The Children’s Book by A.S. Byatt

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Since The Children’s Book was published in 2009 I’ve picked it up a few times but have been put off by the length (over 600 pages of small print in the paperback edition) and also by the very mixed reviews. It seems that people have either loved this book or have found it almost impossible to get through. After I read my first A.S. Byatt book, Possession, earlier this year and found it easier to read than I had expected, I decided it was time I stopped feeling intimidated and tried this one too. I enjoyed it but now that I’ve read it I can understand why it might be a love it/hate it type of book. If you’re not interested in the historical and cultural events of the Victorian and Edwardian periods, if you don’t like reading fairy tales, if you prefer books with more action and less description, then this may not be the right book for you. It’s such a complex novel with so many layers I would find it impossible to write a summary of the plot, but I’ll do my best to give you an idea of what the book is about.

In The Children’s Book, Byatt tells the story of the Wellwood family and their friends and neighbours in the context of the larger social changes taking place in the world around them. As you can probably tell, despite the title, this is not a book for children. However, many of the characters are children at the beginning of the book and we watch them grow up over the years and begin to follow their own paths in life. As the children become adults they make some surprising discoveries and find that nothing is quite as it seems.

The book begins in the late Victorian period and ends just after World War I, so all kinds of important historical moments and events are covered, from the Exposition Universelle de Paris to the death of Queen Victoria and the Boer War. Some of the characters become involved with groups and movements such as the Fabians, anarchists and Suffragettes. There are also lots of descriptions of the Arts and Crafts movement, pottery and ceramics, puppet shows, summer crafts camps, making lanterns etc. And from the world of literature there are references to authors including Oscar Wilde, the Brothers Grimm, J.M. Barrie and Kenneth Grahame.

One of the main characters, Olive Wellwood, is a famous writer of fairy tales and she creates a special book for each of her children, Tom, Dorothy, Phyllis, Hedda and Florian. Inside each child’s book is a personalised story Olive has written for them. We are given the chance to read extracts from some of these stories and this was one of my favourite aspects of the novel. I know not everyone will be as enthusiastic about the fairy tales as I was, but I did really enjoy them.

In addition to the Wellwood family, there are literally dozens of other characters, each of them with an interesting story of his or her own. As the book progresses the relationships between the various characters become very complex and intricately linked. Considering the length and scope of the book, I think having a character list to refer to would have been very useful! Of all the characters in the novel, I think Dorothy Wellwood was my favourite. I was interested in her attempts to study medicine and become a doctor, something very rare and difficult for a woman at the beginning of the 20th century. In Dorothy and a couple of the other young female characters who also consider going to university, we see how women often felt that they had to make a choice between marriage and a career and couldn’t have both.

Something I probably haven’t made clear yet is how dark and moving this book is at times with its portrayal of the loss of childhood innocence and with the number of devastating family secrets that are revealed. A.S. Byatt has said that she wanted to explore the effects of writing children’s books on an author’s real children, and one of the saddest parts of the novel for me was the storyline involving Olive Wellwood’s eldest son, Tom. I won’t tell you what happens to him but I thought it was heartbreaking.

The only thing that disappointed me slightly was that towards the end it seemed as if Byatt was trying to squeeze as much as possible into the final pages of the novel. After the slow, steady pace of the rest of the book, I thought the ending was very rushed and the story seemed to disappear under an overwhelming amount of historical facts and dates. Apart from that, I loved this book.

Have you read The Children’s Book? What did you think of it?

Shanghai Girls by Lisa See

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Shanghai Girls tells the story of two beautiful Chinese sisters, Pearl and May Chin, who are leading glamorous lives working as models in Shanghai. When their father gambles away all his money, he attempts to pay his debts by selling the girls to husbands who have come from America to look for Chinese wives. It’s 1937, however, and May and Pearl are modern women; they expect to make their own decisions and be allowed to choose their own husbands. Finding that this freedom has been taken away from them, they try to rebel against their arranged marriages, but are eventually forced to leave China behind and travel to Los Angeles to live with men they barely know. We then follow Pearl and May as they try to adapt to life in America, but find themselves facing a new set of challenges.

The story is set against a backdrop of the historical and political events taking place during the first half of the 20th century including the horrors of Japan’s invasion of China and later the rise of communism. Pearl and May’s story is very sad, with one tragedy followed by another, and only a few moments of happiness, so this is not always an easy book to read. There are also some plot twists and one or two big secrets, though it’s not too hard to guess what these are before they’re revealed. But above all, this is a story about the bond between two sisters.

