What We Become - Arturo Perez-Reverte

Atria Books, June 7, 2016.

Three Stars

What We Become is the epic tale of the love affair between a wealthy, high society woman, Mecha, and a clever thief and con man, Max. In 1928, they meet on a cruise ship heading to Buenos Aires – Max is a charming employee of the cruise line, hired to dance with the single female passengers. Mecha is travelling with her husband, but he likes to watch while she dances the tango with Max. Mecha’s husband is a composer, and he is intrigued by Max’s descriptions of the old school tango, found in the slums of Buenos Aires – he arranged for the three of them to travel together, creating a bond of intimacy between all three.

Almost a decade later, in 1937, Max and Mecha meet again on the French Riviera. Mecha’s husband has been killed, and she is living a high life with her wealthy, powerful friends. Max has been hired to steal secret documents from one of Mecha’s acquaintances, although even he does not understand the potential repercussions of his actions.

The two meet again in the present, 1966. Mecha is the mother of a chess champion, who is competing in an important match against the current Russian champion. Max finds himself involved in confrontations with Russian gangsters and spies as he enters Mecha’s life for a third time. Even in old age, Max is cocky and confident, able to con his way through any circumstance. His world is cinematic like an old black and white movie, and he carouses through life as a vaudeville character. Max and Mecha’s relationship is romantic in a similarly old-fashioned film kind of way – they fall instantly in love, but there is no depth to their feelings.

The novel bounces through time, jumping from one meeting to another. The disjointed temporality is unsettling, but it does show causation between each time period, and expose why things happened the way they did between Mecha and Max. Max compares his relationship with Mecha to an adjourned chess game, in which both players are constantly second-guessing their next move. Meanwhile, Max seems uncertain about whether he actually loves Mecha at all – he tells her, “I love you. I think. And yet love has nothing to do with all this.” (p. 429) This is the most romantic declaration in the book, so don’t expect more from withholding Max.

The strength of What We Become is in its detailed descriptions of lush settings and rich, elegant parties. It is the glamorous luxury of old Hollywood combined with the excitement of exotic locales. Lifestyles of the rich and famous are contrasted with the slums of Buenos Aires and violent political situations in which Mecha’s husband is conveniently killed. The structure of the novel is elegant, but its actual story is superficial – Max and Mecha are pawns in Perez-Reverte’s chess game. They are two very flawed, troubled characters who spend their lives searching for love. While they make a connection immediately, they are unable to trust and therefore cannot make their relationship work over time.

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I was asked by the publisher to compare What We Become with another forthcoming novel: Midge Raymond’s My Last Continent. Aside from the obvious (near-identical covers, cruise ship settings, characters named Keller), the two books are more different than similar. Both involve intense love affairs that develop from sporadic meetings over the course of many years – Deb and Keller in My Last Continent, and Max and Mecha in What We Become. When they are reunited in the present, both couples are faced with a climactic event that shakes their relationship to its core. For Deb and Keller, it makes them stronger – their love is stripped to the basics and they learn what really matters in life. For Max and Mecha, current circumstances pull them apart, and they realize that their love may have been based on excitement and danger all along, with no real basis. And while both novels are large in scope, My Last Continent also delves into the minutiae of life, the details that make a real love story. In contrast, What We Become is epic in scale, but it doesn’t reach into the souls of its main characters in quite the same way. Both novels were strong, and I recommend both for summer reading, but for me, My Last Continent was a much more enjoyable read that I connected with on a deeper level.

 

I received this novel from Atria/Simon & Schuster in exchange for an honest review.

Miller's Valley - Anna Quindlen

Random House, April 5, 2016.

Three Stars

I have read several of Quindlen’s novels, and while they are always satisfying, they sometimes seem to be missing that extraordinary element. Although Miller’s Valley ostensibly reaches deep into the psyche of the Miller family, the characters’ emotions still only skim the surface of their potential depth. This certainly wasn’t a five star novel for me, but I did enjoy it and I sped through it.

