Commonwealth Prizes Shortlists 2012

Commonwealth Writers has announced shortlists for the 2012 Commonwealth Book Prize and Commonwealth Short Story Prize. Writers from around the world have been shortlisted for each prize in anticipation of becoming a regional winner on 22 May and ultimately competing for overall winner which will be announced at Hay Festival on 8 June. Continue reading

Book review: Sister by Rosamund Lupton- Thanh’s pick

This is a rather unusual book. 

 It presents itself as a crime thriller, the story of Tess, a missing young pregnant woman, later found dead in a toilet building, presumably by suicide. 

Beatrice, her older sister, didn’t believe it, because it’s totally out of Tess’s character, a life-loving, joyous optimistic person, and because of other suspicious circumstances:  there was cystic fibrosis in the family history, so Tess went through a trial test for genetic therapy for her unborn baby – the baby was supposedly cured but died of another disease.

Beatrice tried to unravel all the cover-ups, originally suspecting everyone – the illegitimate father of the baby, the love-struck college student in Tess’s class etc…  She ended up finding the real truth:  the cure trial test that Tess went through was hijacked by a rogue doctor who did his own genetic enhancement test, then murdered first the baby, then the mother to cover his trail. Continue reading