
‘Yesterday’ — A Book Review
“How do you solve a murder when you can only remember yesterday?”
This is an unusual book and the story how I came to read this book is every bit as unusual.
I was on my way home from the London Book Fair. As usual, I had a bag full of notes and materials collected during the fair. So while I was riding the District line from West Kensington to Victoria, I pulled out a copy of “The Bookseller”, the trade magazine for publishing in the UK an started scanning the headlines.
It is at this point that a very attractive woman sitting on my left, chats me up.* Now, for anybody familiar with the London Underground and its unspoken “do not speak to strangers on the tube” rule, this is a bit of a shock, even more so as it is a young and attractive woman who is being the rule breaker.
The opening question was a simply “Oh, have you been attending the London Book Fair?” to which my answer was “yes” followed by “do you work in publishing?” At this point, the nice lady starts explaining how she is a first-time author, and that her first book has just been accepted for publication. A light goes off in my head “ah, this explains the unusual behaviour”. This is then followed by the inevitable question of what it is I do. My stock answer, as usual, is “I run my own company called Jellybooks and we focus on reader analytics. We figure out if people finish the books they start, if they recommend them to friends, if they engage with them and more”. The rather unexpected response from the nice lady is “well, that sounds scary”. Now it’s my second time in less than 5 minutes to be gobsmacked. However, as my tube stop was rapidly approaching, there was just enough time to hand over a business card and say “check it out online”. In return, I got a business card back “Felicia M. Yap, author”.
Back home, curiosity drives me to find out who this unusual woman is and her backstory is every bit as fascinating as the first encounter “biochemist, doctorate in history, grew up in Kuala Lumpur, Faber Academy alumna, etc.” and then “six figure publishing deal with Headline (Hachette), represented by Jonny Geller of Curtis Brown” and the penny drops. This is not some desperate self-published author, but somebody who has already broken through publishing’s most formidable glass ceiling.
Some irregular interactions on twitter follow until the volume of book mentions starts increasing as publication date approaches.
In late July, the advance reading copy on Netgalley crosses my desk. I am not one to usually request an ARC on Netgalley (there is just so much good stuff to read among the ARCs we distribute at Jellybooks), but in this case I make an exception. After all the book’s tag line still sticks in my head:
“How do you solve a murder when you can only remember yesterday?”
So last weekend I finally get around to reading this intriguing thriller, propelled forward not least by the fact that I have been invited to the book’s launch party at Carmelite House (Hachette’s HQ) this Thursday.
So, what’s my verdict?
The first 50 pages were pretty hard going for me. I am not one for explorations of relationships, dating, (in)fidelity and the like, especially not among straight people. Also I could never stop thinking “how much of this is autobiographical” and what is purely fictional and that in its own way made for difficult reading given that I had personally met the author. There are indeed some telling paragraphs later in the book on what you can learn about authors from reading their books…
However, as the book progresses it gets better and better. It is a superb psychological thriller with some deep and unexpected twists. Just when you think you might have it all figured all out, it turns yet again, though not in a contrived, artificial way, but in a supremely logical and “ah, that makes sense” kind of way. Kudos for the plot! Well done!
I also loved the exploration of the Mono/Duo divide in the book’s fictional description of a world where some people can remember only 24 hours (Monos) versus others who can remember two full days (Duos). It is a framework for exploring class division, racism and much more and does so without having to refer to common stereotypes.
[Note: the concept of limited memory is the only “SciFi” element of this book, otherwise it’s a pretty contemporary novel/thriller — I wouldn’t place this title in the Scifi genre.]
Also the book’s exploration of “what is love” in the second half is beautifully done and very warm.
Overall, it’s a brilliant debut, though I still think it’s more of a woman’s book that a gay man’s book, but I nevertheless enjoyed reading it. I certainly did.
‘Yesterday” by Felicia Yap is out on Thursday 10 August’17 and to her book launch party I shall bring a cutting of the rose “Lady Emma Hamilton” (see image at top). This rose grows in the front garden at my Brixton home and if you want to find out why I chose that particular rose, then read the book!
P.S.: I much prefer the UK cover to the US cover, so credit to the UK cover designer for doing a great job!
*_“chats me up” as in “starts a conversation”, in case Felicia M Yap (author) misinterprets my narrative here (well she just made a comment about it on Twitter :) )
