The Voyage Home

Pat Barker

The Voyage Home by Pat Barker is the third installment of her multi-novel project on the Trojan war. In this novel, Barker turns her attention to Agamemnon’s return journey to Greece and its aftermath. The novel unfolds in two alternating threads—a first person narrative in the voice of Ritsa, a captured Trojan woman who serves as Cassandra’s handmaid; and a third person narrative that focuses on Clytemnestra and her revenge on Agamemnon for sacrificing their daughter, Iphigenia.

The novel opens with Ritsa and Cassandra as captured Trojan woman being shipped with Agamemnon to Mycenae. Ritsa describes the harrowing journey in vivid, sensory detail. Barker inhabits Ritsa’s interiority, and through Ritsa, we come to know Cassandra. Their relationship is fraught with ambiguity because, although Cassandra was once higher in status than Ritsa, now they find themselves inhabiting virtually the same status as spoils of war.

The alternating thread revolves around Clytemnestra as she prepares for her husband’s homecoming. She maintains a façade of welcoming his return while plotting her revenge. Clytemnestra has managed the kingdom during Agamemnon’s ten-year absence. She projects a calm and efficient exterior but is haunted by the death of Iphigenia and plagued with guilt for not saving her.

The novel’s strength lies in its depiction of the three female characters: Ritsa, Clytemnestra, and Cassandra. All three have been traumatized by war and all three are victims of male dominance. Each is depicted with a unique voice and perspective. And each tries to exercise agency in a world where women are routinely raped, victimized, and treated as pawns in male power plays.

Barker skillfully evokes atmosphere in both locations. The transport ship to Greece is described in vivid detail with its slippery ropes, creaky joints, cramped quarters, musty smells, damp atmosphere, and pungent stench. The palace in Mycenae is oppressive with its dark and gloomy winding hallways and hazardous stairs. To add to its sinister and menacing atmosphere, the palace of Atreus with its bloody-thirsty history is haunted by ghosts of children whose whispers can be heard and whose handprints are visible on the walls.

The novel strips war of whatever glory it ostensibly carries by depicting its returning warriors, especially Agamemnon, as sweaty, smelly, licentious men, haunted by their past deeds which they try to bury under a façade of ribaldry and partying. The women, traumatized by witnessing the murder of loved ones, the destruction of their homes, and their powerlessness against the onslaught of male sexual violence, epitomize the human cost of war. But the novel is not just about the Trojan war. Barker collapses the time separating the centuries of then and now by peppering her novel with contemporary vernacular to depict the deleterious impact of any war at any time and at any place.

By the Lake

John McGahern

By the Lake by John McGahern is a character-driven novel that is simply beautiful and beautiful in its simplicity.

It focuses on Joe and Kate Ruttledge living on a small lakeside farm in Ireland. They are surrounded by a motley crew of villagers who casually drop by for a drink and a chat. All are welcomed and all are offered refreshments. Most prominent among them are their closest friends, the village gossip, Jamesie; and his lovely wife, Mary. There is the elderly Bill Evans, traumatized by the abuse he suffered as a child. Bill no sooner enters their home than he is offered a drink and a couple of cigarettes. Patrick Ryan is building a shed for them, which, somehow, never gets finished. Jamesie’s brother, Johnny, comes home to visit every summer. John Quinn is the local womanizer, always on the lookout for another propertied widow to marry and exploit. And Joe’s wealthy uncle, nicknamed “the Shah,” has a generosity of spirit hidden beneath a no-nonsense exterior.

Nothing very much happens in the novel. The opening chapters are a little chaotic. The reader feels like an outsider listening in on conversations between people who know each other well and who have stories to share with one another. Gradually, the picture solidifies. Each character emerges with a distinct personality and an authentic voice. They casually drift in and out of one another’s conversations and one another’s lives. We come to know them, know their banter, their foibles, their camaraderie, and their predilections. But what emerges above anything else is their unequivocal support for one another. All are tolerated with grace and kindness. And all are awash with love.

McGahern situates the novel in lyrical descriptions of the natural world. The rural setting is seen through the lens of its seasonal changes. The flora and fauna are evoked in such vivid sensory detail that the rural setting assumes the same degree of prominence as a character in the novel. The villagers’ lives are inextricably intertwined with their natural environment and with the rhythmic cycles of nature.

Although nothing much happens in the novel, in a sense, what does happen is all that matters. McGahern captures a time when life was simpler, when neighbor helped neighbor, when a person’s word was tantamount to an iron-clad commitment, when people worked in harmony with nature, and when peace and serenity are captured in the sight of a heron gracefully gliding over a pristine lake.

Highly recommended.

Mona's Eyes

Thomas Schlesser; trans. Hildegarde Serle

Mona’s Eyes by Thomas Schlesser, translated from the French by Hildegarde Serle, is the story of ten-year-old Mona’s excursion into the world of art.

Mona’s journey begins when she is suddenly struck by a mysterious episode of blindness. Although her bout with blindness is temporary with Mona regaining her vision within a few hours, her parents are understandably very concerned. They consult a doctor who runs a series of tests and scans. When the results reveal that there is no physical cause for the blindness, the doctor suggests Mona visit a psychiatrist. Her maternal grandfather, known as Dadé, agrees to accompany her to her psychiatrist’s appointment every Wednesday. But instead of doing so, he unilaterally decides Mona would be better off visiting famous works of art in Paris museums. He tells Mona these expeditions are to be their little secret, urging her to deceive her parents.

