adelaide Faith. I saw this jacket, and read this copy, and I had to have it. The book made me deeply, deeply uncomfortable, which I realized was because it written from the point of view of a character who doesn’t know how to be a person. I wanted to butt in and tell her what to do. I found this exercise deeply frustrating, but it was also good for me, and illuminated for me a kind of human I didn’t know existed. I can’t say I’ve ever read anything like it. I went looking for more information on the author and I found this… fascinating… piece, which I’m going to need you all to read.
Childhood, Youth, Dependency by Tove Ditlevsen. I’m not done with this yet—a trilogy of memoirs from the late ‘60s, early ‘70s about growing up in the margins of Danish society—but I don’t need to google to know that thousands of people have called it “quietly devastating.” I had never read Ditlevsen before, and now I see her name popping up everywhere, a writer’s writer, it seems.
More soon. x
We can talk about the founding of Daunt in person. I have opinions I will not put in writing.