My Name is Yip: Shortlisted for the Betty Trask Prize

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I thought the novel started out a bit slow and dry, and it took me a few chapters to get used to the narrator’s voice. His debut novel My Name is Yip has been shortlisted for the Betty Trask, the Wilbur Smith, a South Bank Sky Arts Awards, and the Society of Authors' First Novel Award, and longlisted for the Walter Scott Prize. Purporting to be the written account of Yip’s adventures narrated from the comfort of later life, it explores a society in flux, one about to turn its back on religion and embrace greed and individualism.

Paul Howarth, author of Only Killers and Thieves * I love the compelling narrator, somehow a cross between Charles Dickens's David Copperfield and Charles Portis's Mattie Ross.This book tells a story which is both moving and filled with some really emotional moments, and punctuated with a sprinkling of humour, which lighten some of the tougher moments.

The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products. By the time Yip reaches his fifteenth year he has not spoken a word - he is mute, friendless, an outcast.A mesmeric and rollicking adventure told by a narrator like no other - one who beguiles, moves, delights and also had me so worried for him, I was on the edge of my seat. Gold is discovered nearby, and Yip commits a grievous crime that leaves him with no choice but to flee.

She struggles to manage his needs, leaving Yip to find the means of asserting himself in an unforgiving, hostile environment. This is violent, anarchic American history with echoes of Sebastian Barry's Days Without End , but Paddy Crewe's take is startlingly original . I’m a huge lover of historical fiction and the Midwest has to be one of my fave time periods so I enjoyed being thrown back into it. It takes a while to realise he’s been recruited into a freak show, with attractions such as the Pig Faced Lady and queasily sexualised identical twin girls the Living Dolls. From a meditative, almost sleepy start, My Name is Yip accelerates into a wild gallop through the happenings that have come to define the nineteenth-century American Wild West in the contemporary imagination: the Gold Rush, escaped slaves, murderous saloon brawls, Native American scalpings, travelling freak shows, Yip is swept along by them all.The timbre of Yip's voice and the constant movement of characters through desolate landscapes creates an energy that seduces the reader. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice.

Though steeped in backwoods dialect and lacking in grammar, punctuation, and syntax, the narrator weaves a literary gem. The American Mid West, October 1815, and Yip Tolroy announces his entry into the world in complete silence, with a cord wrapped around his tiny neck. I love the compelling narrator… somehow a cross between Charles Dickens's David Copperfield and Charles Portis's Mattie Ross. The characters were well-developed, and descriptions of places made you feel like you could see them.It also took me a little while to get used to the fact that the author doesn’t use quotation marks in conversations and the chapters are very very short (which is why there are 90+ chapters). I’ve got to say up front this simply wasn’t a book for me, not that there was anything wrong with it. Abandoned by his father at birth and brought up by his forceful if loving mother, Yip grows up to be hairless, severely stunted in growth and without the ability to speak. The book highlighted the unjust treatment of people who don't look the same as everyone else, and it was sad to see some of what Yip was put through. The style of writing is something special, it takes a while to get into and you either like it or not.