Pearl, born in the Year of the Dragon, is very protective of her younger Sheep sister, May, who Pearl believes is their parents’ favourite. Throughout the story it’s obvious that May and Pearl love each other but there’s also a lot of jealousy and resentment – something more serious than normal sibling rivalry – that threatens to damage their relationship. I found I didn’t actually like either of them, though this didn’t stop me from enjoying the book (in fact the only character I really did like was Sam, Pearl’s husband). As the first-person narrator of the novel, Pearl was the sister I naturally tended to have more sympathy for. May seemed very selfish and shallow to me, but as I learned more about her I started to understand what caused her to behave the way she did and I saw that the relationship between the two sisters was more complex than I’d thought. Both characters had good points and bad points and I found both of them frustrating at times!

The only problem I had with this book was that the ending was not very satisfactory. It was obviously intended to be left on a cliffhanger so that you would have to read the sequel to find out what happens next. The sequel, Dreams of Joy, is out now and I’m hoping to start reading it soon, but I was still disappointed that this book didn’t have a proper ending.

This is the second of Lisa See’s historical fiction novels I’ve read. The first was Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, a story set in 19th century China, but I liked this one a lot more than Snow Flower. Have you read any of Lisa See’s books? Which ones have you enjoyed the most?

New York by Edward Rutherfurd

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This historical fiction novel by Edward Rutherfurd looks at the fascinating story of New York City from its early years as a 17th century Dutch trading post through to the present day. Along the way we learn about some of the important events that have shaped the New York we know today, from wars, blizzards and stock market crashes to the 9/11 tragedy. Some real historical figures make brief appearances – including Peter Stuyvesant, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Abraham Lincoln and a few others – but the story is told through the lives of a fictional family, the Masters, who we follow down the generations.

I should start by saying that I’m a big fan of Edward Rutherfurd, having read all of his previous books (London, Sarum, The Forest, Dublin, Ireland Awakening and Russka). Each of Rutherfurd’s novels tells the story of a city or country over a period of hundreds of years and follows the lives of some of the families who lived there. His novels are all written in the same format and although they certainly won’t appeal to everybody I do think that if you read one of his books and enjoy it, there’s a good chance that you’ll enjoy at least some of his others.

This one, New York, is slightly different to the previous books in that it covers a much shorter period of time (from the 1600s to the present day, in comparison to Sarum, for example, which begins in the ice age and ends in the present day). This means that where in the previous novels it was sometimes necessary to skip forward by a few centuries, missing out several generations, New York is told as a more continuous narrative.

Another difference is that while Rutherfurd’s other books have told the stories of five or six main families, this one concentrates on one in particular: the Master family. I’m not sure I liked the way Rutherfurd chose to follow the Masters throughout the entire book. They were a family of merchants and bankers so their lives revolved around money, banking and the stock exchange, things I don’t find very interesting to read about. The book would have worked better for me if instead of spending so much time with the money-obsessed Masters, there had been more focus on some of the other families we meet: the Caruso family, who were Italian immigrants, the Jewish Adler family, the Irish O’Donnells, and the descendants of Quash the slave.

I also felt that the book was too uneven. I appreciate that when writing a novel like this one it must be very difficult to decide what to include and not to include, but I thought there were some parts that felt very rushed while others dragged on for too long. Also, I found the characters in the earlier chapters more engaging and well-developed. It almost seemed that the author himself had started to lose interest when he reached the 20th century and was making less effort to think of compelling storylines and characters for the later sections of the book.

I don’t want to sound too negative though, because I did think this was a good book and I learned a lot from it. I’m British, have never been to New York (though I would love to) and have never had the opportunity to study its history, so a lot of things mentioned in the novel were new to me. I knew little or nothing about some of the historical events such as the Draft Riots of 1863 and the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911, for example. I expect that if you’re a New Yorker you’ll take different things away from this book than I did (and maybe you’ll notice historical inaccuracies that I wasn’t aware of) but hopefully you’ll still be able to learn something new.

But although I did enjoy New York, it’s not one of Rutherfurd’s best novels in my opinion, for the reasons I’ve mentioned above. If you’re new to his books, Sarum (English history with a focus on the city of Salisbury and nearby Stonehenge) would be my personal recommendation as a good place to start, though it really depends on your own areas of interest. If you’d like to try some Russian history, I can also highly recommend Russka, and the two books about Ireland are excellent too. Oh, and one final thing I should say is that Rutherfurd’s novels are very long. This one has over 1,000 pages, though it hasn’t taken me as long to read it as I was expecting. I don’t see how the story of New York could possibly be told in any less than 1,000 pages, so I hope the length won’t put you off!

Have you read any of Edward Rutherfurd’s books? Which ones have you enjoyed?

