Inspired on The Man Booker Prize 2014 Final Part

Chelsea

Hi, I’m Chelsea, a Consultant here at Inspired Selection. Originally from the states, my love of books led me to pursue an MA in Publishing at Kingston University, before starting in my role at Inspired where I focus on working within the trade and academic sectors.

If I had to choose three images that depict me, they would be: chocolate ice cream because I have a huge sweet tooth, the ballet because I’ve always had a passion for dance and the news as I am obsessed with current events.

Also, something that most people would never guess about me would be that growing up I was a painfully shy child – but somehow, I managed to move abroad on my own, work in recruitment and love to go to networking events and speak to people! Even though I’ve recently relocated back to Texas, I will continue to work for Inspired Selection and cannot wait to speak with you soon!

To Rise Again at a Decent Hour – Joshua Ferris

‘To Rise Again at a Decent Hour’ tells the story of Park Avenue dentist, Paul O’Rourke; or rather, allows him to speak to us in this first person narrative. After a traumatic childhood event, Paul has spent a large portion of his adult life looking for somewhere he fits in, despite his prominent and prosperous dental practice. One day, he is surprised and outraged to find out that someone has built a website for his practice and opened Facebook and Twitter accounts in his name, all things he has previously scorned. As he watches the social media channels grow, he is at first angry but then begins to worry that perhaps his online identity is more interesting than the actual man. These media channels begin proselytizing about a forgotten peoples and religious sect, based on doubt, and atheist Paul wonders, has he finally found a group of people with whom he belongs?

This book addresses the disconnection that many people feel going through life and the loneliness and isolation that can result from living in such a busy society full of ‘exclusive’ groups. Paul is always obsessed with the close knit religious communities but can never fit in due to his disbelief in God which leads him to constant distress and depression. Whilst dealing with weighty topics, the book is interspersed with humour in the main form of anecdotes that Paul gives us from his daily life as well as the random tangents he has the habit of following. These things then combine to make Joshua Ferris’ third offering both relatable and readable.

Rachel

I’m the Graduate Consultant here at Inspired Selection and the newest addition to the team specialising in entry-level and junior roles across the industry. I’m an ex-bookseller with a love of literature and as any of my friends would tell you, never get me started on discussing books because I won’t stop!

I have a bit of a soft spot for the Man Booker Prize because at the Cheltenham Literature Festival, which takes place in my home town, they hold an event every year with the Shortlisted winners which I love attending.

The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan

The Narrow Road to the Deep North is a poignant, insightful and moving story about an Australian POW building the Burmese railway for the Japanese. It moves between different periods of the main character, Dorrigo Evans’s life, telling the story of his time before the war growing up in Tasmania, his harrowing experiences as a Doctor in the POW camp, his celebrated status as an old man and of a love affair that burns in his mind throughout his entire life.

The language and description within this book is both exquisite and horrific, as Flanagan moves seamlessly from describing falling in love in the heat of an Australian summer to the gruelling environment and events of the POW camp. There were many times whilst reading this book that I had to pause and just think about what he had said with regards to general human existence, the meaning of life and the point of suffering. Apologies to anyone who saw a girl in a fur coat on the tube staring absent-mindedly into space, that was me…

His character development, something I feel passionately about within novels, was perfect. The different time periods showed how the experiences shaped him marking a clear progression from naïve young adult to knowing elder.

Something I hadn’t been expecting from this novel was Flanagan’s ability to highlight the cultural differences and thought processes between the Japanese and the Australians, explaining how each character came to their conclusions and their own actions, showing that in some horrific situations there are just bad circumstances and differences in cultural upbringing that result in misunderstanding.

All in all, a fantastic read and I can understand why this novel was awarded the Man Booker Prize for 2014. I’m now off to discover and read the rest of Richard Flanagan’s novels…

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Inspired on the Man Booker Prize 2014 Part 2

  Abigail

I’m Abigail, the Managing Consultant here at Inspired Selection. I have a particular focus on professional publishing, coming from a professional services background myself.

I am not alone in this industry to hold an English degree and it was a joy to read this book for the blog. If I were stuck on a Desert Island however, the three books I would take with me would be Captain Corelli’s Mandolin by Louis de Bernières, Jane Austen’s Persuasion and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë. From a literature background, it’s a privilege to be surrounded by publishing people in my job and I look forward to working with all you readers of this blog in the near future.

