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Blog Tour/Book Review: We Were the Salt of the Sea by Roxanne Bouchard

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I’m delighted to be co-hosting today’s stop on the blog tour for We Were the Salt of the Sea by Roxanne Bouchard, translated by David Warriner, and to share my review of this fascinating literary crime novel.  Do check out the review by my co-host Kirsty at Curious Ginger Cat.  You will also find some wonderful reviews of the book at previous stops on the tour (see tour schedule at the bottom of this post).

We Were the Salt of the SeaAbout the Book

As Montrealer Catherine Day sets foot in a remote fishing village and starts asking around about her birth mother, the body of a woman dredges up in a fisherman’s nets. Not just any woman, though: Marie Garant, an elusive, nomadic sailor and unbridled beauty who once tied many a man’s heart in knots. Detective Sergeant Joaquin Morales, newly drafted to the area from the suburbs of Montreal, barely has time to unpack his suitcase before he’s thrown into the deep end of the investigation.

On Quebec’s outlying Gaspé Peninsula, the truth can be slippery, especially down on the fishermen’s wharves. Interviews drift into idle chit-chat, evidence floats off with the tide and the truth lingers in murky waters. It’s enough to make DS Morales reach straight for a large whisky…

Format: ebook, paperback (300 pp.) Publisher: Orenda Books
Published: 28th February 2018           Genre: Literary Fiction, Crime

Purchase Links*
Publisher ǀ Amazon.co.uk  ǀ  Amazon.com  ǀ Hive.co.uk (supporting UK bookshops) *links provided for convenience, not as part of any affiliate programme

Find We Were the Salt of the Sea on Goodreads

My Review

‘You go to sea because you’re a drifter among others and you only feel at home in the silence of the wind.’

Although the reader never meets Marie Garant in life, her vibrant presence pervades the book because of the impact she had on so many of the inhabitants of the Gaspé.   Even in death, she is the invisible force which drives events.

The author does a brilliant job of conveying the tight-knit, almost claustrophobic atmosphere of the small fishing community.  It’s a place where everyone knows everyone else, their daily routines, their histories…their secrets.  Although there are strong bonds of friendship and family, the most powerful common bond is that of the sea.  It’s the villagers’ livelihood, their food source, their recreation, their awareness of time even – not just the change of seasons but the rhythm of passing of time.  ‘He waited for two waves to go by, time enough for the sea to keep washing gently over the shore, erasing the memories in the sand.’  The sea is their constant companion and frequently, as it turns out, their implacable enemy robbing the community of many souls over the years.

‘They’re always harping on about people being the salt of the earth….Well, doesn’t that make us mariners the salt of the sea?’    

The sea is used as a metaphor for life, for emotional experience, for the search for fulfilment.  ‘She’s the wave that drags you away from shore and then carries you home.  A whirlpool of indecisiveness, hypnotising, holding you captive.  Until the day she chooses you.  I suppose that’s what passion is…a groundswell that sweeps you up and carries you further out than you thought, then washes you up on the hard sand like an old fool.’

There is wonderful descriptive writing about the sea and the translator, David Warriner, has done a superb job of retaining the lyrical quality of Roxanne Bouchard’s writing.  Some of the characters have distinctive modes of speech (“Christ in a chalice”) and, at times, I found the dialogue didn’t flow quite as naturally as the rest of the writing.  However, I loved some of the imaginative descriptions such as this one as Catherine sits on the wharf watching the fishing boats tied up there. ‘They were dozing there empty, gently rocking to the rhythm of the waves, snoring against the wharf.  They barely raised an eyelid when I arrived.  They didn’t care.  Sighing, they slipped back into slumber, like fat, lazy cats sinking into the great blue cushion of water.’  Isn’t that simply brilliant?

Tasked with investigating the death of Marie Garant, Sergeant Morales, newly transferred from the city, encounters a wall of silence.  He begins to question his relationship with his absent wife, finding himself drawn to Catherine, another outsider who is on her own quest for answers.   Faced with prevarication and obfuscation, Morales starts to wonder whether he still has what it takes to unravel the mystery of Marie Garant’s life and death.

I really enjoyed We Were the Salt of the Sea, not just for the intriguing mystery at the heart of the book but for the wonderful, imaginative writing.  I would love to see other books by Roxanne Bouchard translated into English.

I received an advance reader copy courtesy of publishers Orenda Books in return for an honest and unbiased review.

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In three words: Lyrical, suspenseful, mystery

Try something similar…The Fortunate Brother by Donna Morrissey (click here to read my review)

Roxanne BouchardAbout the Author

Ten years or so ago, Roxanne Bouchard decided it was time she found her sea legs. So she learned to sail, first on the St Lawrence River, before taking to the open waters off the Gaspé Peninsula. The local fishermen soon invited her aboard to reel in their lobster nets, and Roxanne saw for herself that the sunrise over Bonaventure never lies. We Were the Salt of the Sea is her fifth novel, and her first to be translated into English. She lives in Quebec.

Connect with Roxanne

Publisher Website ǀ Author Website ǀ Twitter ǀ Goodreads

About the Translator

David Warriner translates from French and nurtures a healthy passion for Franco, Nordic and British crime fiction.  Growing up in deepest Yorkshire, he developed incurable Francophilia at an early age.  Emerging from Oxford with a modern languages degree, he narrowly escaped the graduate rat race by hopping on a plane to Canada – and never looked back.  More than a decade into a high-powered translation career, he listened to his heart and turned his hand again to the delicate art of literary translations.  David has lived in France and Quebec, and now calls beautiful British Colombia home.

