The Eights by Joanna Miller – a immersive story of female friendship at an Oxford college in the 1920s

~ Judith ~ Leave a comment

Debut novelist Joanna Miller recreates the struggles of women to be taken seriously at Oxford in the post-WWI era. At the time, the women’s suffrage movement had won the vote for British women over 30, with some provisos. You would think a university like Oxford would be at the forefront of social movements and ideas, but sadly this is not the case for the young women at the heart of The Eights. While some professors were happy to have women in their classes, others point blank refused, or were deliberately obstructive.

The book follows four female students over the course of their first academic year. Dora, Beatrice, Otto (Ottoline) and Marianne have little in common, apart from the fact that at St Hughs, their rooms are on Corridor Eight. This is what makes the book interesting as each of them has come to study from completely different backgrounds. And that this is the first year that women can be conferred degrees at Oxford. Before that, while they were allowed to study, no degrees were awarded when they finished the same courses as men.

It’s 1920, Britain is still reeling from the war, and young, eligible men are in short supply. Which is the only reason Dora’s mother thought Oxford a good idea. Here at least there are plenty of young men and very few women. She just wants to see Dora married off to someone suitable. Dora is however grieving for her lost love, Charles, and for her brother, both lost to the trenches.

Dora’s mother is not the most sympathetic, but not as bad as Otto’s mother who doesn’t care for her daughter a bit. Otto is the oldest of the four students, comes from wealth, runs with a rather fast set, drinks a lot and is in no hurry to marry. She’s also brilliant at mathematics. Beatrice, also super bright, has mother problems too. Her mother is famous suffragette, still furiously campaigning for women’s rights and good on her for that. But poor Beatrice, tall and ungainly, struggles to win any maternal feelings from her.

Marianne has no mother at all, and has come on a scholarship. She disappears odd weekends to help her widowed, clergyman father, she says, but the reader soon knows she’s hiding a secret. We don’t find out what that is until the end of the book, but other secrets bubble to the surface for all of them, one way and another. Meanwhile there are endless rules, tests and exams and even bells. Discipline is rigid, while the young male students seem to get up to all sorts of hijinks, and drinking, seriously a no-no for the girls, is quite the done thing for the lads.

She is aware she looks ridiculous in her academic dress. Which genius decided that women should wear the floppy cap sported by students four hundred years ago? It is impossibly itchy. She has tried a jaunty angle, pulling it down around her ears or wearing it at the back of her head. Nothing works. Oddly enough Marianne, long-necked like a goose, looks as if she was born wearing one. The last few days have revealed that Marianne exhibits both empathy and a dry wit, a surprisingly appealing combination to Otto, but today Marianne seems anxious again, wringing her hands until her knuckles glow like pearls.
‘It’s just a talk, we’re not going down with the Titanic,’ Otto whispers in her ear.

Each character is nicely developed and faces her own challenges, disappointments and triumphs. They learn more than what’s on their syllabuses and the story nicely ambles along. Miller has done a lot of research and recreates the geography of Oxford with care, also peppering the book with snippets of news articles, notices and rules from the time, which give the book a nice authentic feel. While there’s some romance, it isn’t the main part of the story, which is as it should be. Our characters didn’t come to Oxford to get married off in their first year.

I found The Eights is a charming, entertaining and at times moving story and the pages whipped by. I’d be happy to find out what happens to Dora, Marianne, Beatrice and Otto next – I do hope they finish their degrees and go on to do wonderful things. Altogether this is a brilliant debut, and a four-star read from me.

Book Review: The Newer World by Sebastian Barry – life beyond the American Civil War for a man born into slavery

~ Judith ~ Leave a comment

Sebastian Barry is one of those writers who can create such perfect sentences you pause in your need to find out what happens next just to enjoy them again. So I was happy to throw my hat in the ring for his new book, The Newer World, when it was offered on Netgalley.

The story kind of follows on from Barry’s earlier books set in America around the time of the Civil War (Days Without End and A Thousand Moons). Characters from those books cross paths with our main character in this one – Tennyson Bouguereau, a man born into slavery. We’re in rural Tennessee, where Tennyson grows up with his twin sister Rosalee, losing his parents in one act of brutality after another. The Civil War and the end of slavery brings hope of freedom, but there are many in the area who supported the Confederate cause and don’t see the freed slaves as anymore deserving of a decent life than before.