The Lives of Others – Neel Mukherjee

Reading this book left me with a vast range of emotions but none of them was surprise at this piece of literature being shortlisted for this prestigious award. The storytelling was captivating and I was compelled to turn each page.

This is a piece of prose which built boundaries and broke them down. The two distinct fonts from different narratives achieved this physically, creating a boundary between story tellers and this is a microcosm for so much more. It was a reminder of the geographical and class boundaries that define this text and the world in which it exists. India in the 60s gives us cruel and graphic images and providing this to us in text form, Mukherjee champions the notion that there need not be a boundary between text and image as the reader experiences palpable colour and movement in the written words.

Esme

Hello! My name is Esme and I am a Senior Consultant at Inspired Selection, I have been with the company for almost 3 and a half years now and I can honestly say it has flown by. My role at Inspired is focused on recruiting into the STM (science, technical and medical) and Education publishing sectors, working with my clients and candidates to find the absolute best fit for everyone. My background is in science communication and outreach work in schools so this is an area that I absolutely love and thrive in.

What do I love most about my job? It’s got to be the people, and don’t just mean my colleagues (they are wonderful though), it’s about all the candidates and clients I get to meet every day, it’s about digging down and finding out what the persons niche is and what they absolutely love doing and then finding that perfect fit in a new job and company that makes them happy. It’s not just about finding people a ‘job’ – it’s about their career, their happiness and making sure they’ve had the best experience possible.

Some images that depict me –

 

 How to be Both – Ali Smith

I really struggled to get into ‘How to be Both’ by Ali Smith. Normally, I’m a kind of, ‘pick up a book and finish it in two days’ kinda girl so it was a bit of a shock to end up dithering over this one for the best part of two weeks.
The story is in two parts – the book started with a disembodied spirit trying to find it’s way on the earth who ends up staring at the back of a boy looking at a painting in a museum gallery, this ‘boy’ was in fact George, a teenage girl from modern day Cambridge as we find out later on in the novel. She was looking at a painting by a relatively unknown renaissance artist of the 15th Century – Francesco del Cossa, a born girl disguised as a male in order to us her talent as an artist in some of the grandest courtyards in Italy.

Francesco’s story took up the first half of the novel and ended after she had completed three wall panels each showing a month of the year – this is what present day George was staring at when the spirit saw her. Francesco wrote a letter asking the Duke for more money than the other artists due to her level of skill – and this is how George’s mother, and the rest of the world came to find out about her.

The book then flips to modern day with George – her mother had recently died and it tells the tale of her typical teenage struggles but also, the lead up to the death and the trip to Italy to see Francesco’s work. I found George’s story the one that affected me most, and perhaps that’s because it is closer to home and closer to what I know and understand today.

Saying that, it was an interesting experiment for me, an intertwining story of completely different worlds and an example of how these can subtlety influence each other. How to be both is not the most enjoyable book I’ve ever read, it was sad and upsetting at times but having had time to reflect on the story, hats off to Ali Smith – it was an interesting one at that.

Inspired on The Man Booker Prize 2014

Yesterday, the winner of the Man Booker Prize 2014 was announced and awarded to Richard Flanagan for his novel The Narrow Road to the Deep North.

The Man Booker Prize was set up in 1969 and this year celebrated its 46^th year. It’s aim is to promote the finest writers in fiction by rewarding the best novel of the year written by a citizen of the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland. Judges for the prize are changed regularly and are chosen from a wide range of disciplines, including writers, academics and critics as well as actors, poets and politicians who all have a passion for the best works of fiction.

One of the main reasons publishing houses and authors alike covet the Man Booker Prize award is not only due to the cash prize of £50,000 and a designer bound copy of their book, but because it encourages a wider readership. Most authors that win or those who are shortlisted for the prize enjoy a dramatic increase in book sales worldwide. The release of the longlist, shortlist and winner for this award therefore creates great hype within the publishing industry

Inspired Selection, as big readers with a variety of tastes in fiction, decided to read to the shortlist of the Man Booker Prize award in order to discuss amongst ourselves who we thought might win this year.

Please read on to meet our Inspired Team and their thoughts on this year’s shortlist, we will post two of the team member’s reviews over the course of three days, stay tuned!

