As the Concrete 25/26 season draws to a close, we Books editors invited members of team Concrete to review a title that speaks to the theme of ‘goodbye.’ For some, that farewell arrives in a novel’s emotional final few pages; for others, it’s found in a story marked by grief and loss. Sometimes, of course, that goodbye is directed at the book itself. After all, not every reading experience is a good one!

With that in mind, here are the emotional (and occasionally annoying) reads that capture the spirit of saying cheerio to another great academic year.

Lie with Me by Philippe Besson (Translated by Molly Ringwald) 

Most Philippe Besson novels end in tragedy, but the autobiographical nature of Lie with Me makes for a specific type of heartbreak. 

Set in three parts between Besson’s adolescence in rural France and the present day, Lie with Me explores a secret love affair between Besson and his classmate, and the way this first love affected his adult life and writing career. Besson’s writing is simple yet evocative, painting a visceral picture of his school life in the mid-1980s, letting the reader fall in love with Thomas along with him.  

Lie with Me’s ending hurts because, given its ties to Besson’s real life, it is completely unexpected. The teenaged characters don’t know what awaits them after school finishes, let alone thirty years in the future, yet still the reader is given closure that 18-year-old Besson was not. 

By Micah Petyt

Neuromancer by William Gibson

Do you ever get tired of reading about the darkest futures we could create? The cyberpunk genre has become an aesthetic in recent years, refusing to evolve with the times and ignoring the themes and critiques of society meant to call people to action.

This contemporary lens has influenced my view on some of the stories that created the genre. When I tried to read William Gibson’s 1984 novel Neuromancer, I could not find the headspace to get through it. The polluted seas, the terrible quality of life, it all struck me as too depressing.

The setting of Chiba, Japan seemed in line with cyberpunk’s fetishisation of Japanese culture, rather than a reflection of its status in the 1980s as a pioneer of technology. Obviously, that status has remained ingrained in the genre.

The characters seemed inconsistent, the mechanics of the world vague throughout. I had to give up, but I would perhaps chance it again with the right mindset.

By Ollie Wheaton

Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D.H. Lawrence 

D.H. Lawrence’s scandalous final novel could quite possibly be dubbed an early version of a Wattpad fanfic. It chronicles the miserable Lady Chatterley as she pursues an affair with her gamekeeper, Oliver, as her husband is paralysed from the waist-down and unable to perform sexually. Despite being a thoughtful meditation on how class differences function in sexual relationships, this novel is ultimately a Freudian frenzy teeming with insufferable characters. 

Originally banned in the UK for explicit content and then-unprintable words, it’s easy to imagine that the reason for this ban was not for the profanity of its language but the pure cringe of its ‘spicy’ scenes. It’s concerning that Lawrence believed women could feel their wombs after sex, and that “passion” moves “through the bowels”. 

However, through all this, there’s something oddly fascinating about watching Lawrence write his way to a more honest kind of human desire. And for that reason, it is impossible to call this novel a complete mess. 

By Polly Dye

On book series in general…

On BookTok, there has been a consistent rise in the popularity of recommending book series, most with larger than five works. One question, why? It is similar, I believe, to when we re-read our favourite books. We desire the comfort of already knowing the characters and the world. There is something easy about it. You don’t need to take the time to learn new character dynamics or complex fantasy world building. Instead, you can easily submerse yourself in familiarity. Characters come back to you, the world as intimate as your own home. Who could say no to something as inviting as that? And soon, you’re seven books deep, characters as close as friends, until it is abruptly ripped from you. It’s the end of the series and, rather dramatically, the end of your life… well, not quite, but there is a certain grief felt. You become so accustomed to this world that any other feels hollow, a betrayal, regaling many a reader with a dreadful case of “book hangover” or “book slump,” with the only cure to re-read again… So, the series, in all its pretty appeal, can be deadly. Dear reader, tread carefully… 

By Lilia Colledge

Image credit: Polly Dye