september-october 2024 books…

Wide Sargasso Sea (Jean Rhys): I remember starting this book (first published in 1966) many, many years ago but gave up after only a few pages. I recently picked up a copy while we were staying at Alice’s and read it in a couple of days. The novel, initially set in Jamaica, opens a short while after the Slavery Abolition Act 1833 abolished slavery in the British Empire in August 1834. It’s a ‘postcolonial novel’ that serves as sort of a hypothetical prequel to Jane Eyre, the novel details the tragic decline of a young woman, Antoinette Cosway, who is sold into marriage to an English gentleman, Mr Rochester. Rhys portrays Cosway amidst a society so driven by hatred, so skewed in its sexual relations, that it can literally drive a woman out of her mind. It’s a tough, compelling read.
The Matisse Stories (AS Byatt): My friend Tony recommended this book (good man!). The book (first published in 1993) consists of three short stories and pay homage to the artist Matisse. Each of them offer verbal portraits of apparently ordinary lives driven by pain and disquiet. At first, they begin on a deceptively simple, almost cosy way: a middle-aged woman having her hair cut; a mother trying to work at home while she waits for the doctor to check her son's chicken pox; and a woman meeting a colleague for lunch at the Chinese restaurant she regularly patronises. But darker forces emerge or, as one reviewer put it: “Byatt is adept at rendering disintegration in a series of more or less macabre, violent and comical set-pieces”. I really enjoyed the book and thought Byatt’s writing was rather beautiful.
The Outrun (Amy Liptrot): This is our next Storysmith bookgroup selection (which I first read in 2020 – and decided it was one of my ‘books of the year’)(I haven’t changed my mind). It’s a beautiful, lyrical, brutally-honest memoir. At the age of 30, Liptrot finds herself ‘washed up’ back home on Orkney. The previous ten years of her life had been an utter nightmare; she left Orkney, went south, ended up in London and started a downward spiral of hellish alcohol addiction. She lost jobs, a boyfriend she loved, her health and self-respect – and ended up in rehab, with her psyche teetering on the edge of the abyss (I couldn’t see how anyone could survive what she had been through). So, Liptrot returned home (she briefly tried a couple of times before without success). She was alcohol-free, but an absolute mess. She retreated to the ‘outrun’ (the name given to a rough pasture on her parents’ farm) and, very slowly, thanks to her amazing resolve and determination, her life is gradually restored and re-formed. For a time, she works on her father’s farm then gets a job on a survey of the endangered corncrake (which immediately set me back with my own memories of the corncrakes of Iona!), and eventually she retreats to the tiny island of Papa Westray, off Orkney. There she walks the hills, goes wild swimming, tracks the wildlife, stares at the skies and discovers a new meaning for her life. Thanks to the internet, she constantly learns new things – astronomy, rock formations, history and the like… and, crucially (and wonderfully), she’s remained sober for two years (and resolved to being sober the rest of her life). She writes beautifully. It’s an incredibly brave, eloquent and hopeful book. I loved it all over again… and, now, it’s been made into a film (starring one of my favourite actors, Saoirse Ronan) – which, much to my huge relief, doesn’t let the book down!
Raffles (EW Hornung): First published in 1899 (my copy: 1950). Wikipedia describes Raffles as a ”gentleman thief” - living at the Albany, a prestigious address in London, playing cricket for the Gentlemen of England and supporting himself by carrying out ingenious burglaries. Raffles has Harry "Bunny" Manders – a former schoolmate to help him. It’s a bit like Holmes and Watson in reverse. Fascinating in theory, but I actually found this book of short stories unremarkable, not particularly clever and, frankly, rather boring.
Akenfield (Ronald Blythe): I’ve started ‘gently’ reading Blythe’s wonderful book ‘Next To Nature’ (a year’s observations, gossip and stories compiled about his Akenfield village home on the Suffolk/Essex border), but have been determined to try to read it slowly - on a monthly basis (January, February etc) in the way the book has been set out. But I also felt somewhat frustrated not to be able to continue to immerse myself in Blythe’s wonderful prose… so ended up reading this book (first published in 1969) about his account/portrait of modern rural life in his village, compiled during the course of 1967 – its inhabitants (ex-soldiers, farm labourers, district nurses, teachers etc etc), their stories, their experiences, their hardships and their joys. It’s a beautiful, fascinating and frequently moving book. Highly recommended.