Tag: historical fiction

#BookReview The Northern Reach by W. S. Winslow @flatironbooks

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Welcome to today’s stop on the blog tour for The Northern Reach by W. S. Winslow which will be published in hardcover on 2nd March 2021. My thanks to Claire at Flatiron Books for inviting me to take part in the tour and for my digital review copy via NetGalley.

The Northern ReachAbout the Book

Frozen in grief after the loss of her son at sea, Edith Baines stares across the water at a schooner, under full sail yet motionless in the winter wind and surging tide of the Northern Reach. Edith seems to be hallucinating. Or is she? Edith’s boat-watch opens The Northern Reach, set in the coastal town of Wellbridge, Maine, where townspeople squeeze a living from the perilous bay or scrape by on the largesse of the summer folk and whatever they can cobble together, salvage, or grab.

At the center of town life is the Baines family, land-rich, cash-poor descendants of town founders, along with the ne’er-do-well Moody clan, the Martins of Skunk Pond, and the dirt farming, bootlegging Edgecombs. Over the course of the twentieth century, the families intersect, interact, and inter-marry, grappling with secrets and prejudices that span generations, opening new wounds and reckoning with old ghosts.

Format: eARC (240 pages)             Publisher: Flatiron Books
Publication date: 2nd March 2021 Genre: Historical/Contemporary Fiction

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Amazon UK
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My Review

The book’s structure – a series of interconnected stories set in a fictional coastal town in Maine – will no doubt provoke comparisons with Elizabeth Strout’s Olive Kitteridge and Olive, Again. However, the stories that make up The Northern Reach stretch over a period of time – from 1904 to 2017 – and follow the lives of members of four families whose fortunes intermingle over the generations. There are a lot of characters to keep track of but, thankfully, the author has provided a series of family trees which I certainly found myself referring to frequently.

The Northern Reach encompasses tragedy, loss, family breakdown and infidelity but also includes welcome moments of humour. I particularly liked the story ‘Striptease’, which although it has an undercurrent of sadness, describes a joyful daytrip in which a woman throws caution – along with a few other things – to the wind.

Although many of the characters are not particularly likeable, the author has a keen eye for how people behave and react to others. For example, in the chapter entitled ‘Starvation Diet’ set in 1966, Liliane, born in France, encounters snobbery from her husband’s relatives and their neighbours. At a “pot luck”, which she learns is nothing at all like a dinner party, she endures rather unsubtle put-downs from her mother-in-law, including deliberately mispronouncing Liliane’s name and comments about “fancy food”.

In ‘Planting Tiger’, Victoria is forced to return to Wellbridge for the funeral of her father, known to all as ‘Tiger’. It’s a town, and a past, she has done her best to leave behind. “Victoria picked her way through the clots of gossiping biddies, low-slung keg bellies, and blondes who could only be Tiger’s ex-wives or girlfriends.”  Ashamed of her family for reasons which will become apparent, she is dismayed at the unexpected arrival of her fiancé, Tino, especially when her mother, Jessie, turns up and introduces herself to him. Mishearing his name, Jessie wonders “what kind of parents named their kid after a member of the Jackson 5, and not even the famous one“.

‘Requiem (For The Unburied)’ set in 2017, recalls the event to which Edith Baines’ memory repeatedly returns in the opening chapter of the book, but also involves a more recent tragedy reaching well beyond the confines of Wellbridge. I can’t finish this review without mentioning the beautiful descriptions of the coastal scenery which is the backdrop to events in the lives of so many of the characters. ‘The slate-blue bay shudders beneath a gusting wind, foamy whitecaps breaking here and there.  The high tide has just started to turn, and in a few hours, the waterline will have retreated twenty feet from where it is now, leaving behind a wet moonscape of barnacle-crusted boulders, mounds of ochre seaweed, and even the odd starfish…’.

I really enjoyed the beautiful writing and the varied characters brought to life in The Northern Reach. I thought it was an impressive debut and I’d be keen to read whatever the author comes up with next.

In three words: Insightful, acutely-observed, poignant

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W. S. WinslowAbout the Author

W. S. Winslow was born and raised in Maine, but spent most of her working life in San Francisco and New York in corporate communications and marketing. A ninth-generation Mainer, she now spends most of the year in a small town Downeast. She holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in French from the University of Maine, and an MFA from NYU. Her fiction has been published in Yemassee Journal and Bird’s Thumb.

