by Sara Gruen
This book is the story of three rich/spoiled Americans who head to Scotland to try to prove the existence of the Loch Ness monster.
Maddie and her husband Ellis are cut off from his father after a scandalous New Year's Eve party in 1944. Ellis and his best friend Hank decide the only way to redeem him in his father's eyes is go to Scotland and prove the existence of the Loch Ness monster. His father had tried to do this year before but was proved a a fraud.
Maddie comes from a very unhappy home. Her mother was a bit psycho and only doted on her daughter to make her husband jealous and to have someone to confide in and dump her troubles on. She runs away with a married man but comes back in shame when the man returns to his wife. She accidentally kills herself, taking pills while having a bath. She had expected someone to find her before her demise. Maddie's father had sent her away to a boarding school after a fight with her mother and after seeing the negative impact the woman was having on her daughter. He doesn't seem to have any affection for Maddie.
Maddie meets Ellis and Hank when she sneaks off to one of the family homes. She parties wildly with all the local rich kids and doesn't hesitate when Ellis asks her to marry him.
Despite the war the men find a way to get them on a freighter and they make their way to Scotland where they find accommodation in a small hotel Ellis has registered them in Maddie's family name because he fears a negative reaction to his own family, and he is right, eventually someone sees him and recognizes the resemblance.
As the men cruise the lake, the lakeshore and interview locals Ellis's behaviour to Maddie becomes more rude and dismissive. She had been diagnosed as having a nervous disposition but it is Ellis who is consuming all her pills. Maddie overhears a conversation between the two men indicating that Ellis married her as a result of a coin toss.
The people in town resent the two men not being in the war, both apparently have medical excuses, Hank has flat feet and Ellis is supposedly colour blind. She later realizes that Ellis has faked his colour blindness and threatens to out her. His behaviour to her becomes even more aggressive and he threatens to have her hosptitalized for her nerves. She is terrified that he will do this and she telegraphs her father asking her to help her get out of Scotland. Her father basically responds saying that she has made her bed....
As the men roam about Maddie is bored so she offers to help around the hotel. She becomes friends with the local women who work at the hotel and in the bar/kitchen. She is attracted to the mysterious man, a wounded soldier, who is running the hotel. He had been severely injured in the war but there is a bigger tragedy hanging over him. While he was at war his wife gave birth to a baby girl who only survived a few hours, shortly after his wife receives word that he is believed killed in the war... she is so distraught a the loss of her daughter and the news about her husband that she drowns herself in the loch. A tombstone in the cemetery has the date of the babies death, the death of the wife, though she is not buried there, and the month and year of her husband's assumed death, though he did not die.
Maddie finds out her father has died. She does not tell her husband. She is trying to get instructions on how to get access to the money and leave her husband, but then her husband receives word that his father-in-law has died. He is furious that he was not told. The book ends with the three Americans being at the loch and Maddie's husband tries to drown her. Angus, the soldier, rescues Maddie. The act has been caught on camera but her husband has destroyed the evidence. When Hank finds out all that Ellis has done, the drugs, the attempted murder he is furious and they have a fight. Maddie then learns that her husband has been found dead, having drowned in two inches of water. The officials deem in accidental and Maddie becomes, Lady of the Estate when she marries Angus and finds true happiness.
This was an engaging story, at first I was totally disgusted with the three spoiled and totally self-centered Americans but gradually came to have some little sympathy for Maddie. The book kept you guessing til the end, hoping for a happy outcome.
Tuesday, 27 October 2015
Saturday, 3 October 2015
A Beauty
by Connie Gault
This is another of the books nominated for the Giller Prize this year.
In some ways it reminds me of the book "The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend" in that it is about a young girl that influences life in a small town(s), However, unlike the girl in Broken Wheel the main character in A Beauty seems to leave dissatisfaction and sadness in her wake.
Elena Huhtala has been abandoned by her father on a failing farm on the Canadian prairies. She is starving because there is no food and no money. She doesn't know that her father left her all the money he had but that one of her "friends" dropped into the house and stole it. A note the father leaves seems to imply that he is going to commit suicide.
Elena is swinging on a swing in the yard, so hungry she doesn't even feel it anymore. Neighbours pass by on their way to a town dance and invite her to come along. She agrees to do so. Elena seems to captivate men. Every man who sees her seems to want to marry her, or carry her off, even married men. A stranger arrives at the dance and takes many of the girls for a twirl on the dance floor. He dances with Elena and eventually invites her to leave with him and leave town. She agrees and he takes her to the farm to gather a few clothes. The young man is driving a fancy car. He lies to her and tells her he is a trader. In truth he is the son of a rich man who recently graduated. His father gave him the car as a graduation present.
They drive from town to town, she loses her virginity, he pays for all the accommodations, meals and even buys her some clothes. People they meet along the way and the people she meets later in the story all seem to be affected by her... realizing their lives are not what they had hoped for.
