Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Top 10 stories set outside the city

Edward Hogan is the winner of the Desmond Elliott first novel prize for Blackmoor, his story of a Derbyshire village during the miners' strike.

For the Guardian, he named a top ten list of stories that "show that you don't need to write about big cities to say big stuff."

One book on the list:
Union Street by Pat Barker

A brilliant, and quite correctly disturbing book. Of Union Street's women, the story of Kelly Brown – a victim of rape – made the biggest mark on me. Barker's take on the care and oppression of communities is complex and thoughtful. "You can get used to anything," Kelly says, ominously, at the start of the book.
Read about all ten stories on Hogan's list.

--Marshal Zeringue