One of the best books I have read during lockdown is
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo, a funny and punchy novel detailing the interconnected life experiences of twelve (mostly) black British women. Deftly exploring poignant themes of feminism and race, the novel gives a voice to those who have been underrepresented within British fiction.
Alongside its refreshing narrative, one of the most striking features of this novel is the lack of conventional punctuation. Full stops, capital letters and speech marks are all scrapped in favour of emphatic line breaks and commas, both of which are used to tightly control the speed and rhythm of the prose: “while dancing/ for herself/ out of it/ out of her head/ out of her body/ feeling it/ freeing it/ nobody watching/ nobody judging”. Printed almost as verse, the narrative favours a close interiority of the characters: it is almost a stream of consciousness which mixes narration, dialogue, and internal monologue.