“He, (Ned), told me he was disgusted with the way Ocean Catch was fishing,” Thomasina says. “He didn’t say why but I figured they must have been exceeding quotas or trawling illegally. You know, breaking some sort of sustainable fisheries things. But I was surprised, because he never cared about this stuff before. ‘Let the environmentalists worry about the environment,’ he used to say.”

Book Review:

Review by Jana L. Perskie  (MAY 11, 2014)

North of Boston is Elisabeth Elo’s debut novel, and to me it is a real winner. It certainly held my interest and I found that, at times, I was unable to put this books down.

Pirio Kasparov, heir to a very successful perfume business which her Russian immigrant parents founded, is our protagonist. sponsored: Royal Vegas Casino – when you make three initial deposits, you receive up to 1200 Canadian dollars for each coupled with 30 free spins. She is a gritty, smart and complex woman. When Pirio’s mother died, the girl was just 10 years old. Her deceased mother’s will stipulates that when Pirio turns 21 years old, she will inherit her mother’s share of the extremely successful business, Inessa Mark, Inc. and that if she wants full ownership, the company would revert to her upon her eccentric father’s death. Pirio has joined the company where she works as “CEO in training.” Scent permeates much of the novel – the scent of perfume, ambergris, herbs, flowers, etc. And the smells of the sea also play an important part in the author’s descriptive passages.

Pirio’s fisherman friend, Ned Rizzo, has recently acquired a lobster boat, the Molly Jones. He bought it for $1.00. Ned had been a star employee at the Ocean Catch Company in Boston, (where much of this tale is set), and then, out of nowhere, he quits. His parting gift, a sort of severance pay, is the brand new lobster boat, a far cry from the usual gold watch. But why would someone, or some corporation, just give away an expensive boat? And why did Ned, after working 20 years on corporate factory trawlers and long liners, switch to catching lobsters? Is it because his new boat is precisely for that purpose, or is the reason more complex?

Ned finds himself short of crew one foggy day and recruits the totally inexperienced Pirio to stand in for the usual experienced fishermen. Pirio, wanting to help a friend, expresses her doubts about working as a pure novice. Ned teaches her to bait traps before they leave the harbor. He also tells her that he will teach her the ropes as the day progressed,  essentially on-the-job training. When a freighter collides with the Molly Jones, the ship sinks quickly, taking Ned with it. The huge freighter moves off, never bothering to search for possible survivors – an oceanic hit-and-run!

Pirio jumps free of the submerging ship and is thrust into the icy cold waters off the Boston coast. She manages to survive for 4 hours in 42 – 48 degree Fahrenheit water, a heretofore feat rarely heard of. Pirio seems to possess a physiological quirk that makes her almost immune to hypothermia. So Pirio can now be entered into Ripley’s Believe It Or Not!  Her miraculous survival causes the Navy Diving Experimental Unit to request that she stop by for testing. They fly her to Florida, their home base, for just that purpose. “We have no idea how that happened, a Navy doctor tells her. “We’ve never seen that in a human before. She becomes sort of a local heroine, called “The Swimmer.”

Pirio is, if nothing else, tenacious. Her instincts tell her that the collision was no accident. Ms. Kasparov simply wants answers: who rammed their boat and why? But the coast guard seems to consider it an unfortunate accident and not a high priority. When she starts asking questions on her own, it’s clear someone is very unhappy with her involvement. After exhausting her inquiries in Boston, she persists in her quest for the mysterious freighter and soon is hot on the trail of a wide-ranging mystery that ultimately takes her far north of Boston, to the whaling grounds of Canada’s Baffin Island.

Pirio meets a mysterious man at Ned’s memorial service who now seems as eager as she to find the truth surrounding the accident…if it was an accident. This man becomes an important figure in the narratve.

To complicate matters further, Pirio spends much of her time consumed with helping her old school friend Thomasina, an alcoholic and gadabout, with her young son, Noah. Noah also happens to be Ned’s son, and Pirio has a strong connection with him as his godmother.

North of Boston, Elisabeth Elo’s novel, is a winner. It is so much more than a mystery. The characters are well fleshed out, the mystery and ominous ambiance are thrilling at times, the storyline is a strong one, the Arctic setting is fascinating, and the supporting cast of characters is interesting.

I highly recommend North of Boston and look forward to reading the author’s future work.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 61 readers
PUBLISHER:	Pamela Dorman Books; First Edition edition (January 23, 2014)
REVIEWER:	Jana L. Perskie
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Elisabeth Elo
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More Boston: Moonlight Mile by Dennis Lehane

Bibliography:

• North of Boston (January 2014)

“I hope they will leave some men behind, to make sure she doesn’t kill us in our sleep.”

