The Tea Planter’s Wife, by Dinah Jeffries****

Posted on September 13, 2016 by seattlebookmama

theteaplanterswife Gwendolyn is 19 years old when she marries Laurence Hooper, the owner of a tea plantation in Ceylon, an island nation south of India now named Sri Lanka. Jeffries provides a compelling, sometimes painful glimpse of the mores and assumptions of the heirs of the UK Empire at the outset of the peasants’ rebellion led by Ghandi. Though a few small glitches occasionally distract, this is a strong piece of fiction that fulfilled the writer’s mission admirably. Thank you to Net Galley and Random House-Crown Publishing for the DRC, which I received free in return for an honest review. The book is on sale today.

The protagonist is not a sympathetic one, and those that need a main character they can love should stop even considering this book right now. But some of literature’s most interesting characters are flawed ones, and the development of this one within the constraints of what Caucasians in the UK expected their lives to resemble at this time, and within the even greater constraints of material self-interest, is fascinating. I found myself wanting to haul this character out to the cheese room and tell her that all other women are not her enemies. She has almost nothing required of her by the easy life into which she has married, and as a local gossip points out, Gwen has “never had to fight for anything”.

Gwen has a passel of problems, however, some real, some imagined. She sees her sister-in-law as a rival not only for her husband’s affections and loyalty, but also for his fortune. She sees his wealthy former girlfriend and business associate, Christina, trying to pull him back into a relationship. What about MacGregor, the surly foreman of the laborers? What about Savi Ravasinghe? By the time the book was halfway done, I found myself alternately scolding her for making enemies everywhere and then, a heartbeat later, screeching at her to beware.

Ultimately I didn’t think I was impressed by this story until I looked back on my notes. I had highlighted nearly every warning bell and red herring and made little notations like, “Noooo!” Obviously this story engaged me all the way through. At times I was frustrated, but that was the author’s intention. At no time was I bored. And given the level of suspense and a certain amount of mystery, I realized that one genre tag had gone missing. I added this title to my “mystery” shelf, because there is so much unknown information that will keep the reader up late as well as any whodunit.

The author makes a few missteps that break the spell of time and place momentarily. At one point there is an argument between two of the characters about Ravasinghe, and one accuses the other of race prejudice, while the other responds that it “has nothing to do with the color of his skin!” This is either ignorance or revisionism. In the 1920s and 1930s racism was at a fever pitch. Colonialists based their system of rule partially on paternalism, which overtly declared that the “lesser” races needed the great white fathers to look after them, employ them, house and feed them. In the USA, Jim Crow and the Klan were at their all time most powerful; African-Americans were afraid to walk on the same sidewalks in the South, and in the North they nevertheless kept to their own neighborhoods to the greatest degree possible. Biracial marriage was an invitation to ostracism or even death, and less than one percent of the Caucasian population in any English speaking nation would even pretend that such ostracism wasn’t about race.

In fact, US President William Howard Taft declared that the day would dawn when the United States flag would fly at “equidistant points” that would include North America, South America, and Central America in fact rather than merely economically, and he told the American people that God had willed this due to the moral and racial superiority of Americans—by which he meant Caucasian Americans. In the East, look what the peasantry went through just to get the vote! No, no white folks in the British Empire or USA were going to defend themselves against charges of racism; racism was assumed to be the will of God.

There’s another “oopsie” moment when the roof of a large building catches fire and the fire is put out with a garden hose and pots of water. No.

But all of this is mitigated by the expert manner in which the author describes the setting, having had a family member that lived on such a plantation, or a similar one. Part of the reason I wanted to read this DRC is the fact that it was set in Ceylon, and here Jeffries does not disappoint. I was afraid the ending would either be saccharine or unspeakably brutal, but she deftly avoids both extremes and comes up with a surprising and believable alternative.

So in the end, I recommend this book to you. It’s not always easy for some of us to look in the mirror, or at the mirror of one’s ancestors, but everyone comes from somewhere, and the playing field still isn’t level. Nobody can fix what’s wrong today without knowing where the trouble came from. The Tea Planter’s Wife is a historical treasure in this regard; Jeffries is to be congratulated.