The farm where Tennyson and Rosalee work is owned by the Magan family, who only just make a living from their land. But at least they are more kindly than other landowners. Luther Magan even allows the children to be educated and passes on a patch of land to the twins when he dies. His son Elija (Lige) however signs up for the Union during the war, which marks the Magans out among their neighbours. The war seems to bring out the worst in them, and when Tennyson defends the Magans property and his new friends (Lige has opened his home to Cole, McNulty and Winona, from the earlier books), he must leave abruptly, or risk being lynched.

So begins a tale of new beginnings and abrupt departures as Tennyson attempts to make a life for himself. A sympathetic lawyer named Briscoe helps him on his way and Tennyson makes the journey to Nashville where his singing voice lands him an opportunity to join a touring choir. A new friend, George, helps him adapt to his new life. As a reader you realise how basic a slave’s life could be as Tennyson learns about cleanliness and to dress in a suit, his old rags thrown away.

Still, it seems that whatever Tennyson learns and however much he adapts, freedom doesn’t equal acceptance in a white dominated society, and danger and injustice hover around him. But you can’t help feeling hopeful, particularly when he falls in love and is appreciated for his singing voice. Nothing is plain sailing, though, and Tennyson must make a terrible choice, between love and the obligations of friendship.

Barry does an amazing job of recreating the period and the people, his main character feels truly authentic and his struggles really tug on your heart. He’s also a witness to an America putting its colonial stamp on its land which is truly illuminating. For all he endures, he’s a survivor and by the end of the book, you can’t help but feel that there might be another story for Tennyson, and another book. I’d certainly be keen to see how his story continues. Another masterly work from Sebastian Barry, The Newer World is a five-star read from me.

The Newer World can certainly be read as a stand-alone novel and is due for publication on 10 September. With thanks to Netgalley and Faber & Faber, in return for an honest review.

Book Review: The Cromarty Library Circle by Shona MacLean – a novel about life in a Scottish town on the brink of change

~ Judith ~ 4 Comments

This book could almost be titled Love in the Time of Cholera, or possibly The Book Group if those titles hadn’t already been taken. The Cromarty Library Circle takes us to 1830 and a small coastal town in the north of Scotland, where a group of its more genteel citizens decide to start a small library, a kind of book group where each member chooses a book. These are purchased, read and passed on to the next in the circle, which also meets regularly to discuss them.

I must say I quite like the idea of this kind of book group. The circle includes the minister, Alasdair Mackay and his younger wife Rachel; the local gentry, Sir William Mackenzie, also with a younger wife, Charlotte, who is a friend of Rachel’s. There’s Janet Cameron, the hotelkeeper, and her bank-teller son Ludovic, and the spinster sisters Elspeth and Anna Rose. There’s a quaint old antiquarian and a young romantic-minded schoolteacher. The Hossacks, representing new money, are the owners of the rope works.

The story follows the problematic marriages of the Mackays, which is mostly happy, and the Mackenzies, which isn’t. We’ve got the predatory Farquhar Hossack, a thorough ne’er do well, and also medical student, making life uncomfortable for Ludovic, whom he’s bullied since childhood, and Ludovic’s sister, a young black girl brought back from a sugar plantation by Sir William. In the background, an abolitionist bill is slowly making its way through parliament, and this drives some dire predictions around future prosperity by those who have made their fortunes on the back of slavery.

Ludovic is friends with John, the schoolteacher, and Stanislaus, the clockmaker’s apprentice. Stan’s a refugee from Poland following the Russian quashing of an uprising, a former count now making his home in Cromarty. I enjoyed their discussions about the wider world – Ludovic dreaming of America, Stan dreaming of home, while John mostly seems to dream about the fine-looking ladies of the library circle.

‘But why are you not there?’
Despite the young man’s great intelligence, James often had to remind himself that Stanislas had much to learn about life in a Scottish town. He laughed. ‘Me? Because I am neither great nor good. And there are amongst the chosen ones a goodly few whose memories stretch back forty years and are not inclined to forgive what they have been so careful not to forget.’ What they would neither forgive nor forget was James’s youthful enthusiasm for the French and their revolution that had, in his younger days, drawn him to Paris itself.
‘But you have read more than those people. You have read more than anyone in this town.’
James took out his eyeglass and pointed it at Stanislas. ‘Not quite, Stan. Miller, the stonemason, has read more than anyone else in this town, and I can assure you, they haven’t invited him to join their number either.

