Bond Street Books, Oct. 27, 2015.
Three Stars
Robert Hendricks is a psychiatrist with some mental
issues of his own. As his relationships slowly fall apart around him, he is
offered an unexpected reprieve – an invitation to a small French island. The
invitation is issued by another psychiatrist named Pereira who claims to have
some information about Robert’s father, who was killed during World War I when
Robert was still a small child. However, over the course of several visits to
the island, Robert has still not learned anything about his father. Instead, he
is seemingly overcome with the need to pour out his own story to this virtual
stranger – the story of his own experiences as a soldier.
Where My Heart
Used to Beat is ostensibly the story of Robert
Hendricks, but more than that, it is the story of the last century and the many
atrocities it witnessed. The novel questions the authenticity of memory and
fact, and whether we can trust our own version of the past. Above all, it asks
whether humans have been altered irretrievably, due to the acts we have not
only witnessed but also perpetrated in the past hundred years or so.
There was some really lovely and unusual language in
the novel, but it was hidden amongst pages of reflections on both world wars. I
found myself skimming over Robert’s impromptu therapy sessions with Pereira, in
favour of the theoretical conversations between the two men. Their ideas about what makes us human were so
interesting, such as discussions of the “billion firing synapses” that make us
“believe” we are human (p. 60-61) to the thought that it is only a “dynamic
function” or piece of neural tissue that separates us from other animals. (p.
130)
Robert believes that madness is merely a function of
the brain, a physical problem. As humans are the only species to go “mad,” he
asks whether it has some Darwinian advantage to our survival. It may be “the
secret of what we are” (p. 199) and yet it causes pain and distress, much like
our proclivity towards violence and war. Robert tells Pereira that the past
century of world wars has fundamentally changed the psyche – is this what makes
us human?
Aside from these philosophical debates on the nature
of humanity, I didn’t find anything new or interesting to hold my attention.
This is my first novel by Faulks, and apparently the themes of war and memory
are his usual ones. The style reminded me of many other writers as I was
reading, and that’s not necessarily a good thing – I didn’t feel like the
writing was truly original. There were also some odd sexual incidents with
young girls that didn’t add anything to the story except to make me see Robert
as a Humbert-like character.
Most of the time, Robert was emotionally cold and
generally unlikeable. Over many conversations, he hashes through all of his
memories of war and decides to track down his former love – but when he finds
her, he’s not all that interested in her. I suppose the point is that it was
really only the memory of her that he loved, but I still felt that the scenes
between the two could have used more elaboration. I did like the hints that
Robert was an unreliable narrator of his own life, but again, I wish that theme
had been developed further. Overall, I felt like Faulks started writing with a
clear premise – that the world wars ended the importance of individual lives –
and that he forced his plot and his characters to fit that idea, no matter how
awkward or unbelievable the story became. It was like a fictionalized version of
a psychiatric case study, and it could have been read more clearly as
non-fiction.
I received this novel from Goodreads First Reads and
Bond Street Books in exchange for an honest review.
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