I Am Sovereign

by Nicola Barker

__________________________________________'One of the funniest, most finely achieved comic novels, even by her own standard … I think it’s a masterpiece.' ALI SMITH‘I think Nicola Barker is incapable of a dull page. [Her work] is unified by its spirit of adventure.’ KEVIN BARRYHow long does it take to change the world?Could it happen in approximately twenty minutes?Charles, a forty-year-old teddy bear maker, is trying to sell his late mother's house, helped by his estate agent Avigail (who thinks Charles is an imbecile). The prospective the fearsome Wang Shu - who has no desire to make idle chit-chat - and her downtrodden daughter, Ying Yue.During the twenty-minute viewing a huge number of things happen, although it is also entirely possible that nothing happens at all. Which is it? Can the world really turn on its axis during a mundane discussion about cheese preservation? Has fiction the power to do that? Should it even want to?__________________________________________'She really is a genius.’ GUARDIAN‘Life-affirming hilarity – Evelyn Waugh on ecstasy.’ NELL ZINK'A madly brilliant little book that asks who at any point is in control of what. I loved it.' DAILY MAIL‘Nicola Barker’s wildness and capacity for the absurd often delight me.’ SARAH MOSS‘What an audacious writer Nicola Barker is … In an era when plot is king, Barker has typically, joyously, dispensed with one … Barker’s pleasure in the novella feels defiant.’ EVENING STANDARD‘I Am Sovereign is bursting with energy, compassion and humour.’ LITERARY REVIEW‘Barker is a writer in a class of her own … A work of coruscating intelligence, of deep humanity.’ OBSERVER‘A riotous burst of a novel that scrutinises the nature of fiction with the lightest of touches.’ MAIL ON SUNDAY‘A bracing, brilliantly bonkers comic novel … This is freewheeling fiction that delights in the visual.’ SUNDAY TIMES‘Barker’s writing is very, very funny, both ha ha and strange ... Fans of Ali Smith’s “Seasonal Quartet” will enjoy a similarly arch, detached view on the banality of contemporary Britain ... A gloriously audacious blend of, well, the deep and the trite.’ INDEPENDENT

Genres: Fiction, British Literature, Novels, Ebooks, 21st Century, Humor, Literary Fiction

210 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 1, 2019

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Nicola Barker is an English writer.
Nicola Barker’s eight previous novels include Darkmans (short-listed for the 2007 Man Booker and Ondaatje prizes, and winner of the Hawthornden Prize), Wide Open (winner of the 2000 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award), and Clear (long-listed for the Man Booker Prize in 2004). She has also written two prize-winning collections of short stories, and her work has been translated into more than twenty languages. She lives in East London.

Reviews

[Meike · Rating 4 out of 5]

This experimental novella is a riot, it's smart and hilarious, and it manages to be a real-page turner without even offering a proper story - the reader doesn't crave to know what happens next, but what other outrageous twists this author has in store. In "I Am Sovereign", Barker sets out to depict a twenty-minute house viewing in Llandudno, Wales. We meet Charles who inherited the house from his mother and builds teddy bears for a living, his real estate agent Avigail, as well as Wang Shu and her daughter Ying Yue who are interested in acquiring the property. But slowly, it becomes clear that we are actually reading a text about writing texts - the mindsets, feelings and backstories of the protagonists are explored, alternatives are established, possible developments are pondered, interpretations are offered and discarded, the author (Barker herself, or an alter ego) gets into a fight with a character who feels misrepresented, questions her own approach and the quality of her output and even changes parts of the novella while writing it. The walls between fiction and real-life crumble - the two areas are only one letter apart (watch out, autocorrect!). The protagonists come to life while at the same time reflecting real life; the flaws of and misunderstandings between the characters, including the character named "The Author", become a heightened version of reality.

Barker does all of this with lots of drive and verve: She manages to discuss the narrative process while celebrating the freedom it offers. While Ali Smith (whom I also love) has started to incorporate other serious artists in her seasonal quartet, Nicola Barker does not only feature herself (or a certain "Nicola" a.k.a "The Author" who also wrote H(A)PPY), but also Lucy Molloy, a housewife/tattoo model/YouTuber from Perth who is loved by the fictional characters Avigail and Ying Yue for her refreshing blandness (in case you want to know what they mean: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cR0Q3...) - and it's true, Barker's fictionalised everyday people are much more eccentric and thus interesting than the heavily tattooed internet star Lucy appears to be. Avigail and Ying Yue realize that and applaud Lucy's aggressive normalcy and conventionality - I loved this commentary on influencer culture vs. fiction.

