Is this this year's Night Circus? Or
Snow Child?
It has the delicacy of Snow Child and
the mystical essence of Night Circus.
Unlike Night Circus the landscape is
very real and around us all at all times. Written by acclaimed nature
writer Melissa Harrison the book takes 3 very different characters in
an urban landscape and a relatively short time period.
Jozef is an immigrant of several years
standing working to maintain a mean existence. TC is a child of a
broken home who is a reader and adventurer/explorer in an age of
xbox. Lastly, Sophia, a pensioner widow, living in her marital home
long after it's show home glory has been eroded.
Gradually the three lives interconnect
in an innocent manner reminiscent of times long past. Society,
however, has moved on and sideways glances are inferred throughout
the story.
What makes this book stand out is the
setting of the tale. The urban landscape is painted over with the
description of nature which abounds including the changes in the
seasons – the new arrival of life, plants surviving, trees coppiced
and sprouting. There's an element of nature to be admired in every
layer of brick, crack in the pavement and derelict property.
That doesn't mean the reader is spared
the harsher realities of urban warfare. There are tattoos, pit bulls,
broken families, sadness and hunger present in the narrative.
This is a beautifully written book, not
an off note in it at all, by a writer with an enviable vocabulary.
This one is my pick to soar high in
2013.
Would I buy another? Yes
Publisher - Bloomsbury
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