LoveReading Says
LoveReading Says
Following a woman’s coming-of-age journey from childhood to her unravelling of pivotal truths about her past as an adult, Ola Mustapha’s Other Names, Other Places possesses all the page-turning pull of a mystery.
Nessie’s voice is utterly enthralling — clear, commanding, and laced with tension from the moment we meet her as a child, newly arrived in London from Tunisia, forever feeling that she was neither white enough, nor African enough: “Life had been hard since we moved to England. Hard and exhausting. I was constantly in trouble. People were always angry with me. Without being able to articulate it, I knew I was liked by most adults in Tunisia and disliked by most in England”.
Into Nessie’s split existence, and into the dysfunctional dynamics of her family, her parents befriend the enigmatic Mrs Brown, to whom much of the novel is addressed. Mrs Brown’s abrupt disappearance comes as a shock. “She’s gone away,” her father explains. “She doesn’t want to know us anymore”, and Nessie becomes aware that “Our lives might have taken a different turn if you hadn’t vanished”.
Years later, Nessie moves to Japan, where she struggles with a fresh bout of feeling out of place as long-buried truths to come light.
Refreshing and surprising, suspenseful and steeped in secrets, Other Names, Other Places had me in its thrall.
Joanne Owen
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Other Names, Other Places Synopsis
Mama, Baba… and Mrs Brown.
Wayward Nessie is caught between cultures: too English for her Tunisian parents, yet not ‘white enough’ or ‘African enough’ to fit in with any of the groups at school. Her father is determined to make the family ‘respectable’, while Mama is lost in nostalgia for the country she left behind. Even Nessie’s sister Sherine, who appears to find it easiest to slip between identities, faces struggles of her own.
Then there is the charismatic Mrs Brown, who befriended her parents on their arrival in England. She soon becomes the glue holding the family together, until one day she disappears from their lives as quickly as she arrived.
Years later, struggling with patterns of self-sabotage, Nessie returns home to confront the mysteries of her childhood. Forced to re-examine everything she thought she knew, she begins to wonder: what really happened between her parents and Mrs Brown?
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9781914148316 |
| Publication date: |
18th July 2024 |
| Author: |
Ola Mustapha |
| Publisher: |
Fairlight Books |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| Primary Genre |
General Fiction
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| Other Genres: |
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| Recommendations: |
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Press Reviews
Ola Mustapha Press Reviews
'Ola Mustapha revels in the confusions and squashed experiences of growing up that most would rather forget. This is a novel of rootlessness and family secrets, which tells its truth with briskness and deftness, aiming straight at the reader's heart' -Leila Aboulela, author of River Spirit
'An immersive and gorgeous read' - Eva Verde, author of Lives Like Mine
'Mustapha's spare, lucid prose explores a complex web of displacement as her main character carves a hard path between cultures and little-understood family loyalties. A searching, honest and evocative book' - Fiona Vigo Marshall, author of The House of Marvellous Books
'An impressive and layered novel, by a writer to watch out for' -Polis Loizou, author of A Good Year
'Ola Mustapha's storytelling is vigorous and complex...Its rich explorations of culture, identity, and family secrets are at once relatable and revelatory' - Phoebe Walker, author of Temper
Author
About Ola Mustapha
Ola Mustapha was born in London and spent part of her childhood living in Egypt, before returning to England. She studied economics and Japanese at university and then moved to Japan, where she taught English for several years. She now lives in London and works as an editor. Her short fiction has been published in literary journals including Aesthetica, Storgy and Bandit Fiction.
Other Names, Other Places is her debut novel.
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