Are you excited for next week? “What happens next week?”, you might ask. Well, my little blog can celebrate its 4th anniversary. Hmm, maybe that isn’t too exciting. What then? It is also International Women’s Day. That might be more interesting. But what happens on International Women’s Day? The Women’s Prize for Fiction 2023 longlist is announced. Surely, that is exciting! Of all the book prizes out there, I think the Women’s Prize matches my personal reading taste the best. Whilst leaning towards more literary novels, the judges don’t shy away from commercial entries. Focus is on the good reading experience and topics relevant for women today.

Last year, in her acceptance speech, the winner Ruth Otzeki talked about how women should support each other. Specifically, she mentioned a promising young student of hers. This student was Leila Mottley, who has since then gone on to become the youngest Booker longlisted author ever.

I decided to warm up to this year’s Women’s Prize with Leila Mottley’s Nightcrawling, which may also be a contender for the longlist next week. Let’s see if it deserves it.

Kiara is a 17-year old black girl, who is trying to cope on her own, after her father dies and her mother has been sent to prison. Marcus, her older brother, is living with his head in the clouds, hoping to become a famous rapper. Unable to find a job, Kiara eventually takes to the streets to make money as a sex worker. When picked up by the police, she gets involved in an extensive sexual exploitation scandal involving a large number of officers from the Oakland Police Department. The novel is inspired by a real case.

In the end notes, Mottley explains how she wanted to explore, what it means to be a black woman, unprotected and vulnerable. That she does exceedingly well. Throughout the novel, I felt various degrees of hopeless desperation and furious anger on behalf of Kiara. Her situation goes from bad to worse to absolutely unbearable. I think someone on Booktube said, if Thomas Hardy had been a contemporary young black woman, this is the novel he would have written. That could very well be the case. The relentless waves of disasters and misery certainly reminded me of Hardy’s Jude the Obscure.

Whilst an utterly gripping story, Nightcrawling isn’t flawless. No doubt the constant escalation of horrific incidents is intentional – poor Kiara really doesn’t get any breaks or any help in life. But dramatically, I reached a point, where it was almost too much. A bit of variation in the writing – slowing down and then escalating again – may have made the dramatic highlights more impactful.

Also, I found it hard to connect with the characters. Most of them were defined by the numerous depressing events, which happened to them, but they didn’t have a distinct personality and felt like types rather than real people (the junkie, the innocent child, the ambitious lawyer, etc).

Still, these niggles don’t change the fact that Nightcrawling is a super impressive debut, which deals with important and relevant topics. I certainly won’t be mad, if it should appear on the Women’s Prize longlist next week.

Title: Nightcrawling [2022]
Author: Leila Mottley 
Format: Audiobook, narrated by Joniece Abbott-Pratt
Genre: Contemporary Fiction