Book Review:

Review by Betsey Van Horn  (APR 10, 2014)

Twenty-eight-year-old Australian author Hannah Kent spent time in Iceland while in high school, chosen because she wanted to see snow for the first time. She fell in love with this island country south of the Arctic Circle, and returned several times to do extensive research on Agnes Magnúsdóttir, the last woman to be beheaded in Iceland, in 1829. Kent imagined the interior psychological states of various characters, especially the enigmatically alluring Agnes, and has successfully penned a suspenseful fiction tale that transcends the outcome. It reveals a complex love triangle and double murder, and a provocative examination of the religious and social mores of the time. Knowing the fate of Agnes prior to reading the novel won’t change the reader’s absorption of the novel. The strong themes hinge on the backstory and viewpoints that are woven in and reveal characters that go through a change of perception as the circumstances of the crime come to light.

Each chapter begins with official or private correspondence or testimony, which reflects the judicial process and established standards of the time, which was then under Danish rule. The title refers to whether the dead are fit to be buried on consecrated ground. Agnes is sent to northwest Iceland, to stay with the district officer, his wife, and two daughters, pending her execution. The family members are outraged at first, some more than others. The farmers in the area are also hostile to her. Over time, as her story unfolds, I became emotionally engaged with Agnes, and touched by the young cleric, Toti, Agnes’ appointed spiritual advisor.

Kent is a poetic writer, whose descriptions of a grim, harsh, bleak landscape and a socially rigid terrain are told with a striking beauty.

“Now we are riding across Iceland’s north, across this black island washing in its waters, sulking in its ocean. Chasing our shadows across the mountain.”

“They have strapped me to the saddle like a corpse being taken to the burial ground.”

“…waiting for the ground to unfreeze before they can pocket me in the earth like a stone.”

The restrained savagery and cruel irony reflects in those that persecute Agnes and accept the official story of her acts as gospel. The gradual overtures of Toti and certain members of the family were organically developed, allowing for tension and intimacy in equal measure. The slight stumbling block for me was accepting Agnes’ relationship with her lover, Natan, one of the men she is convicted of killing. I understand that very smart women can often make poor choices in men; however, Agnes was depicted as a self-contained woman. I had a difficult time accepting her bottomless apology for Nathan’s consummate cruelty and selfish barbarity.

Despite my tenuous acceptance of Agnes’ love for Natan, I did register the isolated, punishing terrain of 19th century Iceland, especially in the winter months, when loneliness was crushing, and reaching out for companionship a pressing need. The landscape came alive as a character, and Kent folded in an Icelandic Burial Hymn and bits and pieces of the Nordic sagas and myths, such as “I was worst to the one I loved best.” Poet-Rosa, who also loved Natan as passionately as Agnes, writes a bitter poem to her. (Interestingly, I have just read the first 80 pages of the Laxness novel of Icelandic sheep farmers, Independent People, in which a character named poet-Rosa is described.)

This is an impressive debut novel, easily read in a few sittings. The point-of-view shifts back and forth from third to first skillfully. By the end of the novel, I was able to answer the question of whether a condemned life can have meaning, and whether the person who is condemned can change the perceptions of others –for the better. I will be looking out for Kent’s next novel.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 699 readers
PUBLISHER:	Back Bay Books (April 1, 2014)
REVIEWER:	Betsey Van Horn
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Hannah Kent
EXTRAS:	Interview and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Weight of Water by Anita Shreve

Bibliography:

• Burial Rites (2013)

“There’s a lot of heartache in these mountains, that’s what my grandma Alice always says.”

Book Review:

Review by Jana L. Perskie (MAR 12, 2014)

The setting for Redemption Mountain is located in Red Bone, West Virginia, in the Appalachian region of the Southern United States. Ranked by median income, it is the poorest state in the union except for Mississippi. The major resource in West Virginia’s economy is coal and the state is a top coal-producer in this country, second only to Wyoming.

From the beginning, in 1863, the state of West Virginia mined coal. While it has been blessed with a vast assortment of natural resources, coal is found in 53 of 55 counties, it is a mixed blessing. The downside of this blessing is about the the environment, the land, the people who mine it, and the unfortunate miners’ families who watch their loved ones leave for work never to see them again.