Mona’s adventure into the world of art begins. Over the course of a year, Mona and Dadé visit the Louvre, the Musée D’Orsay, and the Centre Pompidou. They stand before a different work of art each week. Together they gaze intently at it, study it, discuss it, interpret it, and derive a lesson from it. Dadé provides a brief background on each artist’s life and contextualizes the work within an artistic movement. The work is described in detail. More often than not, Mona points out details that her grandfather overlooked. As the visits progress, she recognizes the influence on one artist’s work with another even though they are centuries apart, articulates connections between different artistic movements, and interprets the art work unassisted. And there’s the rub.

It is highly improbable that a ten-year-old child could have Mona’s prodigious memory or have her analytical powers when viewing a work of art. Her exchanges with Dadé are pedantic and come across as clumsy prompts to invite him to share context. And when she is not prompting him, she launches into an analysis of the art work that far exceeds the capabilities of a ten-year-old. Her Dadé comes across as arrogant and irresponsible. He encourages her to deceive her parents. And his constant amazement at his granddaughter’s erudite comments come across as hackneyed and tiresome.

The weekly visits to the museums are couched in minor plot lines with Mona’s school, her father’s business and struggles with alcoholism, her mother’s frenetic behavior, and the mystery surrounding her grandmother’s death. The plot lines are insignificant, and trite; the characterization, weak.

Schlesser’s novel-writing skills fall far short of his credibility as an art critic. He offers some interesting insights into the art works. He is informative and lucid when analyzing structure and composition. But when he interprets a work and derives its “lesson,” he gets into murky waters. Does a work of art have to be reduced to a lesson? Does it have to “mean” something? Can it not just be?

The Furies

Natalie Haynes

The Furies by Natalie Haynes unfolds primarily in the first-person voice of Alex Morris, a young theatre director mourning the untimely death of her fiancée, Luke. The manner of his death is hinted at but not fully revealed until late in the novel. Alex’s grief is so intense she leaves London to try to escape all that reminds her of him. She accepts a position in Edinburgh teaching dysfunctional children who are no longer accepted in regular schools.

Although Alex works with children of different age groups, her focus is on the class of fifteen-year-olds—two boys and three girls. Using drama therapy, she introduces the teenagers to classical Greek tragedies. She encourages them to analyze the characters and to discuss their motivations, their feelings of guilt—or lack, thereof—and their acts of vengeance. She succeeds in engaging the students in the readings and discussions.

Mel (Melody), an intelligent deaf girl, is particularly inspired by the plays and responds to the discussion. Alex’s narrative is punctuated with Mel’s dairy entries in which the young girl unveils her thoughts about the plays and her growing sympathy for Alex. She develops an unhealthy curiosity about Alex and begins stalking her. She also reveals the unhealthy degree with which she has embraced the Greek tragedies and adopted their underlying message.

Some issues with plausibility surface in the novel. For example, Alex has no prior experience in teaching, let alone in conducting a class with particularly challenging students who have been abandoned as lost causes by many others in the teaching profession. And with barely a year of teaching under her belt, she is offered the position of the school’s director when others who are more qualified and who have been there longer are by-passed.

But the novel more than makes up for these shortcomings through the classroom discussions about the plays. It is fascinating to read how these troubled teenagers engage with the Greek classics. They ask questions, speculate on motives, and interpret the material. The plays act as catalysts for the teens to open up about themselves, share their perspectives, and reveal how they do or do not relate to the characters and events in the plays. It is thrilling to see them breathe life into these ancient classics.

Another strength of the novel is Haynes’ ability to capture the insecurities, projections of tough external veneers, sensitivities, awkwardness, and halting dialogues of fifteen-year-olds. Alex manages to break through to them, and in the process, seems on the verge of finding a meaningful purpose to her life. But tragedy intervenes and Alex plummets back into the depths of despair. The novel ends on a hopeful note, however, as Alex picks up the pieces of her shattered life.

An engaging novel in which Haynes skillfully and periodically drops details about past events and foreshadows future events until a full picture emerges of what actually transpired.

Empty Cages

Fatma Qandil; trans. Adam Talib

Empty Cages by Fatma Qandil, translated from the Arabic by Adam Talib, is a fictional memoir in the first-person voice of Fatima, the youngest child in a middle-class Egyptian family. The discovery of an old tin that once contained chocolates is the catalyst that triggers Fatima’s reflections of growing up with two older brothers, an alcohol-addicted father, and a loving and supportive mother.

Beginning in the 1960s to the present day, the novel unfolds in a series of vignettes that are in a non-linear sequence. They include snapshots of Fatima’s childhood, including her recollections of being molested as a child. She traces the gradual economic decline of the family; her father’s increasing addiction to alcohol until his death; the selfishness of her brothers, one of whom disappears in Germany for twenty years, and the other who reluctantly and irregularly sends money to support their mother’s cancer treatments. Throughout it all, Fatima struggles to complete her studies and fulfill her ambition of being a poet.

The diction is unflinchingly honest and candid. The style is confessional and intimate. Fatima identifies her brothers as selfish, narcissistic individuals who virtually abandon their widowed mother. She is well aware her father’s addiction is what dragged them into financial ruin. She is forced to rely on friends and family for help with her mother’s medical expenses.

