SEEING THE WORLD THROUGH BOOKS

YEAR-END REPORT OF MOST POPULAR REVIEWS , JANUARY TO DECEMBER, 2015.

Dec 10th, 2015 by mary

NOTE: Every six months or so, I like to check to see what are the most popular reviews on this site, and I’m always surprised by how many of the most-read reviews are for classics, rather than for more recent books. Numbers 6, 7, and 11 are new to the list this year.

Since January 1, 2015, these are the reviews that have attracted the most readers:

cover-doerr-all-the-light...1 1. Once again, with more than twice as many hits as any other review on the site: Norwegian author Jo Nesbo’s THE REDEEMER, always a surprise, is top of the list, though it is not my favorite Nesbo novel (THE REDBREAST is).

2. Winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Anthony Doerr’s ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE, is set in Saint-Malo, France, in the waning days of World War II.

3. The review of Zachary Mason’s THE LOST BOOKS OF THE ODYSSEY includes the map of the real places Odysseus visited on his journey, a feature very popular, apparently, with high school students.

cover-hare-amber-eyes-199x3001

4. Alan Paton’s THE HERO OF CURRIE ROAD, the complete collection of Paton’s short fiction, mostly autobiographical, always surprises me on this list since this book has never been published in the US or UK at all, though it is readily available on Amazon/South Africa.

5. Winner of the Costa Award for Biography in 2011, Edmund De Waal’s THE HARE WITH AMBER EYES, follows three generations as the author, an artist, searches for his family’s lost heritage as a result of World War II.

cover-artificial-silk-girl 6. NEW— BIG SURPRISE: Banned by the Nazis in 1933 and rediscovered in the 1970s, this book has just this year been translated into English for the first time. Irmgard Keun’s THE ARTIFICIAL SILK GIRL, published in Germany in 1932, is said to be for pre-Nazi Germany what Anita Loos’s Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1925) is for Jazz Age America.

7. NEW–Nobel Prize winner J. M. G. Le Clezio’s THE PROSPECTOR, first published in France in 1985, is an adventure story which is also a coming-of-age story, a treasure hunt, and an exploration of culture. Set in Mauritius.

8.David Bret’s PIAF: A PASSIONATE LIFE, is a biography of the Little Sparrow.

cover-lady-in-van

9. Kamila Shamsie’s KARTOGRAPHY focuses on the interrelationships of a group of vividly realized, young residents of Karachi and the ethnic unrest of 1971 which changed their lives and those of their parents. This civil war between East and West Pakistan becomes key to understanding the themes.

10. Jan-Philipp Sendker’s THE ART OF HEARING HEARTBEATS, set in Burma/Myanmar, recreates a young woman’s search for her father’s roots.

11. NEW–Alan Bennett’s THE LADY IN THE VAN, tells of Bennett’s kindness to a homeless woman who lives in a dilapidated van without water or plumbing. When he allows her to move the van into his driveway temporarily, he has no idea that she will stay for fifteen years. (Movie to be released in the US this month.)

Posted in 6-2015 Reviews | No Comments »

Hilary Mantel–THE ASSASSINATION OF MARGARET THATCHER

Dec 3rd, 2015 by mary

Note: Hilary Mantel was WINNER of the Man Booker Prize in 2009 for Wolf Hall, and WINNER of the Man Booker Prize in 2012 for Bring Up the Bodies. She was also WINNER of the Costa Book Award for Bring Up the Bodies in 2012.

