‘Wonderful’ debut novels to get stuck into: The Unexpected by Ellen Wiles, Brightly
The Unexpected by Ellen Wiles (HQ £9.99, 432pp)
Best friends since childhood, Kessie and Robin are in their mid-30s and hearing increasingly loud ticks from their biological clocks.
Single Kessie is wondering whether she can afford to pay for a sperm donor; Robin is seven years into a relationship with a man who won’t commit to having a child.
Kessie sets up a profile on a shared parenting app and is delighted when she meets a man who seems mad about her. She is less delighted when he ghosts her, especially when she discovers she’s pregnant.
‘Ro’ is happy for Kessie, but sad for herself – her relationship having imploded when she realised her boyfriend was wasting her time. When Kessie’s daughter is born she struggles to bond with her, and Ro steps in hugely. In the process, all sorts of common assumptions about motherhood and family are turned on their head.
It’s brilliant on friendship, identity, longing and resilience.
Brightly Shining by Ingvild Rishoi (Grove Press £12.99, 192pp)
This small book (published to rave reviews in Norway in 2021) packs a big punch and I read it in one sitting.
It tells the story of young sisters Ronja and Melissa, whose alcoholic father is out of work again. Set at Christmas, the threat of an intervention by social services hangs heavy over the girls as their dad flounders.
Things seem to look up when he gets a job selling Christmas trees, but he spoils the opportunity by getting drunk.
The girls refuse to accept ruin, demonstrating extreme resilience by taking on the job themselves to keep their family fed and together. The sense of place is so strong I could almost smell the pine needles. A beautiful novel about family, community and kindness. Wonderful.
The Fortune Teller of Berlin by J. C. Maetis (Viking £9.99, 432pp)
The Fortune Teller of Berlin is available now from the Mail Bookshop
It’s 1940 in Berlin and clairvoyant Edith is working as Hitler’s personal fortune teller. She didn’t want the job – especially since her predecessor Erik, also her lover, was murdered not long after predicting the Fuhrer’s rise to power – but could hardly refuse.
Set on revenge for Erik’s death, she agrees to work for the Resistance as a double agent, with the best of British and French intelligence to guide her. Edith
visits bookshops to find encrypted messages, which help her to influence Hitler’s
military decisions. But she lives in fear of her secret being found out – particularly
of what would happen to her daughter.
Alongside this, Edith begins an affair with her SS chaperone, who is hiding secrets of his own. The tension ramps up, and it’s full of impeccably researched Second World War detail. Compelling.