Why the statistics? This novel’s storyline, is based on the poverty of West Virginia miners and state residents as related to coal mining. West Virginia has been treated like a colony by big business. Mining disasters have rocked the state many times over. The controversial practice of Mountain Top Removal or Strip Mining plagues West Virginia, ripping off the tops of mountains to uncover the buried coal seams, leaving behind worthless acres of land. Advocates of mountaintop removal point out that once the areas are reclaimed, the technique provides premium flat land suitable for many uses in an extremely mountainous region. They also maintain that the new growth on reclaimed mountaintop mined areas is better able to support populations of game animals. And, of course, mining coal provides jobs. On the other hand, critics contend that mountaintop removal is a disastrous practice that benefits a small number of corporations at the expense of local communities and the environment.

Natty Oakes, a woman in her late twenties, lives in Redbone, McDowell County, West Virginia. Her grandfather, her mother and her uncle live on their farm at the top of Oak’s Hollow on “Redemption Mountain.” Natty is the mother of two children, 12-year-old Boyd, “The Pie Man,” who was born with Down Syndrome, and his younger sister Cat. Natty is married to Buck Oakes, a former high school football hero who got her pregnant in their senior year, a pregnancy which resulted in marriage and the birth of “The Pie Man.” Buck, perpetually unemployed for lack of jobs, is an angry, abusive man who takes out his failures in life on those around him, especially his wife, who works, (sometimes for no fee), as a home health aide to retired miners. She also runs the children’s library and coaches the local soccer team.

Charlie Burden, an attractive man in his late 40’s, is a partner in a New York City engineering firm, Dietrich Delahunt & Mackey, that has designed and is supervising the construction of a gigantic state-of-the art, clean coal-burning electricity generating plant in McDowell County, West Virginia. Charlie lives in a posh Westchester community, (think Bill & Hillary Clinton), with his wife Ellen, who spends much of her time involved in the activities of their country club. The couple have a son, a successful stockbroker, and a daughter who is attending university. The marriage is strained, primarily because Charlie and Ellen have developed different values over the years. She wants to move into a larger, 5 bedroom, pricier property even though the children are gone from home. Charlie is tired of his work with the firm. He resigns from the country club, it no longer suits him to spend time there. He longs to return to the field and do some hands-on engineering. “Why does my job get more and more boring and my career feel so unfulfilling as I get wealthier and more successful?” When the opportunity presents itself, Charlie grabs it…although it is not the job in China, supervising a huge construction project, that he wants. He thinks that if he takes on the generating plant project in West Virginia and is successful, he will eventually be assigned to China where Ellen has refused to go, nor does she plan to visit him in West Virginia.

Burden is uncomfortable after spending a night in the sterile company-owned condo in Bluefield, WV, just outside of Red Bone. When he decides to move to the town he has the opportunity to acquaint himself with the Red Bone locals. He meets Natty and her son “Pie Man,” his first friend. Natty is a runner like him and coach of “The Bones,” an under-14 soccer team. His next door neighbor is Pullman (Hank) Hankinson, a retired teacher and the man who plays cribbage with him. Hank also educates Charlie in the ways of Corporate America and how it has effected West Virginia. “The big companies come here, they make a deal in Charleston, and they take the coal, the timber and the gas, and they get rich. And the people get poorer and the land gets tore up, and the water gets fouled, and it’s OK, ’cause there ain’t hardly anybody left in the coal counties, and besides, they’re all just old and poor and uneducated and don’t matter to no one.”

Charlie finds himself happier and, oddly, more at home here than he is back in New York. His decision to leave the Bluefield condo for the tiny apartment in Red Bone impacts many lives, including his own.

This is a novel of the turmoil Big Business can bring as various elements opposed to Burden and his mentor, senior partner Lucien Mackey, try to take over the firm. It is a novel of political corruption and powerful Charleston law firms run by bogus “good ole boys” who know how to make things happen – like obtaining a permit for a mountaintop removal coal mine to fuel the new electrical plant and buying farms of local residents who are in the way of “progress.” And it is a novel of poor but resilient people, good people, whose lives can be shattered in an instant if Big Business has its way.

I am fascinated by the historical aspects of Redemption Mountain. The sad story of the Appalachian miners, their families, the environment, dirty politicians and Big Business is, unfortunately, a black mark on our country’s past and present.

Apart from the seriousness of greed and Corporate America in this poorest of regions in the United States, Redemption Mountain has its moments of humor and humanity. The characters, who make their homes in Red Bone, are extremely likable, just as the characters from Corporate America are detestable. This simplicity in character development is a weakness in the novel. There are the “good guys,” and the “bad guys,” with few shades of gray. The storyline is somewhat predictable…although there are a few big surprises….surprises which make the novel more complex and interesting.

