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His engrossing first-person narrative, lyrical and slangy by turns, is the vehicle for a tough yet tender story of faith and friendship, as well as money, knife crime and the failings of the British education system * Observer New Review, 10 Best Debut Novelists of 2022 * I had more cousins than rivers had rivulets, and like a doting stepmother, Stapes took us all in. A few of my aunties had council houses on the offshoots, and I think I had a cousin or two in the high-rises that overlooked the toings and froings of the busy road. Those who didn’t live nearby could be found on Stapes more often than in their own homes – at Nanny’s, in Ladbrokes or one of the yard shops, buying cassava and plantain. My likkle cousins might be found at the blue cage playing ball, and the elders might be at one of the free houses tossing dominoes and talking about things they knew nutun about. The storytelling was told in Jamaican patois, which was difficult to read as text, but easier to understand if heard on audio. That narrator was fabulous. I will say the story was just average and fizzled out in the middle for me. It felt like a crime-romance-memoir-cultural critique-all-in-one piece to me. I wanted more development. If you're coming to Coles by car, why not take advantage of the 2 hours free parking at Sainsbury's Pioneer Square - just follow the signs for Pioneer Square as you drive into Bicester and park in the multi-storey car park above the supermarket. Come down the travelators, exit Sainsbury's, turn right and follow the pedestrianised walkway to Crown Walk and turn right - and Coles will be right in front of you. You don't need to shop in Sainsbury's to get the free parking! Where to Find Us
An Olive Grove in Ends by Moses McKenzie | Headline An Olive Grove in Ends by Moses McKenzie | Headline
Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it. – Matthew 7:13 – 14 My mama used to bring me to this house when I wasn’t much older than a toddler. We wouldn’t come inside – she wasn’t as brazen as Cuba and me – we would only drive to the gate, and she would point up at the windows and tell me how she would imagine herself looking out of them when she was but a child herself. Boysah, yuh better lef di poor gyal loose, Sayon. Maybe next time mi bump innah Marcia mi could tell er, dem deserve fi know exactly who deh date dem daughter.Perhaps the most impressive thing about this novel is the fact that it was penned by a young man in his early 20s. This is also arguably its greatest weakness, but the strengths predominate. As debut novels go, this one is better than average. As in any of the other manuscripts? Oh, no, no, no. He’s a character that was invented just for this. You know man’s gonna live here someday, cuz,’ I announced. Cuba screwed his face; he didn’t mean to doubt me, but he wasn’t accustomed to dreams. ‘How you gonna buy dis yard, akh? You need white people ps to buy dis – big man ting.’ ‘Don’t watch dat,’ I told him. ‘Man’ll find a way, truss me.’
An Olive Grove in Ends by Moses McKenzie | Waterstones An Olive Grove in Ends by Moses McKenzie | Waterstones
The attending officers who were standing beside the tape scanned the crowds, looking for admissions of guilt in the dark faces of passing strangers, but I made it impossible for them, or anyone else watching, to read my trepidation. As ever, there was bop in my stride and a bounce to my gait, but my mind was split, contorted in a million directions, few of them fruitful. I’d worked hard these past years, and my boyhood dream was well within sight. If all went to plan, I would be able to offer the homeowners eighty per cent of the house’s last valuation. Eighty per cent. Cash. By the end of the year. And with the promise of more to come – surely they couldn’t refuse that? But it was just that which bothered me: if all went to plan. Because it was only June, and Cordell’s death had me scrambling. A young man has dreams of buying a house at the top of a "bad" part of Bristol, rapidly being gentrified, where he has just committed a murder, and ostensibly, just seen one the following day-- causing events, and his dreams, to spiral beyond his control. Growing up, Sayon found respite from the chaos of his environment in the love and loyalty of his brother-in-arms, Cuba; in the example of his cousin Hakim, a man once known as the most infamous drug-dealer in their neighbourhood, now a proselytising Muslim; and in the tenderness of his girl, Shona, whose own sense of purpose galvanises Sayon's.
Summary
His family was the only one older than mine in the city. We knew each other well and demonstrated our respect through patronage. I gave him an extra tenner each visit and dropped a couple of pounds in the charity box I knew he took a cut from. We spent the entire afternoon chasing the shadows of those white horses, but we didn’t catch the swish of a tail, nor the print of a hoof. We returned to the house-atop-the-hill downcast and defeated. I found my place in the tree again, and Cuba took up the twigs. And among a tale of a 11-year-old (going on about 21 at least compared to my schooldays) gangster in the making (while also intelligent) Sayon recounting tales of his various schemes and fights what are we to make of the insertion of this sudden passage of exposition An Olive Grove in Ends is published in the UK under the Wildfire imprint of Headline Publishing and in the US by Little, Brown. It was listed as a Guardian Novel of the Year 2022, shortlisted for The Writers’ Guild Best First Novel Award 2023 and, in an influential US review, has been called ‘the most exciting UK debut in years’. Moses has won the 2023 Hawthornden Prize for Literature, a 2023 Somerset Maugham Award, and the Soho House Breakthrough Writer Award in 2022.
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