The story is charming in its portrayal of these characters, all brought to life in a believable way, with their worries and foibles. But the issue of wealth from plantations worked by slaves casts a dark shadow. Also in the background there’s the emigration ships, preparing to take people to Canada and beyond. These are people who have lost their crofts due to the land enclosures – sheep replacing small-scale farming. Also in the harbour are the quarantine ships – an attempt to stem the spread of cholera which has been slowly creeping up the British Isles.

I loved these characters, their stories each coming to dramatic points throughout the book in a more than satisfying way. The stranglehold on people’s lives by duty and a strict social hierarchy, which I kind of expected. And also the power of the minister and his barbed comments about behaviour from the pulpit, which I hadn’t. But I’m also impressed by MacLean’s dept of research into the politics and concerns of the time which adds depth to the novel and creates an interesting world.

There is both joy and sadness in the story, and the feeling that while our characters have been through a lot by the end of the book, they have much more to face. But perhaps they are finally strong enough to weather the storms coming. The Cromarty Library Circle is a terrific historical novel and a five star read from me.

Book Review: The Only Survivors by Megan Miranda – an atmospheric thriller with plenty of twists

~ Judith ~ Leave a comment

Megan Miranda’s always a safe pair of hands for a solid psychological thriller. There’s usually an atmospheric setting and that’s the case here with The Only Survivors. The story follows a group who went to the same high school, who in their senior year were on a school trip that went horribly wrong. Of the original nine survivors, seven are left, meeting up once a year for a week to check in with each other, to make sure they’re all OK.

It’s now ten years since the accident that saw two vans of kids drive off a twisty bit of road into a river. Twelve people lost their lives, but no one really knows what happened. Amaya’s lawyer parents stepped in; their firm produced an acceptable story and that was that, no blame, no repercussions. Just a tidy payout to the survivors, a memorial library in honour of those who died.

As the anniversary looms, with their usual week away at The Shallows, a rambling beach house on a sandy peninsula, Cassidy has almost decided to stay home. She has a new relationship, which unlike those before, might be going somewhere, and she has been trying to distance herself from the group, changing her contact details. However an email telling her that one of the survivors has taken his life gets through. Ian was always fragile, and Ian was the one Cassidy was closest to. Driven by guilt for not being there for him, Cassidy changes her mind and packs her bag.

The story follows Cassidy’s growing unease at The Shallows, a feeling that someone is watching them. Woven into this are switches back in time to the hours following the crash. It soon appears that those who made it out aren’t just suffering from survivor guilt but have other reasons for remorse. There’s finger pointing and blame hovering just under the surface of their interactions, particularly now there’s the threat of a new inquiry.

As an older reader, you can’t help but imagine how your eighteen-year-old self would cope in a life and death situation like this accident. It’s easy at first to forgive – they’re so young and did well to get out alive. Ten years on they’ve made good lives for themselves career-wise but have they really moved on? Secrets emerge in the snippets from the accident that have you guessing – secrets involving arguments and a knife – nicely upping the tension.

As the man called 911, he counted them in the beam of the headlights. “Seven, eight, nine kids – “
“We have to go back,” Clara sobbed. “There are – ” But Joshua pulled her tighter, so tight, her cries were muffled into his shoulder.
“Shh,” Josh said, close to her ear.
They’d all heard the violence of the river. The crash of the water flooding through the gorge, close at their heels. They knew there was no surviving it.
Amaya saw it all, a montage: the people they had left behind – injured, huddled along the base of the cliffs. The haunting look in their eyes. It was too late for them, she knew. She’d known it from the start.

In the present day, as another weather emergency threatens, it’s hard for Cassidy to know who to trust, especially when Amaya makes an early departure. Megan Miranda does a nice job of working the psychology of the different characters, the way they bicker and lurk alone in their rooms, or clump together at the local bar for hours in apparent solidarity. Everyone seems to have secrets.

Tension builds nicely, helped by the atmosphere of the house, with its unlatched doors that blow open in the wind, the creaky floorboards and ramshackle balconies, as the story works to a surprising and shocking conclusion. But the most shocking thing of all is that you can just imagine how this could actually happen. The Only Survivors is a terrific page-turner, and a four-star read from me.