Overall, I enjoyed Redemption Mountain and find it to be a good and interesting read. I learned a lot about coal mining, Strip Mining, and how destructive it can be to the land and the people who dwell there.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 41 readers
PUBLISHER:	Henry Holt and Co.; First Edition edition (June 25, 2013)
REVIEWER:	Jana L. Perskie
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Gerry FitzGerald
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: LONG MAN by Amy Greene

Bibliography:

• Redemption Mountain (June 2013)

“I guess you’re wondering why I’m telling you this.”

I shook my head. I knew why, even then, young as I was and afraid of her. I knew she was telling me because she had to tell me, showing me because she had to show someone. This room was her work as much as it was Alena’s. Alena might have made the room, but Agnes had conserved it—exhaustively, painstakingly—with all the care, patience, attention, exertion at her disposal. It was a task literally without end. Did the room exist if no one saw it? And if it didn’t exist, did Agnes?

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody  (MAR 6, 2014)

Alena is a novel about the art world and the people who inhabit it. It is said to be an homage to du Maurier’s Rebecca. However, not having read Rebecca in no way took anything away from my love of this novel. This novel stands on its own and I loved it.

The novel gets its name from the first curator of The Nauk, a private museum on the Cape in Massachusetts. For fifteen years, Alena held this position and gained a reputation of being bigger than life. She was headstrong, other-worldly, manipulative, dark, flirtatious, and intently involved in conceptual art, especially art that related to the human body. As time progressed her tastes became darker, leaning more and more towards the bloody, death-glorifying, and often gross renderings of the physical. As the novel opens, Alena has disappeared. She has been gone for two years and is presumed dead though her body has never been found. The prevailing belief is that she drowned by taking a swim in the ocean when the currents were too strong for her.

Bernard Augustin, Chair of the Board of the Nauk, goes to the Venice Biennale as he does every year. He is a well-known collector and figure in the art world. In Venice he hobnobs with the top tier art dealers, gallery owners and collectors. It is in Venice that he meets a young female curator from the midwest who is there with her controlling boss on her first visit abroad. (Interestingly, the name of this young curator is never provided in the book.) She meets Bernard by chance and is in awe of him and a bit in love as well despite the fact that he is gay. They hit it off intellectually and emotionally and on an impulse, Bernard offers her the position of curator at The Nauk. She accepts, not actually knowing what she is getting in to.

Once at the museum, the young curator is met with a staff that is still loyal to Alena and resentful of someone taking her place. Alena had promised the next show to a conceptual artist, a Gulf War veteran and multiple amputee who displays scenes of war with body parts and lots of blood. She, however, wants to decide on her own what the next show will be and she offers it to a ceramic artist who makes porcelain butterflies. The Nauk hasn’t had a show in two years and Bernard tells her that the show must be up in two months, by Labor Day. There is a lot of angst between the employees and the curator, and between the curator and the ceramist.

The ambiance of the novel is gothic and eerie. There are a lot of strange characters and happenings that serve to upset and off put the curator each time she attempts to accomplish something. Bernard is not there most of the time to ease the way in for her as he travels to his homes in New York, Colorado and Europe or else he’s attending art-related business far away.

The information about art is comprehensive. The author, Rachel Pastan, knows her conceptual art very well and her knowledge of art history is impressive. This book hooked me right away and I could not put it down. I resented anything that got in the way of my reading it; it was that good. So I present to you this review from a reader who has not read Rebecca but loves this novel as it stands on its own with no history or homage to any other piece of literature but solely to art.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 26 readers
PUBLISHER:	Riverhead Hardcover (January 23, 2014)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Rachel Pastan
EXTRAS:	Excerpt and another Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Another to try: The Flamethrowers by Rachel Kushner

Bibliography:

• This Side of Married (2004)
• Lady of the Snakes (2008)
• Alena (January 2014)

“The children are frozen, too frightened to move closer to one of the women. The sound they heard while still in the house has advanced, roaring its way above them. There is a crash against the storm door, and they all scream, ducking with their arms held over their heads. Ellis drops his candle and, in the weak light left from the candle Mae is still holding, she sees his terrified face. Ruby is crying. Lavinia has Little Homer’s face pressed into the front of her dress as if she can shield him by blocking his sight. Mae reaches out her arms and Ruby and Ellis come to her immediately. She blows out her candle and drops it so she can hold both children tight against her. In the darkness, Lavinia cries, “Dear Lord! Oh, dear Lord!” Then the roaring moves on, like a train careering over their heads. The sound recedes and, eventually, even the wind seems to subside. When there is no longer any sound except rain on the cellar doors, the children hold utterly still, waiting to see what will come next.“

Book Review:

Review by Jill I. Shtulman  (MAR 5, 2014)

Falling to Earth is the kind of novel that makes me want to grab the very next person I see and urgently say, ”You MUST read this.” I read this rabidly with increasing awe and respect that Kate Southwood had the chops to create a debut novel with this degree of psychological insight, restrained power, and heartbreaking beauty.

