Girl, Woman, Other

It's a rare and beautiful thing when, as a reader, you really don't want a novel to end. This was the case with Girl, Woman, Other - an exuberant and multi-layered novel about the joyful diversity of modern Britain. Each of the twelve characters depicted by Evaristo has her own unique voice. Although all are female and predominantly black, they are empowered. Girl, Woman, Other is not just about rightful triumph in the face of prejudice and adversity, but also an insight into novel perspectives. As a (privileged) white reader of this work, some of the prior assumptions I may have had were challenged. If you can't learn from a novel such as this - to see things from the stance of an ‘other’ - then it would be highly disappointing. However, to suggest that Girl, Woman, Other is explicitly didactic is also to miss the point. Evaristo can be very witty, almost to the point of caricature and satire in this work. The novel is full of polyphonic voices, energy and pace. It takes a certain skill to keep drive for 450-plus pages, with the reader learning along the way too. Evaristo's writing style - somewhat poetic and often lacking conventional punctuation - helps to truly memorable, worthy of the 2019 Booker, and a certain top ten for me in 2023: ten out of ten.

By Bernardine Evaristo