Painter of Silence - Georgina Harding

Painter of Silence is one of the books that has made it to the Short List of the 2012 Orange Prize but it was on my reading radar despite this accolade.
The Painter of Silence is a story set in Romania in the early 1950's but it sways back and forth between then and the earlier period of World War 2 and the establishment of Communism. The two main characters, Augustin and Safta have known each other since child hood when Augustin's mother was the cook for Safta's wealthy, land owning family. Augustin was born deaf and mute but he found a way of communicating through his talent for drawing. Now, after a traumatic and violent past he has found Safta working as a nurse in a hospital in the town of Iasi - he has come specifically looking for her as he has as story he needs to pass on to her in time, through his drawings.
This is an extremely visual, evocative book full of rich imagery that sometimes felt as though a painting was being drawn for the reader by the author. The inability of Augustin to speak out loud means that the reader is brought into his inner thoughts as a way of understanding him - this is a technique used for most of the characters even though they have the ability of speech and I really liked the feel this gave the book - of almost a dreamlike type quality. I know this is sounding all a little wishy washy - but the story, plot and characterisation all remain strong despite this ethereal quality to the writing - it was the best of both worlds for me!

The Week That Was...

The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern

The Night Circus was one of those books I had seen and heard about but stayed away from for so long - I'm not really sure why - I think I thought it might have been a little too "out there" for my reading tastes. How wrong I was! This book is already one of my favourite reads of 2012 and I am sure it will stay at, or near, the top of the list no matter how many books I manage to read this year.
The Night Circus tells the story of a special circus Le Cirque des Rêves (The Circus of Dreams) that travels the globe during the late 1800's opening only during the night hours to captivated crowds. The circus is part traditional circus and part magical realm - the setting of a contest between two novice magicians, Celia and Marco where they attempt to out perform and out maneuver the other in a contest designed to be the death of one of them.
Reading this book reminded me a lot of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell - another book that I originally stayed away from but couldn't put down when I did eventually decide to read it. The Night Circus was very similar in its appeal for me - a combination of relationships and settings grounded in reality but also a magical, fantasy element that captured and intrigued me. The book is rich in imagery - I can only imagine that a movie version is already being looked at - and I felt the author did an amazing job in bringing her visionary world to life for the reader. Looking back over the plot carefully after finishing it is easy to see some gaps and inconsistencies but I prefer not to dwell on these - I certainly didn't notice them when I was caught up in the reading and I was completely transported to the world of The Circus of Dreams.
The book was long listed for this years Orange Prize but unfortunately did not make it to the short list - I would like to see books showing this much imagination and story telling ability rewarded much more often.

The Sealed Letter - Emma Donoghue

It seems like I was one of the few people who didn't fall heavily for Donoghue's much loved and talked about book, Room - I thought it was clever in so many ways but despite the content it just failed to connect with me for some reason.
My latest Donoghue read is a completely different matter however - The Sealed Letter had me hooked from the start and I can see why it has been long listed for the 2012 Orange Prize.
The Sealed Letter is set in Victorian England and is based on the true story of divorce proceedings between an upper class couple of the time - Henry and Helen Codrington. Divorce cases were still extremely rare in these times (Donoghue writes in her author's note that in Britain between 1670 and 1852 there were fewer than two divorces a year with this rising to several hundred a year after the Matrimonial Causes Act of 1857).
The story is told from the perspectives of the three main characters, Henry and Helen and Helen's close friend, Emily 'Fido' Faithful a young single woman firmly behind the feminist reform cause of the day who runs a successful printing press in London. Fido and Helen come back into contact with one another seemingly by chance when Helen and her family return from Malta where her husband has been stationed for several years with his position in the Navy. Fido quickly discovers that the Helen she thought she knew has developed into a woman in a compromising position - she has a lover whom her husband knows nothing about and she appeals to Fido to support her in what Fido believes to be an attempt to end the illicit affair.
The story covers the legal trial that takes place after Henry Codrington cottons on to what is going on under his nose and petitions for divorce from Helen - drawing Fido in as an unwilling and at times helpless witness. As a legal thriller I found this book to be extremely entertaining but it has so many more levels to it - the unequal relationships that occurred between men and women of the time and the powerless positions women could be placed in if they did not "toe the line" and clearly meet all of societies expectations of them was clearly demonstrated throughout the story. The characters themselves could be frustrating and very unlikeable but that intrigued me - and the fact that the story was based somewhat in fact and meticulous research just added to its authenticity for me - a fantastic read.

