Hanya Yanagihara (2015) A Little Life. London, Picador. 978-1-5290-6124-6

 

This is an epic, magnificent book focusing on the lives of four male friends who meet when they are in college and continue their friendships through the ups and downs of work, art and the relationships between themselves and people who join and leave their circle. It starts with them in their late teens and continues through to late middle-age.
 
[Trigger Warning: Domestic Violence]
[Spoiler alert]
 
The domestic abuse in this book occupies a relatively small part of what is a huge book, and is somewhat overshadowed by the self-harm and abuse the main character suffers, but it is significant in it’s brevity but intensity.
 
Jude forms his very first consensual relationship with an artist, Caleb. The relationship very soon becomes both physically abusive and mentally abusive as Caleb humiliates Jude at every opportunity. Finally he rapes him and throws him downstairs, leaving him for dead.
 
Despite the abuse being a discrete part of the book, it is difficult to separate from the main story as tolerating the abuse for as long as he does, illustrates how abuse has characterised Jude’s life and how poor his self-esteem, despite his outward and worldly achievements.
 
Awards:
 
·        Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2015
·        Finalist National Book Award for Fiction 2015
·        Winner of Kirkus Prize for Fiction 2015
·        Shortlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction 2016
·        Shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2016
·        Shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award 2017

Angie Cruz (2019) Dominicana. London, John Murray. 978-1-529-30487-9

 

    Again, the main theme of this book is not domestic abuse, but it occurs as part of the marriage between the main character and the man twice her age she is persuaded to marry at 15 to improve the chances of a better life for all the family.
 
[Trigger Warning: Domestic Violence]
[Spoiler alert].
 
Ana comes from a poor family in what is now the Dominican Republic. The best chance for her family to have a better life comes from emigrating and moving to America. Ana attracts the eye of a Dominican who has already moved to NYC and marriage brings with it the prospect of the whole family making that move. Ana’s husband is violent towards her when he feels his authority over her is undermined or their precarious position is threatened by her actions. When, during political upheaval in Dominica, her husband returns home, Ana is left free to fall in love, make friends, and develop some financial independence. When her husband returns, she has to choose between duty and family, freedom and love.
 
The story is told to the backdrop of political events in Dominica and American intervention in those events and the murder of Malcolm X. It beautifully details the experience of immigrants in 1960’s New York and is based on the life of the author’s mother.
 
Awards:
·        Shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2020