The House of the Wind by Titania Hardie

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The House of the Wind is a novel consisting of two storylines, one set in the present day and one in the 14th century. In 2007 we meet Madeline Moretti, a young lawyer living in San Francisco. Maddie is grieving for her fiancé, Chris, who has been killed in a car accident. She is also involved in a complicated legal case involving a large company suspected of putting the health of their employees at risk. In an attempt to help Maddie cope with her bereavement away from the stresses of her job, her Italian grandmother arranges for her to spend some time in Italy with a family friend. When Maddie arrives in Tuscany she becomes intrigued by the legend of the Casa al Vento, or House of the Wind, which tells of a woman who emerged unscathed from the ruins of a house destroyed by a storm.

The second main thread of the novel is set in the same area of Tuscany in the year 1347, a time when a mysterious and deadly disease is spreading across Europe. Maria Maddalena, known as Mia, has been raised by her Aunt Jacquetta and hasn’t spoken since her mother’s tragic death. When two young pilgrims come to stay at Jacquetta’s house, Mia slowly begins to find her voice again and at the same time makes some surprising discoveries about her past.

The House of the Wind is the first book I’ve read by Titania Hardie. I thought her writing was beautiful and whether I was reading about 14th century Tuscany or modern day California I was able to become completely immersed in the time and place. I also liked the way so many different elements of myths and legends, religion, poetry, medieval medicine, arts and literature were incorporated into the story.

The obvious similarity between Maddie’s story and Mia’s is that they are both young women trying to deal with their pain and grief (more than six centuries apart) but there are lots of other connections between the two and these are slowly revealed to us as the novel progresses. Although both of the storylines were engaging, I found I was much more interested in the 14th century one and it was fascinating to learn what life was like in Tuscany during that period. However, I’ve read a lot of books with dual timeframes and it seems to be almost inevitable that I’ll like one more than the other (usually the historical one due to my love of historical fiction). I expect there will be plenty of other readers who prefer the present day storyline!

The only problem I had with this book was that the pace was too slow for me in places and there were times when I felt the plot wasn’t moving forward at all, which made the book feel longer than it needed to be. Other than that, I enjoyed The House of the Wind and as I haven’t read Titania Hardie’s previous novel, The Rose Labyrinth, I still have that one to look forward to.

I received a copy of this book from Headline for review

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

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I’ve heard so much about this book since I started blogging, particularly around this time of year when it seems such a popular choice for Halloween or the dark winter nights. Yet somehow I had managed to avoid reading any detailed summaries of the plot and so when I finally picked this book up to read it for myself, I was able to go into it with very little knowledge of what it was about. I would hate to spoil things for any future readers, so I’ve deliberately tried to keep my summary here as vague as possible.

The book is narrated by eighteen-year-old Mary Katherine Blackwood, or ‘Merricat’, who lives with her sister Constance, their Uncle Julian, and Jonas the cat in a big house on the edge of town. Near the beginning of the story we see Merricat walking home with some shopping, being taunted and chanted at by everyone she passes. It seems the Blackwoods are very unpopular, but at first we don’t know why.

When Merricat returns home, it becomes even more apparent that something is wrong. Merricat herself does not seem like a normal eighteen-year-old – she likes to bury things in the grounds of the Blackwood house and believes that using magic words and rituals will protect her home and family. Constance is agoraphobic and afraid to walk any further than the garden. Uncle Julian, confined to a wheelchair, is obsessed with the book he’s writing about a tragedy that occurred six years earlier. And what exactly has happened to the rest of the Blackwood family?

We Have Always Lived in the Castle is a great book and now that I’ve read it I can see why it’s considered a modern classic. Something that impressed me about it was the way the story was cleverly constructed so that the truth about Merricat and her family was only revealed very slowly. We know from the first page that something is not right but we’re not quite sure what it is. As we read on we start to form some suspicions, though we’re made to wait a while to find out if we’ve guessed correctly or not.

This is a very disturbing and unsettling book with its portrayal of the claustrophobic world behind the locked doors of the Blackwoods’ house and the cruel, hostile atmosphere of the town outside. Some of the sense of unease comes from the fact that the book is narrated by Merricat, who clearly lives in a world governed by her own rules and superstitions. The reader becomes trapped inside her mind and is made to share her unusual outlook on life. And yet although there’s something slightly sinister about her, Merricat is also very child-like and both she and Constance have a vulnerability that made me concerned for them, locked away in the isolation of their ‘castle’.

The ending was not quite what I had expected and I was left with questions that still hadn’t been answered, but having thought about it, maybe it was a suitable ending for such a strange and powerful book. This was my first experience of Shirley Jackson’s work and now I’m looking forward to reading The Haunting of Hill House.

