Mister Pip

New Zealander Lloyd Jones has written a superb and unusual tale for any book lover's consideration. Winner of the 2007 Commonwealth Prize, Mister Pip is a story narrated by Matilda, a 13 year old girl living in a small village on an island in New Guinea during a brutal civil war in the 1990's. Helicopters hover, power goes out, teachers have fled, and both government and rebel troops of boys surround the village. Only one white man, Mr. Watt's, remains, becoming their teacher with dreams of making the classroom a "place of light". Mr. Watt's has an abiding love for Dickens and one particular book, Great Expectations. He reads to the children to provide an escape from their dreary days, to set their minds free, to encourage them to allow their imaginations to flourish. The children are enthralled by the story, especially the character Pip. When the rebels mistakenly assume that Mr. Watt's, identified as Pip, is a spy, the tale darkens and devastating events occur. "Just as Great Expectations changes Matilda, instilling in her a moral code, so the environment in which it is read changes the book." Faced with a crisis, Mr. Watt's must spin a tale that combines elements from Pip's life, his own, and that of the beleaguered islanders. Despite the heartache and horror that are contained in the story, there is considerable charm, humor and power in this book.

Jones writes in a lyrical way and has a wonderful ear for the earthy aspects of village life. Some people are "silly as bats" and "argue like roosters". He mentions characters with big bums. Despite devastating events in the story, the author makes it clear that he has great faith in literature and it's power to effect change and offer solace. That's what contributes much to create a memorable book. This book stands alone quite well but I think it would be an ideal book to read along with Great Expectations, to form the basis of a stimulating discussion.

Finding the Past

“The Clothes on Their Backs” by English author Linda Grant was short listed for the 2008 Man Booker Prize. The heroine of this involved story that spans over sixty years is Vivien Kovacs. Vivien is the daughter of Hungarian Jewish refugees who escaped from Hungary before the war and found themselves in London. The ladies of the Women’s Royal Voluntary Service found the Kovacs a flat in the staid Benson Court where they, almost literally, hid for fifty years. Vivien’s father was a master craftsman in the backroom of a gold and diamond jeweler, and her mother rarely left the flat. They never mentioned to Vivien that they were Jewish.

As a lonely, only child Vivienne “floated through time and space…. Until I was ten I was completely unaware that I had a relative”. The doorbell rang one day and a voice on the other side of the door claimed to be Vivien’s father’s brother. But Vivien’s father angrily cried. “Go away or I will call the police”. With that introduction Vivien had an infamous, evil uncle.

Vivien finally escapes her life at Benson Court by going to college where she meets and falls in love with the quintessential tall, blond, English boy. The residents at Benson Court send Vivien and her new husband off on a honeymoon to the French Riviera where her beloved Alexander dies on the second night of the honeymoon as the result of a ghastly accident. Vivien returned to London and Benson Court and fought depression as she wandered the streets of London. One day she finds herself in Regent Park sitting next to her uncle "The Face of Evil". Her uncle is a criminal who used woman to make his fortune and then became a notorious slum landlord who landed in jail. Vivien and her uncle form a bond as she agrees help him write his memoirs. He tells the story of his wonderful childhood with Vivien’s father and their parents in Hungary, of how Vivien’s father and mother left and he stayed to be imprisoned and tortured. He gave Vivien a past, which her parents had denied her. Sandor Kovaks' story is sad, funny and dramatic, and probably the best part of the book.

Linda Grant has written a story with many layers and diverse characters. The main theme of this story is that things and people are not always what they seem to be, and it sometimes takes strange twists of fate to reveal what the truth is. The plot and the writing make for a very enjoyable, although sometimes convoluted, novel.

Revisiting an Old Friend

It's easy to get caught up in reading the hottest new authors and forget about old favorites. Recently as I surfed the web I found a reading group whose favorite book was William Maxwell's Time Will Darken It. Our group read and enjoyed two Maxwell books in the late 90's, but I had completely forgotten about him. It was time to revisit an old favorite.

The book's epigraph is a quote from “Artists on Art”, a book about landscape painting technique. It advises artists to add enough white to their paint mixture to produce a bright tint: “it must not be dark; on the contrary, it must be rather on the light side because time will darken it...”. And at first Maxwell's novel seems to be a bright charming landscape painting of the Midwest in 1912. Lawyer Austin King, his wife Martha and daughter Abbey live in Drapersville, Illinois in an innocent time when people still traveled by horse and buggy, had iceboxes on their back porches, and dropped in for visits without calling first.

When the Potter family, relatives of Austin's from Mississippi, arrive for a self-invited visit Martha is dismayed and Austin is sheepish, but it does not seem that this minor inconvenience could disturb the tranquility of the household. But slowly the presence of these visitors begins to take its toll. Austin, trying to please everyone, unable to express his feelings to his wife and unwilling to recognize the ulterior motives of his relatives, begins to lose all that he holds dear. His attempted kindness towards the Potter's daughter Nora, who harbors a burning crush on the older man, succeeds in harming them both. Again and again characters fail to understand each other, with unfortunate results.

Maxwell's prose is spare and elegant. The picture he paints of Elm Street and its residents is precisely and lovingly rendered. Behind the lace curtains he shows us the yearnings of characters trapped in the prim landscape of Drapersville. Maxwell's pace is measured; his story moves slowly in a way that seems to correspond to the time in which it takes place, a time not far into the twentieth century. He takes time to let you experience the changing of the seasons, the ebb and flow of small town life. But his plot can suddenly turn a corner and surprise you as well.

Revisiting William Maxwell reminded me once again of his wonderful talent for exploring the simple, sad moments we all experience in life.

Birds of a Feather

It has always seemed to me that people who are interested in birds and bird-watching are not just "interested" but "passionate", more so than other people with other interests. So I picked up Joyce Hinnefeld's novel In Hovering Flight in hopes of getting a better insight and understanding into this passion. The principal characters are Addie, a bird artist; her husband Tom, a college professor of ornithology; and their daughter Scarlet, named as you can guess for the Scarlet Tanager. They live in southeastern Pennsylvania. Hinnefeld is a college professor (of writing) in Bethlehem, PA (write what you know).

Addie met Tom when she was a college student in the spring of her senior year in his Biology of the Birds class. This gives the author the context for introducing samples of field journals, anecdotes about John James Audubon, descriptions of the local habitat, some poetry about birds and even "Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny." (Can someone please explain to me what that means?) The class also introduces Cora and Lou (Louise) who will be Addie's life-long friends. Although Addie's life isn't that long. She dies in her late fifties in the first chapter surrounded by her husband, daughter and these two friends.

The narrative voice alternates among each of the three family members; and the events jump back and forth in time from the college days to the time of Addie's death. Along the way Addie becomes quite radicalized by the destruction that she sees to her beloved birds and their habitat from environmental pollution. How would you feel as a teenager (Scarlet) if your mother (Addie) were being taken off to jail or had to go into hiding as a result of her protest activities? It's not surprising that for a period in high school Scarlet leaves home. But she moves in with the family of her mother's good friend Cora.

And this brings me to the aspect of the book that in the end captured my interest more than the birds. Scarlet knows that Addie, Cora and Lou have remained friends since college but she has never really understood all of the forces that bind them together. As the events of their shared history are brought to light, I was reminded again of how fortunate we are if we have (women) friends of long standing.

Now I think that I will call the local chapter of the Audubon Society to learn more.