frumiousb

Before I start, I'm going to share that this is a pretty nasty review. In the interest of fairness, I should warn you that I appear to be in the minority about The Secret Scripture. Many people really like it a lot, and you should balance that affection against my negative opinion.

Around one third of the way through the book, I incredulously flipped back to the front cover. "Shortlisted for the Booker? Really?" That was my first moment of disconnect with the book. I have had that kind of moment with Booker listed selections before, and generally they tend to knit themselves together for me by the end of the novel. By which I mean that even if I end up not really liking the book, I do eventually understand what what others find appealing.

My moment of realization with The Secret Scripture never appeared. I *really* disliked this book. Barry is a skilled stylist, but in a precious and flowery kind of way that completely runs against my taste. Even so, I could have forgiven it if the plot had been any more interesting. But it wasn't.

This book for me comes down squarely in a genre that I truly am beginning to hate-- I'm calling it academic gothic. I guess that it isn't really new, but somehow lately there seem to be a lot of entries in the field floating around. The Secret Scripture is kissing cousins to The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield, which I also kind of hated. (So a note to you, dear reader, if you liked the Setterfield then you may well like the Barry and should pay no attention to me at all.)

What did I dislike so much about the plot? Well, everything, actually. At the top of my hate is the surprise secret at the end which I figured out very early on in the book. I hated the device of the diary entries which read like no diary entries that humans have ever written. I hated the predictable story, a rehash of the woman wronged. I hated the half-baked romance which seemed to justify itself as literature by drawing on the conflict. I liked, literally, nothing.

I feel moved now to stop and apologize to Mr. Barry. I honestly don't often have this kind of allergic reaction to a book. I normally am nearly mealy-mouthed about finding things to both like and dislike. I cannot help but think that such a strong and visceral dislike necessarily says more about me than it does about your book. I promise that I will give something else a try in the future, because I suspect that it is the plot that made me hate this so much.

I can't recommend this. But others obviously like it very much-- make up your mind for yourself.

When I discussed this book in the Sunday Salon, I was pretty sure that this was the first Doyle that I had read. But trying to summon my thoughts for this review, it occurs to me that actually I think that I've also read his Barrytown Trilogy and those books clung only vaguely to my memory. (I started reviewing online, mostly at Amazon, because I had lost nearly two years of reviews during a computer crash-- and I read enough books that while highlights stick well in my mind, I often have to physically see the book again or reread my notes to bring back my memory of the text.)

I may go back and re-read Barrytown if I can dig up my copy once we get into the new house. (Thousands of my books are in boxes in storage, and have been for five years or more.)

Anyhow. To say that I enjoyed The Woman Who Walked into Doors would not be the right description. The book is a rather harrowing depiction of a woman in the grip of abuse and alcoholism. A woman who tries, in a now familiar story, to reconcile the idea of a man who loves her with a man who beats her.

I was suspicious, as I noted in the Sunday Salon post, about anyone who isn't Paula Spencer (or someone very close to her) claiming the first person experience of poverty, alcoholism, and abuse in a first person narrative fiction. As it happens, however, Doyle does a credible job with this. Given the time that he spends in Paula's head in this book, I had the feeling that he was trying to work out the question that many of us have watching a situation like that-- why? why does she stay? how does she survive?

What's really nice about the work is that it resists the temptation to make Paula and her situation sentimental. That resistance makes the real love that she has for Charlo really affecting. She clings to it in the face of all reason and against all circumstance. I do not feel as though I closed the book any wiser about why a battered wife stays battered, but I did feel as though it lifted a little corner off the mystery as to how you keep loving someone who torments you.

In the end I found it a good book, if often a little bit difficult to read. It is not a pleasant subject, and Doyle doesn't pull his punches. For me I found that it missed something-- something larger than the subject, perhaps. That something kept me from finding it a great book. But it was still certainly a good use of time, and a book that I would recommend. I would particularly recommend it if you have some special interest in the treatment of the subject matter.

A number of you recommended Paula Spencer and even noted that you like that better. I'll be giving it a try.

As I sit here and contemplate The Gathering by Anne Enright, I find myself thinking about book prizes. I did not buy this book because I was familiar with Enright. I bought it because it won the Man Booker prize in 2007.

I find that there are really only two awards which I use as a source for my reading lists. One of those, oddly or not, is the Hugo. I often use the nominee list as a source for new speculative fiction. The other prize that I find I care about is the Man Booker Prize. I am not really sure why I picked the Man Booker, being an American and all. I guess that it has to do with living in Europe these last 10 years. I think it also is because I consistently find the shortlist a high quality source of good fiction. I have not always liked every Man Booker discovery which I have read, but the standards are usually pretty high.

Which book prizes do you follow, if any? Any that you particularly care about? Any which consistently annoy you? Tell me in the comments of the post...

*****

Anyhow, on to Anne Enright

( ... )