Tag: NetGalley

#BookReview Oh William! by Elizabeth Strout @VikingBooksUK

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Oh William!About the Book

Lucy Barton is a successful writer living in New York, navigating the second half of her life as a recent widow and parent to two adult daughters. A surprise encounter leads her to reconnect with William, her first husband – and longtime, on-again-off-again friend and confidante. Recalling their college years, the birth of their daughters, the painful dissolution of their marriage, and the lives they built with other people, Strout weaves a portrait, stunning in its subtlety, of a tender, complex, decades-long partnership.

Oh William! captures the joy and sorrow of watching children grow up and start families of their own; of discovering family secrets, late in life, that alter everything we think we know about those closest to us; and the way people live and love, against all odds. At the heart of this story is the unforgettable, indomitable voice of Lucy Barton, who once again offers a profound, lasting reflection on the mystery of existence. ‘This is the way of life,’ Lucy says. ‘The many things we do not know until it is too late.’

Format: Hardcover (256 pages)         Publisher: Viking
Publication date: 21st October 2021 Genre: Contemporary Fiction

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My Review

At one point in the book William tells Lucy, ‘You steal people’s hearts, Lucy’ and it’s clear Elizabeth Strout has found it difficult to part with the character who first appeared in My Name Is Lucy Barton and more recently in Anything Is Possible. Oh Willam! definitely feels like the final instalment in Lucy’s story.

The book is narrated in the first person by Lucy in a conversational style, without chapter breaks, shifting back and forth in time to include memories of her traumatic childhood and the early years of her marriage to William and its subsequent breakdown.  As Lucy reflects on her own actions, things she could have done differently, and missed opportunities, it feels like something of a confessional. At one point, William accuses Lucy of being self-absorbed; it’s a fair accusation but then aren’t we all self-absorbed to some degree?

Although William and Lucy’s marriage involved much disappointment, including infidelity, what comes across is the continuing affection they have for each other.  The phrase ‘Oh William!’ occurs frequently, sometimes reflecting Lucy’s exasperation with William, at other times her feelings of pity, of tenderness or of understanding of what he’s going through.  After a period apart, during which much has happened in both their lives, they quickly return to being close confidantes.  And, of course, their daughters, Chrissy and Becka, provide a lasting link between them, evoking memories of happier times.  At one point, Lucy wonders, ‘What is it that William knew about me and that I knew about him that caused us to get married?’ The journey they take together to investigate a secret involving William’s family history left me disappointed that they couldn’t have made their marriage work. However, as Lucy reflects, ‘This is the way of life; the many things we do not know until it is too late.’

The most striking part of the book for me was the final section in which William and Lucy visit the area where William’s mother, Catherine, grew up and he learns more about his mother’s early life. It was here that I got the most sense of Lucy being a successful novelist as she imagines Catherine’s journey to a new life with William’s father. ‘Oh, I could see young Catherine half-running, half-walking down that windswept November dark road, and getting to the train station without her boots, just her shoes and snow on the ground…’ 

Oh William! demonstrates Elizabeth Strout’s trademark careful dissection of the way people act and interact, their hopes and regrets, and their struggles to come to terms with loss and disappointment.

In three words: Tender, insightful, acutely-observed

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Elizabeth StroutAbout the Author

Elizabeth Strout is the Pulitzer prize-winning author of Olive Kitteridge, as well as The Burgess Boys, a New York Times bestseller, Abide With Me and Amy and Isabelle, which won the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize. She has also been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize. She lives in New York City and Portland, Maine. (Bio credit: Publisher author page/Photo credit: Goodreads author page)

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#BookReview The Tale of the Tailor and the Three Dead Kings by Dan Jones

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The Tale of the TailorAbout the Book

One winter, in the dark days of King Richard II, a tailor was riding home on the road from Gilling to Ampleforth. It was dank, wet and gloomy; he couldn’t wait to get home and sit in front of a blazing fire.

Then, out of nowhere, the tailor is knocked off his horse by a raven, who then transforms into a hideous dog, his mouth writhing with its own innards. The dog issues the tailor with a warning: he must go to a priest and ask for absolution and return to the road, or else there will be consequences…

Format: Hardcover (96 pages)             Publisher: Head of Zeus
Publication date: 14th October 2021   Genre: Short Story

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My Review

The medieval ghost story on which The Tale of the Tailor and the Three Dead Kings is based was first recorded in the early fifteenth century by an unknown monk and transcribed from the Latin by the great medievalist and author, M.R. James in 1922.  The book is Dan Jones’ own retelling of the story.

I confess I found this a curious little book not least because the actual story takes up only a small part of it. The rest of the book is made up of an introduction, in which Dan Jones relates how he first became aware of the story and M.R. James’ transcription of it, and a historical note about Byland Abbey where the story was first recorded.  Most strangely, the book also contains the text of the original story – in Latin. I suspect only Latin scholars will find this of much interest, although the inclusion of M.R. James’s annotations on the text (in English) is an interesting feature.

It was the mention of M.R. James that first drew me to the book as, like Dan Jones, watching one of the BBC adaptations of his ghost stories was a Christmas tradition in our house. Without having access to M.R. James’s original transcription of the story it’s quite hard to judge what Dan Jones has changed or added to his version. It certainly has some vivid images, such as Snowball the tailor’s encounter with a great dog, described as smelling of ‘pure and ceaseless death and of the scuttling things that live in the permanent dark’. This demonic figure brought to mind Night of the Demon, the film version of the M.R. James story ‘Casting The Runes’; the steps Snowball takes in order to protect himself whilst doing the spirit’s bidding made me think of certain scenes in Dennis Wheatley’s The Devil Rides Out.

Although The Tale of the Tailor and the Three Dead Kings has some ghoulish moments, I wouldn’t say it was especially scary, certainly not as spine-tingling as some of M.R. James’s ghost stories such as ‘The Mezzotint’, ‘Oh, Whistle, And I’ll Come To You, My Lad’ or ‘The Ash-Tree’. Judging by the pictures I’ve seen, the hardcover edition of the book would make an attractive and unusual gift.

I received an advance copy courtesy of Head of Zeus via NetGalley.

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Dan JonesAbout the Author

Dan Jones is a historian, broadcaster and award-winning journalist. His books, including The Plantagenets, Magna Carta, The Templars and The Colour of Time, have sold more than one million copies worldwide. He has written and hosted dozens of TV shows including the acclaimed Netflix/Channel 5 series ‘Secrets of Great British Castles’. For ten years Dan wrote a weekly column for the London Evening Standard and his writing has also appeared in newspapers and magazines including The Sunday Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Wall Street Journal, Smithsonian, GQ and The Spectator.

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