| Summary: |
""My name is Bina and I'm a very busy woman. That's Bye-na, not Beena. I don't know who Beena is but I expect she's having a happy life. And I don't know who you are, or the state of your life. But if you've come this way to listen to me, your life will undoubtedly get worse. I'm here to warn you ..." So begins this self-declared "novel in warnings"--an unforgettable, riotous and heartbreaking tour de force. At its centre is Bina, a bracingly plain-spoken older Irishwoman who, we gradually learn, is under police surveillance for a crime considered so unspeakable and incendiary that she cannot refer to it directly upon threat of immediate arrest. As a last resort, Bina has taken to her bed to write out her own version of her story in a series of "warnings"--punctuated by occasional "remarkings"--on the backs of old envelopes. Slowly, while Bina elliptically orbits around the events that led to her great crime, we piece together the poignant truth: at the heart of this book is a deliberate act of merciful euthanasia that brings with it an awful burden, one that an anguished Bina cannot bear to face. Through the voice of sharp-tongued Bina, an extremely challenged and challenging character who is also immensely endearing, Anakana Schofield filters a whole world, giving us a singular novel filled with light and dark, humour and sadness, love and rage. A work of great power, skill, urgency, and above all, transformative empathy from a unique and astonishing writer."-- |
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