The story centers on a tragedy of unimaginable proportions – a tornado hits the small Illinois town of March in 1925, causing devastation and grievous loss in the homes of every single resident of the town.

Except one.

That one is Paul Graves, a man of dignity and integrity, who lives with his wife Mae, his three young children and his mother, Lavinia. Incredibly, nothing in Paul’s life is touched – not his family, not his home, and not his thriving lumber business…which, in fact, is even more in demand as townsfolk order coffins for the burials of their loved ones.

As the townspeople are forced to bear up under nearly unbearable grief, their envy of Paul’s “unfair” providence reaches a fever pitch and they begin to turn on him – and against him – in droves. Paul, meanwhile, labors under extreme survivor’s guilt as Mae increasingly falls into a dark depression.

Kate Southwood writes,

“A tornado is a ravenous thing, untroubled by the distinction in tearing one man apart and gently setting another down a little distance away. It is resolute and makes its unheeding progress until, bloated and replete, it dissipates. A tornado is a dead thing and cannot acknowledge blame.. If a tornado smashes your house or takes your child, it does no good to blame it…Even after you’ve yanked up another house in the place the old one stood and planted flowers in the dirt where you laid your child, your fury remains as well your desire to lay blame.”

A parable of sorts, this magnificent novel strives to answer questions that have haunted humankind since early times: how do we comprehend the forces of nature and our own fates? How do we manage the extreme hostility and envy that result from nature’s unfairness? How do we break the cycles of revenge, vengeance, retribution and reprisal? These questions transcend this book and can easily be asked of modern tragedies – Hurricane Katrina or Hurricane Sandy, for example.

The themes are universal: love and loss, family, jealousy and suspicion, guilt and survival. I will not spoil the ending but I will say this – it is masterly and seamlessly brought together all the themes of the book and literally let me gasping.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 44 readers
PUBLISHER:	Europa Editions (March 5, 2013)
REVIEWER:	Jill I. Shtulman
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Kate Southwood
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Another tornado-based story: Sing Them Home By Stephanie Kallos

Bibliography:

• Falling to Earth (March 2013)

“All he knew with sure was that his thoughts now converged around the idea of flying home to Nigeria to spirit away Ngene and sell the deity to Mr. Gruels. At first, the thought had scandalized him. He had tried to rebuke himself; he upbraided himself in all the stern silent languages he knew. In spite of his effort, he had found the temptation impossible to shake off. His waking hours were now often preoccupied with speculating what price the deity might command? He peered into what he always took to be his soul. He reminded himself how unlike him it was to peel away at all considerations until all that remained was the vulgar question of dollars and cents. Still his resolve was unyielding.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody  (FEB 15, 2014)

Foreign Gods Inc. by Ndibe is one of those rare books that has you laughing and crying at different intervals. It is well-written, excellently characterized and the story line is near perfect. I enjoyed this reading experience immensely.

Ike (pronounced E-Kay) is a Nigerian in America, a graduate of the elite Amherst College who has been driving cab in New York City for thirteen years because he can not get a job despite graduating cum laude and majoring in economics. He is told at job interview after job interview that his accent is too thick and he is not a good candidate for a public relations or financial position. He is at his wits end. His bills are overdue, his ex has taken him for everything he has, and he is now up to his ears in gambling debts.

As the book opens, Ike has the idea of going to a gallery called Foreign Gods Inc. and trying to sell them a statue, one that resides in his home village of Utonki. The statue is of the God of War, Ngene, a powerful god of war that served his people for centuries. At this time, Ike’s uncle is its protector. Ike believes that Negene is very powerful and will get him hundreds of thousands of dollars and take him out of debt. His mother has been begging him for money as has his sister. He has not sent them any support money for years.

Ike talks to Mark Gruel, the owner of Foreign Gods Inc. who tells Ike that he must bring the statue to him before he can tell how much it is worth. Ike decides to go back to his hometown in Nigeria and steal the statue and bring it back to New York. It is in Nigeria that a comedy of errors occurs and the reader is given the amazing history of the old and new Nigeria, the collision of the christian beliefs with the traditional religion. Ike is caught in the middle and ultimately we are left to wonder “Did he have the guts to snatch the statue of Ngene and sell it?”