One of the strengths of the novel is the depiction of Fatima’s relationship with her mother. It is a relationship built on unconditional love, mutual support, and a shared understanding of life’s struggles. They are totally and unequivocally devoted to one another. Fatima describes in graphic detail the challenges of being the sole caregiver to her mother as she battles cancer treatments of chemotherapy and radiation. She displays a herculean patience in treating her mother’s ailing and fragile body in need of constant attention and constant care. She describes the continuous vigil by her mother’s side, remembering to change her IV bag, her bandages, and her diaper. And she does it all with sensitivity and tenderness.

An accomplished poet, Fatma Qandil received the Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature in 2022. This, her debut novel, is at times lyrical, at times raw, but always engaging, sensitive, and genuine. Her determination to survive and to remain true to her voice is commendable. How much of this novel is autobiographical is unclear. But what is clear is Fatma Qandil has given her central character a narrative voice that authentically depicts what life is like for a woman struggling to survive in a misogynistic, patriarchal world.

A Calamity of Noble Houses

Amira Ghenim; trans. Miled Faiza and Karen McNeil

A Calamity of Noble Houses by Amira Ghenim, translated from the Arabic by Miled Faiza and Karen McNeil, is the story of two wealthy, prominent Tunisian families connected through marriage. A family tree illustrates who is related to whom. Zbaida Rassaa marries Mohsen Ennaifer, the son of a conservative judge. Zbaida is educated in a French school and has been raised in a progressive family espousing liberal views on women in Islam. The novel charts how the families are torn apart by an event that happened on a fateful day in 1935, an event which continues to haunt them and their offspring for decades. The event is the discovery of a letter addressed to Zbaida, ostensibly revealing her illicit affair with her former tutor and social reformer, Tahar Haddad.

The novel unfolds through multiple first-person voices of each character impacted by the event in one way or another. Included are the voices of two servants, one of whom has an unflinching loyalty to Zbaida. The narratives present different perspectives on the event and its ensuing consequences, with each adding layer upon layer of detail. The testimonies are confessional in nature and reveal a tangled web of lies, deceits, betrayals, violence, secrets, regrets, and hypocrisies. These are set against the backdrop of the socially constructed male hegemonic power structure with its concomitant double standards the privilege the male. Embedded throughout the narratives are historical events of Tunisia under French colonialism, its political unrest, and its struggle for independence. The historical context lends the narratives an aura of authenticity.

What emerges from this elaborate tale is a complex tapestry of gripping revelations as each member of the household relives the traumatic. Their recollections illuminate their prejudices, inconsistencies, and jaundiced perspectives. The novel concludes in the present day with Zbaida’s granddaughter, Hind, trying to piece together this elaborate puzzle to ascertain the truth of what happened on that eventful day and its aftermath. Her quest to discover the truth about her grandmother’s ostensible affair with Tahar Haddad remains unresolved.

A gripping, well-executed tale that illustrates the elusive nature of a past event due to the personal bias and jaundiced lens which shape a participant’s recollections.

The Lotus Shoes

Jane Yang

The Lotus Shoes by Jane Yang loosely adheres to the Cinderella trope of rags to riches with a setting in 19th century China. The narrative unfolds through the alternating first-person voices of Little Flower and Linjing.

Driven by severe poverty, Little Flower’s mother sells her to be a muzai (a maid servant) to Linjing, the daughter of a prominent family. But Little Flower’s mother tries to secure her daughter’s future prospects by binding her feet in the hope that her “golden lilies” will attract a spouse who will release her from bondage.

From the outset, Little Flower and Linjing have a contentious relationship. Linjing is jealous of Little Flower’s golden lilies and insists they should be unbound. The forced unbinding of her feet means Little Flower has permanently deformed feet. Linjing is also jealous of Little Flower’s extraordinary skill with embroidery—a talent unheard of in a maid servant with large feet. Little Flower’s embroidery skills earn her the respect of Linjing’s mother, which only exacerbates the tension between the two girls.

When Little Flower tries to escape her bondage, she is captured and suffers a severe punishment which leaves one of her hands permanently disfigured. Things come to a head when Linjing’s true parentage is revealed, and both girls are sent away to a sanctuary for celibate women to work in a silk factory. Linjing pins her hopes on escaping the drudgery of work by convincing herself the employer of the silk factory is attracted to her. When she discovers he is attracted to Little Flower, she becomes enraged and plans revenge. The consequence of her exposure of Little Flower’s relationship is far more serious than she had anticipated. The novel ends with both girls going their separate ways. Little Flower marries her former employer; Linjing becomes a teacher for orphaned Chinese girls.

Set against the backdrop of 19thC China, the novel captures the rigid hierarchy of Chinese society; the patriarchal family dynamics; the treatment of women as commodities to be sold, bartered, and/or married off; and the obsession with bound feet as a marker of upper-class society. The tension between Little Flower and Linjing propels the narrative. But the portrayal of the two main characters is stiff, labored, and marred by a heavy reliance on their respective internal monologues. Each is caught in a repetitive loop of interiority, articulating the same thoughts ad infinitum to the point of become tedious. Their internal thoughts lacked subtlety or nuance. The narrative further suffered from the unwarranted amount of exposition which slowed the pace and disrupted the flow.

The story had a lot of potential, but the execution was disappointing.