“Even after all this time, it’s hard to grasp exactly what happened. I try to write it as it occurred, but I find myself changing the names to protect the guilty. I wonder if [that experience] left me forever off-kilter in some way, tilted from the vertical and condemned to see life skewed.”–from “Sorry to Disturb,” set in Saudi Arabia, where the author herself spent four years.

cover Hilary Mantel has never hesitated to say exactly what she means, and her descriptive abilities leave no room for doubt about exactly why she believes as she does. Though she is praised for her elegant turns of phrase when those are appropriate, she is equally skilled at stating, in no uncertain terms, her opinions about less elegant subjects. When Mantel’s recent short story collection, The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher was first published in September, 2014, Mantel found herself on the front News page of the London Daily Mail, having done the unthinkable by imagining a story in which a man with Irish ties decides to assassinate the then-Prime Minister. Margaret Thatcher had died only a year before the story was published, and the public and many politicians were outraged by this story, with some calling for a police investigation of author Mantel while others bemoaned her “unquestionably bad taste.” Mantel held her ground, telling the Guardian in 2014 that she “feels boiling detestation” for Thatcher and considers her an “antifeminist psychological transvestite who did long-standing damage to the UK.”

In comparison to these remarks, the short story of “The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher” feels almost tame, however dark or ill-advised it may have been. A woman who leads a comfortable life on the top floor of a house that has been divided into apartments opens the door to a man she thinks is the plumber sent to service the boiler. She quickly discovers that this man has a completely different mission. Through some lively dialogue in which the two speak at cross purposes, the female speaker (and the reader) learns that the man plans to assassinate Margaret Thatcher when she is released from the hospital behind this apartment, where she has just had eye surgery. As the two pass the time until the Prime Minister emerges, the speaker comments that “It’s the fake femininity I can’t stand, and the counterfeit voice….It’s the way she loves the rich… and the way she revels in her ignorance. It’s her lack of pity. Why does she need an eye operation? Is it because she can’t cry?” As the conversation continues, the would-be assassin proves to be less articulate but more single-minded than the woman. For him it’s all about Ireland, its history, and the starvation death of Bobby Sands. The conclusion, like the conclusions of most of these stories, leaves issues unresolved as the action winds down.

Notting Hill Streetscape, where Marcella was planning to work.

“The School of English,” the other long story in this book, has a totally different tone and focus. Here a young woman, Marcella, is being given a tour of an elegant house in St. John’s Wood where she may begin working. The butler, Mr. Maddox, escorting her, is hard pressed to explain the large “panic room” facility, which she is expected to clean every week, even if it is never used. The butler’s snobbishness and arrogance are contrasted with the honesty and desire to please of the potential maid, who comes from a foreign country. When asked to explain her dismissal from her previous employment, the maid’s story is almost beyond belief, illustrating the horrendous behavior of some upperclass teenagers with whom she has had to deal and the almost equally demeaning behavior of the butler to whom she is telling this brutal story. As the two continue talking, the maid emerges as the person to be most admired, and the butler, who considers himself among the elite, a small person with a small heart. Concerned with correcting her English grammar and her faulty understanding of upperclass “privilege,” the butler allows Mantel to pillory the pretensions of those who see themselves as somehow “special.”

A Saudi woman shops at a mall with her children in Jeddah March 8, 2009. Arab countries are sharing in the celebration of International Women's day. REUTERS/Susan Baaghil (SAUDI ARABIA SOCIETY)

A Saudi woman shops at a mall with her children in Jeddah. Photo from REUTERS/Susan Baaghil

Between these two stories, which bookend eight shorter stories, are a variety of subjects, many of them treated in a darkly humorous or satiric way. “Sorry to Disturb” takes place in Saudi Arabia in 1983, during the time when the author and her husband were also living and working there. Ijaz, a young man from Pakistan comes to the door to ask to use her phone, and she cannot rid herself of his phone calls and visits for months afterward. She has few ways to escape physically or emotionally from her apartment, laws concerning women’s behavior in Saudi Arabia being what they are, and she suffers from migraines and other illnesses. Mysterious events occur in the apartment, and she is utterly isolated from the Saudi women around her.

Harley Street, where the surprising story of that name takes place. Though Mary Joplin of “Comma” ends up needing some psychiatric care, she does not get it on Harley Street.

In yet another change of time and place and focus, “Comma” is the tale of two young girls who hide under a bush in the garden of a very elegant London home, hoping to catch a glimpse of a severely handicapped child who lives there, a child whom one of the girls describes as looking like “a comma.” The difference between the two female playmates, in terms of their educations and their parental nurturing, or lack of it, parallels the action of the story when the handicapped child is finally wheeled out into the sun. In a twist unique to this collection, the author also shows the lives of the girls twenty-five years later.

