Tring Book Club - The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor and Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

An interesting novel by a respected author I hadn't read before. We don't get to know Lucy Gault for the first 21 years of her life. A decision she made at the age of eight has devastating consequences for her family, but the writer glosses over her school life after that event. He wants to get on with what happens to her from her twenties but I wanted to know how her feelings as an older child formed the young woman now presented to us in detail.

I struggled with some of the prose: "It was apparent to him also that the bewilderment possessed the household at Lahardane as unproductively as did the agitation that disturbed his thoughts when he dwelt for too long on what had come about." I really don't want to read a sentence over and over to get the meaning, although this doesn't happen very often here. I prefer simple prose that rushes off the page. 

However, Lucy soon becomes a strong, sympathetic, though heart breaking character, and I enjoyed how we follow the story of her life and the people that are important to her.

She may tell people she is fine, but the truth is very different. Eleanor is one of the most complicated characters I have read for many years. She is bright and highly educated (who else would have a three words of Latin for a password) but without any social skills, all due to her past. She has little time for other people but would be horrified if she knew what they thought of her. She mentions "Jane Eyre; strange child, difficult to love". She doesn't know that could be a description of herself.

There are shattering glimpses of what happened to her as a child, a back story that is brilliantly constructed and revealed only in bits and pieces. The author has the most wonderful turn of phrase, some of the dialogue is extremely funny. There are times, after I had put the book down, that I would again burst into laughter. Maybe there is too much advertising for Glen's Vodka (Scottish of course), Tesco, Greggs and Magners. So the book is not perfect. How can a small modern house have space for "several cars on the drive".

This was the second time I read the book and felt much happier about the huge twist at the end than I did before. There are some important themes that punctuate the novel in brilliant ways: loneliness, how an act of kindness can have major repercussions, and how someone can change given the right circumstances and the right person.