Instructions for a Heatwave

Maggie O’Farrell

Instructions for a Heatwave by Maggie O’Farrell takes place over a period of four days in July during the 1976 heatwave. Opening on July 15, Gretta watches as her retired husband, Robert, leaves the house to fetch the paper from a nearby store. When he doesn’t return, Gretta becomes concerned. The police are called. It turns out Robert has withdrawn money from their bank account and mysteriously disappeared.

Gretta calls her son, Michael Francis, who then contacts his two sisters, Monica and Aiofe. Michael Francis lives in London with his wife and two children. Monica lives in the countryside with her second husband. And Aiofe flies back from America where she has been living for several years. Gretta’s three children converge on their family home in London to solve the mystery of their father’s disappearance.

The novel alternates between the multiple perspectives of Gretta and her three adult children. With each perspective we learn the character’s backstory and current situation. Gretta, of Irish Catholic descent, settled in London with Robert and raised three children. She is garrulous, opinionated, manipulative, and deceptive. Michael Francis, a frustrated history school teacher, is experiencing marital problems with his wife, Claire. Monica is also experiencing marital problems with her second husband and is treated with contempt by her two step-daughters. And Aiofe, suffering from some form of undiagnosed dyslexia, feels ashamed of her inability to read and has harbored that secret from her employer and boyfriend in America.

O’Farrell sets this family drama against a vivid description of a heat wave. The family tension similarly heats up with past grievances, resentments, and childish petty squabbles. Accusations are hurled from one to another; misunderstandings abound. Eventually, the children piece together clues and confront their mother with their findings. Gretta reluctantly reveals secrets she and Robert had kept from their children for decades. The family then heads to Ireland to search for Robert. The novel has an open-ended conclusion with Robert walking up the path to reunite with his family. Although not clearly stated, the suggestion is the family has healed and forgiven one another’s trespasses. Their mutual love has re-surfaced in spite of the bruises and hurts.

This compelling family drama skillfully weaves the four different perspectives which illuminate one another as they unfold. The characters are portrayed as distinct, unique, and believable individuals. We see the challenges and anxieties they each face. O’Farrell is an expert at presenting a character’s interiority and dialogue that is specific to that individual. Her ability to get inside a character’s head and to present each one as a believable individual is nothing short of masterly.

An engaging, well-crafted story with characters that leap off the page with their authenticity.

Highly recommended.

Heart the Lover

Lily King

Heart the Lover by Lily King is an engaging novel about the relationship of three college students. The novel unfolds in the first-person voice of Jordan, the nickname given to her by Sam and Yash, two classmates in her literature class. Sam and Yash are house-sitting for a professor during his absence. Jordan becomes Sam’s girlfriend and moves in with them. But Sam, a devout Baptist, is unwilling to fully consummate their relationship, much to Jordan’s dismay. Meanwhile, she finds herself attracted to Yash, the gangly, brilliant roommate. Predictably, Jordan’s relationship with Sam fizzles out and she and Yosh become lovers. Unexpectedly, their relationship also comes to an abrupt end.

Fast-forward decades later. The narrator, now a successful author, is happily married and the mother of two sons. Yash pays her a visit, stirring up old memories and personal hurts. The narrator experiences a traumatic upheaval when one of her young boys is diagnosed with a brain tumor requiring a series of brain surgeries. And in the midst of this turmoil, she receives news Yash is dying of cancer and has been hospitalized. She rushes to his bedside where she is reunited with both Sam and Yash. They share laughter and old memories, all the while knowing Yash is on his death bed.

Lily King skillfully evokes the strong bonds that can be forged between students attending the same college and many of the same classes. Jordan, Sam, and Yash are in and out of each other’s lives, discussing professors, debating books they’ve read, sharing opinions, and eating pizzas. But in Jordan’s eyes, this is a relationship of unequals. She perceives herself as academically and intellectually inferior to Sam and Yash. She refers to herself as a “mere student” while they are “scholars.” Intimidated by them, she is in awe of their intellect and is flattered by their interest in her. She allows them to rename her Jordan. Her real name, Casey, is not revealed until the last sentence in the novel. Since renaming is a means of asserting power over an individual, it is apparent Sam and Yosh deem themselves superior to Jordan not only by having the audacity to rename her to suit themselves but also by the manner in which they later dismiss her in their relationship.

King enables us to see Sam and Yosh through Jordan’s eyes, while at the same time we recognize their masculine assertions of power and their contempt for her academic interests. The irony is that decades later, Jordan has become a successful novelist and is happily married. Sam is divorced and Yash never marries. Although she may be justified to do so, Jordan never lords her success over them.

What King captures so poignantly, effectively, and with tenderness is the love these three people have for each other, a love that transcends past transgressions, hurts, betrayals, miscommunications, abandonments, distances, and separations. It is an unshakeable love that transcends time and place. It is a college love affair for the ages.

Highly recommended.

Shakespeare Saved My Life

Laura Bates

Shakespeare Saved My Life by Laura Bates is a powerful memoir of Dr. Bates’ experience teaching Shakespeare to prisoners in a maximum-security prison. The memoir takes place over a period of several years, during which time she comes to know, respect, and befriend Larry Newton, a convicted murderer. The memoir focuses primarily on Newton and his reactions to Shakespeare’s plays.