Book Review: Margaret, Are You Leaving? by Dianne Yarwood – an empathetic, insightful story about finding your roots

~ Judith ~ Leave a comment

Yet another book about a character coming to terms with her family’s past, but no less enjoyable for all that. I’d chosen the book for its interesting and attractive cover – yes, covers do matter – and was soon engrossed in Maggie’s story. She’s an engaging character, a real live-wire, now in her forties. We’re in Sydney a couple of decades ago and Maggie’s at work where she fields calls from viewers for a television channel. She’s interrupted by a phone call from her brother Lucas with the news that her adoptive mother is dead.

The news is a shock, but not because of grief, but rather because it reminds Maggie of her terrible childhood. Lucas also reveals that he has found some documents about Maggie’s birthmother, but she’s reluctant to go down that path, aware that the woman gave her up when she was two, and that makes two mothers that were unable to love her. The book follows Maggie’s eventual decision to find out more about her origins and the journey that takes her.

When Maggie’s not at work at the station, she also has a job as a part-time teacher aide, which she loves and has a talent for. She’s particularly good with troubled children, seeing in them the need for connection that she had missed out on. You can’t help thinking what a terrific mother she’d have been herself.

I loved the character of Maggie, who really carries the novel. She’s madly enthusiastic for cooking – there’s lots of delicious food described – and when she’s unhappy, goes fishing, whatever the hour. I particularly loved her dog, a pointer called Brian, who strikes me as one of the best literary dogs I’ve met.

She drove to Rodd Point and parked by the water, then set herself up on the stone sea wall with Brian locked by her side. The water was inky and changing in the moonlight. She wore a small head torch and it lit up her hands, the fishing line, the ledge where she sat with her legs dangling over its edge.
It occurred to her that she’d come here to scream. To scream and scream and not be heard. But there was someone else. A little further along a man stood on one of the small rocky ledges in front of the wall. Fishing as she was. Alone and quiet as she was.
So instead she held one finger on the line waiting for movement and worked to fend off despair. Her chest rose and fell, water lapped. Brian lay beside her with his head resting on her leg.

Maggie also bonds with her TV channel co-worker Anna, who has her own mother-related subplot. As an Englishwoman having settled in Australia, Anna desperately misses her family back home – particularly her mother. This mother is the opposite of Maggie’s mother, the two phoning each other most days, while Anna’s own home life revolves around children and family.

The story reveals some sad truths about Australia’s immigration history – particularly the difficulties European migrants found adjusting to life in Australia, often carrying the burden of their wartime experiences. Maggie’s experiences in institutional care as a troublesome child also make for sobering reading. In the Author’s Note at the back of the story, more of this is explained plus that this book is inspired by the life of the author’s friend.

But the overall feel of the book is uplifting, a feel-good read due to the empathy Dianne Yarwood creates for her characters, even the not very nice ones. There’s wisdom and humour as well, and maybe it was a little too feel-good for me, but you can’t help wanting a happy ending for someone who has had so much sorrow. Margaret, Are You Leaving? is a three-and-half star read from me.

Book Review: More Than Enough by Anna Quindlen – a warm and witty novel about family, friendship and DNA

~ Judith ~ 4 Comments

Anna Quindlen’s new book has some similar themes as Ann Patchett’s Whistler. And while Patchett’s obviously the heavyweight here, both authors have a wisdom and warmth about them with a real empathy for their characters. More Than Enough follows forty-two-year-old English teacher Polly Goodman who belongs to a book group where no one is allowed to read the book. They buy the book, each taking turns to choose the book, but no one is to read or talk about the book, because their monthly get together is a chance to talk about themselves and share what’s important.

It’s her three friends from her book group that have bought Polly a DNA kit as a kind of joke. Perhaps if she’d had a happier relationship with her mother, if her father wasn’t in a care home for early onset dementia, she would have hesitated longer before sending away her sample for analysis.

When Polly discovers she has a match with someone outside her family, the sceptre of a family secret emerges and she agrees to meet Talia, a troubled young girl she instantly warms to. Garrison, Polly’s brother is gay and insists there isn’t a chance of his fathering a child – I love Garrison, who’s both worldly wise and hilarious. She can’t talk to her father about it, and her mother’s a formidable, high-flying judge who doesn’t inspire confidences.

Meanwhile, Polly and her lovely husband Mark, a large-animal vet at the zoo, are trying desperately to have a child, have had several disappointing rounds of IVF, to the point that it begins to seem impossible. There are more book group meetings, and Talia introduces Polly to her grandmother, a wise and empathetic breeder of alpacas, which she uses for her absurdly expensive range of knitwear.