Margaret Thatcher protecting her sensitive eyes.

Death, marriage, infidelity, psychiatric ailments, the writing life, book clubs, and issues of adolescence, among other themes dominate these stories, but Mantel writes with a rapier in her hand, often turning a seemingly innocent scene into a scene of dark twists and sometimes ironic humor. Through her use of dialogue, Mantel conveys the inner stories of her characters as they respond with feeling to the stories within her stories. What appear to be ordinary events often prove to be extraordinary as the author’s descriptive abilities bring her realism alive and show the characters’ feelings at the same time. Even the stories which have touches of the bizarre or other-worldly are grounded so that the reader feel s/he is inhabiting the real world of the characters, no matter how strange or weird. The stories feel intimate and the reader often empathizes even when the author’s tone veers into the satiric or darkly ironic, and though the collection is uneven, it is also varied, providing something for everyone, including those who still resent Mrs. Thatcher.

ALSO by Hilary Mantel: WOLF HALL, and BRING UP THE BODIES

Photos, in order: The author’s photo is from http://www.smh.com.au

The picture of Notting Hill, where Marcella seeks work, may be found on http://www.travelandtransitions.com/

The Saudi woman at the mall with her children may be found on http://teacupsandtyrants.com

Harley Street, famed for its physicians, is the setting for a story called “Harley Street” here. http://www.skalp.com/

Following her surgery for an eye problem, Mrs. Thatcher wore dark glasses, as in this photo. https://www.pinterest.com/

For the complete story of the controversy regarding Mantel’s story of the “Assassination of Margaret Thatcher,” here is the link to the new article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/

THE ASSASSINATION OF MARGARET THATCHER
Review. Book Club Suggestions, England, Literary, Short Stories
Written by: Hilary Mantel
Published by: Picador (September 1, 2015)
Date Published: 09/01/2015
ISBN: 978-1250074720
Available in: Ebook Paperback Hardcover

Posted in 6-2015 Reviews, Book Club Suggestions, England, Literary, Short Stories | No Comments »

Patrick Modiano–AFTER THE CIRCUS

Nov 24th, 2015 by mary

Note: French author Patrick Modiano was WINNER of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2014.

“Today I see the scene from a distance. Behind the panes of a window, in muted light, I can make out a blond man in his fifties wearing a plaid bathrobe, a girl in a fur coat, and a young man…The light bulb in the lamp base is too small and weak. If I could go back in time and return to that room, I would change the bulb. But in brighter light, the whole thing might well dissolve.”—Jean, narrator of this novel.

Through a young narrator, whose real name is unclear for most of this book, French author Patrick Modiano constantly muses about the past as it intrudes on the present, filled with imperfect and incomplete memories as they appear and reappear in the young man’s life throughout this novel. The narrator’s present has always been colored and perhaps distorted by the emotions of his past, and he worries that if he obsesses too much about the past and tries to rethink it too often, that he may lose whatever sense of confidence and reconciliation he feels about these events. In the vivid scene from which the introductory quotation, above, is taken, for example, the young man/narrator is nineteen years old, living at his estranged father’s apartment in Paris following his father’s sudden move to Switzerland to avoid criminal prosecution in France.

The “man in his fifties wearing a plaid bathrobe,” in this quotation, is someone who has worked for the narrator’s father for years and shares the same house in Paris. The “girl in the fur coat,” whom we learn is Gisele, is someone to whom the narrator has been attracted after both of them have faced police interrogation on the same day in connection with the same serious crime. As an adult narrator, flashing back to these troubled teen years, the man still remembers this scene, and he would like to be able to regard these events in a “brighter light” and perhaps achieve some finality regarding the residual guilt he feels about his own role. He fears, however, that a “brighter light” might undermine whatever reconciliation he has already managed to achieve regarding these events, and he does not want any of his hard-earned acceptance of events – “the whole thing” – to “dissolve” and leave him even more vulnerable.

