When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife

• This novel is so raw and powerful; it will make you cringe. It will make you feel terrified. I loved the honesty in the voice. I loved it when Meena Kandasamy wrote that she wrote about strong women characters but she was struggling in her own life. It is a reminder that even the strongest of us sometimes feel trapped and helpless. This is one amazing read, well written, short and packed with all the punch. I have nothing but praise for the book.

• This was an excoriating read, and absolutely not what I expected in terms of style. Kandasamy’s prose is direct, uncompromising and confrontational, in a way that reminds me of Mohsin Hamid but which is also unlike him because it isn’t in anyway contrived. The canny structure and rhythm of the narrative grips you and pins you in place, so that you can’t look away, even when what you’re reading is devastating and horrific.

• This is a book that felt so thrillingly alive and teeming with ideas that I frequently copied down quotes while I was reading it. Meena Kandasamy writes about a young woman reflecting on the atrociously abusive marriage that she lived through.

• Kandasamy refuses to narrate the violence in a traditional or obvious manner. The story is real, but it is also a reflection on how to narrate trauma. And that is how this novel, shortlisted for the prestigious Women’s Prize, has been received.

• But if you place a story of violence in the hands of a poet, of a writer who intimately understands the power and value of words, then the result is that the pain enters inside you and you feel it as if it were your own.

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