Notes to Self by Emilie Pine

In the first essay of this extraordinary debut collection, the author Emilie Pine, throws you head first into the harsh reality of dealing with an alcoholic parent. 

“Caught between endless ultimatums (stop drinking) and radical acceptance (I love you no matter what) the person who loves the addict exhausts and renews their love on a daily basis.” “It took years of refusing him empathy before I realized that the only person I was hurting was myself.” 

This first piece, Notes on Intemperance, is a painfully honest essay describing the despair, ugliness - and beauty - of a messy parent/child relationship, and conditioned as a reader to look for the happy ending, it is a surprise somehow to realize that there isn’t one. There isn’t a tragic ending either, it is just a sometimes sad, sometimes happy, sometimes ok, always real ending. Just like life itself. 

And that’s the common thread through all the essays. As different as the topics are (infertility, the consequences of parenting, the female body, a wild child life that would scare any parent, and how women are seen and see themselves in a professional environment) what they all have in common is a raw and radical honesty. They are beautifully written, and sometimes painful to read. It’s somehow a relief that it is a collection of short stories, so you can put it down for a couple of days to absorb what you read before going back for more. 

At times, you feel like you are along for the ride as the author tries to figure out life’s ups and (frequent) downs, how to navigate them not just externally but more importantly internally. 

“I could end the story there. I could say that education saved me, and in many ways that would be true. But it would only be part of the truth. Because there are things I’ve left out. And if I’m to tell it, then this is the part where the story turns, and where I find myself, again, asking why I’m telling it all. Let me pause, and just look out the window for a while. Let me stand up and walk away from the desk. Let me take a minute.”

The essays are intensely reflective, beautifully written and often make for difficult and raw reading. However, as personal as the writings are, they are also surprisingly universal and relevant. Emilie Pine has written a collection of essays that will leave most readers with plenty of food for thought.

Happy reading!

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The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis

Lewis is one of my absolute favourite writers - he’s such a graceful writer with a dry sense of humor and an unfailing eye for a good story and the humans within it. Often, his approach to a subject is slightly off-beat, coming at it from a slightly different angle, thus unexpectedly illuminating what everyone thought they knew by forcing them to look at it through new eyes.

This one is -highly unusual for him- not about the financial markets but the Trump administration but seen through some of the key agencies (first and foremost, EPA - the United States Environmental Protection Agency - really didn’t know that it is basically home to all of the US’ nuclear stuff. But then again, neither did Scott Pruitt, Trump’s first appointee as head of the agency). If anyone is the unsung hero in Lewis’ tale it is the scientist civil servant, doing what they do, not because they have a political vested interest, nor because they earn a lot (they don’t) but because they care deeply about their field of scientific interest.

Another book which deserves to be widely read - a smooth running civil service machine is really the engine that keeps a state running. Lose or misuse it, and you’ve got “the fifth risk” of collapse.

Reviewed by Pia Eisenhardt

Happy reading! 

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The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

The cover says ‘The perfect thriller’ and it is. 

Theo Faber is a psychotherapist with a mission: make Alicia Berenson speak again. Alicia was a talented artist and married to the love of her life, Gabriel. However, she ended up shooting him 5 times in the head one evening in her studio. She tries to commit suicide, but doesn’t succeed. 

During her trial, she refuses to speak, is convicted of the murder, and locked up in a secure psychiatric unit, The Grove. Silence can speak louder than words, and the finale portrait that Alicia creates draws on the Greek mythology Alcestis. But what actually happened – and what made Alicia kill her love?

Theo is convinced that he can treat Alicia and make her tell her story. He is obsessed with the story and mystery of Alicia, and when a vacancy at The Grove opens up, he finds a way in. He goes over and above the calling and duty of his position to uncover the silence. He starts digging around her past and family. He meets with her cousin, Paul, who has a history of gambling and still lives with his mom in an old house. He meets with people from the art world, and finds that Alicia was on her way up with prices rising. He discovers that perhaps Alicia’s silence goes deeper than the murder of Gabriel. 

The narrative is by Theo, but also includes Alicia’s diary entries. Alicia’s history is unfolded, but it also turns out, bit-by-bit, that Theo himself has had a difficult upbringing. Their parallel stories are well written, and the author has managed to include psychological issues within the psychological theme. 

The ending takes some turns and makes it a highly recommendable psychological thriller. It is well written, perfect pace, and it will keep you guessing as it twists and turns. 

Pick it up if you liked The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins. Happy reading!

Reviewed by Lotte Bastholm

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Bad Blood by John Carreyrou

If you want to remain happily mesmerized by the inner workings of Silicon Valley and what you imagine to be cutting edge discoveries made by great young minds working all hours of the day and night in open spaces full of inspirational toys, then don’t read John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood. 

If you want to stay comfortably attached to the myth of tech startups and all the good they want to contribute to society, then don’t read John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood. 

If you ever believed that the best education, most money and much sought after networks produced the greatest minds, incredible results, and world- and life changing products and you want to keep believing that, then don’t read John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood. 

If, however, you are up for some myth busting of the extensively researched, well written, fascinating, frightening and exciting kind, then I suggest you run down to your local bookstore and pick up a copy of John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood. 

The book follows a young ambitious Stanford dropout, Elisabeth Holmes, and her quest to change healthcare in America and fulfill a goal she sets at age 8 to become a billionaire (maybe that right there should have been a red flag) with a new blood taking technique where you can test blood with a single finger prick system and merely one drop of blood. A technique - and device - that turn out to not actually exist. Yes, there is a good deal of science and scientific explanations in the book, but don’t let that scare you off as it is necessary, very well written and not at all difficult to understand. 

The system Holmes, and her company Theranos, are selling is surprisingly (to some) difficult to implement, but Holmes, not one to give up easily, decides to forge ahead, not as one would imagine - or hope - by pulling the product, slowing down, focusing on more research and development, but rather by trying to find a way to continue selling the faulty product by the help of her boyfriend and partner Sunny Balwani, and an intricate web of lies and deception involving participants and investors (all named) that include some of the savviest minds and deepest pockets in America - not to mention an employee burn rate of astronomical and diabolical proportions. The method is simple: as soon as an employee discovers inconsistencies or technical problems and solutions that they find ethically and morally questionable, they are asked to leave, often after being bullied and threatened into signing extensive (additional) non-disclosure agreements.

The book is full of twists and turns, many of them so unbelievable that you couldn’t have made it up. Bad Blood will rival any thriller out there with it’s sociopathic characters, spies in nondescript vehicles, outlandish harassment techniques and overall deplorable and shocking behaviour. 

It would be a ‘merely’ fascinating, intriguing and fun rollercoaster of a read, if it weren’t for the lives that were ruined and the potential frightening consequences to the health of hundreds of thousands of patients had Elisabeth Holmes and Theranos been allowed to continue. Finally, Bad Blood is an indictment of a world infatuated with ‘the new’, with scientific discoveries we dream of but don’t really understand and the danger of a ‘no questions asked’ love affair with tech and the Silicon Valley entrepreneurs of the world. But it is also an important story of the gratitude we all owe to the courageous people who are willing to come forward to reveal difficult truths at their own, very real peril.

Happy reading!

RESERVE YOUR COPY OF Bad Blood by John Carreyrou