After meeting Gisele, Jean and she go to the Gare du Nord to the storage area, where she retrieves a suitcase and brings it to Jean's apartment for safeguarding.

After meeting Gisele, the narrator accompanies her to the storage area of the Gare du Nord, where she retrieves a suitcase and brings it to his apartment for safeguarding.

For fans of Modiano, much of this may sound familiar. Though Modiano has insisted many times that his novels are fiction, they all have direct parallels with his own life, and as he visits and revisits his own difficult and tormented childhood and teen years in the plots of his novels, he often introduces events in one novel and then returns to them again in other novels. Pedigree, his autobiography (in which he confirms the reality of specific events and traumas which dominate his novels), remains a straight-forward presentation of his real life up to his early twenties, almost journalistic in style, with little elaboration and even less emotion. Ironically, it is his “novels” – like this one – which most clearly reveal the emotional effects of his early life, his incredible resilience, and his remarkable ability to come to terms with his past and use these events to provide insight not just for himself but for his legions of fans.

From Jean's window, they can see the statue of Henri IV.

From the narrator’s window, they can see the statue of Good King Henri IV.

In an almost off-handed, casual way, Modiano manages to incorporate extraordinary events into his novels about a seemingly “normal” childhood – for him these events were “normal.” In this novel, the young narrator, not yet of legal age, is interrogated by the police regarding any knowledge he may have about two people engaged in criminal activity, whose address book includes the name of the narrator – not the experience of the typical college student. The narrator’s father, like Modiano’s, however, has been involved in organized crime throughout Europe, so it is actually not surprising that the police investigate. It is equally unsurprising when the reader learns that the father has now escaped to Switzerland to avoid prosecution.

The Winter Circus, built in 1952, was a favorite place for circus acts and shows, especially in the 1920s.

The Winter Circus, built in 1952, was a favorite place for shows and the circus, especially in the 1920s. A number of characters here have performed in this venue.

As he is leaving the police building, the narrator sees a slightly older woman being questioned in the same building, and curious about this stranger and attracted to her, he waits for her, then takes her to supper so they can talk about their mutual interrogations. The woman, Gisele, has a suitcase, and when asked, the narrator readily agrees to keep her suitcase in his own apartment building while she moves. As she also has additional belongings in the place where she has been staying, she also asks to store these at his place as well. Questions about her own motivations and her background abound – who she really is, what her interest is in the narrator, what is in the suitcases, who are the older friends to whom she introduces him, why is she so anxious to join him on a trip to Rome, and other issues. When they are asked by one of Gisele’s mysterious friends to “play a little joke” on someone who will be “wearing riding breeches,” the friend’s offer is one the couple cannot refuse, and the novel hits its high point in terms of the action. The aftereffects are just as dramatic, as many of the questions begin to get answered.

La Petite Roquette prison which was familiar territory to one of the characters here.

La Petite Roquette, a prison which was familiar territory to one of the characters here.

As in other Modiano novels, there are overlaps regarding events. The book’s title, After the Circus, has a number of references here: The Winter Circus is a building where a number of edgy, demimonde characters in the novel worked, over the years. In another circus reference, one woman who works as a dancer and, more privately, as a strip tease performer, is humiliated when Gisele and the narrator come with their older “friends” to see her while she is stripping: She “hasn’t entirely turned into a circus animal or some beast you go visit in the zoo on Sundays,” she chides the older men. Most important for the reader are the references to the circus for its connotations with Modiano’s earlier life, though these do not have the same connotations for the narrator. As shown in Suspended Sentences, Modiano’s parents essentially abandoned Modiano and his younger brother Rudy for two full years when the boys were not yet in school, and for that entire time Modiano lived with a group of circus acrobats whom the parents paid to take care of them. The boys’ lives were bizarre, though not physically abusive there, as their minders engaged in criminal activity for which their closest caregiver eventually spent years in jail. The references to the Winter Circus and the circus in general conjure up innumerable unpleasant memories for the young narrator about his father, just as the circus is a pervading, unpleasant reference to his father for Modiano in his own work. The conclusion, in which we discover that the narrator’s name is “Jean,” presages the direction which he (and Modiano) will take in the future, a direction which will feel familiar to those who have enjoyed Modiano’s novels, and his autobiography, Pedigree.