Most of all, Miller’s Valley is the coming-of-age story of Mimi Miller, as she grows up in a small farming community in the 1960s. Mimi’s family have lived for generations in the valley that bears their name – and for almost as long, the government has been planning to flood the land due to problems with the man-made dam. Because the family, along with their neighbours, live under constant threat of displacement, they seem to place extra value on their combined strength, and connections with one another. The novel is very character driven, with each life defined by the impending loss of the community.

We see most of the story through Mimi’s childhood eyes, with only the odd moment of clarity as she looks back on her past as an adult. She listens to the adults talking and arguing, without a proper understanding of what’s really going on outside her family’s walls – and because she doesn’t know the truth, it is only revealed to the reader as time passes as well. Mimi especially idolizes her oldest brother, but he is drastically changed after his experiences in Vietnam.  While at war, he leaves behind his pregnant girlfriend, and Mimi must grow up fast in order to help raise her new nephew. Meanwhile, she also has an aunt with a terrible secret who refuses to leave her house, and eventually a father who is disabled due to a stroke. Although Mimi has a chance to escape the valley, she stays behind and puts her family first.

Mimi faces the dysfunction of her family with grace and love – she accepts their flaws as normal, which makes her relatable to most readers. Her family has their problems, but they are fairly realistic, and they still represent the most stable, loving force in Mimi’s young life. The importance of home and familial roots is an important theme in this novel, and although the potential flood could wash clean the sins of the past, it will also cause Mimi to be set adrift, with no home to hold her firmly in place.

Mimi is a child narrator, but she does look back at events with some hindsight and wisdom. I did feel that her narration lacked the emotion that would have accompanied the many dramatic events she experienced, but that could be because it is a reflection of the past as opposed to being written in the present tense. More than anything, Miller’s Valley is a simply told yet meaningful family chronicle. In spite of its difficult content, I found it to be a comfortable, cozy read.

I received this novel from Random House and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Hot Little Hands - Abigail Ulman

Random House, May 31, 2016.

Four Stars

Hot Little Hands is a collection of short stories, all about young women of varying ages and circumstances. The stories share several themes, including desire, as alluded to in the title – the girls learn about their own desires, but also about becoming an object of desire, and about how confusing that can be when we’re young. The title comes from a figure of speech that is really about yearning – not just sexual but also a sense of anticipation for the future, and the urge to grow up quickly to experience the world.

The girls in these stories are searching for their place in the wider world, trying to discover their individual sense of self, and many of them are described while traveling to new countries and experiencing new situations. Some of the stories are more linked than others, especially several about a girl named Claire. She is the narrator of my favourite story in the collection, “Your Charm Won’t Help You Here.” In the story, Claire is attempting to enter the United States en route from Turkey, and she is held up in customs for reasons she cannot understand. It is a scathing analysis of the dangers of travel in a post-9/11 world.

I often find short story collections frustrating – I feel like as soon as I begin to engage with a plot and its characters, it’s all over. Although these stories have some cohesive themes, it’s not quite enough for my preferences. However, the dialogue and inner thoughts of the girls are realistic and distinct, and the writing style itself is confident and evocative. Ulman is definitely an author to watch, and I will be waiting impatiently for a debut novel.

I received this novel from Random House and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

A Place Called Winter - Patrick Gale

Grand Central Publishing, March 26, 2016.

Four Stars

Patrick Gale’s writing is stunning as always in this timely historical novel about a man struggling with his sexual orientation. Harry Cane’s story starts in early 20^th century England – he is living a quiet, unassuming life with his wife Winnie and their young daughter. Harry believes that he is happy, until a chance encounter with another man awakens a passion that he didn’t know was missing from his life. He is blissful in his double life, balancing romantic love with familial duty – until Winnie’s brother catches Harry at his lover’s home, and gives him the option to quietly leave the country.