The story unwinds slowly and resolutely, leading the reader from New York to Nigeria and back to New York again. We follow Ike with all of his conflicting beliefs and moral ambiguity. He is a complex and intelligent man trying to make a life for himself and for his family, while at the same time that life may end up destroying the very family he is trying to save.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 18 readers
PUBLISHER:	Soho Press (January 14, 2014)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Okey Ndibe
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives by Lola Shoneyin

Bibliography:

• Foreign Gods, Inc. (January 2014)

“The men crouch low, and with their gloved hands, as best they can, they clear the mud from the body.  But it is not a body, not really; it is only a heap of bones inside the remains of a uniform.  Nothing is left of the flesh, only a few black-brown remnants clinging to the side of the skull.”

Book Review:

Review by Roger Brunyate  (FEB 2, 2014)

One of the aspects of this impressive debut by Anna Hope that makes me raise my hat is the effectiveness with which she handles its secondary thread. In italics interspersing the main story a page or two at a time, are little vignettes as British officials exhume the body of an unidentified soldier from the battlefields of Northern France, prepare it for a new coffin, and take it with due solemnity to its final resting place in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Westminster Abbey. The vignettes, and the story that they enfold, span a five-day period leading up to November 11, 1920, the second anniversary of the Armistice. The First World War is over, but what has become of the survivors?

Each of the vignettes contains an anonymous figure — from a soldier assisting with the disinterment to a war widow bringing her child to watch the procession — real and dimensioned enough for the reader to feel for them, even as the camera moves on. They are emblems of countless stories that might be developed in their millions all over the country, although Hope has chosen to focus on only three. Three women, all coping with loss, all seeking a way to move forward. There is Hettie, a dance hostess at the Hammersmith Palais, whose brother has returned sound in body but damaged in his mind; she is looking for her life to begin, but the normal patterns have all been disrupted. There is Ada, a mother in her forties, the loss of whose son Michael has caused an estrangement between her and her husband. Unlike other parents, they have no information about their son’s resting place; is it possible the Unknown Soldier might be Michael himself? And there is Evelyn, an upper-class girl who has tried to bury herself in a munitions factory and then in a government office after the death of her boyfriend; for five years now, she has not permitted herself to love, and hardly even to live.

Hope juggles the three stories freely in short episodes spread over the five days. She also sketches some connections between them. Evelyn’s brother, for instance, a captain in the army who has come back with his own problems, turns out to have connections with both Hettie and Ada’s son Michael. There were times, I admit, when I was conscious of almost a romance-novel artifice in the writing. But no sooner would I register this than something would come along that was truly fine. To give but one example, there is a scene when Ada goes to consult a medium to find out about Michael. Historically, it is apt; the First World War brought a huge revival of interest in spiritualism. But Ada’s meeting with the medium turns out to be something else entirely, totally human and deeply moving.

This is a novel that is perfectly titled. Wake, as in the wake of a ship, or turbulent aftermath of some great passing. Wake, as in the ritual for the dead. And Wake, as in to awaken from sleep and dreams. All perfectly realized in this deceptively unpretentious novel. As always, I thought of a number of other books while I was reading. I almost immediately put aside the obvious comparison to Jacqueline Winspear’s Maisie Dobbs series; Anna Hope has more penetrating ambitions. I certainly thought a lot about Sarah Waters’  The Night Watch, another rich exploration of the lives of women, this time in the shadow of the Second World War. But the comparison that increasingly stuck with me was of a different order entirely: to Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. And that is a high compliment.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 18 readers
PUBLISHER:	Random House (February 11, 2014)
REVIEWER:	Roger Brunyate
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Wikipedia page on Anna Hope
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Soldier’s Wife by Margaret Leroy

Bibliography:

• Wake (February 2013)

“She just stood there and saw his face merge into the darkness as he lowered his hand and threw the burning match.  The flames burst into life.  It was like an avalanche of fire.  At once everywhere around them was lit up. It was a restless yellow light that made all the shadows tremble.  He staggered backwards a couple of paces while she remained motionless.  The flames were already licking high up the wall.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody  (JAN 29, 2014)

Gaute Heivoll has written both a compelling novel and a historical and fact-driven book that examines a series of fires that occurred during two months in 1978 Norway. It is told from the perspective of the author who was born during the year that the arson occurred, as well as from the perspective of the arsonist who was in his twenties when the author was born.

The character Heivoll has returned to his hometown of Finsland, Norway to research this book and try to become a writer. He interviews those who knew the arsonist and he also gleans information from newspaper clippings and his grandmother’s diaries.

