 Hi everyone, welcome back to my channel. This is going to be a big video. Today I'm going to be giving you little reviews of all of the Women's Prize 2019 longlisted books that I've read so far, and I'm going to be talking to you about them in order of the ones I've liked least, to the ones I've liked best. I have really, really liked my reading experience of this list so far. Like I said in my Women's Prize Longlist 2019 reaction video, so many of these books are so at my street and sounded so great to me, and I've just been loving reading them, and I'm really excited to share my thoughts with you. And if you stick around to the end of the video, you'll be able to hear about a giveaway that I'm hosting with a Women's Prize Longlisted Publisher, which is beyond exciting. So let's just get into this. This might be quite a long video. So the first book that I'm going to talk about is Cersei by Madeleine Miller. This novel tells the story of the goddess Cersei over quite a long period in her life, including the time which she spent with Odysseus, as you can see in the Odyssey. So don't get me wrong, I thought this was a good book. There's a lot of admirable, lovely, well thought through things going on in here. It just wasn't really my cup of tea. This whole trend of feminist Greek retellings is awesome. I completely get why everyone's doing it and why everyone is loving it at the moment. I'm just not really the target audience for it, I guess. I'm not very familiar with the original stories. It's not really my niche. I haven't read the Odyssey. I don't know the story super well, and so I'm not massively familiar with these characters. So now this story has been told in a new way from a different angle. A large part of it is unavoidably lost on me. That being said, this book has a lot of strengths aside from all of that. The writing is a major strength in here. It's quite simple, but definitely has some beauty and whimsy to it, which mirrors the story very well. There's a lot of really lovely, colorful, rich imagery in here, which adds to this overall sense of something being really grand and magical. It's also really cool how Madeleine Miller manages to mix so many different stories into this one novel. So the book kind of reads as a collection of short stories in a way, with every chapter focusing on something really distinct, but adding to the overall story. And I really, really like that structure. The characters in here are also pretty good. I liked reading about Cersei and her son in the second half of the novel in particular. Their relationship was actually my favorite element of this whole novel. I will perhaps controversially add that I didn't find the characterization of Cersei herself in this novel to be brilliant. I didn't get an entirely distinct picture of her in my head. I didn't hear a really clear voice. And I didn't find her development particularly convincing. Overall, I thought this was a good novel. I enjoyed my time reading it. But I just didn't love it as much as everyone else has seemed to. There were definitely elements missing for me in it. And I don't think it was executed as well as everyone else seems to, but I'm glad I read it. The next book that I'm going to talk about is The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker. This is another feminist Greek retelling, which in itself just shows how popular they are at the moment for two of them to make it onto this year's long list. This one focuses on the story of the Iliad from the women's perspective. So as with Cersei, there was naturally something missing for me when I was reading this novel. I haven't read the Iliad before. I didn't have a particularly clear conception of Achilles as a character when I picked this up. So I didn't have much for me to compare it to. But I really, really enjoyed reading this one nonetheless. I found it to be a very refreshing story. It was very shocking at times. And I just thought it was a really good read. I love that throughout this novel, Pat Barker managed to strip away the idea that the Trojan War would have been all men fighting and heroism and glory. She writes in a very direct way about all of the brutalities that the women would have faced. But she also doesn't overlook the daily struggles, the small heartbreaking, really degrading things. And I thought that was very brave and very admirable. The storytelling in here is also brilliant. Pat Barker writes in such a traditional story-like manner that makes the book so readable. It's so easy to consume despite the heavy subject matters. And I didn't want to put this book down while I was reading it. I do have a couple of bones to pick with this book though, starting with why did Pat Barker think it was necessary to switch the perspective away from the women's voice in this novel to Achilles in some of the chapters. That really frustrated me. Switching the focus of some of the chapters in this book to Achilles' voice was not only self-defeating because the brilliance of this book is the power it gives to the women's voices, but it was also so useless. The male perspective brought nothing to this book for me. It offered no new insight. It would have been so much better if Pat Barker's editor had just slashed those chapters out. It would have been so much more powerful. The writing in here isn't technically the best either. It's definitely readable, as I said before, but there wasn't much finesse to it. And I was very surprised by that because I've read the regeneration trilogy by Pat Barker before. And in that trilogy, her writing is so clear and clever. But in here there were moments that were a little bit clumsy, and there were definitely passages that were way overwritten. Overall, I thought this was a really, really good book. I loved my reading experience of it, despite there being a couple of areas that fell a little bit flat for me and baffled me somewhat. The next book that I'm going to talk about is My Sister, the Serial Killer, by Ayinkan of Braithwaite. This novel is set in Nigeria and it follows our protagonist, Kareed, whose sister Ayula seems to be making a habit out of killing her boyfriends. Ayula then starts dating Kareed's colleague, who Kareed has loved for a very long time, and Kareed realizes that she needs to stop her sister's killing streak. I absolutely devoured this book. I loved it so, so much. I absolutely tore through it. It was such a page-turning, entertaining reading experience for me. The style of this book isn't a style that I tend to read much in novels, and I think that in part is why I enjoyed it so much. It read just like a thriller to me. The