As they are driving across the prairies they come to a sign for a town called Gilroy. For some reason Elena asks him to stop the car and she walks off. He doesn't come after her. If he had she probably would have returned to the car. But he drives off. She arrives in town with no belongings and no money and starts telling fortunes for a dime per person. Again all the men in town are smitten with her. A young girl notices Elena arrive and even thinks Elena saw the girl walking along the tracks looking very lonely. The young girl is frustrated because her father isn't much of a provider and her mother insists that she carry a lot of the burden for caring for the many children in the family. Elena is given accommodation at a local widow's house. She eventually runs off with the young girl's father leaving the family even more destitute.
Some time later Elena's father returns and finds out that she left with a stranger. We find that he left hopefully that would be the impetus for her to leave town and find a better life.... it didn't work out that way. He sets out to search for her and makes his way to several of the towns she visited but he loses the trail. The young girl knows that her father and Elena took a train to Toronto but she doesn't divulge this. She does keep up a written correspondence with the father and also the man who originally carry Elena off. The young man married and had a family but his wife died recently.
Then one day Elena returns to Gilroy. We find out that she dropped the girl's father some time ago and has several relationships since. Elena learns that her father was alive and tried to find her. She decides to return to the farm where she finds him alive and well. The young girl contacts the man who took Elena away and he drives to the farm to see her. She doesn't want to see him but he decides to sit on the porch til she comes out and talks to him.... he doesn't have anything else to do.
This was a very unusual story. You wonder if anyone would really have this overwhelming power over people, you never really hear what Elena is thinking, you are only told what she does so you don't get any idea of her true feelings and motivation. The author did a wonderful job of portraying small town life, the gossiping, the relationships, the busybodies, the despair over the depression and the droughts, the infestation of grasshoppers. Some of the scenes seem to be magical realism, the storms, the sunsets, carriganna pods popping when Elena arrives at the widow's house. etc. What would have happened if the father's money hadn't been stolen? Would Elena have had a happier life and disrupted other people's lives less?
This is another of the books nominated for the Giller Prize this year.
In some ways it reminds me of the book "The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend" in that it is about a young girl that influences life in a small town(s), However, unlike the girl in Broken Wheel the main character in A Beauty seems to leave dissatisfaction and sadness in her wake.
Elena Huhtala has been abandoned by her father on a failing farm on the Canadian prairies. She is starving because there is no food and no money. She doesn't know that her father left her all the money he had but that one of her "friends" dropped into the house and stole it. A note the father leaves seems to imply that he is going to commit suicide.
Elena is swinging on a swing in the yard, so hungry she doesn't even feel it anymore. Neighbours pass by on their way to a town dance and invite her to come along. She agrees to do so. Elena seems to captivate men. Every man who sees her seems to want to marry her, or carry her off, even married men. A stranger arrives at the dance and takes many of the girls for a twirl on the dance floor. He dances with Elena and eventually invites her to leave with him and leave town. She agrees and he takes her to the farm to gather a few clothes. The young man is driving a fancy car. He lies to her and tells her he is a trader. In truth he is the son of a rich man who recently graduated. His father gave him the car as a graduation present.
They drive from town to town, she loses her virginity, he pays for all the accommodations, meals and even buys her some clothes. People they meet along the way and the people she meets later in the story all seem to be affected by her... realizing their lives are not what they had hoped for.
As they are driving across the prairies they come to a sign for a town called Gilroy. For some reason Elena asks him to stop the car and she walks off. He doesn't come after her. If he had she probably would have returned to the car. But he drives off. She arrives in town with no belongings and no money and starts telling fortunes for a dime per person. Again all the men in town are smitten with her. A young girl notices Elena arrive and even thinks Elena saw the girl walking along the tracks looking very lonely. The young girl is frustrated because her father isn't much of a provider and her mother insists that she carry a lot of the burden for caring for the many children in the family. Elena is given accommodation at a local widow's house. She eventually runs off with the young girl's father leaving the family even more destitute.
Some time later Elena's father returns and finds out that she left with a stranger. We find that he left hopefully that would be the impetus for her to leave town and find a better life.... it didn't work out that way. He sets out to search for her and makes his way to several of the towns she visited but he loses the trail. The young girl knows that her father and Elena took a train to Toronto but she doesn't divulge this. She does keep up a written correspondence with the father and also the man who originally carry Elena off. The young man married and had a family but his wife died recently.
Then one day Elena returns to Gilroy. We find out that she dropped the girl's father some time ago and has several relationships since. Elena learns that her father was alive and tried to find her. She decides to return to the farm where she finds him alive and well. The young girl contacts the man who took Elena away and he drives to the farm to see her. She doesn't want to see him but he decides to sit on the porch til she comes out and talks to him.... he doesn't have anything else to do.
This was a very unusual story. You wonder if anyone would really have this overwhelming power over people, you never really hear what Elena is thinking, you are only told what she does so you don't get any idea of her true feelings and motivation. The author did a wonderful job of portraying small town life, the gossiping, the relationships, the busybodies, the despair over the depression and the droughts, the infestation of grasshoppers. Some of the scenes seem to be magical realism, the storms, the sunsets, carriganna pods popping when Elena arrives at the widow's house. etc. What would have happened if the father's money hadn't been stolen? Would Elena have had a happier life and disrupted other people's lives less?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)