Posts tagged with “mother”

18 April

Mother's Milk

03:58 AM
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During March and in response to a request for a novel from an English author this was the chosen book.

Although the reading group was sparesely attended due to ill-health the general consensus was clearly none too favourable though.  We were somewhat at a loss to see how the work had apparently garnered such critical acclaim, though as I noted if Will Self took it upon himself to describe Mr St. Aubyn as “pre-eminent” I had to say the emphasis must have been firmly on the “pre”!

I did enjoy the writing as particularly English, though I am not sure it showed English culture in an especially kind light.  As I observed at reading group if I encountered someone from another culture inclined towards a certain misguided anglophile delusional idealism this might be part of a required reading list to show them the down-side to being “English”.  Some of the parenting and relationship issues displayed are chronically dysfunctional.  Which prompted me to another observation, that if there were an imaginary reading group composed entirely of therapists and psychoanalysts then they would surely have a thoroughly enjoyable time meeting to discuss this book.

The narrative begins from a childs point of view with discusions rather to the father’s then the mothers.  There are two sibling boys in the family and a rather affected view of the thinking and behaviour of the younger jarred somewhat with me.  It simply did not seem authentic and left me with a firm belief that the author was far removed from first hand experience of fatherhood.  I can also clearly remember early in my reading having the thought that he could write quite authentically a woman’s voice in the first person, but by the time I had completed the novel I am far from sure this is correct.

When the reading group met it had been a couple of weeks since I finished reading and I was surprised how little I could remember of the actual plotline, although the impression of a very English novel and the jarring aspects of the narrative remained.  The group and I agreed that one authentic aspect was the portrayal of extreme old age and the inability to communicate readily with the associated anguish it might cause.  Perhaps if there is a unifying theme in the novel this is it.  The father also descends into alcoholism, the child’s voice is an isolated one observing the family and sidelined by the younger sibling, and the mother has compensated by absorbing herself with him.

A very English family perhaps, but not a very functional one.  With the contrived nature of the humour and the sensation of a “Merchant Ivory” work of literature perhaps the same could be said of this novel?

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16 January

The Secret Scriptures

07:44 AM
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One could be forgiven for thinking that this book might fall into the Dan Brown/Da Vinci code “genre” to go by the title, but you’d be wrong.  There is a narrative device of two journals which alternate and one of these is necessarily hidden away and secret.  Perhaps secret is the wrong word, but there is a big “secret” which is only revealed towards the end of the book.  It is hard for me to talk about plot specifics without revealing this secret without “spoiling” the plot.

I was really quite taken with the way this book covers the sweep of an entire century, yet does so in a very engaging way by literally covering the life story of a woman from the last century to this.  All this in the context of Ireland.  There always seem to be questions I am left asking myself after reading a book, and I think the more of them I have usually is a pretty reliable indicator as to how good the book is or at least how much it engaged me.

For this book one question was if Sebastian Barry were Irish and another was whether he started the book with the ending in mind and some sort of plot outline.  For the former a quick google has revealed that he was Dublin born and is indeed Irish, as I expected since the book is immersed in Irish culture and history which was one of the reasons I so enjoyed it.  This also enabled me to learn a lot of history and background both of the troubles and of the recent revelations of abuse cases endemic in Ireland and a few other island nations (such as the island of Jersey where a residential childrens’ facility apparently had many many historic abuse cases).

As to where he started his planning of the book - well Google is less revealing of course and we can likely only speculate.

But this does lead me to the last thing I am curious about, which is how many readers are surprised by the final “twist” to the plot.  As the interleaving narratives progress we are left wondering if they will overlap in any other way than their perspectives on Roseanne’s life (it is told in the first person from the beginning and in third person from the end).  The third person is not the narrator per se, but another character in the book.  I found this plot device immensely satisfying and it gave Mr Barry a lot of opportunity to show what a fine writer he is.

To conclude - thoroughly recommended!  And please please do leave a comment to let me know if you were totally surprised as you finished the book or if you, like me, had intimations as to what was to be revealed before it was!

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