The Jealous Kind, by James Lee Burke*****

Posted on August 30, 2016 by seattlebookmama

thejealouskind James Lee Burke is a legend, a venerable and highly respected writer known for his luminous prose and quirky characters. In this, his second work of historical fiction in a planned trilogy, he demonstrates that he can still work magic better than ever. I received this DRC from Net Galley and Simon and Schuster in exchange for an honest review, but I would have paid full freight if I had to, and I rarely say that about any book anymore.

Our protagonist is Aaron Holland Broussard, and the setting is Houston, Texas in the 1950’s. Aaron is a child of the middle class. His father drinks too much and his mother is mentally ill, suffering terribly from depression during a time period when tranquilizers and electric shock were the best—and worst—that modern medicine had to offer. But he’s got a solid home to return to at the end of each day, his own bedroom, and a fine collection of pets. All told, his life is a great deal better than those that the young people around him face, especially his closest friend, Saber Bledsoe.

Diehard Burke fans will recognize in young Saber the ghost of Clete Purcel, a favorite character in the author’s Dave Robicheaux series. The role played by Saber, and before him by Clete, is that of the loyal friend that will do anything for the protagonist but whose judgment is often poor and whose impulse control is nearly nonexistent. At times the friend lightens things up with off-the-chain behavior, and at others the same friend creates problems that the protagonist has to try to repair. Even without Saber, it’s easy to become part of drama in this time and place, because

“Violence was an inextricable part of the culture; it hung in the air, perhaps passed down from the massacres at Goliad and the Alamo and the Battle of San Jacinto or the feuds during Reconstruction or the systematic extermination of the Indians.”

Burke is widely known for his capacity to create settings from the natural and pastoral on down to the bizarre, the exotic, and sometimes the polluted or corrupted. When I entered an exclusive men’s club as an imaginary companion of Aaron’s Broussard’s, I was fascinated immediately not only by the description of the club, but by my anticipation of what Burke might do with it.

But let’s step back a minute and take it from the top. Early in this story, Aaron is at a drive-in restaurant when he sees the lovely Valerie Epstein get into a conflict with her boyfriend, Grady Harrelson, a child of the local bourgeoisie. Grady lives on “…that giant island of oak trees and wealth and faux antebellum splendor…” Grady usually gets what Grady wants, but not this time.

When Grady strikes Valerie, Aaron intercedes. Aaron and Valerie– “I never saw anyone who had so much light in her eyes ”–fall in love. Ah, youth! Mr. Burke may be in his sunset years, but he remembers adolescence like it was yesterday, and he paints a vivid, poignant picture of impossible, doomed love on the part of two young people that imagine so much more than can ever come true.

Meanwhile, Aaron finds he has accidentally created problems his family doesn’t need; combine down-and-out, loyal Saber Bledsoe, a thirst for justice, a sadistic shop teacher, a rodeo that features a notoriously vicious bull named Original Sin, and the local Mob. Toss in a Cadillac with a small fortune concealed in the door panels and some vigilante justice, and you’re in for a hell of a ride.

Readers always deserve to know when some racist terms are going to be tossed their way, and they’re here in plentitude. They span across just about every race and ethnicity, and keep company with ugly remarks about women—by bad guys, of course—and some homophobic remarks common to the time period. On the one hand, these things were part of the scenery of Caucasian middle-America in the 1960’s when this reviewer was growing up, and so I cannot imagine them not also being common in the decade before it, in which this story is set. On the other hand, for some folks one really nasty word can ruin an entire novel, and so if that’s you, step away from this one. This also serves as an advisory to teachers considering using this novel in the classroom; frankly, the literacy level is really past what the average high school student can handle anyway.

