The Meaning of Geese

Nick Acheson
Chelsea Green, £18.99, pp240

During lockdown, many turned to the wonders of the natural world for solace. None more so than renowned Norfolk naturalist Nick Acheson, who got on his bike in search of his beloved geese over the grim autumn and winter of 2020/21. This diary of that time is quite beautiful in its detail of the pink-foot, brent and snow geese he watches from the edge of fields. Add Acheson’s reflections on a changing environment and his fleeting interactions with like-minded bird lovers and The Meaning of Geese is mournful and magisterial.

Two Sherpas

Sebastián Martínez Daniell
Charco Press, £11.99, pp271

A British climber lies motionless on an Everest ledge. As two Sherpas ponder what to do next, their predicament triggers Daniell’s brilliantly tangential excursions into their state of mind, personal histories and aspirations. None outstays its welcome – most of the 100 chapters are two pages or less – allowing the Argentinian novelist to interrogate colonialism, exploitation, even Shakespeare. Superbly translated by Jennifer Croft – the description of the quiet, injured man “lying Britishly on the mountain” is wonderful – this book becomes a viewpoint from which we can see the whole world.

The Second Cut

Louise Welsh
Canongate, £9.99, pp378 (paperback)

You sense that going back to the murky Glasgow of Louise Welsh’s debut novel, The Cutting Room, was as much fun for the author as her increasingly broad church of readers. Twenty years on, Welsh’s auctioneer sleuth Rilke has another mystery to solve – his old mate washes up dead after tipping him off about a house clearance – but this time in a city pockmarked by Grindr, gentrification and a pandemic. But The Second Cut is as blackly comic as it is squalid and Welsh balances all the storylines with ease.

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