The first book in her “living autobiography” series, this is a response to George Orwell’s “Why I Write” which I read so long ago that I don’t really know in exactly what ways that is, but I don’t think that matters too much.
I actually read the second book first and this felt very different in the sense that it was a lot of looking back, analysing Levy’s childhood in apartheid South Africa. The story is very traumatic and she tells it well, mixing in child and adult perspectives on the subject.
It’s touching, thoughtful, and thought provoking. Made me think of complicity and agency, of why we love places and why we hate them. Why we leave. Why we run. Why we bury certain things.
It’s a good novel that packs a lot into its diminutive frame.
I already have her third one, Real Estate, from the library.
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