What: The list of living authors whose books I will always read is a very short one, but David Mitchell makes the cut. He's an impressively versatile writer, and he excels in multi-perspective, layered narratives, such as his intricate puzzle-box of a novel, Cloud Atlas. With Black Swan Green, his fourth book, Mitchell simplifies everything, as if to prove that he's not all about fancy footwork and narrative sleight-of-hand. The stripped-down, straightforward novel tells the story of Jason Taylor, a thirteen-year-old boy in an English village in 1982. No flashbacks; no complex matryoshka-doll structure; no sweeping, multi-national settings; no tricks. Without the overarching structural flourishes, Mitchell's equal dexterity on a sentence level gets center stage.
Comparable to: I'd compare it to other coming-of-age stories, but, really, I haven't come across another book that succeeds in making a thirteen-year-old boy so human and likable.
Representative quote: "I cleaned my teeth without mercy. Mum and Dad can be as ratty or sarcastic or angry as they want to be, but if I ever show a flicker of being pissed off then they act like I've murdered babies . . . Kids can never complain about unfairness 'cause everyone knows kids always complain about that."
You might not like it if: You want all of David Mitchell's books to be like Cloud Atlas.
How to get it: So I guess some of you first check to see if something is available for your Kindle? Well, this is. Also, your local bookstore may or may not have it, but I'm sure your library system will.
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