And then there's life coach Richard Grannon haunting some characters as well as the author - what narratives does the culture of self-optimization employ, and how do they relate to fiction? Barker surely has thoughts (in case you're strong enough to face Grannon's ideas on the "super ego", which also play a role in the book, click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDGVL...).
It's also Grannon who claims that "we can feel good and confident controlling the sovereignty of our own emotional state" (quote from his website). But who is the sovereign of our own lives? In how far are we in control of our sentiments and narrative, and in how far is Nicola Barker in control of the narrative of her own book? Can she master her own creative power, or do the characters - like Gyasi "Chance" Ebo, who demands to be written out of the story because he disagrees with his inventor, The Author - have lives of their own? Maybe the story itself is a reality, which is disturbed by The Author's outrageous ideas, like letting a character mysteriously be struck by a falling oyster.

As an underlying theme, Barker is talking about understanding and connection, and how we are all searching for it, real people as well as fictional characters (who may or may not represent real people). Again and again, we encounter attempts to truly grasp someone else's feelings and motivations, both inside the story and on the meta-level, when the story is constructed. Throughout the novella, Barker's tone remains crisp and witty - with this book, she once again proves that experimental fiction can be both challenging and fun, no FUN. A Booker nomination would be well deserved.

[BlackOxford · Rating 5 out of 5]

Self-Help and Its Discontents

Nicola Barker is a master of literary slapstick - psychological as well as physical. The choreography of her set pieces (packed into 20 minutes of a house viewing in Llandudno) is excelled by no one. She is Chaplin with a pen (or touch pad). She could have written scripts for Peter Sellers or Rowan Atkinson. And she has no hesitation about inviting the reader into rehearsals either. Her characters are inadequate in all the right ways - too much or too little motherly love, striving to be anything other than what they are, and, of course, unrelentingly hapless. They are determined to improve themselves. But this means fighting against the very selves which they are. They are ridiculously neurotic, therefore, which makes them... well, lovable.

[Barry Pierce · Rating 4 out of 5]

'I Am Sovereign: Unconventional and plotless, but sure to impress critics' , my review in the Irish Times.

[Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another Nicola Barker novel about empathy, the lack of it, the desperate need for it, how it might be effected. It's also about how men become gammon, how self-parenting is a thing when actual parents are terrible, motivational figures, meta stuff about how authors lose control of their wilfully anarchic characters (an Ethiopian carer called Ebo), the self-sabotaging nature of acquisitiveness, cheese, cat ambivalence, cursed brooms and all kinds of other madness, somehow all squeezed into 208 widely-spaced, largeish-font pages. It's a bit too much of a high-wire jeu d'esprit to really hit Barker's heights (it's basically The Yips at high speed) but it's another reminder that Barker is possibly the best around just now, and that the next, apparently much bigger effort should be very special indeed.

'Michelle and Barack Obama are Charles's perfect parents.

The two-year old Charles sits happily on Michelle Obama's warm lap as she gently plaits his hair (although anyone who plaits knows that this process is never gentle) into fastidiously neat lines of corn-rows.

Hmm. That's a slightly odd and unsettling fantasy.

For a 40 y/o man.

Barack...

Ah, Barack.
Barack takes Charles to the Oval Office and lets Charles sit on the President's chair. And answer the President's phone.

Yes.

And he pats Charles supportively on the shoulder. And he says things like: 'You don't need to buy that second-hand juicer because you are already good enough, son.'

Barack thinks that Charles is perfect just as he is.

Barack and Michelle wouldn't change so much as a single hair on Charles's head.'

[Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Author suspects that this novella (which is currently in danger of becoming a novel so needs to end quite soon) is either extremely deep or unbelievably trite.
It’s impossible to tell.
The Author (Gyasi ‘Chance’ Ebo claims) will persist in calling it ‘unbelievably trite’ because she is fundamentally disingenuous.
The Author (The Author claims) will persist in calling it ‘unbelievably trite’ because - at some profound level - it is unbelievably trite’

In this book Barker writes

The Author has been prey to “mixed feelings” about the novel, as a form, ever since completing her last work (H(A)PPY) which - to all intents and purposes - destroyed the novel (as a form) for The Author.