ALSO by Modiano: DORA BRUDER, FAMILY RECORD, HONEYMOON, IN THE CAFE OF LOST YOUTH, LA PLACE de L’ETOILE (Book 1 of the OCCUPATION TRILOGY), (with Louis Malle–LACOMBE LUCIEN, a screenplay, LITTLE JEWEL, THE NIGHT WATCH (Book II of the OCCUPATION TRILOGY), THE OCCUPATION TRILOGY (LA PLACE DE L’ETOILE, THE NIGHT WATCH, AND RING ROADS), PARIS NOCTURNE, PEDIGREE: A Memoir, RING ROADS (Book III of the OCCUPATION TRILOGY), SLEEP OF MEMORY, SO YOU DON’T GET LOST IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD, SUCH FINE BOYS, SUNDAYS IN AUGUST, SUSPENDED SENTENCES, VILLA TRISTE, YOUNG ONCE

Post-Nobel Prize books: SLEEP OF MEMORY (2017), INVISIBLE INK (2019)

Readers wondering where to start with Modiano’s novels may want to consider beginning with SUSPENDED SENTENCES, which is the most revelatory of the novels, and then return to his other novels, which draw on the same experiences.

Photos, in order: The author’s photo appears in http://www.thelocal.se

The Gare du Nord, where Giselle has a locker, is a central hub of Paris: http://mikestravelguide.com/

“Good King Henry” ruled France from 1589 to 1610, and his statue was visible from Jean’s apartment. https://commons.wikimedia.org

The Winter Circus, built in 1852, was the site of numerous circus performances for some of the characters here, especially in the 1920s. http://www.parisattitude.com

La Petite Roquette, a prison, was “home” for a time to one of the characters in this novel. http://sur-les-toits-de-paris.eklablog.net

ARC: Yale University Press

AFTER THE CIRCUS
REVIEW. Fictionalized biography, Coming-of-age, France, Literary, Psychological study, Social and Political Issues
Written by: Patrick Modiano
Published by: Yale University Press (October 27, 2015)
Date Published: 10/27/2015
Edition: Margellos World Republic of Letters
ISBN: 978-0300215892
Available in: Ebook Paperback

Posted in 6-2015 Reviews, Coming-of-age, France, Literary, Psychological study, Social and Political Issues | No Comments »

Daniel Sada–ONE OUT OF TWO

Nov 20th, 2015 by mary

Note: WINNER of many prizes for his individual novels, Sada was also WINNER of Mexico’s National Prize for Arts and Sciences, Literature, for his complete bibliography in 2011.

“One out of two, or two in one, or what? The Gamal sisters were identical…the same age, the same height, and wearing, by choice the same hairdo…One is the other, and the other sometimes denies it, though always secretly, of course…Do they ever grow weary of one another? Possibly, though if they did, their souls would be void. The thing is: their sole importance has only ever been this similitude – a double meaning that just might be single.”

One out of Two, an early (1994) novel by award-winning Mexican author Daniel Sada, has just been published in English translation for the first time – a tragicomic classic by an author whom both Roberto Bolano and Carlos Fuentes have highly praised for his “contributions to literature in the Spanish language.” It joins Almost Never (2008) as one of only two books by Sada available in English, to date. Though the book appears, at first, to be a simple morality tale, Sada is an adventurous novelist who endows his main characters with more than the flat, stereotypical behaviors and thoughts which one usually associates with stories written to illustrate a moral lesson. While keeping his style uncomplicated, he shows his characters as they live their ordinary lives and make some remarkable decisions which cause unexpected complications for them. The mood is light and the action often very funny, though equally often, it is ironic or edgy. The cumulative result is farcical rather than pedantic, serious rather than lightweight.