Polly and Mark are lovely characters, you want the best for them and you get the backstory of their relationship. There’s Polly’s school teaching and her growing up with that tough-cookie of a mother – something Polly has always resented. This reminded me of the mother-daughter relationship in Whistler, along with the sense of a mother keeping secrets. Again, we have characters that are well-meaning – there’s nobody whose nasty or manipulative , nobody driven to do something terrible – maybe because there can be enough things going on in ordinary lives to create the tension a story needs to keep you reading.

Each term I put a poster on the old cork board with a quote from a writer. This year it’s from Louisa May Alcott: “I am not afraid of storms, for I am learning how to sail my ship.” At least a few of my first-years will copy it down, worried that it will make its way onto the exam. Every time I look at it, I will think to myself, Lies, lies and damn lies. But that’s just me, still afraid of storms, and of capsizing.
“Who is George Eliot?” I’ll ask them right out of the gate so that I can get a snapshot: the ones who had researched the writer, the ones woh hadn’t, the ones who didn’t know who I was talking about, even occasionally the ones, usually transfers from other schools, who thought George Eliot was male. I loved my job, and I loved Windsor, but I had to start playing intellectual chess day one.

Over all, this is a warm, gentle read, laced with sad moments as well as humour. Although it may seem a little slow going, it’s well worth it as you become invested in the characters. I had to put it aside for a few days when I was away for a weekend – I don’t like taking library books on holiday – and couldn’t wait to get back to Polly’s story on my return. I’ve enjoyed other novels by this author and More Than Enough did not disappoint – a four-star read from me.

Book Review: Cold Sunset by William Boyd – Gabriel Dax returns, completing this accomplished espionage trilogy

~ Judith ~ Leave a comment

Gabriel’s Moon and its sequel, The Predicament, follow the career of reluctant spy, Gabriel Dax, a travel writer who has become useful to the British secret service. He’d unknowingly become involved in the movement of information thanks to his brother, and now, because of his infatuation with his handler, Faith Green, finds it difficult to extricate himself from the world of espionage.

In the third book, Cold Sunset, Gabriel can’t ignore the fact that he’s become a killer, with two deaths bugging his conscience, both self-defence, but still. Just as well he continues to see a therapist, who he’d originally contacted for help with a sleeping disorder. Now he unburdens himself quite openly about his spy work, which is troubling, and his relationship with Faith, which also raises red flags.

It’s 1964, and Boyd paints a very realistic and vivid picture of the time. There’s attention to all the details – the clothes and cars, the restaurant meals – that give you time and place without overwhelming us in period colour. We’re also very aware that we’re a couple of decades on from World War II, with social change in the air, that women can have careers, and that we are in the midst of the Cold War.

Gabriel’s trying to complete his new book, On the Beaten Track, with unusual angles to very familiar tourist attractions, a useful cover for a job for Faith in the United States. Nothing is ever quite as simple as she makes out, of course, and on his return he realises he’s in the sights of a man with a grudge – a hangover from what happened in The Predicament. The world of espionage is already encroaching, when Faith has a new assignment for him: to “exfiltrate” their double agent in Moscow.

So not long into the story, the pace is set for some nail-biting situations. Boyd also cleverly brings in characters from the previous books – Tyrone, his London friend who’s something of a fixer, or Varvara, his former Russian contact in London, a set-up designed to keep Gabriel onside with their counterparts in Moscow, and a nice little earner. It’s all meticulously plotted, as any spy novel should be. But it’s also a thoughtful examination of what life as a spy might be like – the lies Gabriel tells people, even his friends, the “kill or be killed” aspect that’s always hovering in the background.

And although Gabriel’s a flawed character – there’s his drinking and poor judgement with women just for staters – he’s also very much aware of how he’s caught in Faith Green’s web and what it’s doing to him. This gives the book an interesting psychological aspect, which along with the brilliantly crafted writing, makes the book a satisfying read.

I read Cold Sunset courtesy of Netgalley and Penguin Random House. Best read after the first two books in the trilogy, Cold Sunset is due for release on 3 September and is a four-star read from. me.

Book Review: Whistler by Ann Patchett – a surprise reconciliation and the story of a family

~ Judith ~ 4 Comments

A new Ann Patchett novel is always such a joy, and this one did not disappoint. Whistler is written from the point of view of Daphne, a teacher at a private girls’ school in her fifties. She admits to being popular with older men, so it’s not surprising that Jonathan, her husband, is a seventy-year-old retiree. They’re at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York when Jonathan notices an elderly man following them. It turns out to be Eddie, the stepfather Daphne hasn’t seen since she was nine.