Instead she decides, she says, to concentrate on the novella form which is ”delightfully slight ... not too ambitious ... eminently manageable ... generally unchallenging ... unbearably cute and write a book whose overriding concept .. is that it should take place, in its entirety, during a twenty minute house viewing in Llandudno” - only to struggle with the maintaining an appropriate length for the book.

The twenty minute interaction of her characters (an estate agent from a Hasidic Jewish background, a middle aged man Charles who makes bespoke teddy bears which he then refuses to part with, a fierce Chinese lady viewing the house with her near invisible daughter/interpreter) is interrupted by one of Charles’s customers sneaking into the house to claim the teddy bear he ordered but with which Charles will not part.

Which customer that is though changes as Barker does not so much break through the fourth wall as systematically dismantle it brick by brick.

She starts by abruptly arguing in a series of formal legal style exchanges with the first version of that customer) one she later admits to wanting to drop due to feeling uncomfortable after a visit to the Sangatte camp).

She then discards any attempt at maintaining the novelistic convention of an artificial editorial obliqueness from the text via device of an unnamed and unacknowledged omniscient narrator; instead asserting directly her own sovereignty over her work.

She even provides her own review - see opening quote.

And most impressively for me she even identifies her reviewer.

I am still unclear if everyone received their own version of the book, but mine has a entirely pointless and rather tedious recurring theme on the real life You Tube self help guru Richard Grannon (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=16WtoFr...) inserted solely to show that the author’s sovereignty extends to knowledge of her reviewer. Grannon is a link to my name and more directly she references my avatar via a brief but crucial reference to the real agency behind Grannon (the ideas of acknowledging the real agency behind someone as well as breaking through literary walls - here the reviewer/author one - being of course key to the book)

a giant blond dog which lollops about shedding hair and stealing socks

[Eric Anderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lately it feels like Nicola Barker hasn’t been able to finish writing a novel without wanting to blow it up. Her last novel “H(A)PPY” was set in a future society where everyone’s mind was plugged into a single continuous stream and its hero’s consciousness became more hallucinatory while the text itself morphed into multi-coloured fragments and bizarre structures. It seems like there’s more tension in her narratives lately where the fourth wall is breaking down. Her new book “I Am Sovereign” is a self-designated novella. Within the story it’s stated “This is just a novella (approx.. 23,000 words)”. It’s story is quite simple on the surface. The 49 year-old protagonist Charles creates customized stuffed bears and is seeking to sell his house in Wales. Over a twenty minute period estate agent Avigail presents the house to prospective buyer Wang Shu accompanied by her daughter Ying Yue who has come along as her translator. But the concept of this tale is merely a box within which Barker illuminates the artificiality of her characters and uses them as ciphers to discuss concepts of narrative itself. What little story there is soon breaks down – Barker even states at one point “Nothing of much note happens, really, does it?” Instead, Barker engages in arguments with a particular character and muses upon the nature of language, storytelling and authority. There’s a frenetic energy to Barker’s writing which is irresistible if you’re in a good humour or frustrating if you’re after an old-fashioned plot.

Read my full review of I Am Sovereign by Nicola Barker on LonesomeReader

[MJ Nicholls · Rating 4 out of 5]

An improvisatory, loose novella exploring Barker’s personal fallout with the form for which she is famous, reminiscent of B.S. Johnson’s own peevishness in Albert Angelo. In her last novel, the tremendous H(A)PPY, Barker seemed reinvigorated, having boxed herself into writing tiresome screwball comedies, though this turn into self-interrogating metafiction suggests Barker is in an existential funk. As long as she continues to channel this existential funk into whatever form she pleases, I will remain a passionate devotee.

[Will · Rating 4 out of 5]

I adore Nicola Barker. She is a singular talent, unlike any other writer working today. Odd – yes, I think so, but an oddness I love, an oddness that sets her apart, an oddness that never bores. I can’t imagine ever picking up a Barker novel and being bored. With I Am Sovereign she is as bold, imaginative, playful and endlessly inventive as ever. She can create the quirkiest characters to ever jump off the page and she has certainly done that here. While highly entertaining, Barker is also a brilliant and insightful writer, always managing to explore something deeper beneath all the fun. I’m not sure if this ranks with her best (or does it?), but it is very, very good, simply a joy to read and absolutely hilarious. I laughed. I had a wonderful time. Yes, I adore Nicola Barker.