plot is very dark and intriguing and satirical. The writing is really clear and sharp and witty, and the structuring of the novel makes it all the more addictive. The chapters are really short and really quick to get through. It is true that there were elements in this novel that could have been executed a little better. The characters weren't particularly good, if I'm honest. I enjoyed reading about them at the time, but I don't think they'll be sticking with me for a very long time. There were some interesting themes touched on in this novel, such as family relationships and gender dynamics, but they weren't explored on any kind of deep level. They didn't offer any kind of new insight for me. But nonetheless, I loved this. I think it's such a good time, such a fab novel, and I'm really glad that the women's prize made me pick it up. Also, isn't this cover just the coolest thing you've ever seen? Next, I'm going to talk about an American Marriage by Tyari Jones. This novel tells the story of newlywed Celestial and Roy, who live in Southern America and are settling into their new lives together, when Roy is wrongly convicted of raping a woman, and the two newlyweds are ripped apart. I really, really liked this novel, as I hoped I would. You will all probably know by now that character is my favourite aspect of a novel, and this book is all about its central characters. You actually get to read about the time in which this novel is set from three different perspectives in the novel, the perspective of Celestial, the perspective of Roy, and the perspective of one of their best friends. You get to witness how all of these characters change individually, and how all of their relationships have gone another change, as all of the circumstances around them change. And all of these characters have made mistakes, all of them have been wronged, and you don't know who to sympathise with and who to not sympathise with. This novel also explores broad themes of love and loyalty and race and justice, and it also looks at masculinity and femininity and gender roles and pressures. This novel was strangely exhausting to read, I found. You have real highs and lows with the characters, and you feel as though you're really experiencing what they're experiencing in terms of their difficulties and struggles, and that is something that Tiari Jones executed really brilliantly, I thought. I did like the beginning half of this novel a little more than the second half of the novel, I will say. I found the character's voices to be much more distinct and engaging in the first half. I think this was largely because a significant part of the first half of the novel is told through letters, and I absolutely loved those letters. I found the voices of the characters so distinct through those letters, and I fell head over heels in love with some of those passages. So ideally, I would have liked a little bit more from the character's voices throughout this novel, but overall I was really, really impressed by it. I love how complex and perceptive it is, and how much depth there is to it, without it being a really difficult read. So yes, loved this. Next, I'm going to talk about Ordinary People by Diana Evans. This novel is set in South London in 2008, and it focuses on two different couples. So firstly, we have Melissa, who is struggling with her identity after having a baby and is feeling uncomfortable in her home, and we look at her partner Michael as well, who is struggling with the growing distance between them. We also get to look at the lives of Stephanie and Damien, who are struggling with the death of Damien's father, and various other marital problems that they're facing. This is another character-focused story that, like an American marriage and another novel that I will be mentioning soon, just looks at Ordinary People living their ordinary lives. Apparently, stories about standard everyday people is a trend at the moment, and I couldn't be happier about it. Looking at these four characters throughout this novel was so fascinating to me. They are all so interesting in their own ways. It at once felt very intimate looking at their individual lives and mindsets and beliefs, but it also felt really epic and wide-reaching at the same time, like anyone could relate to these characters in some way or another. Reading this novel, you will be constantly asking yourself what these characters should be doing in their situations, and you will also ask yourself what you would do in their situations. There are so many complex themes explored in this novel specifically to do with one's identity and how that relates to love and sex and aging and parenthood, and I felt really reflective while I was reading this novel. It was definitely very thought-provoking for me. One slightly odd thing, there was a supernatural storyline that ran throughout this story that somewhat baffled me. I'm not going to lie. It was just a small thread that ran through the story, but I'm not sure if I missed something. Maybe there was some kind of obvious metaphor that I wasn't getting or an illness of a character or something. Whatever it was, it was lost on me. But aside from that, I thought this novel was brilliant. I thought it was really, really good. It's just a really solid character-focused literary fiction. The characters are brilliant. It's very relatable and emotive. It's insightful. The prose is good. The storyline is really immersive. It takes a lot of boxes. Getting on to my favourites now. The next one that I'm going to talk about is Praise Song for the Butterflies by Bernice L. McFadden. This novel tells the story of a little girl called Abiyo who lives in West Africa, and she lives a very privileged and comfortable life when she is young. But when bad luck befalls her family, Abiyo is sent to live in a religious shrine as a sacrifice in the hope that this will atone for some of the sins of her ancestors. Throughout the course of this novel, we follow Abiyo as she is enslaved in the shrine for 15 years before she gets out and has to try and live her life. I absolutely loved this novel. It was firstly very eye-opening to me. The practice of ritual servitude in Africa isn't something I knew basically anything about before going into this novel, so that was really interesting to me. But I also just generally love reading about countries and cultures that are different to my own, especially Africa. I tend to love reading novels about contemporary Africa or recent African history. I read this novel very quickly and I was so invested in it all the way through, both in terms of being engaged in the storyline