Although his formal education ended at fifth grade, and although he had never heard of Shakespeare prior to this experience, Newton’s approach to Shakespeare’s plays is inspiring. He interprets each play with fresh eyes and without the encumbrance of relying on literary critics. He connects with Shakespeare’s words on a personal level and applies them to his own experiences. His insights and ability to relate to the characters is inspiring. His repeated refrain is Shakespeare liberated his mind and saved his life. Newton becomes a star pupil who uses Shakespeare’s plays to challenge other prisoners to consider their own lives and to question their motivations and actions. Eventually, he writes a series of workbooks and produces plays to help others experience a similar, liberating transformation.

Dr. Bates’ work with prisoners earns recognition among prison officials, the media, and university students and administrators. Larry becomes a celebrity, impressing even Shakespeare scholars with his interpretations and fresh insights. His transformation is acknowledged by prison officials. No longer deemed a violent threat, Larry is released from the ten years he spent in solitary confinement and is permitted to join other prisoners.

The memoir is a powerful testament of the profound ability of literature, in particular, Shakespeare, to transform lives. It is also an indictment of the penal system. The conditions of Larry’s solitary confinement are horrifying. And when he was only seventeen, Larry had agreed to serve a life sentence without the possibility of parole not fully comprehending what he was doing.

Laura Bates’ memoir challenges readers to reconsider attitudes toward punishment and rehabilitation of incarcerated individuals and to acknowledge the power of education to transform their lives. She provides statistics to demonstrate the prisoners who participated in the Shakespeare program no longer committed violent offenses in prison and were not repeat offenders after their release.

Larry is white, and although his experience with Shakespeare is inspiring, the memoir’s focus on a single white inmate is problematic. Since the majority of the prison population consists of people of color, the memoir would have benefited from greater inclusivity by giving voice to the interpretations and reactions of a wider and more diverse population. Nevertheless, this is an inspiring memoir chronicling the transformative power of education and the constructive impact it can have on incarcerated individuals.

Fundamentally

Nussaibah Younis

Fundamentally by Nussaibah Younis unfolds in the first-person voice of Dr. Nadia Amin. Having published an article on the possibility of rehabilitating ISIS brides, she captures the attention of the UN who invite her to lead a deradicalization group for ISIS brides in Iraq. Escaping from a failed relationship and a fraught connection with her mother, Nadia accepts the position and arrives in Baghdad. She meets her team, each one of whom displays little faith in the chance of success.

Undeterred, Nadia meets the ISIS brides to begin work. While at the refugee camp, she encounters Sara, a British Asian, who became an ISIS bride at the age of fifteen. Nadia sees herself in this young woman since both are British Asian. She becomes fixated on her, determined to get her rehabilitated and returned to England. Meanwhile she ignores the other women who need assistance and who are, perhaps, more deserving than Sara.

Why these women became ISIS brides and what can be done to ensure they are no threat to society is a matter of grave concern. Unfortunately, the subject is treated with a glibness that is off putting, mainly due to the tone and nature of Nadia’s narrative voice. Nadia is self-absorbed, naïve, silly, irreverent, flippant, and prone to histrionics. She swears constantly, is boisterous, crude, and disagreeable. Her attempts at humor are obvious and strained. Her interiority and speech are littered with sexual innuendo. Her go-to response when she is confronted with an obstacle is to drink herself into a stupor and engage in promiscuous sex. Her fixation on Sara seems more to do with her need to find a purpose for herself than it actually has to do with helping a young woman redeem herself for making a serious error in judgment.

The characters are two-dimensional and cartoonish. The UN staff are self-absorbed individuals who are more interested in promoting themselves than in helping others. They play childish pranks on each other and lack moral, ethical, or intellectual depth. The focus is almost exclusively on the European staff with almost a total absence of Iraqi voices—the very people who are essential to the success of any UN mission in Iraq since they know the local population and can navigate the complex dynamics. The Arab women in the refugee camp are similarly rendered voiceless and invisible. Although a number of them are present, we get barely a glimpse of their torturous stories, experiences, and traumas because their voices are buried beneath Nadia’s attempt to bond with Sara.

The humor throughout the novel is puerile and in poor taste; the dialogue, unrealistic. And while the novel raises serious issues, it fails to address them adequately or to deliver any workable insight on resolving such a complex problem. And to top it off, the ending in which Nadia orchestrates Sara’s escape is rushed, absurd, and highly improbable.

A problematic treatment of an issue that warrants a complex and nuanced exploration.

The Heart in Winter

Kevin Barry

The Heart in Winter by Kevin Barry opens in Butte, Montana, in the 1890s. Tom Rourke, a periodically drunk, opium-addicted Irishman earns money to support his habits by writing letters for illiterate men to entice brides from the east. He stumbles along in a drunken, drug-addicted stupor, frequenting brothels and writing songs.

Rourke’s daily habits come to a screeching halt when he encounters Polly Gillespie, a newly arrived mail-order bride to a self-flagellating, religiously-obsessed owner of a copper mine. Tom is immediately smitten. And, as it turns out, so is Polly. They engage in a clandestine love affair and decide to elope to San Francisco. They steal money. The steal a temperamental palomino horse, and they gallop off in search of freedom. Hot on their heels is the ruthless Jago Marrak with his two shady accomplices enticed by reward money to catch the culprits. The remainder of the novel consists of the lovers’ encounters on their journey to freedom until the end of their escapade. Polly has the last word many years later.