For the sake of respectability, Harry is forced to leave his family behind. He travels by ship to Canada and begins to build himself a life in the newly colonized prairies. The environment is harsh, but there are good, strong people there, and Harry learns that he is capable of more than he ever realized. A chance meeting with a certain man on the ship leads Harry to an available homestead beside the land of a brother and sister, and he becomes increasingly involved with both siblings.

The novel jumps around from Harry’s time in a mental asylum, then back to his original settlement in the prairies, until the two timelines finally collide. In retrospect, I do like the structure of the novel, but at the time, it was somewhat hard to follow, and I questioned the necessity of the sections set in the asylum – although, in the end, it all makes sense. The historical setting is atmospheric, and it felt solid and real. The settlers’ interactions with the Cree people were thoughtful and well-written also.

A Place Called Winter moves at a slow, meandering pace, much like its protagonist Harry, although it does accelerate towards the ending. Harry finds love – both platonic and romantic – in unexpected ways, and it is intensely real. My only complaint is the emotional distance of the characters, as I found it difficult to get into their heads. However, Harry does eventually find his own inner strength, in his willingness to sacrifice everything for his new makeshift family, instead of giving up easily like he did before. Harry’s experience is one of redemption, and this novel shows us that it is always possible to start over, with a second chance at living a life that makes us happy.

I received this novel from Grand Central Publishing and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Last Painting of Sara de Vos - Dominic Smith

Farrar, Straus & Giroux, April 5, 2016.

Five Stars

The Last Painting of Sara de Vos moves fluidly through three different time periods, with one painting to connect them all. The painting is a rare landscape by a Dutch Golden Age artist – the first woman to be accepted into the painter’s guild in Holland. Only one painting by Sara de Vos is extant three hundred years later, and it becomes the obsession of two individuals whose lives then collide.

The painting becomes part of the collection of Martin de Groot, a wealthy man living in Manhattan in the 1950s. In between the opulent parties held in his lavish apartment, Martin notices some discrepancies in his favourite painting – and he soon discovers that it has been stolen at one of his events and replaced with a forgery. The trail leads him to Ellie Shipley, an Australian grad student struggling to survive in the city, and a skilled copyist of Golden Age paintings. Ellie is in denial that she is involved in any sort of criminal activity, as she falls in love with the de Vos painting now in her possession.

When Martin and Ellie meet face to face, she is unaware of his connection to the painting – but he knows exactly how she is involved. In spite of his initial animosity towards Ellie, Martin’s feelings soon change – although he continues to hide his identity, which leads to dramatic consequences. Their relationship remains unresolved until the present day, where Ellie works as a museum curator in Sydney, Australia – and continues to live with the fear that her former crime will be discovered.

The three settings wrap around each other and eventually merge, showing the many ways that past deceit can affect the present. All three main characters – Sara, Martin and Ellie – are so intricately described with distinct personalities, and their depth of emotion is so real that I could feel Ellie’s pain, especially. Martin, meanwhile, begins his adventure as a vigilante to discover who stole his painting, but he realizes that his feelings are more about injured pride, and learns that there are more important things in life.

The story itself is captivating, especially the insight into Sara’s original conception of the painting. Smith uses somewhat common plot devices for art/historical fiction, yet they are elevated here. There was so much information about artistic techniques and restoration woven into the novel, but it was always compelling and never dry. The technical details show an appreciation for art that goes beyond the admiration of a pretty picture.

Sara de Vos is actually a compilation of several Golden Age artists, although I found it hard to believe she was not a real person, because her character was so individualized. I thought it was interesting to compare Sara in 17^th century Holland with Ellie in 1950s New York, and see that both had similar struggles as female artists competing with their male counterparts. Both women felt equally real, as did their atmospheric settings. I did feel a bit let down by the third setting in Australia – the ending was a little rushed, and not quite as immersive and believable as the rest. However, overall, this novel was just as much a masterpiece as the painting it describes.

I received this novel from Farrar, Straus & Giroux and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.