Shirley Kossick
YOUNG WIVES’ TALES by Susan Sussman (Headline Review, R59,99)
MOLLY, one of the young wives of the title, is passionately involved with storytelling and is struggling to finish a dissertation on the subject. But the prologue – a marvellously evocative passage on the premonition experienced by Molly’s aunt – gives warning that danger is lurking.
This turns out to be the arrival of Molly’s sister, Judith, who threatens to capsize Molly’s marriage to Matthew, her work on her dissertation and even her enjoyment of storytelling itself. With an unerring instinct for maximum damage with minimum effort, Judith undermines every aspect of her sister’s rather fragile confidence and self-esteem.
While Molly juggles with her numerous responsibilities – caring for Matthew, baby- sitting the neighbour’s infant son, looking after her father’s apartment and his wife’s cats, not to mention completing her dissertation – Judith sails coolly on. Monied, spoilt and greedy, she takes what she wants, even her sister’s stories which, as if to salt the wound, she misunderstands and distorts.
Not least of the pleasures of this novel is the two sisters’ differing views of the tales recounted. Their opposing responses to just about everything are summed up in a childhood memory which, so traumatic for Molly, eludes Judith. “The same violent quake crumbling my world passes unnoticed in hers.”
Perhaps most compelling – besides Molly herself – in this comparatively small cast of characters are Wanda and Lucy, a strange and mysterious pair of aunts whose mission is to soothe, love and protect Molly. Their presence adds a zany dimension to the novel as well as an appealing whimsicality. (But there is also a whiff of witchcraft about them reminiscent of the ancient aunts in Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman.)
This story about stories has humour and insight and poses some interesting questions about truth, reality and personal identity.
l Also out in Headline Review paperback are three first novels. Fifty Ways of Saying Fabulous by Graeme Aitken is a comic tale of gender-bending in the New Zealand outback. The “hero”, Billy-Boy, is plump and good- natured but unprepared for the confusion – not to say hostility – his sexual orientation leads to.
Carry Me Like Water by Benjamin Alire Senz has a large cast of far-flung characters who at first seem unconnected. Gradually, though, the binding threads come to light as the complex plot evolves. Partly an examination of cultural shock as Spanish and American mores meet, the novel is also about family ties with a touch of magic realism thrown in for good measure.
Isla Dewar’s Keeping Up with Magda is set in a Scottish fishing village over which the eponymous Magda reigns supreme. The hub of the village is her Ocean Caf, where she dispenses food, drink, dietary tips and advice on most subjects. The self- involvement of a small community is beautifully observed by Dewar, whose compassion and lively sense of humour make this a thoroughly enjoyable read.
In contrast to these three new writers, Marie Nimier is a well-established French novelist whose work has been compared to that of Camus. Her fifth novel, The Giraffe, first published in 1993, is now available in an English translation by Mary Feeney. The story – aptly described by Elle as “bizarre, perverted and sensual” – is told in clear, crisp prose which highlights the protagonist’s extraordinary fixation on Solange, a character whose identity I leave to the reader to discover.