A number of factors make this a delicious read. Prominent among them is the narrative voice. It is at once funny, engaging, sarcastic, and snappy. The language is expressive, poignant, and sings with lyricism. Barry has a way of making his words dance on the page. Butte is described vividly as a copper-mining, lawless town espousing crude social structures, debauchery, with an influx of immigrants, mail-order brides, sex-workers, and drunks. Barry is equally effective in character portrayal. Even the minor characters leap off the page as well-rounded, authentic individuals, beginning with Rourke’s photographer employer, the three-member posse in hot pursuit, Polly’s erstwhile husband, and the colorful characters Tom and Polly encounter on their journey. But most striking of all is his portrayal of Tom and Polly.

To describe them as passionately, head-over-heels in love is to put it mildly. They connect wordlessly, know each other’s foibles, understand one another, struggle together, and persist in spite of their dwindling resources. Their diction is authentic, laced with humor and sarcasm. Barry communicates their unequivocal love without resorting to mushy language or cliches. His is a delightful portrayal of adoring, star-crossed lovers fumbling wildly in search of a freedom they really don’t expect to find on a horse they barely know how to ride.

The novel is imbued with a farce-like quality. Its compelling characters; realistic setting; energetic pace; and rhythmic, lyrical prose make this a quick, thoroughly delightful, and engaging read in the very capable hands of Kevin Barry.

The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of the Modern World

Selena Wisnom

The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of the Modern World by Selena Wisnom is an exciting and extensive exploration of the library of Ashurbanipal in the seventh century BCE in ancient Mesopotamia, the area of modern-day Iraq.

Ashurbanipal, king of the Assyrian empire, espoused knowledge, accumulating texts from all over his empire to house them in his library. It is estimated his library held more than 30,000 tablets covering a wide range of topics, including medical knowledge, prayers, laments, songs, literary works (including The Epic of Gilgamesh), esoteric lore, records of victories in battle, documents for governing, correspondences, and dictionaries. Written in cuneiform script on clay tablets, the library is a window on the culture and times of Ashurbanipal. And because Ashurbanipal preserved tablets that were considered ancient even in his lifetime, we also have access to the cultures of ancient Sumer and Babylonia which predate Ashurbanipal by 2,000 years.

Professor Wisnom, an Assyrian scholar with an expertise on cuneiform script, is a lecturer at the University of Leicester. She provides a systematic exploration of the contents of Ashurbanipal’s library from a wealth of the surviving tablets that have so far been deciphered. Her exploration is extensive, beginning with the cuneiform writing system invented in the fourth millennium BCE to the story of its decipherment by Victorian scholars in the 19th Century. She includes analyses of manuals on magic, medicine, divination, astrology, and relationship with the gods. She compiles what daily life must have been like for Ashurbanipal by reading his correspondences and list of duties. But perhaps one of the most exciting finds is the Nineveh Medical compendium, the first known medical text consisting of a collection of treatments organized from head to toe, beginning with all manner of ailments in the head and proceeding all the way down to the anus and hamstrings. This fascinating medical compilation is currently available online at the British Museum.

Wisnom’s book includes several pages of color plates, a Bibliographical Essay for each chapter, A Guide to Primary Sources, a 40-page Bibliography, and extensive notes. The diction is accessible, peppered with occasional humor, and minus the academic jargon that frequently plagues a work of such impressive academic quality. It is very readable, engaging, and highly recommended for those interested in understanding the profound and ubiquitous influence of Mesopotamia in shaping our world.

A Sufi Commentary on the Tao Teh Ching: The Way and Its Virtue

Seyyed Hossein Nasr

A Sufi Commentary on the Tao Te Ching: The Way and Its Virtue by Seyyed Hossein Nasr highlights some of the similarities between the Tao Te Ching with Islam and Sufism. Part 1 of the book consists primarily of interpretations of the Tao. Part 2 makes a more consistent effort to connect the Tao with Islam and Sufism, drawing on their similarities, and citing passages from the Tao alongside passages from the Qur’an and excerpts from the writing of Sufi scholars.

The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and his Mother)

Rabih Alameddine

The True, True Story of Raja the Gullible (and his mother) by Rabih Alameddine sweeps through sixty years of Lebanon’s history in the voice of sixty-three-year-old Raja, living in a Beirut apartment with his octogenarian mother, Zalfa. Raja is a popular and highly successful philosophy teacher, well loved by his students. He is also a homosexual, a fact well-known throughout his neighborhood and for which he was mercilessly teased as a young boy.

The novel opens in 2023 but then leaps back in time to the 1960s, leads up to and includes Raja’s experiences as a teenager during the 1975 Lebanese civil war, the banking crisis, the COVID pandemic, the 2021 devastating Beirut port explosion, Raja’s short trip to Virginia, and concludes by taking the reader full circle back to 2023. Alameddine skillfully weaves Lebanon’s turbulent history in the narrative, lending it an air of authenticity. But what makes this novel such an outrageously funny and delicious read is Raja’s engaging voice as he contends with his force-to-be-reckoned-with mother.

Raja is a book lover who enjoys solitude, routine, and quiet walks. All this comes to a screeching halt when his mother moves in with him. Rather than trying to accommodate to her son’s wishes, Zalfa imposes herself into every aspect of her son’s life. She coerces information out of him about his students, has an opinion on every subject, admonishes him, bullies him into submission, tramples on his self-proclaimed boundaries, and insists on and succeeds in getting her way in everything. Their relationship is adversarial. They constantly cuss at each other. Their dialogue is riddled with argumentative banter. But underneath their tempestuous exchanges is the fierce, unequivocal, and unconditional love they have for one another.