The Translation of the Bones - Francesca Kay

The Translation of the Bones is one of the long listed books for the 2012 Orange Prize and another example of this prize introducing me to a fabulous author.
The Translation of the Bones focuses on a small part of the community of the Church of the Sacred Heart in Battersea in the time leading up to Easter. The book opens with one of the parish members, Mrs Alice Armitage, going through her weekly cleaning routine of the church:

It's beyond belief what you find between the pews, Mrs Armitage was saying. Coins and gloves you might expect, but socks and underwear? Hairclips, buttons, handkerchiefs, and now look at these, these perculiar white pills. She held out her hand to Father Diamond, who looked at it carefully and shook his head.

We are also introduced to other members of the church, Stella Morrison, as she contributes her weekly offering by bringing in and arranging fresh flowers and then Mary-Margaret O'Reilly, a young woman with a developmental delay who is fixated on lovingly cleaning and caring for a statue of Jesus when she falls from a ladder and injures herself. The injury to Mary-Margaret sets off a chain of events and even though the start of the book is gentle and unassuming in so many ways Kay builds the tension and the storyline perfectly. I felt real connection to these characters and their stories - each character is given their own air space that does not seem to detract from the other storylines and I felt the climax and ending of the novel were written beautifully. I rarely cry when reading novels but there were definite tears in my eyes at the end of the this one.

The Week That Was...

Tides of War - Stella Tillyard

The long list for the 2012 Orange Prize is a little bit of a mixed mystery bag for me. The list has made me feel as though I am on the far edges of the literary world ( being Australian will do that to you!) as I had only read three of the books when the list was announced, Gillespie and I, Half Blood Blues and State of Wonder and there were quite a few on the list that I had never even heard of. This usually generates some excitement - all of these new books and authors to experience! But for some reason (and I have read others saying similar things) this particular long list just doesn't seem to be exciting me all that much - maybe it is a spark to jump out of my reading comfort zone and try something new and different...
Tides of War was chosen as my first read only because it was readily available at my local library - and this book has already made me look at the long list differently. Tides of War is not usually a book I would have been drawn to so without the prompting of the Orange Prize judges I would have missed out on a reading gem.
Tides of War is set in what I always refer to as "Jane Austen time" - the early 1800's in Britain and also Spain where the Duke of Wellington's troops are fighting Napoleon in the Peninsula War. The book contains a number of key characters - each one has their own devoted story line and inner world as well as having various connections to and relationships with other characters. This large number of characters could have led to quite a convoluted and confusing structure but I felt each character was written so well and so distinctly that is was easy and enjoyable to follow them all.
The book begins with introducing Harriet, a young woman newly married to James - a soldier in the British Army about to be sent to Spain to join the fighting. From these two characters others are introduced, the Duke of Wellington and his wife Kitty are extremely interesting - given that they are actual historical figures and not creations of the author's imagination. The combination of real and fictional characters is another one of the strengths of this story - it could have felt so contrived but I was caught up in the story and the historical detail and could not really see any gaps between the two. The impact of war on both the men who are directly involved and the people who remain at home was conveyed extremely well. The changes that can occur within individuals and relationships because of war, trauma and separation was a strong theme and the scenes containing Harriet and James certainly brought this home.
I found this book to be engaging, entertaining, informative and rich in historical detail - and it has restored my sense of excitement in the 2012 Orange Prize long list!