That said, the prose of the final two pages is so glorious that I stopped breathing as I read them without realizing it till the last word was read, and I felt myself exhale. The first book in this series was strong, but this one is still more compelling. I am an Atheist, but Mr. Burke can tell a redemption tale like nobody’s business and leave me yearning for more, more, more. I read several books simultaneously, and it always strikes me that Burke’s work is vastly superior to just about everything else out there. May he live and write forever!

Highly recommended, and available tomorrow, August 30, 2016.

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things, by Bryn Greenwood****

Posted on August 9, 2016 by seattlebookmama

Happy release day! August 9 is a momentous day in the publishing world, with lots of new titles becoming available to the public. Don’t miss out!

Seattle Book Mama

alltheuglyandwon And you thought Fifty Shades of Gray was controversial. Just remember that you heard it here first: if this novel has legs and gets around, it’s going to create a lot of noise. I could almost smell the book-burning bonfires as I read the last half. And lucky me, I read it free thanks to Net Galley and St. Martin’s Press, from whom I received a DRC in exchange for this honest review.

Wavy grows up in the North American heartland, smack dab in the middle of nowhere. When you consider it for a moment, that’s obviously the place for a meth lab to be. No sophisticated, well funded cops will sniff around and shut down your operation; there’s plenty of cheap land for the various vehicles and outbuildings such a business might require.

It’s not as if guests are welcome to drop in.

Guests don’t drop in, in fact…

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I Will Send Rain, by Rae Meadows****

Posted on July 17, 2016 by seattlebookmama

iwillsendrain Annie Bell could have chosen to marry a well-to-do member of the gentry in her home town, a man with fine china and a full time kitchen servant. Young and buoyant, she chooses love instead, and moves to Oklahoma with Samuel Bell to start a brand new life on the free land that’s been provided. What could go wrong when two young people are strong and dedicated to one another? Oh, it’s an old, old story in so many ways, but Meadows makes it brand new. Thanks to Net Galley and Henry Holt Publishers, I read it free and in advance in exchange for this honest review. It will be available to the public August 9, 2016.

When we join the Bells they are no longer newlyweds; a lot of water has gone under the bridge. They have Birdie, a teenager determined to find a way out of Mulehead, and their younger child Fred, a child beset with heavy health issues. He’s sturdier, however, than the baby that didn’t make it. So Annie and Samuel have had success, some fine fertile years on their farm when the wheat was tall and the rain came when it was needed, but they’ve also endured some heartache. Regardless, every Sunday they gather at the only house of worship in town and send up their thanks and prayers for the blessings of nature, and perhaps to ward off its curses as well.

But then, things deteriorate in a horrifying way. Without the sturdy prairie grasses to hold down the topsoil, it is depleted and finally just blown away in the horrible wind storms that come in terrifying intensity, a veritable hurricane of dust instead of water. There is no insulation that withstands the fierce and immeasurable storms, ones that turn day dark as night and fill every crevice in every home, barn, and public building with a layer of grit. Dust isn’t just on the bed, it’s in it. Dust is everywhere, including inside the lungs of little children. And so it is that Fred is stricken with dust pneumonia, an ailment akin to Black Lung disease but without even a paycheck to show for it.

In the midst of it all, Samuel has a message from God: the rain will come, and Samuel must build a boat. And so as the wheat dies beneath the remorseless sun, as the water is rationed and the cattle grow thin, Samuel goes to the barn and commences planning and building the ark that will save his family from the flood.

Everyone in town is laughing at him, but that doesn’t matter to Samuel; he has heard from God.

Meadows is a clever wordsmith, and her capacity to spin setting and develop character are impressive. Young Birdie is in so many ways her mother all over again, and yet Annie is unable to breach the abyss that separates her from her teenage daughter. Annie has learned a lot and she’s learned it the hard way, through experience; Birdie wants nothing to do with any of it, or with Annie. At times I longed to grab that girl by the shoulders and send her into the kitchen for a chat with her mother, but if I could have done so, she wouldn’t have listened anyway. Hopefully this gives the reader a glimpse of how real these characters became to me.