Much of the humor of the novel lies in Raja’s interaction with his mother. This humor is compounded when Zalfa befriends Madame Taweel; a wealthy, gangster-type woman who has made a fortune selling generators to Beirut’s beleaguered population. The two women form an inseparable bond. Madame Taweel frequently turns up at Raja’s apartment unannounced with her gun-toting body-guards. The indomitable female duo speak with one voice as they offer Raja unsolicited advice on how to run his life.

The novel unfolds in disparate threads which eventually coalesce into a coherent whole. The unifying thread is Raja’s distinct voice as he leaps in time while peppering his story-embedded-within-a-story narrative with direct addresses to the reader to assure us he is still in control of the disparate threads.

The novel is hilarious, tragic, poignant, moving, and always, always engaging. Ultimately, it is a wildly entertaining and powerful celebration of love in its many guises and manifestations.

A Far Country

Daniel Mason

A Far Country by Daniel Mason is a slow-moving novel in which Isabel, a young girl in a drought-ridden, remote village of an unnamed country, journeys to the city to find her missing brother, Isaias. The novel unfolds from Isabel’s perspective. Only fourteen years old, Isabel navigates the hazardous trip alone, arriving at her cousin’s home in the “settlements.” She is the care-giver of her cousin’s baby during the week while her cousin works as a maid. Eventually, Isabel finds work during the weekends as a flag waver. But all the while, she thinks of finding Isaias.

The novel’s strength lies in its descriptive details. Mason immerses the reader in the sights, sounds, and smells of the drought-ridden village. He shows the desperation and hunger of the villagers who resort to eating earth to quell hunger. He depicts Isabel’s journey to the city in palpable detail. And from there he describes the sights, sounds, and smells of the settlement of New Eden, which is little more than a shanty town on the outskirts of the city. Here Isabel is exposed to exploitation, harassment, violent crime, and a different type of poverty.

Although Mason is successful in establishing atmosphere and recording details, the novel has a distinctly allegorical feel. There is an abstract quality to it which extends to the characters, none of whom emerge as fully realized or authentic. Isabel becomes a type, a sort of “everygirl.” She represents the poor, the disenfranchised, the rural populations who leave their villages and are forced to navigate unfamiliar territory in an urban environment that is at once frightening and alien. What potential conflicts or tensions she encounters fizzle out and disappear with no follow-up. She alternates between searching for Isaias or passively waiting for him to appear at the doorstep.

The slow narrative pace, the under developed characters, and the distancing effect of the style are a departure for Mason which makes this not as rewarding a read as his other novels.

The Bone People

Keri Hulme

The Bone People by Keri Hulme, winner of the 1986 Booker Prize, is situated in New Zealand and focuses on three individuals: Kerewin Holmes, a solitary artist who lives in an isolated tower; Simon, a young boy with a mysterious background who doesn’t speak, is prone to fits of violence, and has no sense of personal property; and Joe, Simon’s surrogate father who took Simon in when he washed up on the coast after a shipwreck.

When Simon breaks into Kerewin’s tower in the pouring rain, Kerewin takes him in until a family member picks him up. Through Simon, she meets Joe and the three become intertwined into a slapdash unit. Kerewin values her freedom and refuses Joe’s attempts to draw her into a romantic relationship. Their friendship becomes temporarily strained when Kerewin discovers that Joe’s fierce, protective love for Simon can translate into brutal violence towards the young child. When Joe’s beatings cause severe damage to Simon, social services step in and take the child away. Joe is temporarily incarcerated, and Kerewin destroys her tower and moves away. But the three are reunited at the end of the novel in Kerewin’s remodeled tower.

The narrative is complicated, confusing, and difficult to follow, at times. Hulme peppers her prose with a character’s stream of consciousness and interiority; unannounced jarring shifts in perspective; jagged, half-articulated thoughts; bouts of a drunken slurring of words; and leaps in time and location. Scattered throughout the complex, challenging language are references to Māori myths and legends. The tensions between the colonialists and the struggle of the indigenous people to retain their culture and language is sensitively handled. Characters frequently dot their language with Māori phrases and words. Fortunately, Hulme provides a translation of these in the back pages of the novel.

The novel’s conclusion is somewhat unsatisfactory. The ending reads like a hurried tying of loose ends. Joe experiences some sort of mystical epiphany; Kerewin recovers from a near death experience; and Simon is reunited with the two people he loves. The cause of Simon’s mysterious background and strange behaviors is alluded to but never adequately explained. The mystical elements are confusing and come across as a perfunctory deus ex machina inserted to bring the novel to closure.

The novel grapples with issues of cultural identity and erasure; with trauma and domestic violence; with isolation and abandonment; with the importance of familial bonds and community; and with the search for healing and forgiveness. Some of the thematic impact was diluted because of the nature of the narrative and complexity of its language.

A Registry of My Passage Upon the Earth

Daniel Mason

A Registry of my Passage Upon the Earth by Daniel Mason is a collection of nine short stories in which Mason’s talent as a writer of immersive, descriptive prose is on full display. The stories transport the reader to different times and different locations.