and wanting to know what was going to happen, but also in caring about the characters. I really sympathised with Abiyo throughout the course of this novel. I loved that we got to see her over such a broad timeframe from when she was a young girl up until the point when she was a full-grown woman, and we got to see how her character really developed. But there was also a lot of really interesting side characters in the novel. We got to learn about Abiyo's parents and her aunt and some other girls who lived at the shrine and a woman who opened a rehabilitation centre. The prose in here is also gorgeous. This novel actually has one of the most punchy and engaging first paragraphs I have read about in a very long time. Let me read it to you. The prose generally in this novel reminded me of reading a Khaled Yosini book, and I don't really know why. I can't really put my finger on why, and I'm not sure if other people would agree with me on that, but that's what I was reminded of when I was reading this novel, and that is a huge compliment. My only criticism of this novel is that I wanted a little bit more from it, and by that I mean that I found the pacing of the novel to be a little bit off at times. I loved the time that we got to spend with Abiyo as a child at the beginning of the book. I loved all of that insight and detail, and you actually spend over a third of the book in this setting, and I found that when the book progressed we got to spend less and less time in each section, and I wanted to spend more time there. I wanted to know more about Abiyo's time in the shrine and all of the different people she met. I wanted to delve even deeper into the themes explored. I wanted to hear more about her recovery and her relationship with her family. Basically there was just so much good stuff in here that I wanted just more of all of it. I think the book could have definitely benefited from being a little bit longer, but overall I absolutely loved this novel. I just fell in love with it while I was reading it. I think it's so impressive and so engrossing, and I think so many people would enjoy reading it. I'm really really glad that the Women's Prize has drawn attention to it. And the final book that I'm going to be talking about in this video, my favourite Women's Prize read so far is Normal People by Sally Rooney. This is a literary fiction novel that focuses on two characters, Connell and Marianne. Connell and Marianne have grown up in the same rural town in Ireland, but their backgrounds couldn't really be more different. Simply put, this novel follows the relationship between Connell and Marianne from when they are teenagers over the next few years until they are young adults. So it isn't really a surprise that this is my favourite book from the Women's Prize list. I read this earlier this year and absolutely loved it. It became an instant favourite of mine, and if I read something that tops this, I will be amazed. This book just couldn't be more perfect for me. It is the epitome of what I love in a literary fiction novel. It isn't plot driven at all. It's extremely character focused, and it just looks at these normal people living their ordinary lives. It looks at the relationships they hold and the interactions they have. It looks at their mental lives and their upbringings and their social conditioning. The characterisation in here is superb. It is in another league. The complexity of the characters and the complexities of the relationships they hold are breathtaking. Communication is something in particular that Sally Rooney writes so well. There are so many different complexities and subtleties that she writes in, including lots of different forms of communication, not just verbal, different interpretations and misinterpretations. There's the reaching out to try and understand and change, different backgrounds and personalities shaping all of these things. There's a lot going on. The writing in here is so sharp and clean and bold. It's extremely captivating and devourable. It elicited such an emotional response in me, this novel. I felt so seen and hopeful and uncomfortable at times. To be honest, this novel is just so good on every single level I could go on forever. This book is an absolute masterpiece. I'm completely in awe of it, and I couldn't love it more. So there we go. Those are the Women's Prize long-listed books that I have read so far. I really hope you enjoyed hearing me chat about them. For me, currently, I would be over the moon if either normal people or praise song for the butterflies won. Normal people is very, very special to me, and I think it is beyond brilliant, so naturally I would love it if that won. But at the same time, it is getting a lot of attention and praise at the moment, and I think it's so cool that praise song has made onto this list. It's so nice to see smaller publishers getting recognised and amazingly talented writing coming from somewhere different, so it would be amazing if praise song did well. Speaking of praise song for the butterflies, this leads us very nicely onto the really exciting giveaway that I mentioned at the beginning of this video. The lovely, lovely people at Jacaranda Books are going to be giving away a copy of praise song for the butterflies and one of Bernice's older novels as well, two, three of you lot. So we have praise song for the butterflies, which you all now know I love, and we also have The Book of Harlan, which is also by Bernice L McFadden. If you want to be in for a chance of winning one of the three sets of these books, then please just make sure you're subscribed to me, and then comment down below saying you'd like to enter, as simple as that. The giveaway is going to be open until the 26th of the month, and then I will randomly select three winners, and we will send the books out to you. Also, if you do happen to win and you'd like to buddy read the older of Bernice's books with me, I would absolutely love that because I really want to read it at some point soon. Once again, thank you so so much to the lovely people at Jacaranda Books for always being so kind to me and wanting to give away some books to my viewers. That is so lovely. So that's going to be it for this video. I'm sorry if it was a long one, but I've really really enjoyed talking about these women's prize books, and I hope you've enjoyed it as well. Please let me know if you've read any of the women's prize books and what you thought of them. I would love to chat with you about them down below. Thank you so much for watching everyone. I appreciate you all so so much and I will speak to you and see you soon. Bye.