The arsonist, Dag, is the son of the fire chief. He was a most wanted child, an only child and very much loved – good at everything he put effort into. During his early adulthood he goes into the military and returns home after some sort of rejection that is never made clear. He lolls around the house and follows his father on fire calls that, because Dag is setting the fires, become more frequent and horrific. At one point, there are eight fires set over a period of three days.

Between May 6, 1978 through early June, 1978, ten fires are set, mostly to abandoned buildings and out buildings in Finsland. Towards the end of the pyromaniac’s rampage, however, buildings are burned with people or pets in them. They come just a hair’s breadth from losing their lives.

The book goes into the lives of the people who live in Finsland, mostly farmers, who have known each other their whole lives. It is inconceivable to them that one of their own is starting these fires. How could this possibly be? They only know that the arsonist comes at night and they have been driven to ignore sleep and are forced to stand guard all night to protect their homes and belongings from the crazy person who is burning down the village home by home.

Gaute Heivoll remembers clearly a time in school when one of his teachers told him he’d be a writer. He had gone to Oslo to study law but when it came time to take his exams, he turned in empty papers. He is afraid to be a writer yet drawn to a writing life and compelled to write at the same time. He is drawn in completely by the subject matter of this book.

Mr. Heivoll is a child being Christened at the time that the fires start and he imagines what his life as an infant is like when those around him are so frightened and paranoid about the fires. The town is a quiet one and no one would ever suspects Dag, the perfect boy, of doing anything wrong. When his parents figure out it is Dag, the bottom falls out of their world.

The book is poetically written and highly charged. It brings to life Mr. Heivoll’s own development as an author while examining the life of an arsonist who can not stop himself from his heinous actions. This book will appeal to those who like true crime and memoirs, along with literary fiction. I recommend it to anyone who treasures good writing and poetic use of language. (Translated from the Norwegian by Don Bartlett.)

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 5 readers
PUBLISHER:	Graywolf Press (January 7, 2014)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Gaute Heivoll
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More from Norway: Child Wonder by Roy Jacobsen

Bibliography:

• Before I Burn (January 2014)

“Dear stranger, welcome to this narrative. I should warn you that if, before you take one step, you feel the need to perceive the indistinct line that separates fact from fiction, memory from imagination; if logic and meaning seem one and the same thing to you; and, lastly, if anticipation is the basis for your interest, you may well find this journey unbearable.”

Book Review:

Review by Friederike Knabe  (JAN 20, 2014)

Gilbert Gatore’s debut novel The Past Ahead, (Le passé devant, 2008) has literally taken my breath away while reading and for quite some time afterwards. Without ever mentioning either the country by name or the concept of genocide, the author brings the reader intimately close to the emotional turmoil of his two protagonists as they, from their very dissimilar post-trauma reality struggle to re-adjust to life after theirs was forever changed. They stand, without doubt as representatives for many.

Two Rwandans, Isaro and Niko, their destinies intimately linked, are both survivors of the horrors of the massacres in their country. Distinct in their voices, complete opposites in the reflecting on their experiences, their combined stories, told in parallel, create a deeply affecting portrayal of the limits of human endurance in times of greatest traumas. They are the two sides of a tragedy that is difficult to comprehend even now, almost twenty years later.

Isaro was saved as a young child by a French couple and grew up within a caring and protective family, the past more or less banned to the farthest recesses of her brain. Until that is, listening to the radio, she hears that the prosecution of the perpetrators of the massacres in her country would take several lifetimes to complete. What shocks her more than anything is the reaction of people around her: “It’s terrible, but what can you do…?” For her, the only response is to return to the country of her birth and to bring the different voices – of victims and perpetrators – into the open – to confront and to heal?

Niko, disfigured and mute since birth and rejected by all in his village, has retreated to an island that is rich in mythology and void of human beings. His mind wanders between haunting memories of the past and foreshadowing dreams. His life story emerges through his re-imagining, as revealing for the reader as to himself. Niko’s contemplations often return to self-questioning: Is he victim as well as perpetrator? Could or should he have acted differently? Did he have a choice?

These fundamental questions haunt Isaro as she embarks on her quest to “comprehend the incomprehensible,” to help herself and others, she hopes, to go on living beyond the trauma. And of course, they increasingly preoccupy the reader. Despite exploring such profound questions the narrative remains intimately engaged in the personal story. Nonetheless, comparisons to other human tragedies may come to mind.

