In Elizabeth Strout's "My Name is Lucy Barton", the narrator says she will never talk about her marriage. But here we are, years later, when it all spills out in torrents. The early part of the book introduces Lucy's two children, both girls. And at the same time, she talks about her ex-husband William's mother Catherine who is now dead. But Catherine's relationship with Lucy was complicated and her ghost haunts this story. Lucy's early childhood of abject poverty (remember her family lived in a garage in the previous book) rears its head, especially when she remembers that neither her mother nor siblings attended her wedding. But these days, Lucy is a successful writer and her girls both grown and settled. There is one really emotional passage when they all meet up with William after his third wife has left him.
It is then that William takes centre stage as he invites Lucy on a road trip to trace some of his roots. Lucy's second husband has died, and she is still on reasonable terms with William as they travel around some deprived rural areas of closed down America. When Lucy talks about her marriage, it is so revealing that it seems as if we are intruding in something so personal. But the story is never less than enthralling and the spare prose from this wonderful writer grips our attention.
There is something unusual for me to pick on a character after reading about her a good few years ago, and in this case a real treat. I started off with Laura Linney in my head, having seen her as Lucy on stage, but that soon passed, and Strout's real Lucy took over. I will have to wait until next year to read "Lucy by the Sea".
I was pleased to hear that "Oh William" was shortlisted for the Booker prize, despite its short length. Andrew Holgate is leaving the Sunday Times after 23 years, 14 as literary editor. He chose Elizabeth Strout's "Olive Kitteridge" as his best novel of the 21st century. But I prefer the author's Lucy Barton novels.
Having enjoyed William Boyd's latest eight novels, I went back to this earlier book. Lorimer Black is a loss adjuster. having come across them on occasions in my profession, all I thought they did was to check the figures in an insurance claim. But here they are more interested whether there is an actual loss or whether some fraud is in play. However, there are a couple of mistakes: "a ten grand a week penalty clause if you were late". A penalty clause would be thrown out by the courts, instead it should be "liquidated and ascertained damages". A genuine pre-estimate of the costs of delay.
Lorimer is a kind of anti-hero, his hidden wealth never really explained, and his treatment of friends and lovers is pretty poor. "Why did he need another (smart) place to live? ........ insurance, he supposed. Same old story". I actually preferred the parts that involved his family and their background (Transnistrian gypsies, originally from Romania but then all over Europe). Three wonderful sisters would have made for a better book.
Instead, we get a lot about sleep disorders, Lorimer is a sufferer and is in the hands of an experimental clinic. We have repeated explanations about REM sleep etc. However, halfway through the story starts to disintegrate when things go pear shaped. I'm not sure if the book was supposed to be humorous, but to me the plot was fairly thin. The author certainly improved with this next novel: "Any Human Heart"
The main character is Kate Flynn, ("I'm really not very nice"), forty-three and a woman to be avoided at all costs. "The right way to live, the good way, had been invisible to her: now she was locked out of it, peering in through its windows". But David and his son Jamie are fixated by her. Talk about a ridiculous triangle. Kate is back in Wales to look after her elderly mother Billie. Sort of. David has two young children with his second wife Suzie after Francesca died. They all know each other. Best of all was Billie, a bit doo lally, ("what am I cooking Kate? .... Cake!) always buying clothes " white, pink and pale yellow ......... she looks every day as if she is dressed for a wedding". I liked all the conversations between the various characters, especially those of Kate with teenager Jamie (" The deserts of distance between us").
I have never read a book where one of the main characters has the same name as me. Quite weird: "He remembered he hated parties". Right at the very end, Kate sees young men playing football on "frozen mud". That takes me back to the mid sixties. playing on muddy pitches on Wormwood Scrubs that the next week were frozen ruts. Not very nice.
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