Most of the way through this compelling novel I was sure it would merit five stars, yet the ending left me dissatisfied. Even if I could explain this without spoiling it for you, I’m not sure what the writer should have done instead, but the denouement felt contrived to me even though in many ways it seemed like a reasonable ending. Perhaps you will feel differently.

You may have read other historical fiction set in the Dust Bowl, but you haven’t read anything like this. Check it out and see what you think. I’d hate for you to miss it.

The Last Road Home, by Danny Johnson****

Posted on June 27, 2016 by seattlebookmama

The Last Road Home, bold and impressive new fiction by Pushcart Prize nominee Danny Johnson, came to me free thanks to Net Galley and Kensington Books in exchange for an honest review. It tells the story of Raeford “Junebug” Hurley and his friendship with neighboring twins, Fancy and Lightning Stroud. Junebug is Caucasian; the twins are African-American, politely referred to during that time as ‘colored’ or ‘Negro’. The story is set during the Civil Rights movement of the early 1960’s, but in rural North Carolina, the Klan stands tall and strong and absolutely nothing has changed in terms of race relations. Junebug finds himself riding on the fence rail from hell. This fascinating tale will be available to the public in late July. Those that love good historical fiction should read it.

The book begins with one horrible loss after another. At age 8, Junebug’s parents are both killed in a car wreck, and he goes to live with his grandparents. His life is pleasant and stable, helping his grandpa run the farm, but then his grandpa dies too. And by the time his grandmother dies, I have decided that the theme of this story must be grief and loss, or given the number of religious references, perhaps there is some sort of Christian redemption theme here. And on both counts, I find I am mistaken. Johnson is a masterful storyteller, and there is nothing simplistic in how this novel unfurls.

For while Junebug has plenty of questions about the religious fervor that pervades small towns of the South during this era, by the time he buries his grandma, he has had it with religion. “The preacher said a prayer, asking the Lord to be with me in this time of grief. I’d had all of God’s shit I could take and didn’t need His sympathy. If he said it was ‘God’s Will’, I might choke him.”

I wanted to stand up and cheer.

At age 15, orphaned and the sole remaining member of his family, he is on his own. “Fifteen was considered adult in farm years.” Lightning leaves home suddenly, unhappy with the limitations placed on Black men in his part of the world. Fancy is left behind, and she is the only friend Junebug has within walking distance of home. As friendship turns to passion, both find themselves occupying a dangerous place in their community. Given that they are cold shouldered simply for appearing in town together to run an errand, the thought of letting their feelings for one another be known is terrifying. He recalls his grandma’s admonition:

“’Junebug, you need to understand that cruelty and memory have been married together a long time in the South.’”

Johnson does an outstanding job of depicting white neighbors’ responses to the notion that our protagonist is linked romantically with Fancy. At first they are able to maintain the age-old fiction that she is his housekeeper, but she goes home at night, then sneaks back in darkest night to lay beside him. The muted references, little hints given by Caucasian elders nearby to guide the young white farmer away from a liaison that doesn’t fit local expectations, are rendered skillfully. There are a number of really vicious racial epithets tossed casually around by the local landowners, not always even in anger, sometimes in ugly jokes, as this writer knows from childhood experience is the way racists behave when a white supremacist perspective is not something being fought for as an outlier, but rather the dominant, even comfortable, norm. As the book continues, not only anti-Black pejoratives, but also nasty terms regarding Jews and Asians are tossed into the vernacular. None are gratuitous; they are an undeniable part of the setting, which would be revisionist without them.

Fancy and Junebug seem doomed. He tells her, “It feels like my life’s sprung a lot of leaks, and I’m running out of fingers.” She points out that she only has ten fingers too.

I was watching for the pat ending, the comfortable happy fiction that novelists are often drawn toward. Every time I thought I knew where the story was headed, it went somewhere else. Johnson is brilliant at breaking apart stereotypes, making setting real and immediate, and his character development is strong apart from some minor inconsistencies toward the end. And his framework is materialist by and large, showing that our surroundings and role in life shape us in ways we sometimes don’t expect.

