Tag: literary fiction

#BookReview The Wanderers by Tim Pears

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9781408892305About the Book

Two teenagers, bound by love yet divided by fate, forge separate paths in England before World War I.

1912. Leo Sercombe is on a journey. Aged thirteen and banished from the secluded farm of his childhood, he travels through Devon grazing on berries and sleeping in the woods. Behind him lies the past and before him the West Country, spread out like a tapestry. But a wanderer is never alone for long, try as he might – and soon Leo is taken in by gypsies, with their wagons, horses, and vivid attire. Yet he knows he cannot linger and must forge on toward the western horizon.

Leo’s love, Lottie, is at home. Life on the estate continues as usual, yet nothing is as it was. Her father is distracted by the promise of new love and Lottie is increasingly absorbed in the natural world: the profusion of wild flowers in the meadow, the habits of predators, and the mysteries of anatomy. And of course, Leo is absent. How will the two young people ever find each other again?

Format: Audio book (8h 38m)                  Publisher: Bloomsbury/Isis Audio
Publication date: 2nd November 2018 Genre: Historical fiction

Find The Wanderers (The West Country Trilogy #2) on Goodreads

Purchase links*
Amazon UK| Hive (supporting UK bookshops)
*links provided for convenience not as part of an affiliate programme

My Review

The Wanderers is the second novel in Tim Pears’s West Country trilogy. Like the first book, The Horseman, it was longlisted for The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction. (The author recently made it three out of three when the final book in the trilogy, The Redeemed, made the shortlist for the 2020 prize.) I listened to the audiobook version, superbly narrated by Jonathan Keeble, who really captured the rhythm of the writing and created distinct voices for the various characters.

The end of The Horseman saw young Leo leaving his home to head westward, filled with guilt that an innocent act should have resulted in dramatic consequences for his family. Penniless and without the means to sustain himself, he is rescued by a band of gypsies. There follows a wonderful section of the book in which Leo is introduced to gypsy culture and travels with the Orchard ‘tribe’. Once again, his bond with horses and his riding ability form a key part of the storyline. Learning that the gypsies do not intend to travel further westward, he parts company with them in a thrillingly opportunistic way. Once more Leo finds himself travelling alone, reliant on his own enterprise or the kindness of strangers to feed him and provide him with shelter.

Throughout the book, the author populates Leo’s journey with a wonderful cast of characters, such as the patriarch of the Orchard family and an old shepherd. Often he meets people living on the margins of society. For example, an ailing hermit, a veteran of the Boer War who senses the country is moving towards war once again.

During his travels Leo is educated in country ways such as the care of sheep, and how to forage and live off the land. These are described in realistic detail – in some cases, perhaps rather too realistic for those on the squeamish side! As in The Horseman, there are wonderful descriptions of the landscape through which Leo passes. The author vividly depicts a way of life that progresses at a very different pace to our own, one much more aligned with the seasons. Of course, the reader knows it’s a way of life that will shortly be changed forever by the coming of war.

Meanwhile, back on the estate, Lottie feels increasingly invisible as her father’s attention is diverted elsewhere. She fears being sent away from the estate and the countryside she loves so much and being unable to pursue her interest in nature and biology, not considered suitable subjects for a young lady in her position. She clings to the hope that Leo, the only person who seems to understand her passion for the natural world, will keep his promise to return.

The book ends at a turning point for Leo, and for the country. I’m looking forward to finding out what happens in The Redeemed, the final book in the trilogy, which will pick up Leo’s and Lottie’s story in 1916.

In three words: Lyrical, immersive, evocative

Try something similar: The Offing by Benjamin Myers

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Time Pears authorAbout the Author

Tim Pears is the author of eight novels: In the Place of Fallen Leaves (winner of the Hawthornden Prize and the Ruth Hadden Memorial Award, In a Land of Plenty (made into a ten-part BBC series), A Revolution of the Sun, Wake Up, Blenheim Orchard, Landed (shortlisted for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award 2012 and the 2011 Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, winner of the MJA Open Book Awards 2011) Disputed Land and In the Light of Morning.

