17 posts tagged “love”

n what was a departure for Sarah Waters after three (extremely popular) Victorian novels, this book is set during and around the time of WWII.  It tells the story of four characters - Kay; a lonely woman, tired of life and love; Viv, a young beauty who is loyal to her Soldier lover, despite her reservations; Helen, Viv's colleague who is harbouring troubling thoughts about her relationship; and Duncan, Viv's younger brother who has been through some troubling times.

Sarah Waters employs an unusual plot device in splitting the book into three parts which move backwards chronologically.  The first part is set in 1947, when England is recovering from war, and we watch the characters moving through their lives.  The second part is set in 1944, at the height of WWII, and the first part is set in 1941.  (However, each individual section moves forward and tells the events of a few weeks or months in the characters' lives.)  The second and third parts start to fill in the blanks in their lives so that we discover how they came to find themselves in the situations they are in at the beginning (or the end) of the novel.

Every character - even the peripheral ones - is described wonderfully so that the reader really feels that they have come to know these people.  They are decent characters, but each with their very personal and believeable flaws.  1940s London is also portrayed very vividly and beautifully, with the ravaged city almost being a fifth main character.

I have always thought that Sarah Waters is a wonderful and very talented novelist - this book serves to confirm my opinion further.  I found myself anxious to know how the story turned out, and it held my attention completely.  Highly recommended.

Clare first meets Henry when she is 6 and he is 36.  But Henry is no normal man, and due to his chrono-displacement condition (in short, he involuntarily time-travels), he is able to marry Clare when he is 30 and she is 22.

Their love is enduring and strong, but due to Henry's disappearances to other times - which he is unable to control - it means that they have to adjust to a life where Clare often doesn't know where, or even when, Henry is.

Their life together is therefore sometimes difficult but (nearly) always wonderful.  Henry has met Clare when she was a little girl and has effectively watched her grow up while all the time knowing that they will fall in love and marry.  However, while Clare can remember these meetings, Henry (when he is in 'real' time) can't remember them, because they involve time traveling expeditions that haven't happened yet - even though in one way they have already happened.  

Sounds confusing, but it isn't.  Audrey Niffenegger makes this story ebb and flow beautifully, and it is always easy for the reader (if not the characters) to understand what is happening.

I loved the character of Henry.  Rather than making him a tragic yet supremely heroic man, he is portrayed as a man who through necessity, often indulges in theft, burglary and violence (the first two out of necessity - wherever Henry travels to, he always arrives naked and without provisions; and the third in self defence when he has arrived somewhere in said naked state).  This serves to make him more believable.  Clare was somewhat less of a fully rounded character, but she was certainly realistic enough to be believable, and for the reader to care about.

Where Audrey Niffenegger has really triumphed though, is in making an outlandish plot seem credible.  I absolutely do not believe in time travel, and yet for the duration of this book, I found myself totally buying into the concept.  It helps that other characters in the book are as amazed by Henry's predicament as you would expect anybody to be.

This is an original and compelling love story, between two characters who I really found myself rooting for.  But it's not all hearts and flowers.  Clare and Henry suffer a lot of pain and heartbreak during their life, but while their time together is unpredictable and inconstant, their love certainly isn't.  I will be nagging friends to read this book, and will certainly be reading it again myself in the future.

Harry Blake and his young son Tom suffer a tragedy when Harry’s wife Sara dies after a painful illness.

Harry  returns to Fishers Hill, the village where he spent his childhood, in order to recover from the heartbreak and find comfort for himself and his son.  But coming back only brings Harry more turmoil as he finds himself urgently seeking out Judy Roberts, the woman he abandoned in Fishers Hill 18 years earlier when he was just a young man.

Judy is now married to a thuggish brute named Phil Saunders, who has taken away all of her independence and strength.  She aches for Harry, her lost love, who she drove away when she had deceived him years earlier.  Little does she know that Harry is returning to the village, determined to make amends for the past…

This is the first novel by Josephine Cox that I have ever read.  Considering how prolific a writer she is, I expected far more from it, but was sadly disappointed.  There was virtually no characterisation – every person in the story either lacked any personality at all, or was a typical stereotype.  It also grated that the main character, who was so obviously being portrayed as a decent heroic man, seemed so able to forget his wife and immediately decide he was in love with another woman (there were a few cursory mentions of Sara later on in the book, which appeared to be there purely to remind the reader that Harry had loved Sara and had not instantly started to forget her, but they didn’t alter the fact that he seemed almost dismissive of their life together).  I also felt that the story went round and round in circles, and at times, I felt as though despite having read another 50 or pages, the plot was at exactly the same stage that it had been at before I had started them.  Finally, there was great deal of over-explaining – it was as though the author felt the need to explain to the reader exactly what was going on, even when it was completely obvious.

It’s not all bad however – there were two twists in the tale at the end, neither of which I saw coming.  Unfortunately though, it was too little too late for me, and I felt a sense of relief when I finished the book.

Jean-Marque Montjean is a new qualified Doctor, working in Salies, France, in 1914, under the management of the bumptious Doctor Gros.  Jean-Marque’s first patient of his own is the sardonic and mercurial Paul Treville.  When Jean-Marque meets Paul’s sister Katya, the attraction is instant and undeniable.  Montjean is enchanted by Katya’s enthusiasm for life, in contrast to her twin brother’s cynical outlook and disdain for others.  Paul constantly warns Jean-Marque to stay away from Katya and it becomes clear that the Trevilles are hiding and running from a dark secret in their past.  When Jean-Marque is informed that the Trevilles are planning to leave Salies, he insists on one last meeting with Katya, to see if he can persuade her to stay with him…

I enjoyed this book almost all of the way through.  It was a very easy read, with an easy to follow storyline, and I found myself not wanting to put the book down.  However, the ending was something of a let down, because it felt confusing and over-written.  For the first time since starting the book, I found myself having to look back at parts I had read in order to make sure I understood what was happening.

Katya and Paul are both very well drawn characters, and Paul in particular was a character I enjoyed reading about, although he is not portrayed in a particularly sympathetic light.  The minor character of Doctor Gros was also great fun.  However, Jean-Marque himself is not so easy to care for one way or the other.  Although he is the narrator of the story, I found that he was actually the least well rounded out of all of the ‘cast’.  I suspect that had he been easier to empathise with, the ending would have been more exciting and enjoyable.

All in all though, this is a mostly enjoyable book, and perfect if you fancy a bit of mystery, but nothing too heavy.