Those interested in this period of history or that love excellent fiction should order this book. It will be available to the public July 26, 2016; strongly recommended.

Union Soldier, by Gordon Landsborough***

Posted on June 11, 2016 by seattlebookmama

unionsoldier I received this title courtesy of Endeavor Press, who invited me to read and review their material directly; I thank them for the invitation to read and review this Digital Review Copy free in exchange for an honest review.

Our protagonist is McGaughey, a physician with a troubled past who enlists as a Union soldier because he cannot enlist as a doctor. He falls in love with a young woman named Sara, and so this relationship is a key aspect of the book. He moves heaven and Earth to see that she is allowed to stay with his unit, even introducing her as a laundress, a thing I never knew Union troops enjoyed.

Landsborough does a middling job of character development and creates an aura of mystery around McGaughey. I found his depiction of Union soldiers in general alienating. For me, the American Civil War was the last really righteous war the US fought, and so his characterization of most recruits as men that would do anything rather than serve, men that were rough, dishonest and usually of poor character demeaning. I suspect he was striving for realism, or perhaps he truly believes the war should never have occurred at all. Those that take this position may find themselves enjoying the novel more than I did.

Setting was a problem for me. Whereas his descriptions of the immediate area in any given situation were well done, I could never place this story on the map. On the one hand, Flagstaff is mentioned several times and so I was thinking of Arizona. The prominent role given American Indians tells us he has to be in the West. But the Sioux confederation is in the North, primarily in the mid-western USA, and so I was confused.

Landsborough does a creditable job of pointing out that the American Indian was still fighting for justice during this time period. The US government strove to fulfill the integrity of the nation, but didn’t do well by native peoples.

The stereotype that McClellan was an unskilled general whereas Lee and Jackson were brilliant is a tired old saw. A more in-depth look at these generals demonstrates that McClellan was entirely capable but actually sympathetic to the Confederate cause. Considerable evidence proves that his failure to succeed militarily in most situations was intentional. Lee made a number of errors as did Jackson, who was often unreliable when he was expected to show up, but both were bold, and for a time their energy and boldness paid off. I would have liked to see more knowledge of the war itself in this story, which turns out to be more a Western and also a romance than a Civil War tale. To be fair, it was billed as a western, but I latched onto the title and expected something more.

For those that enjoy Westerns or historical fiction that contains romance, this book may be of interest.

The Girls in the Garden, by Lisa Jewell****

Posted on June 3, 2016 by seattlebookmama

thegirlsinthegarden Lisa Jewell is an experienced author, but she is new to me. The Girls in the Garden, published in the UK last summer and soon to be in bookstores in the USA, is good strong fiction, and you should read it. I was fortunate and obtained an advance copy thanks to Net Galley and Atria Books for the purpose of a review. One night I stayed up late, unable to put it down until it was done.

Clare and Adele both have daughters, and both live in mixed-use residences that enclose a very large private garden. It’s been a great place to raise children for generations; in fact, some of the adults raising families here were also here as children. And there are so many children, introduced so quickly! I can usually juggle a hefty cast of characters just fine while also reading other books on the side, but in this case, the combination of all these characters and a surprising amount of culture shock—I am not as well informed with regard to British culture as I thought I was—left me staggering during the first ten percent of the book. My e-reader has notes that say, “Wait! Who?” and “Whose kid is this now?” and twice, “The fuck??” “What is a onesie, other than baby clothing?” Context wasn’t helping, so I did a web crawl. Okay, now I know. And isn’t tea usually mid-afternoon, with cookies or cake, and isn’t high tea formal and later? Do they have tea instead of lunch, instead of dinner, or are there four meals here?

And when I ran across spaghetti and peas for tea at 5 PM, again I wrote, “THE FUCK?” Who eats peas in their spaghetti?