Amy

My name is Amy and I am a Senior Consultant at Inspired Selection, specialising in recruitment for educational, professional and STM clients.

 Select a few images that depict you:

If you were stuck on a desert island, what 3 books would bring and why?

1. Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys, because I could not live without it

2. Tender is the Night by F.Scott Fitzgerald, because every time I read it I get goosebumps

3. A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing by Eimear McBride, a more recent read that has haunted me bit and I want to read it again

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler

This book is an exploration of sibling love, at times making you nod in frustrated empathy and at other times, provoking a profound sadness. The narrative alternates between the present and a series of flashbacks and as we get to know Rosemary, we understand her marginalisation and displacement as a character. The way in which she describes herself as a child – attention seeking, loud, unaware, too curious – trickles into our understanding of her as an adult. Despite all that is disclosed throughout the novel, it is her childhood self that we are drawn back to and this, somehow, serves to excuse the questionable things she says and does.

The book opens in a cloak of mystery as we are given snippets of what has happened to the narrator’s siblings. Without disclosing the big twist, it is hard to go into too much detail on Fern; she is Rosemary’s sister who is sent away when she is a child and is never returned to the family home. However, we find a foyle for Fern in the character of Harlow, the beautiful and uninhibited friend she makes during her university years who fascinates her but scares her at the same time. She is drawn to Harlow in an obvious attempt to replace Fern and this mix of fear and admiration that she feels for Harlow echoes her feelings for Fern. Harlow has the same restless and unpredictable spirit and provokes in Rosemary the same feelings of self-doubt and jealousy. As Rosemary searches for answers to explain Fern’s disappearance, Harlow fills the void until she too disappears from the story.

More poignant, though, is the relationship between Rosemary and her older brother Lowell who she loves without the fear and hesitation she felt for Fern. It is his departure from the family home that hits her the most and the memories she recollects of him throughout the book make your chest tighten. He was the figure she looked up to and the jealousy she feels for Fern (and Harlow) can be traced back to a constant vying for his love and attention. Over the years after he disappears, he re-enters her life now and again but there is always the feeling that he is just out of her reach, destined to eternally slip through her fingers. When she is with him, she feels safe and like she belongs to something, to a type of family unit, but when he is gone her isolation is palpable.

Towards the end, the novel sits firmly in the present and it seems that all loose ends are tied up, at least for everyone except Rosemary. All missing persons have been located and their situations explained, for better or for worse. This has to be the only disappointment in the novel; after building our understanding for Rosemary and our consequent empathy with her, Fowler leaves her where we found her – on the margins, still.

Towards the end, she tells us “My brother and sister have led extraordinary lives, but I wasn’t there, and I can’t tell you that part”. It is safe to say that neither Lowell ‘nor Fern end up in the ideal situation either but they exist in a place where they belong and I don’t think the same can be said for Rosemary.

This book is thought-provoking, and addresses issues of sibling love and rivalry, with an underlying theme of animal cruelty awareness and the protagonist’s grappling for identity and for answers. Answers are provided but the closing lines left me unsatisfied, on Rosemary’s behalf and on behalf of all characters who never quite find their place at the end.

Zoe

I’m Zoe and I am the Office Administrator here at Inspired providing daily admin support to the team as well helping to co-ordinate all marketing and events.

Some images to depict me:

If I was stuck on a desert Island the three books I would bring are:

1. Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk: I think I felt every emotion reading this book and even though I have read it over and over it never fails to make me think and discover something new.
2. The Twits by Roald Dahl: A book that never fails to make me laugh.
3. The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe: Despite its bleak subject, I love to read this poem out loud as the poetic rhythm always calms me.

J by Howard Jacobson

Set in the future, in a dark world where the past is a dangerous country, not to be talked about or re-visited. This dystopian novel follows two people, who fall in love, and yet they don’t know anything about where they have come from or what the future might hold.

 As a big fan of dystopian fiction, I did enjoy this aspect of J and I liked that it kept you guessing right up until the end as to the cause of the fractured state of the world. I also really enjoyed the dry wit used throughout that was very poignant at times.

Whilst I felt the protagonists were well developed, I found it hard to connect with them on a more personal level – however I don’t necessarily think this is a bad thing as it echoed the overarching theme of detachment.