Naomi Ishiguro

‘’I can climb out on to the roof from the windows and see the whole metropolis stretched out before me, those hundreds of buildings - white, or grey, or black, depending on how filthy they are - and the crows: dark wings everywhere, like the shadows of angels.’’

I don’t need to say much. Naomi Ishiguro’s interview included in the book says everything. All I can tell you is that if you read ONLY one collection this year (but why would you do that?), let Escape Routes be the one. It is beyond perfect.

Wizards: In beautiful Brighton, the paths of a young, sensitive, kind boy and a man living in his own world of star signs and planet alignments and karma, meet in a shuttering, exquisite story that will infuriate you and break your heart.

Bear: A newly-wed couple buys a gigantic teddy bear in an auction. Slowly, it seems to take over their lives. But what if this strange toy is a metaphor for their relationship?

The Rat Cather I: In the first part of a beautiful tale, a rat catcher, whose job is to exterminate the rodents in the quiet palace of a dilapidated city, meets an enigmatic princess. I don’t know why but this reminded me of a modern (and no, you clueless Goodreads reader, it has nothing to do with ‘’Medieval’’ times…), toned-down Gormenghast universe and I couldn’t wait to read Part II.

‘’I don’t know what would be inside my heart,’ Daniel says, then, ‘if they dug it up - the archaeologists. I don’t even know if they’d be able to find it. The heart archaeologists.’’

Heart Problems: Oh, how I loved this one! A young Irish tries to navigate an uncertain life in London, without a job and without knowing how to make his relationship with an overbearing woman work. His mind travels back to Killargin, his suitcase is always packed. Just in case…London suffocates him. Until an impromptu meeting by a lake where two strangers will sit and talk and banter about heart problems and the responsibility of a decision…

Shearing Season: A child with an obsessive curiosity about space tries to create The Unknown to impress one of his mother’s lodgers. The results will be - literally - out of this world…

‘’There’s an infestation out beyond our gates, spreading from your very palace halls, filling the city streets with sickness and disease. There are even people who are dying out there because of it. Everyone frightened and desperate, with whispers of plague wherever you turn. Do you make this kind of noise for them?

The Rat Catcher II: The King : In the second part of the tale, our Rat Catcher meets the king, who appears to be all sorts of mad, and realises he has found himself in a strange game of power while the city is suffering from an unknown disease.

Accelerate!: A chaotic story about identity, relationships, responsibilities, and disillusionment. Extremely poignant, triggering numerous questions in the mind of the reader.

The Flat Roof: A woman finds solace in the company of the birds that visit her flat roof, following a tragic incident. A heart-breaking story.

The Rat Catcher III: The New King and the Old: In the third part of the tale, we witness the state of the fallen kingdom through the eyes of the young king. The resolution is nothing short of remarkable.

‘’Crows paced up and down, tapping the concrete with harsh talons and beaks, and looking fiercer and more unforgiving than Annie was quite comfortable with. Smaller songbirds - blackbirds, starlings, finches, sparrows - would flutter on and off the low rail that lined the very edge of the roof on all sides, adding their voices to Annie’s quiet, whispery singing as she watched their wings, and tried to hear the ghostly voice behind her own as she lost herself in those familiar tunes.’’

My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/… (plus d'informations)

Having much enjoyed Naomi Ishiguro's debut collection of short stories, I was was greatly looking forward to her first full-length novel. In 'Common Ground' she brings us a tale of an unlikely friendship between 13-year old Stan and 16-year old Charlie, literally meeting on the local common. Stan lives with his mother, his dad having died the year before, and he struggles to fit in and is the victim of bullying at school; Charlie is a free spirit, a Traveller and - as such - also an outsider. The first part of the book is set in 2003, and we then jump forward in part two to 2012, where the two meet up again by accident, only to find this time that their situations have been reversed. Stan is now a confident postgrad student, while Charlie struggles to keep down a job and is in a sticky marriage. Can the two friends find a way to navigate the future?

So, in theory, it looked like a good book to delve into: lots of issues of friendship, being an outsider, race in modern-day Britain, and so on.... But, I just felt a disconnect from the beginning. Part One felt and read at times like a YA novel, and it didn't improve much in Part Two, although some of the scenes would be a bit too heavy for YAs. Unfortunately, I just didn't believe in the likelihood of the friendship in the first place - it just seemed artificial, a 16yo befriending a 13yo in the way it works out. And as the book went on the 'message' was, well, not so subtle. What I found worked in the short story collection was totally absent here; there were no subtle metaphors, or quiet allusions to meaning. Here, you get The Message very bluntly spelt out to you. This is what the moral is. And now I'm going to tell you again. And again. And, sadly, it became quite tiresome. There surely must be space for the reader to make the connections, space where what is unsaid is more powerful than what beats you over the head, where a scene in part 2 that mirrors something that happened in part 1 is not explicitly pointed out to us ('like déja vu or something' we are told).

The idea is worthy, and at times there are flashes of the lyrical potential that Ishiguro displayed in 'Escape Routes', but it was just way too obvious in hammering home the 'moral of the story'. I look forward to seeing what Naomi Ishiguro comes up with next, but I'm afraid this was just a slightly disappointing 3 stars.… (plus d'informations)

In Naomi Ishiguro’s debut collection of short stories, we encounter a world of fantasy and fairy tale, where characters and their worlds are slightly out of the ordinary. As ever, short story collections generally have some good and some not so good, and this was no exception. The overall standard, however, makes Ishiguro a writer of note and one to watch for the future.

In ‘Wizards’ a lonely young boy is obsessed with wizards, whilst a hipster Tarot reader is busy trying to seduce a client. When their worlds collide, it leads to a devastating outcome. In ‘Bear’ a man becomes increasingly perturbed by an oversized teddy bear bought by his wife, which is moved from room to room until it finally ends up in the bedroom. A story concerning a rat catcher and a power struggle in an unnamed kingdom comes in three parts, dispersed throughout the collection. And other stories feature a man convinced he is disintegrating, a young boy who is asked to draw a picture of ‘The Unknown’, and a high-flying IT worker who becomes hooked on caffeine.

There are nods and allusions to fairy tales; the obvious one being the Rat Catcher story, but another story begins: ‘Once upon a time, there lived an extremely gifted eleven-year-old called Jamie.’ The stories bring to mind Angela Carter, but with a definite millennial twist. The characters are isolated, lost, trapped; birds and animals are a common theme, flight a dominant metaphor. There are moments of clarity, of understanding, but these more often than not are at the precise moment of danger or crisis.

This is clearly the work of a gifted writer, and whilst not all perhaps have the same impact, the stories are compelling and dark, stylishly written and giving enough depth to the characters in a short space of time that they hold your attention. Ishiguro has said that she is writing a full-length novel, which I look forward to immensely. An engaging and involving collection, this is definitely worth and read. 4 stars.… (plus d'informations)