Website ǀ Twitter ǀ Goodreads

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Book Review: Drift Stumble Fall by M. Jonathan Lee

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Drift Stumble FallAbout the Book

Richard feels trapped in his hectic life of commitment and responsibility. From the daily mayhem of having young children, an exhausted wife and pushy in-laws who frequently outstay their welcome, Richard’s existence fills him with panic and resentment. The only place he can escape the dark cloud descending upon him is the bathroom, where he hides for hours on end, door locked, wondering how on earth he can escape.

Often staring out of his window, Richard enviously observes the tranquil life of Bill, his neighbour living in the bungalow across the road. From the outside, Bills world appears filled with comfort and peace. Yet underneath the apparent domestic bliss of both lives are lies, secrets, imperfections, sadness and suffering far greater than either could have imagined. Beneath the surface, a family tragedy has left Bill frozen in time and unable to move on.  As he waits for a daughter who may never return, Bill watches Richard’s bustling family life and yearns for the joy it brings. As the two men watch each other from afar, it soon becomes apparent that other people’s lives are not always what they seem.

Format: Paperback (310 pp.)          Publisher: Hideaway Fall
Published in UK: 12th April 2018   Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Pre-order/Purchase Links*
Amazon.co.uk  ǀ  Amazon.com  ǀ Publisher
*links provided for convenience, not as part of any affiliate programme

Find Drift Stumble Fall on Goodreads

My Review

Richard seems to have everything – a good job, two lovely children, a nice house – but it isn’t making him happy.  Richard feels trapped in a life that hasn’t turned out how he imagined, ‘trapped inside something I created.’  The heavy snowfall currently preventing his usual escape to work only increases this sense of entrapment.  Seeking refuge in the kitchen, he finds parallels between the mundane activity of drying the dishes and his life: ‘I pick up another plate and begin to dry it slowly and carefully…Around and around in a circular motion, like the stylus on a record, in ever-decreasing circles… My mind drifts and I realise I share so much in common with the tea towel and the plate.  An endless journey with no beginning and no end.’

Richard is actually a caring father but he doesn’t see that.  Instead he is overly self-critical, perceiving only his failings, thinking even that his family would be better off without him. There are small signs of Richard’s growing desperation such as his reference to the front door as ‘the door to freedom’.   The idea of escape and ‘starting over’ begins to dominate his thoughts and planning it provides him with a way to cope.  He’s very practical and methodical about his plans but the reader does wonder if he would actually ever go through with it or if just the mere existence of the plan acts as a coping mechanism for him.

The routine of domestic life in Richard’s household – meal times, bath time, bed time, watching TV – is chronicled in minute detail; so much so that I began to have a lot of sympathy with Richard’s desire to break free from it all.  I too found myself harbouring thoughts of escape when reading about mundane problems such as clearing snow from the drive and de-icing the car.

There were characters in the book I found it easy to empathise with – Richard, Richard’s father-in-law Kenneth, Bill and Rosie the neighbours across the road – and characters I frankly found irritating (Lisa and Dina, I’m looking at you.)  Richard and his wife, Lisa, have a curiously distant relationship and I struggled to find much attractive about Lisa, what with her snoring and rather slobbish habits.  However, I have to admit that the scenes of Dina, Lisa’s mother, and Lisa watching the TV together were amusing.  I’m sure we all have experience of a relative who insists on talking or asking questions throughout a programme (“Is that so and so from such and such?”) so you have to restrain yourself from shouting, ‘If you’d just shut up, you’d know what was going on!”.

As events unfold over the space of just a few days, it transpires that the ‘quiet peacefulness’ and ‘utopia’ that Richard believes exists in the bungalow across the road is anything but.  The irritations of Richard’s daily existence pale into insignificance compared with the tragedy that Bill and Rosie have experienced in their lives. In fact, the reader learns, Richard possesses everything that they have lost.

Drift Stumble Fall is a convincing portrait of a man struggling with the responsibilities of daily life, something I’m sure most of us can identify with from time to time unless we have been incredibly lucky.   However, I found the story of Bill and Rosie the most compelling element of the book – a heartbreaking, moving and thought-provoking reminder that the grass may not be greener (in fact, it probably isn’t) on the other side of the fence.

I received an advance reader copy courtesy of publishers Hideaway Fall in return for an honest and unbiased review.  If you’re a book blogger or reviewer and would like to be part of #teamhideaway you can sign up here.

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In three words: Engaging, intimate, funny

Try something similar…Broken Branches by M. Jonathan Lee (click here to read my review)

MJonathanLeeAbout the Author

M Jonathan Lee is a nationally shortlisted author who was born Yorkshire where he still lives today with his wife, children and dog, Alfie.  His debut novel, The Radio, was shortlisted for The Novel Prize 2012. He has spoken in schools, colleges, prisons and universities about creative writing and storytelling and appeared at various literary festivals including Sheffield’s Off the Shelf and Doncaster’s Turn the Page festival.  His second novel, The Page, was released in February 2015.

His much anticipated third novel, A Tiny Feeling of Fear, was released in September 2015 and tells the story of a character struggling with mental illness. All profits from this novel are donated to charity to raise awareness of mental health issues. This was accompanied by the short film, Hidden which was directed by Simon Gamble.

In 2016, he signed for boutique publishers, Hideaway Fall and his fourth novel Broken Branches was released in July 2017, winning book of the month in Candis magazine for September.  He is a tireless campaigner for mental health awareness and writes his own column regularly for the Huffington Post. He has recently written for the Big Issue and spoken at length about his own personal struggle on the BBC and Radio Talk Europe.

His fifth book, the critically acclaimed Drift Stumble Fall is released in Spring 2018.

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