If a reader has to be confused, it’s better to have it be at the beginning and then catch up, than at the end, where one may walk away feeling stung and bewildered. Although I never did fully feel I had placed all of the characters, by the twenty percent mark I had a good feel for the primary ones and most of the others, and that was enough to make this an enjoyable read once I was oriented.

The story builds up to, and then centers around a party at the end of which adolescent Grace is found bloody and half-dressed, lying in the bushes. What has been done to her, and who has done it?

Ordinarily I would consider this a spoiler, but it’s provided on the book’s blurb and jacket, so readers are told right away this is our central problem. But there are layers that delve deeper, and these are what make this such an interesting read.

When is a parent over-protective, and when are they not careful enough? What makes someone a good parent? How much do we hold tight to keep our children safe, and when is it right to let things go; not only to trust our kids, but also to trust the world with our children?

There are no easy answers, but I found myself making small clucking noises when one parent or another makes what appears to me to be an error in judgment. Likely you’ll do the same, though perhaps not in the same places. The ambiguity makes it delicious.

The narrative point of view shifts from that of Pip, who is twelve, to that of Adele, one of the mothers. This is effective. Pip writes letters to her father, and they assume a portion of her narrative, adding a first person perspective, and at first I thought this device was too cutesy, but I changed my mind by the halfway point. It adds something that would be hard to inject as effectively any other way.

As to what has happened to Grace, there are so many possible villains, so many motivations and opportunities, but when the solution is finally reached, I feel as though the author has played us fairly. Sometimes a mystery writer will reach clear into left field for a solution. Perhaps they may discover a secret twin during the last ten percent of the story, or perhaps the villain is someone everyone had believed long dead. And that doesn’t happen here.

Ultimately I don’t think the story is really about Grace. The story is about trust within adult relationships. Misplaced trust can be dangerous; too much suspicion is toxic. And so the dance women do—and perhaps everyone does—is in trying to find the balance. It isn’t easy, especially when we are young parents, still learning the ropes ourselves.

Despite the tumble of characters at the beginning that I suspect will challenge many readers as it did me, I recommend that you read this book. It offers us something I haven’t seen anywhere lately.

The Girls in the Garden becomes available to readers in the USA Tuesday June 7, 2016.

Chancers: Addiction, Prison, Recovery, Love: One Couple’s Memoir, by Susan Stellin and Graham Macindoe****