The two reconnect – Eddie was always the nicest stepfather you could imagine and the pair had been close in the two years they’d known each other. But it all came to an end when Daphne’s younger sister, Leda (their mother had gone through a Greek mythology phase), developed appendicitis and Eddie was left to collect Daphne from school while their mother stayed at the hospital. A car accident on a snowy night ended with Eddie being sent packing and ever since Daphne felt it was her fault.

The story dips back into the past to recreate that night and also tells the story that Eddie was hoping to develop into a book – he’s an editor at a major New York publishing house. The story has a similarity to this one, and involves a horse named Whistler – in case you were wondering where the title came from. We learn about the girls’ father Buddy, who left his family when the girls were small, beckoned back to a life at sea; the resilience and mental toughness of their mother; and of her third marriage to the author of books about positivity, who has become an oddly bitter old man.

A lot of the book is Eddie’s story too. He’s a wonderful character, a genuinely nice guy who makes a strange pact with Daphne’s mother, which hampers his emotional life enormously. But out of it Daphne gets a fabulous dad and friend. Books are his life too, and this he passes on to Daphne. So this is a great novel for book lovers and writers too.

Eddie Triplett had been cut from an entirely different piece of cloth, and it was the same piece of cloth that Daphne came from, or that’s what she told herself. He read constantly, and not just finished books. He read books that were loose piles of paper and marked them up to make them better. “A work in progress,” he liked to say, as if the novel needed some help getting on its feet. At her insistent begging, he once marked up a theme paper she had written for English class, correcting it the way a teacher would so that she could write it out a second time, fixing her mistakes before handing it in. “I don’t think I’m supposed to be doing this,” Eddie said, circling her misspellings, her word repetitions.
“Other parents to it,” she said. And they did. Not her mother but other people’s mothers. Never the fathers as far as she knew.

Segments of the accident as it is recounted are placed strategically through the book and the story builds to a satisfying ending. There’s a thread of grief that runs through it for the years of wasted time, and guilt too over how it all happened. I found this an enjoyable read with good company, but less compelling, less gritty than some of Patchett’s earlier books, in particular The Dutch House, Commonwealth or State of Wonder. The characters so well-heeled and comfortable, even if the past does shake them up a bit – but not for long.

It’s interesting to delve back into a family and see the difference between what a child sees compared to what really happened. I’m sure that the book echoes real life in this way for many of us. So while this is a quieter story than earlier Patchetts, there’s more than meets the eye. With that in mind, Whistler is a four-star read from me.

Book Review: This Is Happiness by Niall Williams – a coming of age story set when electricity comes to a small Irish town

~ Judith ~ 2 Comments

I’ve been reading these Faha novels out of order, but as we follow different but connected characters from this small Irish town in the middle of last century, it doesn’t seem to matter. Having read Time of the Child and loved it enormously, I picked up This Is Happiness, which I’d attempted once before. It had been a little slow and I didn’t have the patience for it at the time. Niall Williams has a very rich, unhurried and idiosyncratically Irish writing style that you have to take your time with it. But once you do, it’s rewarding and immensely entertaining reading.

The story begins with Noel, or Noe as his family call him, a seventeen-year-old who has just abandoned his studies to be a priest. He doesn’t return home to his father’s quiet house in Dublin, but decamps for his grandparents home on the outskirts of Faha, a backwater in County Clare. His grandparents, Ganga and Doady, live in a simple cottage that hasn’t caught up with technology or modern comforts, apart from the fact they have a telephone. It is because of the phone that Christy, a man working for the company soon to install electricity in Faha, asks if the elderly couple can give him room and board.

And so begins an unusual friendship between Christy and Noe. Christy is a terrific character, a striking man in his sixties with a white beard, a blue linen suit and no inhibitions, it would seem. He has worked all over the world and has lots of stories, but is very kind too, gentle with the old people and indulgent of Noe. The two strike out by bicycle in the evenings in search of music, and Christy regales Noe of how his life has one lingering regret, one that involves the widow of the Faha chemist.

Romantic inclinations also shape Noe’s story, in particular his admiration for the doctor’s three elegant daughters, although he receives little encouragement either from the girls or their buttoned-up father. The two romantics, young and old resort to various madcap plans to win the objects of their desire, which gives the story tension and humour. There’s heartbreak too, and Noe learns a few lessons, while in the background the work on the delivery of power goes on .