The main characters, the Gamal sisters, both seamstresses, are forty-year-old identical twins, about whom the narrator notes that “their identity has been a long and difficult compromise, minute by minute and day by day forging them into one accidental and unambiguous joint spirit. One can almost say that the Gamal sisters “are saints: a single pureness.” The sisters believe that if they work hard enough that they will be prosperous, and they believe that they have been successful, “if making do with little is a boon.” They have been dependent upon each other since early childhood, comfortable with each other and unfazed by the outside world, despite its uncertainties. When they were thirteen, they said goodbye as their parents left on a trip, leaving them alone. For two weeks they remained on their own at home in a “grand apprenticeship: a flourishing sisterhood coming into its own right,” cooking, playing games, and dreaming of the future. It is not until their fourth week alone, that they begin to worry. The arrival of their aunt is not comforting, and after a scene worthy of an ironic noir film, they agree to live with their aunt and get some work in a small garment factory. It is not until years later that they break free of her, her last words to them being to “get married.”

The Gamal twins worked as seamstresses in their own shop. Image by Keith Dannemiller/Corbis

Working very hard to develop their business as seamstresses and maintain a house they purchase, miles away from their aunt, the sisters act efficiently and effectively and succeed. Years pass, and when they are almost forty-two, their aunt invites them back for a visit to attend the wedding of her son, giving them advice about how to do their hair more attractively and how to dress as individuals even before they have accepted. They are so busy with their business, however, that only one twin can attend the wedding: the other must stay home and work double to meet their obligations to customers. The stay-at-home sister resents, for the first time, that her sister was the one who got to go to the wedding, and, as every reader will expect, the inevitable happens. Her sister returns from the wedding to announce, “I danced all night with a slender man of interesting age.” Oscar Segura, who still lives with his parents, buys and sells pigs and goats, working hard so that he can purchase a truck to transport his own livestock. The sisters talk over the situation, and the stay-at-home sister reveals that since she has spent the entire time that her sister was away, working till midnight every day, that it is now her sister’s obligation to return the favor.

Entrance to Ocampo, where one of the sisters attends her cousin’s wedding

Oscar Segura, is planning to visit the following Sunday, and the twins develop a plan for dealing with his visit. To say more would risk giving spoilers, though the author himself includes a good deal of foreshadowing regarding the future. Nosy neighbors who have heard about the new boyfriend, want information, so the twins put up a sign in their shop: “RESTRICT YOURSELF TO THE BUSINESS AT HAND,” and they refuse to answer any questions. When their aunt, who does not know which sister was the one who attended her son’s wedding, requests more information and wants them to visit her again, they refuse. At the halfway point of the novella, Oscar Segura’s own take on his relationship becomes the focus, and as Oscar continues to visit on Sundays, the sisters spend each week “teeter[ing] on the verge of hysteria” and engaging in hypocrisy so as not to offend each other while sharing a house and business. In private conversations, Oscar chats about his favorite subjects – the weaning of she-goats and the complications that arise from fattening swine – and shares his long-term goal of opening a huge restaurant. As the relationship develops further, the sisters begin to wonder if they have been cursed by the Devil.

cover almost never Though the novella is simple to understand, Sada has some remarkably subtle touches, making the reality of the sisters’ love for each other real in proportion to the jealousy of one and the triumph of the other. Their long interdependence has commanded their lives, and the fear of abandonment and hostility is real for both of them. As the action develops, the reader and the twins themselves soon conclude that the Gamals are neither the “saints” nor the “single pureness” which the narrator originally believed them to be. Their separate desires, dreams, and hopes for the future, forged as they are from their noticeably different personalities, surge forth under the stress of Oscar Segura’s courtship. The conclusion may surprise some, but I suspect that most others will find it appropriate, and not the “tragedy” which some reviewers have deemed it. With this easy introduction to the work of Sada, many readers will undoubtedly look forward to reading another of his novels, his much more complex and intriguing Almost Never.

