Six Degrees of Separation: From Kairos to Weyward

It’s the first Saturday of the month which means it’s time for another Six Degrees of Separation, hosted by Kate of Books are my Favourite and Best. The idea is that Kate chooses a book to use as a starting point and then we have to link it to six other books of our choice to form a chain. A book doesn’t have to be connected to all of the others on the list – only to the one next to it in the chain.

This month we’re starting with the 2024 winner of the International Booker Prize, Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck (translated by Michael Hofmann). I haven’t read it, but here’s what it’s about:

Berlin. 11 July 1986. They meet by chance on a bus. She is a young student, he is older and married. Theirs is an intense and sudden attraction, fuelled by a shared passion for music and art, and heightened by the secrecy they must maintain. But when she strays for a single night he cannot forgive her and a dangerous crack forms between them, opening up a space for cruelty, punishment and the exertion of power. And the world around them is changing too: as the GDR begins to crumble, so too do all the old certainties and the old loyalties, ushering in a new era whose great gains also involve profound loss.

From a prize-winning German writer, this is the intimate and devastating story of the path of two lovers through the ruins of a relationship, set against the backdrop of a seismic period in European history.

I struggled to get started with this month’s chain. I know I have already used Berlin as a link in several previous chains, so I wanted to do something different. Eventually I decided to go with another book with a one-word title beginning with K: Kindred by Octavia E. Butler (1). This is a fascinating novel exploring slavery on a Maryland plantation through the eyes of a woman from 1976 who travels back in time to the 1800s.

Another time travel novel, also with a one-word title, is Mariana by Susanna Kearsley (2), although the setting is quite different. Our heroine, Julia Beckett, moves into a lonely farmhouse and finds that her life has become linked with the life of a woman who lived there centuries earlier, during the aftermath of the English Civil War. This was one of my first Susanna Kearsley novels and still a favourite.

Staying with women’s names, my next link is to Theodora by Stella Duffy (3). This novel is set in 6th century Constantinople and tells the story of Empress Theodora, wife of Justinian I. Theodora begins life as an actress and entertainer, before rising to become one of the most powerful women in the Byzantine Empire.

Booth by Karen Joy Fowler (4) also has a theatrical theme (and another one-word title). I loved this fictional biography of the 19th century theatrical family, the Booths, which focuses not just on the infamous John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of Abraham Lincoln, but also on his parents, brothers and sisters.

Junius Brutus Booth and Edwin Booth were renowned Shakespearean actors, which leads me to a play by William Shakespeare himself: Macbeth (5). I could have picked any play here, but my reasons for selecting Macbeth are simple – it’s one of the few Shakespeare plays I’ve actually posted about on my blog and, most importantly, it has a one-word title which keeps that theme going throughout my chain!

The three witches in Macbeth are referred to as the ‘weyward sisters’ in Shakespeare’s First Folio (and later, the ‘weird sisters’) so my final link is to Weyward by Emilia Hart (6). In this novel, Hart explores the stories of women from three generations of the same family who are connected through witchcraft and the power of nature.

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And that’s my chain for July! My links have included titles beginning with K, time travel, women’s names, acting, Shakespeare and witches. As an extra challenge to myself I only used books with one-word titles in this month’s chain.

In August we’ll be starting with The Museum of Modern Love by Heather Rose.

21 thoughts on “Six Degrees of Separation: From Kairos to Weyward”

  2. Margaret says:
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    Margaret's avatar

    I like your one-word title chain. I’ve read Macbeth and seen stage productions and particularly like your like to Weyward – and it’s reminded me I haven’t read that book yet!

    • Helen says:
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      Helen (She Reads Novels)'s avatar

      I forgot that last month’s chain started with a single word title too! Yes, it was fun to put this together using only single words but more difficult than I expected.

  10. Literary Feline says:
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    Literary Feline's avatar

    I love your chain! I read Kindred recently, my first Octavia Butler book. I look forward to reading more of her work. I haven’t had a chance yet to read Mariana, but I really enjoyed the one book by Kearsley I did read. Weyward is on my TBR shelf. I keep hearing good things about it. I read MacBeth years ago. I confess I am not a fan of Shakespeare’s plays, but they are memorable.

    • Helen says:
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      Helen (She Reads Novels)'s avatar

      Kindred is still the only book I’ve read by Octavia Butler too, so I would also like to read more of her work. Mariana and Weyward are both great – I definitely recommend them!

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