Fiona Mozleyâs Hot Stew and three other fiction titles
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Author of the Booker-shortlisted
Elmet, Fiona Mozley devotes her second novel to the changing face of a red-light district. Set in and around a Soho brothel,
Hot Stew sees a community of sex workers squaring off against the low running dogs of capitalism. The brothelâs existence is threatened by Agatha Howard â a cartoonish property developer seeking to expel the riffraff in Sohoâs alleyways so gentrification can proceed apace. Arrayed against her are Precious and Tabitha. Both have served at the brothel (run on enlightened principles, with a fierce sense of solidarity among those who ply their trade). They organise a protest that attracts widespread media attention. Mozley gives us a lively, Dickensian portrayal of the Soho demi-monde, including the lowlife ad
In Hot Stew, Fiona Mozley Takes Aim at Gentrifying Cities Esquire 5 hrs ago
Hot Stew, describing a character s pleasant feeling of his own largesse as he doles out a generous tip. Anyone living in a capitalist system like the one Mozley lambasts in this novel knows one thing to be true about wealth: it all too rarely flows downward.
Four years after the publication of her Booker Prize-nominated debut,
Elmet, Mozely returns with her sophomore effort in Hot Stew, a sprawling, ambitious work of social realism about Londoners whose messy lives converge in the city s storied neighborhood of Soho. Millionaire developer Agatha Howard is dead-set on blank-slating a ramshackle building to transform it into luxury condominiums, but first, she must evict the longtime tenants, including the workers and patrons of the property s secret brothel, as well as the barflies at its popular ground floor pub.
Steph Cha
Special to USA TODAY
Fiona Mozley’s debut novel, Elmet, shortlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize, was a brilliant book with a savage energy, told by a single, captivating first-person narrator. Her follow-up, Hot Stew (Algonquin, 320 pp., ★★★ stars out of four), exhibits an entirely different skill set.
Mozley leaves the rural landscape of Elmet for the dynamic urban symphony of London’s Soho: “It is a noisy neighbourhood and anyone who lives in Soho must quickly learn to organise sounds into layers of importance and proximity. With masterful prose, through over a half-dozen point-of-view characters, she tells a story about money and power, love and art, sex work and gentrification – and those are just some of the proteins in this complex stew.
In Hot Stew, Fiona Mozley Takes Aim at Gentrifying Cities
Mozley discusses why the medieval period inspires her, how Charles Dickens influenced this book, and what she hopes and fears for modern cities riven by income inequality.
Hot Stew, describing a character s pleasant feeling of his own largesse as he doles out a generous tip.
Anyone living in a capitalist system like the one Mozley lambasts in this novel knows one thing to be true about wealth: it all too rarely flows downward.
Four years after the publication of her Booker Prize-nominated debut,
Elmet, Mozely returns with her sophomore effort in