The vividly drawn characters in each story are intensely driven. Some are based on historical figures, like Jacob Burke, the pugilist; Alfred Russel Wallace, who shared his theory of evolution with Charles Darwin; and an Egyptian Pharoah who tried to discover the origin of language by experimenting with children. Other characters are fictional—a hot air female balloonist; a mother desperate to relieve her son’s breathing problems in the polluted air of Victorian London; a man who prefers the solitary life in the jungles of Brazil; a doctor suffering from memory lapses at which time a better version of himself appears; and an immigrant who participates in Civil War re-enactments to cultivate a sense of belonging.

Mason injects science, technology, fantasy, and humor in this original and thought-provoking collection packaged in masterful writing. He demonstrates his consummate story-telling skills by immersing the reader in evocative prose and vivid characters. The stories are compelling. Each has a different flavor, but each delves deeply into a character’s interiority to depict the character’s state of mind when confronted with a challenge. And as he has amply demonstrated in this and in his novels, Daniel Mason has a vibrant imagination. His range is both wide and breath-taking.

The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox

Maggie O’Farrell

The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O’Farrell alternates location and time frame between colonial India where two sisters, Kitty and Esme, were born and spent their early childhood; 1930s Edinburgh where the sisters grew up under the care of their grandmother, Kitty; and Iris in present-day Edinburgh.

The novel opens with Iris receiving a phone call concerning her great aunt, Euphemia (Esme). It seems the mental institution where Esme has been incarcerated for the last 60 years is closing down. Iris is contacted because she is listed as the next of kin. She is convinced there is a mistake since she had never heard of a great aunt and her grandmother had never mentioned a sister. Nevertheless, Iris decides to visit Esme and ends up taking her home over a weekend until suitable housing can be found for her. Meanwhile, Kitty, Iris’ grandmother, suffers from Alzheimer and exhibits memory lapses. She babbles incoherently about Esme refusing to release a baby.

Intermittent flashbacks peppered with the characters’ interiority reveal Kitty and Esme’s back stories in India and Edinburgh. Kitty, seemingly docile and well-behaved, subscribes to the social and gendered roles assigned to her. She looks forward to finding a suitable mate. Esme, on the other hand, has little patience for social expectations. She likes to read, wants to pursue her education, is outspoken, flaunts conventions, and has no desire for marriage. Unfortunately, that makes her attractive to an unscrupulous young man who violates her. As a consequence, Esme is carted away to the mental institution where she is incarcerated for over 60 years, unvisited and forgotten.

Esme is erect, calm, lucid, and courteous when Iris meets her. She has her wits about her. She discloses snatches of her past to Iris who then pieces together the reason for Esme’s incarceration and why her existence had been kept a secret. When Esme asks to visit her sister, Iris agrees to take her. The final confrontation between the two sisters with its tragic consequences indicates Esme knew all along who had orchestrated her incarceration.

This very powerful novel unfolds slowly as it reveals snapshots of the past through leaps in time and through the characters’ interiority. Iris’ interiority reveals the challenges in her own life and the horror she feels when she learns of Esme’s fate. Kitty’s interiority reveals her to be cruel, vicious, riddled with guilt, consumed with jealousy toward Esme, haunted by her past actions, and harboring a terrible secret. And Esme’s interiority shows the terror of being unjustifiably incarcerated and forgotten for more than 60 years.

The novel addresses the themes of rape, madness, violence, physical and emotional abuse, childhood abuse, hypocrisy, torture, sibling rivalry, Victorian asylums, and patriarchal double standards. It highlights the tragic fate of young girls and women who did not fit neatly into the mold society had assigned for them.

This is not an easy read because of the nature of the topics it addresses. But in the more than capable hands of Maggie O’Farrell, it is well worth the effort and is highly recommended.

Women's Work: The First 20,000 Years

Elizabeth Wayland Barber

First published in 1994, Women’s Work: The First 20,000 Years by Elizabeth Wayland Barber consists of ground breaking research that traces the role of women and their work with early textiles through 20,000 years of history.

Professor Barber’s painstaking research unearths the invaluable contribution of women’s labor in ancient cultures. Women worked primarily with food and clothing since their childbearing and child-rearing responsibilities required them to work close to home. Because food and clothing are perishable items which leave scant evidence of their existence, women’s work had been rendered virtually invisible.

By shifting her focus, keeping an open mind, and using a different set of lenses to examine the existing evidence, Professor Barber garners a wealth of information about women’s work with textiles from scraps of ancient cloth that survived the centuries—remnants of cloth that had been cavalierly dismissed during early excavations. She combines this exploration with closely examining the surviving tools of spinning and weaving; combing through clues in mythology and literature; deconstructing etymologies; exploring ethnographic studies; delving into documented archaeological discoveries; and contextualizing the location of artefacts. In addition, her research incorporates a hands-on approach. She garners insights by drawing the details of clothing on statues and by painstakingly weaving patterns she had observed in Mycenean frescoes as well as in other ancient sites. She argues clothing served many functions, including as a visual means of communicating the marital status and fertility of women.

The scope and meticulous quality of the research is impressive. Professor Barber does not make unwarranted leaps in conclusion but methodically and systematically allows the evidence to speak for itself. She includes an extensive list of sources and an index.

This scholarly work is highly accessible, informative, and provides a fascinating glimpse into ancient cultures. Above all, it performs the important task of rendering visible women’s invaluable contribution to shaping the warp and weft of civilizations.