Mini-Review: “The Language of Dying” by Sarah Pinborough (Jo Fletcher Books)

An affecting, slim tale of loss, family and never-forgotten pain

Tonight is a special, terrible night. A woman sits at her father’s bedside watching the clock tick away the last hours of his life. Her brothers and sisters – all traumatised in their own ways, their bonds fragile – have been there for the past week, but now she is alone. And that’s always when it comes. As the clock ticks in the darkness, she can only wait for it to find her...

Clocking in at only about 125 pages, The Language of Dying nevertheless packs an emotional wallop. A daughter watches over her dying father, as her brothers and sister visit their childhood home. Each is dealing with their own issues and difficulties – be it drug abuse, general unhappiness with their lives, and also their difficulty in dealing with the imminent death of their father. The narrator recounts a number of fond memories and also some extremely painful ones (which, if I recall correctly from a blog-post the author wrote not too long ago, may be at least inspired by certain real events). The book is filled with a great many small, intimate details – it’s quite British, too, in that respect. The family is clearly a broken family, in many ways, and their dealings with each other can be difficult and cause friction. But then, at other times, they reminisce together over happier times. There is perhaps, also, a history of mental instability. This gives a certain dreamlike and questionable quality to a possibly-supernatural slant to the story that is alluded to at the start, and appears again at the end (one I really liked – and I enjoyed the ambiguity).

“… I still look. Forty next birthday and I’m looking out of the window for something that may be imaginary, that I haven’t seen in fifteen years, if ever I saw it at all…”

This is, as I say right at the top, is a powerful, elegant tale of loss and family, and some of the different manifestations of grief. The story is incredibly moving, and I will admit to shedding at least a couple of tears (ahem, ok, more than that). A remarkable, short piece of fiction. Very highly recommended.

Art: Dream & Death, from the SANDMAN

Art by Eduardo Risso. Only just tried Sandman, and I rather liked it. Expect more coverage to appear on the blog as-and-when I can get more books in the series read. I’ll also be checking out the spin-off series, if possible.

Appreciation: Django Wexler on Terry Pratchett

In the second post in the Terry Pratchett appreciation series, soon-to-be-debut author Django Wexler writes about his love of the Discworld series and Pratchett’s writing as a whole.

“On Pratchett” by Django Wexler

“Write a couple of paragraphs about your favorite Discworld books.” I should have seen the trap in that one. It’s hard for me to pick favorites at the best of times, but starting with the Discworld canon it’s an impossible task. For starters, there are so many of them, and almost all of them are so good! I have more Terry Pratchett books in my personal library than any other author. It’s not even close – there are at least two shelves-worth just for Discworld. I started reading them in high school and never stopped.

“Grim Leaper” (Image)

Writer: Kurtis J. Wiebe | Artist: Aluisio C. Santos

In death, he finally found something to live for. Lou Collins is caught in a cyclical curse of violent, gruesome deaths and new beginnings in the bodies of strangers. With no clue why, Lou desperately searches for a way to break the curse and cross over peacefully to the other side. Then equally doomed Ella comes along. It’s a love story to die for.

This is a really weird comic… It’s a little tricky to review, too. For one thing, it’s not very long, so I’ll keep this review short in order to avoid telling you everything about it. It’s worth a look, though, if you have a short window of free time and you’d like to read something a little twisted, and quite original.