Book Review: A Cold Season by Matthew Hooper

A Cold Season is the searing debut novel from Australian author Matthew Hooper. It is a heart-rending story of loss and grief set during a freezing post WWI winter in a small house in the foothills of Mt Kosciusko.

 

The narrator is 14 year-old Beth as she retells what happened the year her 17 year-old brother Sam went missing. Sam was trekking the hills above their property when a storm came through and trapped him on the mountain. Their father, Owens, leaves to find him and also becomes trapped in the winter storm.

 

As they wait for Sam and Owens to return Beth's mother Grace, convinced they will never return, finds solace in the local outlaw, Wallace.

Her burden of grief turns to anger and she blocks out Beth's brother Sasha and lashes out at Beth. 

 

Matthew Hooper never lets the reader forget how bitterly cold and harsh the climate is.

 

"I felt colder, like my clothes was not working and the mountain's cold was right inside me, making me shiver and shake and rub my knees."

The use of prose that are both lyrical and illiterate portray an uneducated narrator as Beth tells the story in her own words.

"But mostly we was thinking about Owens and Sam, ........ and we was both filled to the brim with upset and worry what sat in our stomachs like heavy stones submerged in dark sorrow-water what filled us up."

A Cold Season is a deeply felt story about how grief is managed in different ways. It is a story filled with sorrow and love and hate, and a sadness that is all consuming.

 I'd love to see it on the big screen one day.

 

My rating 5 / 5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

If I could give it more stars I would!

 

Publisher: Transit Lounge

Publication date: 1st October 2024

Genre: Fiction

Pages: 224

RRP: AU$32.99 (paperback)

Source: Courtesy of the publisher via Quikmark Media

 

 

Book Review: Look at Me by Mareike Krügel

 I read Look at Me by Mareike Krügel for the Dymocks Reading Challenge prompt: a translated book. Originally published in German and impeccably translated into English by Imogen Taylor, I felt it still lost some of the humour in the translation.

 

Kat has an old friend coming to visit but first she needs to get through the day alone, again, as her husband is away with  work.

Look at Me plays out over one extremely hectic day in Kat's life as one thing after another goes wrong and she tries to be everything to everyone, whilst at the back of her mind is the lump she found in her breast and the thought of her own mortality.

 

Look at Me is filled with a quirky cast of characters including 11 year-old Helli, recently diagnosed with ADHD, and Heinz and Theo, Kat's transgender neighbours.

Kat calmly deals with one drama after another as she contemplates her life so far.

 

There is humour, most of it dark, mixed with sadness and the chaos of life with children's needs, work phone calls, appliance malfunctions, husband's texts and neighbours' dilemmas.

 

Look at Me is a story about the messiness of life. Mothers will empathise with Kat as she feels unappreciated but also indispensable. 

 

My rating 4 / 5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐

 

Publisher: Text Publishing

Publication date: 26th February 2018

Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Pages: 288 (paperback)

Source: Own copy

 

This also qualifies for my MountTBR challenge.