He has been Writer in Residence at Cheltenham Festival of Literature and Royal Literary Fund Fellow at Oxford Brookes University, and has taught creative writing at Ruskin College and elsewhere. He lives in Oxford with his wife and children. (Photo credit: Goodreads author page)

Connect with Tim
Website | Goodreads

#BookReview The Offing by Benjamin Myers @BloomsburyBooks

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The OffingAbout the Book

One summer following the Second World War, Robert Appleyard sets out on foot from his Durham village. Sixteen and the son of a coal miner, he makes his way across the northern countryside until he reaches the former smuggling village of Robin Hood’s Bay. There he meets Dulcie, an eccentric, worldly, older woman who lives in a ramshackle cottage facing out to sea.

Staying with Dulcie, Robert’s life opens into one of rich food, sea-swimming, sunburn and poetry. The two come from different worlds, yet as the summer months pass, they form an unlikely friendship that will profoundly alter their futures.

Format: Audiobook (5h 34m)               Publisher: Bloomsbury
Publication date: 16th October 2019 Genre: Historical fiction

Find The Offing on Goodreads

Purchase links*
Amazon UK | Hive (supporting UK bookshops)
*links provided for convenience not as part of an affiliate programme

My Review

The Offing is quite different in style from the author’s Walter Scott Prize-winning The Gallows Pole which I read the year it was shortlisted. It is much gentler in tone but still quietly powerful. For anyone who’s wondering about the title, the offing is the name for the distant stretch of sea where sky and water merge.

The Offing involves a chance encounter between young Robert Appleyard, who has set off to explore the country beyond his home in a small mining village near Durham, and Dulcie, an older woman living in a cottage on the outskirts of Robin Hood’s Bay in North Yorkshire. It leads to a friendship that also becomes an education for Robert. Dulcie introduces him to unfamiliar foods such as lobster, to wine and to her favourite nettle tea. But she also feeds his mind, lending him books of poetry by John Clare and novels by D H Lawrence and others.

For Robert, what starts as a temporary stay turns into a summer in which his mind and his horizons are widened by Dulcie’s unique take on the world. In return for her hospitality he works on clearing the meadow threatening to overwhelm her cottage and on restoring a nearby shack fallen into disuse. What he finds there unlocks memories of the past for Dulcie as well as setting Robert on a new path in life, one he never thought would be open to someone with a background like his.

I loved the descriptions of the natural world and the glorious meals Dulcie prepares for Robert. More than anything, I loved Dulcie – for her generosity, wit, independent spirit, wisdom and determination to live life by her own rules. As she says, “After all, there are only a few things truly worth fighting for: freedom, of course, and all that it brings with it. Poetry, perhaps, and a good glass of wine. A nice meal. Nature. Love, if you’re lucky.” Dulcie sees the potential in Robert that he can’t see himself and is intent on nurturing it as she once nurtured the talent of someone else.

I listened to the audiobook version narrated by Ralph Ineson. His deep, husky voice and northern accent were a good match for the slow unwinding of the story and its rich descriptive passages.

As well as being a compelling story of an unlikely friendship, The Offing is a love letter to the natural world, to poetry and to living life to the full. Highly recommended.

In three words: Lyrical, intimate, powerful

Try something similar: All Among the Barley by Melissa Harrison

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About the Author

Benjamin Myers was born in Durham in 1976. His novel The Gallows Pole received a Roger Deakin Award and won the Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction. Beastings won the Portico Prize for Literature and Pig Iron won the Gordon Burn Prize, while Richard was a Sunday Times Book of the Year. He has also published poetry, crime novels and short fiction, while his journalism has appeared in publications including, among others, the Guardian, New Statesman, Caught by the River and New Scientist.
He lives in the Upper Calder Valley, West Yorkshire. (Bio credit: Publisher author page)

Connect with Benjamin
Website | Twitter