Pearl by Siân Hughes (2023): A Review
Title : Pearl Author : Siân Hughes Publication Year: 2023 Rating : ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Pages : 220 Source : audiobook @storytel.tr Genre : literary fiction, coming-of-age Awards : Booker Prize Nominee for Longlist (2023) Pearl, inspired by the medieval poem of the same name, is a quiet, haunting, and deeply affecting story about Marianne, whose mother leaves the house one day and never returns. Marianne narrates her loss, grief, guilt, and trauma through two distinct voices. One belongs to the Marianne of the past, who experiences abandonment and sorrow as a child; the other belongs to the Marianne of the present, who reflects on those events with the weight of memory and understanding. This dual perspective is one of the novel’s greatest strengths. Through it, we encounter both the raw innocence of a child trying to make sense of the unbearable and the adult who is still living with the consequences of that absence. Marianne’s childhood world is so sorrowful and fragile that at times you ...
