Why did I read this book? That is the question you sometimes ask yourself. And Small Pleasures by Clare Chambers makes me do just this. The answer actually is simple. One, it was longlisted for the Booker Prize 2021. And two, the rave reviews online touting this as one of the best you may find. Unfortunately, I was hugely disappointed.
The second question that comes to mind is – How did I read this book? Actually, when I do not find a book to my liking, I usually discard it midway, not willing to bother myself over something that is not for me. I had basically read past about 80% of the book when I really felt I just wish to stop with it. So, with just some bit of remaining, I rather finish reading it!
Maybe it is just a question of personal taste, since most people have held Small Pleasures in high regards, there were some key issues I disliked in it. I felt the book had a touch of perverse tone to it right throughout. Be it eyeing a married, middle aged man with a happy family life was to me quite gross in the first place. And then the very absurd and abhorrent turn of the main character turning homosexual running away to her lover. Oh Gosh! I really wish to know how the criterion of Booker Prize really works!
If the above was not enough to repulse you away from the book, you had the daughter who was secretly wishing her mother doesn’t recover from her fall so that she could keep having sex with this man. Can it really get more deplorable than that? Well it does, with a ghost like character introduced called “V” who is gross in his own ways doing things I don’t wish to write here. If anything good about the book was the lil Margaret whose innocence & unrelated questions bring in moments of warmth. But that too wasn’t allowed to dwell by the author who tarnishes this lil girl with the possibility of turning the same ghost as she grows up. What should I say!
If by forcing in an unexpected tragedy at the end is what really wins all the accolades & connoisseurship, that seems the only reason this book got it. That was the only thing that pulled it up from the rots but as I see – too little, too late.
I also fail to comprehend the relevance of the title. A single paragraph towards the end enlisting small pleasures of life that you relish every day which were forgotten by this woman’s longing for love. I think, we all already know better the significance of small pleasures of life, and this book would be the last thing you would want to pick up to educate yourself about it.
A Town Called Solace (Mary Lawson) and Klara And The Sun (Kazuo Ishiguro) are other Booker Prize nominees I read this year.