ALSO by Sada: ALMOST NEVER

Photos, in order: The author’s photo is from http://laprensa-sandiego.org/

The image of the Mexican seamstress is by Keith Dannemiller/Corbis and appears on http://www.history.com/

The entrance to Ocampo is from http://www.barksdale-baptist-tx.org

ARC: Graywolf Press

ONE OUT OF TWO
REVIEW. Mexico. Allegory, Humor, Farce, Absurdity, Literary, Psychological study
Written by: Daniel Sada
Published by: Graywolf Press
Date Published: 11/03/2015
ISBN: 978-1555977245
Available in: Ebook Paperback

Posted in 6-2015 Reviews, Allegory, Humor, Satire, Absurdity, Literary, Mexico, Psychological study | No Comments »

Simon Mawer–TIGHTROPE

Nov 16th, 2015 by mary

“[Marian’s] present life seemed episodic…She felt she was drifting through a neutral space, where there was neither love nor hate, neither danger nor safety, neither peace nor war; a place where crude, physical emotion—a raging heart, a sweating forehead, a rising panic—was triggered by simuli she couldn’t apprehend, while the feelings she ought to own, of contentment, of filial love, of sexual attraction even, were no more than vague memories.”

In his newest novel, Simon Mawer continues the story of Marian Sutro, whose wartime exploits he introduced in Trapeze (2012), and it is Marian’s difficulties dealing with the complex aftereffects of World War II which become the focus of this novel. In Trapeze, Marian was a composite character representing the women who served as members of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) between May, 1941, and September, 1944. After training in England, Marian, in 1943, was dropped by parachute into France to help liberate a former flame, Clement Pelletier, from his research lab in France and get him aboard a small plane to England. The emphasis here is on the action and bravery of Marian and her cohorts, with little real character development for the “composite character.”

In Tightrope, by contrast, Mawer focuses especially on the development and detail of Marian Sutro’s character, and as he continues the story of Marian, he makes her come very much alive here as an individual recovering in England from traumas, both physical and psychological, rather than as a symbol of the larger group of SOE.

Author photo by Connie Bonello.

Tightrope opens in the present, when Marian is eighty. The speaker of the opening chapter is sixty-eight, a man who has obviously been involved in state security in England for his whole career and someone Marian has known since he was a child, though they have not seen each other in many years. For some reason, he has been drawn out of retirement to interview her about her war-time past during World War II and the Cold War which followed. Mawer creates suspense about Marian, someone who “had spent time in captivity in one of the concentration camps” and had survived, though she herself never talked about it. The speaker, whom we later learn is “Sam,” the son of a family friend, had once been told by his father that Marian was “dangerous,” and he himself “can fully attest to that.” He has now been sent to meet her, he says, because “they want to close the file. There’s no question of prosecution…They just want to tie up loose ends.” Marian is still interested, even now, however, in knowing if there was a mole at the top of the intelligence organization for which she had been working, and wants to know if Sam and those he works for will tell her if she was betrayed. His response, even at this late stage of history, is that everything is still “unofficial and therefore deniable.” Even Sam is not sure whether she is a heroine or a traitor.

Women imprisoned at Ravensbruck in Germany.

Women like Marian imprisoned at Ravensbruck in Germany.

Marian’s story moves back and forth in time, opening in 1945, when she returns “home,” and it is here that the reader learns, with Marian, that of the forty women dispatched to France in 1943, only twenty-six have survived. Fourteen others were arrested or are missing, including many of Marian’s personal friends. She herself spent eighteen months in Ravensbruck, a German prison camp, tortured, beaten, and at war’s end, barely alive, and she knows that others from her group died there. When she becomes the first SOE member to return to England, intelligence interrogates her for information. As she recalls her friends and their fates, she cannot help wondering, yet again, if a high-level mole might have betrayed them. Further flashbacks show Marian making some dramatic decisions – in one case, a decision for which she will feel guilt for the rest of her life.

Piccadilly Square, August 11, 1945, as the country celebrates the end of the war.

