Whitcoulls Recommends: The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny and Last Rites

The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kiran Desai. Sonia and Sunny live, study and work in America, but their families back home in India worry about the loneliness they feel in a strange country and try to bring them together. They do eventually connect, but relationships in their new world are not straightforward and there are a lot of things to navigate including finding the place where they belong - plus class, race, history, and the complicated bonds that link one generation to the next. This is huge, epic and outstanding.

Last Rites by Ozzy Osbourne. Ozzy’s memoir, for which the last chapter was handed in just days before he died. He tells the story of an extraordinary life...someone who began his stage career as something of a pariah for outrageous behaviour, and ended up selling more than 100 million albums and becoming a beloved son of Birmingham, and the world. This is unfiltered rock ‘n roll. What a life! 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudkin
from News Talks AB.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Joe McKenzie's with me Now, Good morning. Hello, alrighty, what
have you got for us today?

Speaker 3 (00:17):
The first book is called The Loneliness of Sonya and Sonny,
and it's written by Karan Desai, who back in two
thousand and six won the Book of Prize with her
book The Inheritance of Loss, and this is her first
book since. So it's taken nineteen years to come up
with this thing, which is a big, fat, six seven
hundred page epic, right, and it is shortlisted for this

(00:38):
year's Book of Prize. It was shortlisted actually before it
had even been released. And this is the story of Sonny, Sonya,
Sorry and Sonny, who are young Indians who are living
and working and studying in America, and their families back
home start to worry that they seem so lonely and
they're desperate to try and bring them together, which is

(01:00):
difficult because the kids can't tell their families back home
that they're actually having relationships with other people because that
be frowned upon, and so it doesn't quite work until
under their own steam they do eventually connect. And this
is a book about young people trying to find their
place in the world across continents. It goes from India
to America. It's a story of trying to fit in

(01:22):
and how you find your place in the world and
the really complicated bonds that link one generation to the next.
I absolutely loved it.

Speaker 2 (01:30):
How do you get nominated or shortlisted before book's being released?
Is that because the publicity copies would have got the
right people.

Speaker 3 (01:38):
I'm not sure how it worked in this particular case,
but I do know that the judges of the book
A Prize are able to call up yes which might
not have been submitted or not yet published. I don't
know if that's what happened here, but it can very exciting.
Ozzie Osbourne the memoir. Yes, it's called Last Rites, and
I need to start by saying this was the title

(02:00):
of the book before he died, so they kept the title,
which I think is wonderful. And I believe that the
last chapter was handed in just a day or two
before he died. And this is Ozzie's story about his
rock and roll career, his family life. It is extraordinary.
I don't know how he's remembered half of it to
tell us about it, because at one point he talks

(02:21):
about how he was putting away three bottles of spirits
a day. There was all of the drugs, all of
the money, all of the excess. Absolutely extraordinary. But he's
someone who started out as a bit of a pariah
because of his antics on stage. You know, he's famous
for that biting the head off the bat thing, and
he ended up being this beloved son of Birmingham and
of the world, and if he looked at what happened

(02:44):
around his funeral, it was just extraordinary. So he really
made a life for himself. And it has written entirely
in his voice. It feels as though it's him talking
to you. I suspect it was probably ghost written, but
they've done a really good job of putting his voice
on the page, and it's just the most wonderful story
about all of the excess that goes along with that

(03:04):
lifestyle and how you get through it.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
I don't know whether it was the TV show or
what it was, but I think you're right. There are
a lot of people out there who would probably never
have listened to any of his music, but who had
this great fondness for him, and he was such a character.
Once again, I don't think you need to necessarily be
a huge fan of the music to probably enjoy this memoir.

Speaker 3 (03:21):
No, that's right, but he sort of had no filters.
He talks about how whenever he went to bed at night,
he would jump into the bed, he wouldn't just climb
and like the rest of us. And one night he
missed and he knocked his head and his neck very
badly on the floor, which then necessitated a series of
awful surgeries. And how he managed to have the physical
stamina at the end, towards the end of his life

(03:43):
to do what he did that last concert Absolutely extraordinary.

Speaker 2 (03:46):
Oh wonderful. Thank you so much, Joan. The Loneliness of
Sonya and Sonny by Carandasi and also last rites by
Ozzy Osbourne. We'll talk next week.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
See you then.

Speaker 1 (03:57):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin, listen
live to news Talks He'd be from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.