The Northern Reach is her first novel. (Photo credit: Jeff Roberts)

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#BookReview The Art of the Assassin by Kevin Sullivan @AllisonandBusby

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The Art of the AssassinAbout the Book

1899, Glasgow. A man is stabbed to death in a tenement courtyard, and Juan Camarón, photographer-cum-sleuth, is enlisted to assist the police investigation. Perhaps his innovative photographic method can bring to light what the eye may have overlooked.

Yet Juan has problems of his own. His late father’s legacy, a monumental photographic record of the architecture of colonial Cuba, is threatened by a charge of plagiarism from a mysterious señora. Meanwhile, Juan’s hoped-for happiness with his fiancée, Jane, might be over before it’s begun, and even more so when a visiting professor is murdered and Jane is witnessed fleeing the scene. Juan is torn between finding the killer and finding Jane, but are they one and the same? The truth may be hidden in the photographs.

Format: Hardcover (325 pages)           Publisher: Allison & Busby
Publication date: 18th February 2021 Genre: Historical Fiction, Mystery, Crime

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Bookshop.org
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Hive | Amazon UK
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My Review

As in The Figure in the Photograph, Juan’s skill as a photographer and his keen eye for detail play an important role in the unfolding of the story. As he notes, the camera sees more than the naked eye since it records everything. “The camera does not distinguish; does not judge, it does not jump to conclusions. Details missed by the brain are preserved by the machine.” Whereas in The Figure in the Photograph Juan’s application of his serial photography technique – the taking of multiple images of the same scene over a long time period – was the key to solving the mystery, this time it’s his careful and systematic analysis of photographs taken at the crime scene that provide the first clues.

Even when not directly engaged in crime solving, I liked the way Juan responds to people, objects and places with the instincts of a photographer. For instance, noticing how the light falls on a surface or how he might compose a portrait so as to soften the lines on a woman’s face. And he reacts with annoyance when shown a photograph of a scene because he feels the person wielding the camera has created an image open to misinterpretation, dismissing it as “a photograph that recorded an event without conveying its unique meaning”.

The book is set in a period of technological development such as the first moving pictures (although Juan doubts whether these will catch on) and the emergence of the science of psychology, innovative theories about the personality and the first use of talking therapies.

Although the book sees Juan and Jane once again working together to investigate a murder and a possible abduction, there are strains apparent in their relationship. Whereas Juan should admire Jane’s independence of spirit, at times he almost seems to resent her willingness to take the lead, displaying a rather disappointing touch of chauvinism. At one point he reflects, “I should have been proud of her investigative acumen, her keen intelligence. Instead, I felt that my position was being undermined.” As it turns out, Jane’s resourcefulness is sorely needed.

At one point, it seems possible that Jane may have a rival for Juan’s affections when a glamorous figure from the world of the theatre makes an entrance into the story. I loved how the author described the atmosphere of a 19th century theatre before a performance: the spell cast by a full auditorium, the smell of tobacco smoke in the air, the patrons in evening dress and the ‘rising, falling hum of human voices’.

With a plot that encompasses murder, abduction, fortuitous escapes from captivity, agents of a foreign power and industrial espionage, the book has many of the ingredients of a John Buchan adventure novel. As regular followers of this blog will know, there’s no higher praise in my eyes! Indeed, the dramatic events at the Theatre Royal towards the end of The Art of the Assassin recalled for me the music hall scene at the conclusion of Alfred Hitchcock’s film adaptation of John Buchan’s The Thirty-Nine Steps.

Like its predecessor, The Art of the Assassin is an absorbing historical crime mystery with plenty of twists and turns, great period detail and many colourful characters. My thanks to Christina at Allison & Busby for my advance review copy. If my review has made you keen to read the first book in the series, The Figure in the Photograph, it’s now available in paperback.

In three words: Engaging, suspenseful, atmospheric

Try something similar: Castle Gay by John Buchan

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sullivan-kevin-wbAbout the Author

Kevin Sullivan was born in Glasgow. His career in journalism has placed him on the frontline of defining historical moments, from documenting events at Tiananmen Square to driving over a landmine while reporting in Sarajevo. His work has taken him to Singapore, Japan and Spain, and his experiences influence his writing. Kevin currently lives in Bosnia. (Photo credit: Publisher author page)

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