[Betsy Robinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

First, thank you, Black Oxford aka Michael, for reviewing this wild book.

Second, this is a perfect book for me: hilarious, wild, full of profound understanding of silence or All That Is or Ein Sof, soaked in learning about trauma treatments, self-actualization work, and the complexity of our psychology and notions about what is real or even an entity separate from other entities. So I’m kind of amazed (1) that it got published, and (2) that author Nicola Barker and this book appear to be wildly popular in the U.K.

This work is nothing like Haruki Murakami’s but I find the popularity of both authors’ work with people who have never studied World Wisdom Traditions or complicated psychological concepts mind-boggling. Murakami’s meticulous cleanliness seems to put readers in a trance, even if they don’t cognitively understand what’s going on. Conversely, Barker’s anarchic sentences, jumping font sizes, shrieks and blank spaces communicate the same kind of esoteric journey that cannot really fit into language.

This is a free-for-all bumper car ride between people and their ids, filled with abrupt and perfect transitions that are so logical in their illogic that they are funny. And I followed every second of the sudden changes of direction and not only laughed, but felt bathed in Ein Sof—the silence.

I have no idea who would like this book. The Guardian cover blurb calls Nicola Barker “a genius.” I second that, and if I could figure out her popular appeal, I’d steal it.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Is the author a GOD?

Or is the author lead by the leash like a DOG?

In Nicola Barker’s 13th novel (or novella??) this question does occur. In typical Nicola Barker fashion, she tries to explain it. For fans of Barker’s approach to anything, be it politics, dystopias or spiritualism you know it’s going to be playful with a slightly weird edge to it.

Charles is a hoarder, loves self help videos, makes teddy bears and is set in his ways although due to his self help addiction, is trying to improve himself but can’t seem to . He is also trying to sell his house. Avigail, his real estate agent is trying her hardest to sell the house but Charles keeps driving potential buyers away. Wang Shu and Ying Yue are the latest potential buyers. Avigail has 20 minutes to sell the house. Oh and there’s a hairless cat called Morpheus with a cheese intolerance issue. In typical Nicola Barker fashion there are references to books. Usually this is done in an offhand way, which is fun.

Within this plot, Barker weaves in issues regarding, Internet culture, self help gurus, race relations and cultural clashes. The most important part though happens towards the end of the novel when the fourth wall is broken down and Barker herself appears and tells the reader about how she can mold and shape and change the course of the novel in any way possible.

And she does. Which leads to the title.

At one point in the book, Charles is repeating the mantra of his favorite guru I am Sovereign. The real sovereign, however, is the author, who can change anything according to her (in this case) whims.

With every kingdom though, there’s always the rebel and in the last half of I am Sovereign an abandoned character makes repeat appearances in the narrative, until Nicola tries to sort him out. As powerful as the author may be, sometimes the creations can get the upper hand.

The thing I enjoyed the most about I am Sovereign is that it is so much fun to read. Barker tackles some serious topics, authorship itself being a weighty one. Due to the approach and the absurd scenes, I just couldn’t stop laughing. Reading this book made me think, reflect and then laugh out loud and this cycle continued to the last page.

I am Sovereign is proof that experimental literature does not have to be tough going. I’m not saying that this is light reading but there’s a certain type of breeziness which whisks the reader along with the story.

Barker does receive the accolade genius quite often but it is not hyperbole. When an author manages to take a heavy topic and make it funny with a childlike abandon then it does require a lot of brainwork. At the moment Barker is the sovereign of experimental literature.

Many thanks to William Heinemann for providing a requested copy of I am Sovereign in exchange for an honest review.

[Tommi · Rating 4 out of 5]

[3.5] I found this partly inconsequential in terms of the themes it explores, but it is always sheer fun to delve into Barker’s twisted meta-stories. She is doing interesting things with the novel(la) form, even if here her playfulness remains pretty much at the level of her previous novel, H(A)PPY (which I really loved), so I Am Sovereign feels a bit lightweight in comparison.

[Ella · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'll write more, but for now: this book made me a nervous wreck. I found myself clenching my jaw and fists while reading it - the neurosis bled off the page and into my bloodstream. I honestly had difficulty reading more than a page at a time. I think there's something terrific here, but I need some distance to become less affected with jitters, then probably my rating and my mind will change.