Christy was considerably shorter than me, but in deference to his bulk or age took Ganga’s taller bicycle and I the smaller one of Doady. There were bicycle clips somewhere, if only they could be found. Your right sock did emergency duty and was the better for being black and taking the streaks of oil without comment. See us then, a mismatched little and large, pedalling uncertainly out the yard.
The lamps on the bicycles had long since conked out. The small ambit in which my grandparents lived made them redundant, but less so for us, and we met each bump and pothole and progressed into the falling night by jolt and glide.

The writing is very descriptive, Williams capturing every sensation and immersing the reader in Noe’s world. The rain, which seems to be a continual presence in this part of Ireland, suddenly gives way to an unseasonably warm spring, bringing everyone out of doors to experience the sunshine. In 1950s Faha, we see a dying way of life as electricity is set to bring change. While this promises comfort and opportunity, the reader can’t help feel a touch of nostalgia for the old ways.

This was such a charming book, I found myself once again chuckling as I read, or reading sentences aloud to anyone who would listen, because Williams has such a lovely way with words. I am glad there’s a new book in the Faha series to look forward to – O Now! comes out in October. This Is Happiness is a five-star read from me.

Book Review: The Undoing of Violet Claybourne by Emily Critchley – a tense, coming-of-age, historical thriller

~ Judith ~ Leave a comment

This novel was long-listed for a Historical Dagger Award, so I had high hopes for an intelligent mystery. The Undoing of Violet Claybourne is more psychological thriller than mystery and built a well-sustained creeping sense of dread, for this reader anyway.

Most of the novel takes place over the 1938 Christmas holidays when Gillian is invited by new school friend Violet to her family’s crumbling mansion, Thornleigh Hall. Gillian’s mother died when she was born, and her diplomat father in Egypt has remarried and now has a young son, leaving Gillian’s care to a penny-pinching aunt.

Gillian is delighted to be staying with a proper family, and one with good connections at that. Violet is a little childish to Gillian’s mind, still playing imaginary games, and with strange rituals – her “undoings” – which the modern reader will flag as an obsessive-compulsive disorder. But Violet is also affectionate, exuberant and kind.

Violet’s parents aren’t quite what Gillian might have hoped for. Her father is war-damaged and vague, her mother a vain and snooty woman who doesn’t believe in education for girls, but Gillian is soon swept away by Violet’s glamorous older sisters. Only Laura drinks too much and is unstable, while Emmeline, a student of psychology, is calculating and manipulative. Ignoring her school friend, Gillian attaches herself to the older girls with disastrous results.

There are secrets which slowly leak out during Gillian’s visit. Why is Emmeline so mean to Violet? What happened with the tutor who left in a hurry? There’s also a poacher who Flora’s father is oddly tolerant of and who lives on the estate. Then there’s the small boy Robin, also tolerated, the child of one of the maids. This family seems somewhat benighted, so when disasters happen, I wasn’t in the least surprised. Much of what goes wrong seems to come from their general sense of superiority, and the necessity of keeping up appearances.

When I think of the Christmas of 1938, what comes to mind is the sound of the dinner gong, the shine of the silverware, the rustle of Emmeline’s dress as she swept up the central staircase. Jazz music drifting through the drafty, shut-up rooms, scarlet-clad figures galloping across the snowy fields, and Violet sprawled star-shaped across her bed. “How good it is to be home, Gilly.”
    But these are nothing more than scrambled snapshots, a slideshow of disordered images on a fuzzy projector screen. If I am to remember, to truly remember, I must go back to the very beginning.

There’s a Boxing Day hunt, then a ball, as things go from bad to worse, and by the end of the Christmas break, I was relieved when Gillian’s story is rescued by the start of a new term and then the the war. Gillian throws in school for London and gets stuck into the war effort, a chance to forget about everything that happened at Thornleigh Hall. Her story is bookended by glimpses of Gillian in her seventies as the past comes back to her and she finds out what has happened to Violet and her family.

This a nicely paced story, the secrets revealed at just the right intervals, and the writing and characterisation both excellent. I was reminded a little of The Go-Between by L P Hartley as well as Nancy Mitford’s novels, with this book’s exploration of a dying way of life and how secrets can tear a family apart. The audiobook edition was excellent too, read by Nathalie Buscombe. All in all, it’s a four-star read from me.