Latest news with #PhoebeGreenwood
The Guardian
07-08-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Vulture by Phoebe Greenwood review – a caustic satire on war reporting in the Middle East
'Middle East on Fire: Israel positions tanks on Gaza border.' Journalist Phoebe Greenwood's debut novel follows Sara Byrne, a freelance journalist in Gaza in 2012, who is reporting for a 'pretty rightwing' British newspaper. Staying at the Beach Hotel, which is occupied exclusively by 'middle-aged foreign correspondents', she jostles with other reporters for stories while maintaining less-than-cordial relations with her fixer, Nasser. It could almost be a comedy of manners, with sketches of staff members and scenes from the hotel lobby. But it isn't because, as the hotel owner puts it, 'Gaza is a prison in non-stop war'. Vulture is a caustic study of what it means to report from a conflict, and particularly relevant to the current moment. It's a knowing portrait by Greenwood, who was a freelance reporter in Jerusalem between 2010 and 2013, and later a foreign affairs correspondent at this newspaper. Her antiheroine visits a morgue, where the bodies of children, 'dusted in sand and blood', wear torn Spider-Man pyjamas. She narrowly escapes a bombed hospital, which is 'running out of anaesthetic and even basic painkillers'. Still, her editor requires stories, and so – oblivious to the personal toll on Nasser – she pursues increasingly dangerous lines of inquiry. None of the other journalists has 'stepped foot near a terror tunnel', Greenwood tells us, so we follow Byrne in pursuit of this exclusive. Meanwhile, a photographer is killed, and she befriends a strange, hostile child, all the while witnessing scene after scene of unimaginable destruction. The title of the book is testament to its wry tone, and ultimately its position. In Byrne, Greenwood has created a particularly acerbic character, reluctant or perhaps unable to offer sincere emotions in the face of horrifying events. Her battle-weary sense of humour, however, cannot last, and Byrne's mental state becomes increasingly unstable. She believes a bird – identified as a pigeon, but described more like a vulture – is tormenting her. Her eyes are yellow; she winces with pain when she walks. Greenwood handles this descent well; the narration remains jocular, even arrogant, meaning it never feels hackneyed. A brief foray into newsroom pressures and expectations is lightly handled, but Greenwood punctures it succinctly. As a bereaved mother says to Byrne: 'You come, you watch us die, watch us grieve, take our stories, go home. Do you help? No. My husband cleans your sheets, you kill his family.' It is a stark rebuttal to Byrne's self-pity. Occasionally, Greenwood's creative writing feels less successful than the news writing within it: the protagonist's filed copy is sometimes clearer than the prose itself. But Vulture remains a remarkably skilful debut. Greenwood's style is compelling and blackly comic; the story could not be more serious. Vulture by Phoebe Greenwood is published by Europa (£16.99). To support the Guardian order your copy at Delivery charges may apply.
The Guardian
06-08-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Vulture by Phoebe Greenwood review – a caustic satire on war reporting in the Middle East
'Middle East on Fire: Israel positions tanks on Gaza border.' Journalist Phoebe Greenwood's debut novel follows Sara Byrne, a freelance journalist in Gaza in 2012, who is reporting for a 'pretty rightwing' British newspaper. Staying at the Beach Hotel, which is occupied exclusively by 'middle-aged foreign correspondents', she jostles with other reporters for stories while maintaining less-than-cordial relations with her fixer, Nasser. It could almost be a comedy of manners, with sketches of staff members and scenes from the hotel lobby. But it isn't because, as the hotel owner puts it, 'Gaza is a prison in non-stop war'. Vulture is a caustic study of what it means to report from a conflict, and particularly relevant to the current moment. It's a knowing portrait by Greenwood, who was a freelance reporter in Jerusalem between 2010 and 2013, and later a foreign affairs correspondent at this newspaper. Her antiheroine visits a morgue, where the bodies of children, 'dusted in sand and blood', wear torn Spider-Man pyjamas. She narrowly escapes a bombed hospital, which is 'running out of anaesthetic and even basic painkillers'. Still, her editor requires stories, and so – oblivious to the personal toll on Nasser – she pursues increasingly dangerous lines of inquiry. None of the other journalists has 'stepped foot near a terror tunnel', Greenwood tells us, so we follow Byrne in pursuit of this exclusive. Meanwhile, a photographer is killed, and she befriends a strange, hostile child, all the while witnessing scene after scene of unimaginable destruction. The title of the book is testament to its wry tone, and ultimately its position. In Byrne, Greenwood has created a particularly acerbic character, reluctant or perhaps unable to offer sincere emotions in the face of horrifying events. Her battle-weary sense of humour, however, cannot last, and Byrne's mental state becomes increasingly unstable. She believes a bird – identified as a pigeon, but described more like a vulture – is tormenting her. Her eyes are yellow; she winces with pain when she walks. Greenwood handles this descent well; the narration remains jocular, even arrogant, meaning it never feels hackneyed. A brief foray into newsroom pressures and expectations is lightly handled, but Greenwood punctures it succinctly. As a bereaved mother says to Byrne: 'You come, you watch us die, watch us grieve, take our stories, go home. Do you help? No. My husband cleans your sheets, you kill his family.' It is a stark rebuttal to Byrne's self-pity. Occasionally, Greenwood's creative writing feels less successful than the news writing within it: the protagonist's filed copy is sometimes clearer than the prose itself. But Vulture remains a remarkably skilful debut. Greenwood's style is compelling and blackly comic; the story could not be more serious. Vulture by Phoebe Greenwood is published by Europa (£16.99). To support the Guardian order your copy at Delivery charges may apply.
Yahoo
13-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Vulture by Phoebe Greenwood: The darkly comic despair of the foreign correspondent
This novel doesn't need the old-fashioned disclaimer that any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental, because plainly it isn't. Like her heroine, Sara Byrne, author Phoebe Greenwood was a freelance newspaper correspondent on the Middle East. Sara manages to find a job in Gaza and gets to stay at the one decent place, the Beach Hotel. It represents the Al Deira, destroyed by Israeli forces last year, to which the book is dedicated. 'Much like rich Turks, American network crews like nice hotels,' she writes. 'They like airy, sea-fronting suites and restaurants with uniformed waiters where they can eat French fries and safely watch the war raging in the street and skies outside on big TV screens.' That is what the novel, Greenwood's debut, mercilessly depicts — the world of the foreign correspondent. We meet the all-important fixers, the locals who make good money out of providing the hacks with contacts and interviews. Sara launches forays accompanied by fixer Nasser, who regards her with disdain and pity. But he does set up decent interviews, like one with the director of the emergency unit at the hospital who observes: 'I would like to ease their pain, but we're running out of anaesthetic and even basic painkillers.' No fiction there. After a bombing outside the hospital, Sara sees a body: 'It came out backwards, very close to my face, one flip-flop dangling from a dusty foot, skinny and bloody but intact. It was the face that was missing.' But she's under pressure to outperform the competition. And Sara's judgment isn't what it was once. She is also an unattractive character, physically and morally, even among a cohort of unattractive journalists. When she courts disaster and it engulfs others, she has nothing to offer. 'You come, you watch us die, you watch us grieve … you take our stories, you go home,' a bereaved mother tells her. This sobering, blackly humorous and acutely observed book is based on events more than a decade ago. The depressing thing is that nothing much has changed. Melanie McDonagh is a columnist for The London Standard Vulture by Phoebe Greenwood is out now (Europa Editions, £16.99)