Or not. There is something really interesting going on here, and I will need to reread (oh GAWD) to be able to accomplish any coherent thoughts on what that is about.

[Paul Fulcher · Rating 3 out of 5]

The novella, as a form, is not too ambitious. The novella, as a form, is unbearably cute. The Author has been prey to ‘mixed feelings’ about the novel, as a form, ever since completing her last work (H(A)PPY) which — to all intents and purposes — destroyed the novel (as a form) for The Author.

Nicola Barker's I Am Sovereign is a sneeze of a novella, following the flu she caught after the Goldsmith's Prize winning H(A)PPY.

“A sneeze is a sudden, spontaneous, joyous, almost orgasmic experience, whereas the flu is never fun, is it?”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ni...

Barker has a lot of fun, first setting up a bizarre scenario - a chaotic 20 minute house viewing with some decidedly odd characters (one described appropriately as "this strange, bedraggled, ill-drawn creature; this girl, part-stuffed, badly sewn") as well as copious references to two real-life figures, a Youtube self-help guru Richard Grannon, and a tattooed instagram star Lucy Molloy. J

Just as the novella is starting to sag a little, getting bogged down in some rather existential questions, The Author decides to intervene directly, and the last third, as the Guardian memorably put it, "doesn’t so much break the fourth wall as present the author, sobbing, seated among her audience," as well as dialing up the bizarreness - one new character she introduces is a a legally-blind “little old man with quince-testicles.”

An early extract as a taster:

In the Introductory Module which Charles has only watched half of because he suddenly felt terrified and overwhelmed and tired – tired – just so ludicrously, deliriously tired – Richard Grannon stood majestically in front of a whiteboard wearing a newly-pressed blue shirt and calmly outlined the role of the Toxic Super-Ego. The Toxic Super-Ego was sitting (Grannon drew a little cartoon with his trusty marker pen) in its own small bath of ‘toxic shame’.

Grannon is funny and handsome and ‘buff’ and Charles finds it difficult to believe that Grannon was also an unholy screw-up a mere two years ago. Two years. Before he cured himself.

Although there is already something about this picture that doesn’t entirely add up. If a person is truly, authentically an unholy screw-up then how the hell do they still manage to hold down a job as a life-coach/therapist and teach high level martial arts and do a series of other remarkably cool and interesting things like becoming an NLP Master Practitioner and living in the Far East and having an encyclopaedic knowledge of Important Cultural Moments in both fiction and film while owning a giant, blonde dog which lollops about shedding hair and stealing socks?
(from https://granta.com/i-am-sovereign/)

In Gumble's Yard's excellent review, he used the last lines of that passage to show how the novel seemed to know who was reading it.

In my case I read this novel, while developing an appropriate sneeze, between Twitter discussions with supporters of one particular Booker shortlisted novel who somehow took the judges being unable to decide between two other novels as the winner, as meaning their book was robbed. And I felt, biting my tongue to say what I really thought, as the Novelist does in this book dealing with a particularly troublesome character:

It’s the pervasive atmosphere of ill-will seeping into every line that I’m really struggling with. I find myself overcompensating, being excessively complimentary.

As as for why their novel didn't win well, as this book says a few lines later: commas seriously endanger lives, particularly, it doesn't add, where there are no full stops.

Sadly that book is on the Goldsmith's shortlist and this book isn't.

3.5 stars - rounded down to 3 as even The Author is happy to admit this is a sneeze of a work.

[Tonymess · Rating 5 out of 5]

The cover says “She really is a genius” - yep, she really is a genius.
Trite or deep? Did Nicola Barker destroy the novel as a form with her last work ‘H(A)PPY’?
You’ll need to read this novella to figure that out.

[Marina Sofia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Now this was really fun (and quick) to read! It's an author mucking about with the purpose and shape of the novel, sure, but it's also got at least 2 characters that are rather brilliantly done, many hilarious (even farcical) moments. It is crisp, funny, experimental, and says a lot more about our search for identity and connection than many a more serious and longer book.

[Snakes · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not so bad that the book is completely unreadable. But certainly not entertaining at any level. Not sure what the underlying plot even was. Writing a plot summary for this book would be a fiasco. And with the author intentionally breaking the 4th wall at the end and commenting that this book is plotless and trite, I was just left thinking...uh...spot on. I expect more from Nicola Barker.

