Blood test

Thursday

Sam Forster

Charles Baxter’s Blood Test is a necessary novel

The books that most vividly and expansively illustrate the human experience are not the ones that grapple with life’s most romantic or fantastical tribulations. Charles Baxter’s latest work is splendid proof of this abiding literary fact. Baxter, a Minnesotan who is author of a multitude of novels and short story collections, returns with Blood Test, a book that delves into some quotidian yet disconcerting aspects of modern American life. He is well-known for 2000’s The Feast of Love, which garnered a National Book Award nomination, and 2020’s The Sun Collective, among others; his new offering continues his tradition of blending the mundane with the extraordinary.

Blood Test

Thursday

Jeremy Clarke

My future hangs on the result of this blood test

From our UK edition

A new year and another round of medical treatments in the French health system. On Saturday morning, needing a blood test pronto, I drove to the local branch of a chain of commercial laboratories, arriving before daylight. I joined a queue of the worried and unwell that had already spilled out of the door and into the icy car park. Except for a old chap behind me trying to cough up a lungful of warm porridge, and someone else’s lilting accordion ringtone, we were a silent, stricken field. After shuffling forward for 20 minutes, I celebrated the achievement of reaching the outer door and passing through into the interior warmth with a double toot of hand gel from the public dispenser.