Book Review: "The Night Alphabet" by Joelle Taylor

I had been meaning to read this book for a while but honestly, there has been a price increase in hardbacks that nobody is paying attention to for some reason. Eventually, I went to Manchester again and then I caved and bought it. No, I may not have had all the money in the world but I really wanted to read a book that was a) more expensive literally everywhere else and b) didn't really have much going for it on the Kindle. I had seen the format of the book from the inside before and decided that on the Kindle it would just make me annoyed with its spread. I may have mixed opinions about the book but it would be at least 50 pages shorter (and thus, cheaper) if it was not so spaced out.

The book is narrated by the protagonist named 'Jones' (odd name, but yes it's a girl) and is all about her tatoos and different entangled stories that are roughly relative to them. It starts off with the symbol for infinity which sounds much more like child abuse than people believe it does. Her mother seems to stitch the figure of eight laying down on to her daughter's skin whilst she is only 12 years' old and, even gives her daughter vodka whilst doing it. Making the reader believe that you feel like your mother is more of a woman for basically torturing you and disguising it as love is not a good look. As much as I do understand this part, I don't care to give into this strange fantasy that the author is desperately pushing.

Otherwise, the book is actually pretty good. There are some interesting stories littered around and connected by an underlying thread of tattoos and their meanings, the protagonist's own pain and the sense that everyone no matter who or where, is writing their own histories as we speak. However, I do think that the writing style didn't really match the story. Often verbose without reason, the book can feel like a bit of a slog at times when learning about things like the main character's school life seems a bit pointless but is more interesting than a lot of the text it becomes a problem. Descriptive? Yes, but more than often these descriptions are filled with nonsensical imagery that is trying to be profound. Sometimes it is profound and succeeds, but a lot of the time it makes the novel sound flat and tired like the author is droning on without actually saying much.

When it comes to the rest of the book, I am glad to inform you that it actually gets pretty good. The book continues into a mixture of old and new stories, from the winds of the 19th century all the way through to our own time. It is told through narratives, side stories, letters and more and ends up being quite an exciting mixture of techniques which I feel is very post-modern. Off to a shaky start, I think that the author really found their own after about fifty or so pages. No, it may not be a polished novel but I think though it has its flaws, it works when you read the entire thing.

There are some very stand-out themes such as: relationships and pain. There are a lot of references to pain and how we need to 'befriend' our pain in order to deal with it. I feel like this is quite a different concept for a post-modern novel because it does not tell us to forget our pain or make it a part of our victimisation. Instead, it feels a little bit more powerful and makes more sense when you read it with the rest of the story. All these narratives seem to fit underneath the umbrella of dealing with some kind of pain.

All in all, I feel like this book is a mixture of something I cannot support and something I clearly enjoyed. A weird mixture yes, but put together it makes a pretty good novel. No, it isn't perfect, but it makes for good reading and I do look forward to the author's further works though I hope they are less on the side of romanticising abusive situations.