A Red Herring without Mustard by Alan Bradley

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A Red Herring without Mustard is the third book in Alan Bradley’s Flavia de Luce mystery series. I loved the first two books in the series (The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie and The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag) and I was pleased to find that this one is as good as the others.

A Red Herring without Mustard, like the previous books in the series, is set in 1950s England, in the village of Bishop’s Lacey. Flavia de Luce is an eleven-year-old girl who lives with her father and sisters on their family estate, Buckshaw. Flavia has a passion for chemistry and a talent for solving murder mysteries, despite the attempts of Inspector Hewitt to stop her becoming involved. Away from her detective work, Flavia enjoys riding her trusty bicycle, Gladys, spending time in her chemical laboratory and thinking up ways to get revenge on her two sisters, Ophelia and Daphne, who are forever torturing her.

In this book a gypsy woman, Fenella Faa, is brutally attacked while camping in The Palings, part of the de Luce estate. As Flavia begins to investigate the assault, a bizarre murder takes place in the grounds of Buckshaw. The two must be connected, but how? And why is there always a smell of fish at the scene of the crime?

I thought the mystery in this book was slightly more complex than the previous ones, but for me, the real charm of this book (and the series as a whole) is not the mystery plot but the character of Flavia herself and her interactions with the people around her. In this third instalment of the series there’s a lot of focus on Flavia’s family history and in particular, the story of her mother, Harriet, who died when Flavia was younger. I enjoyed learning more about the de Luce family and it seemed that there was some development with not only Flavia’s character but also of her father and sisters, Feely and Daffy. I would like to know exactly why Feely and Daffy are both so horrible to Flavia though, and I’m hoping their relationship will improve by the end of the series!

As well as Flavia’s family, there are a large number of other recurring characters who we meet again in this book including the de Luce servants, Mrs Mullet and Dogger. We are also introduced to a new character, Fenella’s granddaughter, Porcelain Lee. I don’t know if Porcelain will appear in any future books but I hope she does as I would like Flavia to have a friend.

The other thing I love about this series is the old-fashioned feel and the setting of Bishop’s Lacey, a small village community where everybody knows everybody else. It was also interesting to explore some of the hidden corners of Buckshaw, Flavia’s home.

If you’re new to Flavia de Luce, you could probably start reading at any point in the series but I would recommend beginning with the first one and reading them in order. If you’ve enjoyed either or both of the previous novels there’s a good chance that you’ll like this one too as it’s really very similar. And the good news for Flavia fans is that the fourth book, I am Half-Sick of Shadows is out now!

The Land of Green Ginger by Winifred Holtby

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The Land of Green Ginger is the second Winifred Holtby book I’ve read, the first being South Riding, which I read (and loved) in February. This one was published a few years earlier than South Riding, in 1927.

It’s the story of a missionary’s daughter, Joanna Burton, who is born in South Africa but raised in England by her aunts. As a young woman, Joanna is a lively, high-spirited person who dreams of travelling and visiting faraway lands. Then during the First World War she falls in love with Teddy Leigh, a young man on his way to fight in the trenches in France, and they get married.

When Teddy returns from the war to their home in Yorkshire, he is in poor health and Joanna finds herself caring for an invalid husband, managing a farm, and trying to look after their two small children, Patricia and Pamela. Life is hard for Joanna and the only person she can rely on for help is their Hungarian lodger, Paul Szermai. But Joanna has never been popular with the neighbours and when people begin to gossip about her relationship with Szermai, things become even more challenging for the Leigh family.

There are some interesting subplots too, including the tale Paul Szermai shares with Joanna of his life in Hungary and other parts of Europe and how it was affected by war and communism. We also see the attitudes of the local people to the group of immigrant workers who have been employed in Joanna’s village and for whom Szermai is acting as interpreter. Holtby does a good job of portraying a small rural community who are suspicious of outsiders and of anything that might change their way of life.

Although I found Paul Szermai and Teddy Leigh difficult to like, Holtby still managed to make me feel some sympathy for all of her main characters: Szermai, because of his tragic history; Teddy, frustrated by the sickness that is keeping him confined to his bed; and of course, Joanna who has had to abandon all her earlier dreams and ambitions, yet still shows a lot of naivety and innocence. Joanna seems to be unaware of how she is perceived by other people and as a result she never quite manages to fit into life in a small village where everybody knows everybody else’s business.

So The Land of Green Ginger is a dark and emotional book, but the ending leaves us feeling more hopeful. It doesn’t have the same depth and scope as South Riding, but I really like Winifred Holtby’s writing and this is still a compelling story. And finally, I want to mention how much I love the covers of the new Virago editions of Holtby’s books!