The “business of war,” by intelligence professionals working for their country from behind desks, contrasts with the extraordinary sacrifices made by their recruits in the field, and Mawer brings these people and their sacrifices to life. Many intelligence workers lead double lives filled with compromises, with one person working in France for Major Fawley in British intelligence even acting as a pimp who tries to recruit Marian to “escort” German officers. Ultimately, after the injuries and deaths of thousands of soldiers and intelligence workers from other countries, including women from SOE, French General Charles De Gaulle, brands them all as “mercenaries” and expels them from France while he celebrates the French Resistance. When the war is over, the land-based intelligence service remains in business while their recruits return home, many of them traumatized. When Marian arrives at the family residence in Oxford, she must finally come to terms with the horrors of war-time: As she puts it, “it’s like suddenly finding yourself on the edge of a cliff, with nothing to stop you stepping over the edge…I was a good skier, I’ve parachuted, for God’s sake. And now…sometimes I find it hard to stand on the front doorstep.” Her psychological problems form the backbone of this part of the novel.

Hiroshima after the atomic bomb. All that is left is the entrance to a temple and the remains of a cart.

In the last section of the book, the Americans’ use of the first two atomic weapons in history changes the dynamic of war, as Britain and France fear the spread of these weapons to other countries. The Soviet Union, which had been an ally during the war, now looks much more dangerous, and Marian becomes involved in doing Cold War spy work, leading to a whole new series of episodes in a newer time frame. Marian has often used sex as a way to deal with the uncertainties, even horrors, of her intelligence experience, and here she finds herself in love with a new man, though she is not averse to seducing others if it suits her purpose. A trip to the British Museum and a visit to see “Ginger,” the Gebelein Man from Egypt, over 5500 years ago, opens a whole new set of issues regarding violence and raises, once again, the question of betrayal by someone from their own side.

Ginger, the Gebelein Man, from 3500 B.C. in the Britis Museum, where Marion met a familiar face. "Ginger" died a violent death, murdered when he had his back turned.

Marion unexpectedly met someone from her own past when she went to the British Museum to see the exhibit of “Ginger,” the Gebelein Man, from 3500 B.C. “Ginger” died a violent death, murdered when he had his back turned.

Filled with excitement and beautifully paced, the novel does suffer to some degree from its divisions into unnamed sections, which divide the reader’s focus during the novel – Marian’s background and early days in intelligence in France in the first section, her capture by the Germans, along with her psychological aftereffects in the next section, and finally her work with the Russians during the Cold War. The action is complex, filled with many characters (some of whom, including Marian, have multiple names), but the novel is intelligent and thought-provoking, filled with tension and beautifully drawn and well-developed settings, both physical and emotional. Marian becomes a real person here, however flawed she may be, showing the moral conundrums involved in intelligence work and what it requires. Ultimately, the reader must wonder how much leeway someone may allow himself in compromising situations without also betraying important values.

ALSO by Simon Mawer: TRAPEZE, THE GLASS ROOM, PRAGUE SPRING

The 40t anniversary of the atomic bomb is acknowledged b Time Magazine on August 6, 1985.

The 40th anniversary of the atomic bomb is acknowledged by Time Magazine on August 6, 1985.

Photos, in order: The author’s photo by Connie Bonello is from the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com

The Ravensbruck prison camp in Germany is shown in http://www.jewishjournal.com

Piccadilly Square, August 11, 1945, erupted in celebration at the end of World War II, shown on http://www.telegraph.co.uk

The devastation of Hiroshima shows only the entrance to a temple and a ruined cart. http://www.ww2australia.gov.au/vevp/abomb.html

Ginger, the Gebelein Man, from Egypt, was murdered 5500 years ago. Photo by The British Museum. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/

The Time Magazine cover is from http://content.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19850729,00.html

ARC: Other Press.

TIGHTROPE
REVIEW. World War II, Cold War, England, France, Historical, Mystery, Thriller, Noir, Psychological study, Social and Political Issues
Written by: Simon Mawer
Published by: Other Press
Date Published: 11/03/2015
ISBN: 978-1590517239

Posted in 6-2015 Reviews, England, France, Historical, Mystery, Thriller, Noir, Psychological study, Social and Political Issues | No Comments »

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