Posted on May 21, 2016 by seattlebookmama

Chancers I decided to read and review this title because I anticipated that it would be, by and large, a depiction and critique of the American prison system and Homeland Security. As it happens, that is really only a small part of this memoir, which focuses more on the couple’s relationship and the way that addiction warps and undermines trust and affection. Nevertheless, I found it really compelling, and so thank you Net Galley and Random House Ballantine for the opportunity to read and review free and ahead of the public in exchange for this honest review. The memoir will be available to the public June 7, 2016.
Susan met Graham at a beach getaway where they were two of the people sharing a large house over the course of a vacation. Later, when she needed an author photo done for a book she had written, she remembered that he was a photographer that had worked for the Guardian, and she called him to see if he was interested.
That’s when everything began.
The memoir was originally going to be Susan’s alone, but eventually it occurred to her that Graham could contribute a lot in sharing his experiences with addiction and the point of view from which he saw the world when he was in that condition.
Imagine using heroin because it is easier to hide than alcoholism. From the frying pan into the fire! And hide it he did through the first stages of their relationship. He did romance like nobody’s business and she tried to remain objective, but there’s nothing all that objective about falling in love. And so although he made some highly questionable decisions, it took her awhile to find out about the heroin, which he had told her was behind him. But the heroin wasn’t behind him, and neither was the crack. And before she knows it, she is drawn partially down his rabbit hole while keeping one foot in that of mainstream journalism. It’s a strange place to be.
This reviewer has never minced words about my dislike for cops in general and the punitive, demoralizing, racist, class-based system that is the so-called American Justice System; yet Macindoe didn’t earn much sympathy from me. His narrative is in turns puling, angry with no justification, whiny and full of self pity, up until the end when he has finally shucked the monkey from his back as he reaches his golden years.
Macindoe had climbed from his early impoverished years as a child of a Scottish miner to the middle class world of photo-journalism. He was in the USA by preference and because his son from an earlier marriage was here; thus it was hard to feel the kind of solidarity with him that automatically comes to me regarding Third World citizens that are in the US as the only means by which they can feed their families. He owned a brownstone in New York City and had published photos internationally, garnering praise and a certain level of renown. And so…seriously? Heroin?
It was Stellin that kept me turning the pages. Every time she decided to step back from the relationship I wanted to yank her into the nearest lady’s room and tell her one woman to another to lose this guy entirely. Even her former husband, now in a gay relationship, advised her to “cut bait”. And every time she decided she could offer him some assistance even though they were no longer romantically involved, every time she wondered what their relationship could be like if only he were off the smack, I wanted to howl. After all, the relationship might be interesting if one of them grew a second head or a third eye in the middle of the forehead, but what were the chances?
“Chancers” turns out to be a Scottish expression, and I will leave the reader to find out what it means.
I found this story had an addictive quality of its own, a romantic drama not unlike the soap operas that were the only adult voices I heard most days when I was a stay-at-home mother in the 1980’s. Graham was full of shit, I figured, but I still had to know what happened next.
In the course of hearing Susan and Graham’s story, I did learn a number of things about Homeland Security that I had not known before. Imagine feeling nostalgic for Riker’s Island because it was so much more compassionate than the one for potential deportees!
And so I have to say this is a good read, an ideal book to take on vacation and flop on the beach with; just don’t get so absorbed that you scorch your tender skin, because it’s mighty distracting regardless of what is happening around you.
Fascinating and recommended to those that like compelling memoirs or are interested in addiction issues and the US penal system.

Love for Lydia, by H.E. Bates*****

Posted on May 10, 2016 by seattlebookmama

loveforlydia HE Bates wrote before, during, and after World War II. Many readers came to his work after seeing a televised version of it. It was different for me. I am fond of excellent fiction, military history, and short stories, and when I cruised Net Galley and found The Flying Officer X and Other Stories, I took a chance and scored a copy. Once I had read those, I knew I would want to read more of his work when I could. So although I came to this outstanding novel in a different way than most readers, I have to tell you that I loved it every bit as much as they did. Thank you Net Galley and Bloomsbury Reader for the complimentary DRC. I read multiple books at a time, and I feel a bit sorry for others I read at the same time I read this, because almost everything else looks shabby next to Bates’s work. Those that enjoy great literary fiction, romance, and historical fiction—which this technically isn’t, since it was written during that time rather than later, but the feeling it generates is similar—should get a copy. Once the reader opens it, she is destined to be lost to all other purposes until the last page is turned.

This spellbinding story will be released digitally Thursday, May 12, 2016.

The setting is a small town in Britain, a town with a tannery and small farms. One great house surrounded by beautiful gardens stands aloof from the rest; it houses two elderly single women and their alcoholic brother.

Then Lydia, their niece, comes to live with them.

Lydia’s arrival is cloaked in mystery. She doesn’t talk about her mother. The aunts encourage the belief that Lydia is an orphan, but we later learn that isn’t really true. And at first Lydia, who has been cocooned so carefully that she has no social graces nor any real wardrobe, futzing around in clothing that looks suspiciously like that of her elderly aunts, really needs a trustworthy young mentor close to her own age. After having eyed the local population, the aunts send for the protagonist, young Mr. Richards, whose family fortunes have slid to terrible places. Once the proud owners of considerable farmland, the Richards family is now cramped in a noisy flat that shares a wall—and the attendant noises and smells—with the tannery.

Perhaps the thing the aunts like most about young Richards is his great fondness for flowers, an unusual trait in a young man at the party-animal age. He endears himself to the aunt that gives her attention to the landscaping, commenting on the traits of flowers and making suggestions that create an instant bond between young man and old lady, but Richards is unprepared for what awaits him.