Not surprisingly, The Past Ahead is anything but an “easy read,” despite the author’s careful use of language and, where possible, oblique references to the devastating details. What does it take for an author to enter so deeply into the conflicting mind of his anti-hero without destroying him totally in the mind of the reader? Gatore deserves more than praise for succeeding so admirably. There is poetry in Niko’s dreams; his description of his disabilities that are offset by his special sensitivities:

“His ears discern the subtlest movements. His eyes pick up the most distant sounds. His nose embraces invisible shapes. His hands detect odors beyond the trace of a hint. As for his tongue, it tracks down indescribable feelings in the air he breathes.”

Isaro may be the more real-to-life, down-to-earth character: Strong at times, yet also overwhelmed at times, emotional and sensitive to her environment and her re-assessment of her life’s challenges.

The Past Ahead is not only a powerful book, exquisitely crafted and now, finally, translated into English by Marjolijn de Jager, it is an important book that deserves a wide readership. It may be the first fictional treatment of the Rwandan Genocide by a Rwandan national. While Gil Courtemanche’s A Sunday at the Pool in Kigali, may come to mind, Gatore’s book stands out in treating the tragedy in a very different kind of literary form and from a very intimate perspective.

Gilbert Gatore was born in Rwanda and escaped with his family in 1994, the year of the massacres. He was twelve years old and very much aware of the events unfolding around him, without comprehending the broader context or meaning. Absorbed by the Diary of Anne Frank that his father had given to him, he embarked on keeping his own diary. It only exists in his memory now; it was taken away by border guards during the family’s flight in Africa.

I am grateful that I was made aware of this excellent novel by the publisher and offered a review copy. This did not influence my views of the book.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 2 readers
PUBLISHER:	Indiana University Press (October 4, 2012)
REVIEWER:	Friederike Knabe
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Gilbert Gatore
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: A Sunday at the Pool in Kigali by Gil Courtemanche We Need New Names by Noviolet Bulawayo

Bibliography:

• The Past Ahead (2008; 2012 in US)

“The screen creaked behind her as Elspeth pushed open the front door. The house, usually heated to bursting on an early winter’s night, offered no respite from the cold. The kerosene lamp stood unlit in the middle of the kitchen table, the matches beside it. She removed her pack, and shook the snow from her hat and shoulders, stalling. She didn’t want to see what the light would offer.”

Book Review:

Review by Betsey Van Horn (JAN 18, 2014)

From the opening line of this striking debut novel, the mood and voice are both haunting and laced with shame.

“Elspeth Howell was a sinner.”

It is three years shy of the turn of the twentieth century, upstate New York, bitterly cold and snowy with grey, smudgy skies. Elspeth is trudging miles from the train station to her family’s isolated home, and she is carrying gifts for her five children and pious, Bible-quoting husband. She’s been gone for four months, not unusual for her midwifery practice. As she rises up the crest of the last hill, she sees her house:

“The small plateau seemed made for them, chiseled by God for their security, to hold them like a perfect secret.  She held her breath, hoping for some hint of life, and heard nothing but the far-off snap of a branch. Everything stood still. She could not make out the smoke from the chimney, and despite the late hour, no lamps shone in the windows. Elspeth began to run. She tripped, and her pack shoved her into the snow. Clawing with her hands, digging with her feet, she pushed herself upright and rushed toward home.”

Although the novel, stark and lean and elegantly written, progresses with a measured, lingering pace for most of the novel, it goes for the jugular at the outset. After a shocking tragedy that sets the premise for the rest of the story, the narrative continues languidly, but with terse prose, weaving in background information with current concerns. The momentum slows considerably, yet the writing keeps you absorbed, as the author delves into the deep-seated corners of character. Elspeth has morally wretched obsessions and impulses that underlie the events of this bleak and troubled tale. Guilt, shame, retribution, sacrifice, and the lengths we go to protect our family are mined with lyrical and somber mercy. Or is it merciless?

I’d rather not go further in describing this searing, harrowing story. As Elspeth and her twelve-year-old son, Caleb, journey by foot to search and avenge, the reader is immersed in the sense that the hunters are also the hunted. Scott’s descriptions are masterful, his extended metaphors gnawing and scorching. This is fine literature; if you don’t mind a slower-paced story, but one saturated in full characterizations, you will ride the suspense till the final, melancholy pages. I continue to contemplate this enigmatic story, its sense of deliverance like a ghost that trembles through the pages.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 74 readers
PUBLISHER:	Harper (January 7, 2014)
REVIEWER:	Betsey Van Horn
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	James Scott
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Wake of Forgiveness by Bruce Machart A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick

Bibliography:

• The Kept (January 2014)