[Laura Spira · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book made me smile. It's short - a novella - and the action takes place over twenty minutes during which an estate agent, Avigail, brings two clients (a Chinese mother and daughter) to view a house being sold by Charles, who makes specially commissioned teddy bears. The action also includes a cat, Morpheus, and a sort-of burglar. Not to mention the character who after a battle with the Author disappears from the narrative.

We are also exposed to much of the work of a self-help guru. The book title is drawn from his mantra for helping Charles to overcome his Inner Critic. But the title also exemplifies the Author's relationship with her characters, which can be challenging. It's a clever book, perfectly judged in terms of length with very idiosyncratic characters beautifully brought to life, in much the same way that Charles crafts his teddy bears.

[Alan Shaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a very good read, with four interesting and cleverly drawn principal characters who are involved in a somewhat comical houseviewing. Hardly anything happens at all - but it doesn't really need to - as so much is going on in those four heads all the time - and that is what we are mostly privy to.

Despite not quite hitting that fifth star I will put this one straight onto my re-read list. I am sure there will be further pleasure to be taken in a second reading.

[MGF · Rating 2 out of 5]

I definitely think I’m not smart enough to enjoy this (short) book nor understand it. It’s definitely “different” and carries a certain arrogance which put me off.

[Lynsey Hall · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an incredibly clever book, there is so much depth to it, despite being virtually no plot at all. I think I will struggle to explain why I loved it so much. The book (I think) fuses both fiction and non-fiction. It takes place entirely during a 20 minute house viewing. The characters narrate, are observed by one another and also the author. The author interjects at points which makes her a key character in the story as well. I kind of imagined her on the ceiling narrating her writing and character/story development process while the fictional characters are frozen beneath her awaiting their next instruction. I loved this book, it's so unlike anything I have read before. I could absolutely see this making a very engaging stage performance, if it does become one I will be first in line for a ticket.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

A man, who's trying to sell his house, and his estate agent show a woman and her adult daughter around the house. This takes about 20 minutes. Nothing much happens apart from that in this great experimental novella.
So it’s all about form and style really, about fiction and writing. Even the writer Nicola Barker and her editor are characters here. Bizarre, challenging and loads of fun!
Thank you Random House UK for the ARC

[Eliza · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can’t review this better than Barker herself, who can’t decide whether this novella is extremely deep or unbelievably trite. As she does not say in this context, but does elsewhere, it may be both. I’m not sure it matters.

I’ve only read one previous work of Barker’s (Darkmans) and both have left me flummoxed and delighted.

The main question I was asking - what does it mean to be sovereign, am I, are any of us, is anything - was met with a resounding no. And yet here we are.

[Andrew Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I heard that Nicola Barker had inserted herself, as the author, into the narrative of I Am Sovereign, red flags started flapping furiously. But I was intrigued to discover how she’d done it. The answer is ... brilliantly, hilariously, insightfully, amazingly, successfully. No red flags needed here! The most uniquely funny and clever book I think I’ve ever read.

[Linda Duits · Rating 2 out of 5]

A novel in an usual form, describing actions that happen over a 20-minute timespan. The author ends up taking a meta perspective, which could be okay but just didn’t work for me. I just didn’t find the book funny, and the cover said it was supposed to be hilarious.

Sidenote: I was utterly disappointed by the lack of teddy bears. This book is not about teddy bears at all!

[Bart Van Overmeire · Rating 5 out of 5]

While reading The Novella, The Reader was feeling:
Amused.
Entertained.
Delighted.
In awe.

Hence, The Reader wishes to acknowledge that The Author is indeed a genius, as already rightfully stated by The Newspaper on the cover.

[Judith · Rating 3 out of 5]

The usual bonkers but very clever stuff from Nicola Barker.

[Barry · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author's short-form decompression, it seems, to her own last novel. Playful and oddly charming. I enjoyed it very much.

[scarlettraces · Rating 5 out of 5]

ALL the stars

[Jessi]

Call me old fashioned, but I need a plot. Apparently.

[Jill Lawson · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book made me feel such a failure that as I lit the one star, I thought I'm probably rating myself, not the book. I could not cope with this book and never want to have anything more to do with Nicola Barker, no matter how many prizes she has won or nearly won. And as I can't write a review using umpteen different fonts in several different sizes, like the review extracts in the first 6 pages of my edition, I think I'll just stop here. Except to say that everything about the book is completely weird - and not in a good way.