The aunts want him to meet Lydia, and they wonder whether he might take her skating on the lake. He agrees to do so. Lydia has never skated and starts out as if she were a colt trying to navigate a frozen surface, all arms and legs floundering, falling. So he is unprepared for the grace and dignity that soon possess her. They fall in love, and young love proves to be the school of hard knocks for our young man, as it is for so many.

None of this brief outline can provide Bates’s magical facility with words. This blog has reviewed hundreds of books—all read and reviewed by me—and this is one that stands out and that has stood the test of time. Bates transports us to a place we have never been and makes us feel we know it, and its inhabitants, intimately. He also lights on issues like social class and the way those with lifelong privilege might treat those without. But this is not a social justice campaign, it’s a brilliant work of fiction that sizzles in places and scorches in others. Character development is spectacularly done; I have had my nose in half a dozen books since I finished reading this one, yet I still think of Blackie, of Tom, of Nancy, of Alex, and oh of course, of Lydia. The ending is bittersweet yet strangely satisfying.

The vocabulary level that makes for such tremendous depth of character and setting also requires a strong facility for the English language on the part of the reader. Although there are no explicit sex scenes, I don’t recommend handing this novel to your love-struck sixteen-year-old as summer reading unless he or she reads at the college level.

I dare you to find a more engaging love story than this one.

Everyone Brave is Forgiven, by Chris Cleave*****

Posted on April 30, 2016 by seattlebookmama

This is one of those rare novels that I have passed by multiple times despite all the buzz it has generated, because it looked as if it was out of my wheelhouse. A socialite. Pssh. A British officer. Sure. But eventually the enormous buzz among readers and booksellers made me curious. The last time I had this experience, the novel was The Goldfinch, and once I had begun it I gasped almost audibly at what I had almost let slip away from me. And so it is with Cleave’s brilliant novel, historical fiction mixed with more than a dash of romance. I was lucky enough to get the DRC free of charge in exchange for an honest review; thank you Simon and Schuster and also Net Galley. This luminous novel is available to the public Tuesday, May 3, and you have to read it. It is destined to become a classic.

Our protagonists are Mary North and Alistair Heath; she is dating his best friend, and he is dating hers. The night before he is to leave to serve in the British armed forces, a moment flashes between them in which they know they want to be together; when he leaves, each grapples with issues of personal loyalty when thinking of the other.

If talent were a mountain, then Cleave would be Everest. If talent were an island, Cleave would not be Malta, but rather all of Britain. And Cleave’s use of word play, first to show how undaunted British youth were by the challenges ahead, and later in a sharper way as the characters learn terrible things and develop a new definition of what courage looks like, is bafflingly brilliant, the rare sort that makes lesser writers hang their heads and understand—this will never be you.

My primary reservation about this novel was that it dealt with the social elite, and my first thought was oh heavens no. That poor rich girl is going to have to suck it up like everybody else. But I underestimated Cleave and what he was about to take on; Mary, Alistair, and the secondary characters around them begin with a set of assumptions that under his unerring pen seem not only reasonable, but the sort of normal to which their entire lives have accustomed them. Their cavalier approach to the war, from those that serve from those like Tom who at the outset, believe they will “give it a miss”, is the entitlement that has cradled and preserved them from the realities of the greater world all their lives.

And it’s about to change.

Any other city would be chewing its knuckles and digging a hole to hide in. Alistair wanted to yell at people: The bullets actually work, you know! What they did not understand was that the city could be extinguished. That every eligible person could die with the same baffled expression that he had seen on the first dead of the war, in those earliest shocking days before the men had learned to expect it. I’m so sorry—I think I’m actually hit.

In turns amusing, poignant, tender, and heartbreaking, this is a novel you will want to reserve hours of your most private moments to read. You may find yourself taking an unexpected sick day so that you can finish it. Based on the overall story of the author’s grandfather with changes, added details, and embellishments, all of which the protagonists would agree are first rate, Everyone Brave is Forgiven is an unforgettable story of love, war, and innocence lost.