Review: The Fountain of St. James Court

The Fountain of St. James Court or, Portrait of the Artist as an Old Woman

Sena Jeter Naslund, (HarperCollins Publishers: William Morrow, 2013), 447 pp., 

Writing two novels in one, Naslund juxtaposes chapters set up as “Fountain” or “Portrait” to chronicle two artistic women—Kathryn Callahan, a 69-year-old successful novelist living in present-day Louisville, Kentucky, and Elizabeth LeBrun, a late 18^th century artist about whom Kathryn has just finished writing a novel, with the “Portrait” title. Homage to Virginia Woolf aside, the narrative self-consciously presents us with a modern Mrs. Dalloway as we follow Kathryn from midnight to midnight of one single day. By contrast, the chapters presenting LeBrun span her entire life, opening when she is seventy, walking in the woods in France, and looking back on her life, particularly during the French Revolution. Both women muse on the meaning of various things—love, husbands, children, nature, inspiration, the creative process—but LeBrun’s sections are far and away more interesting and more thoughtful than Kathryn’s. The openly stated comparison to Mrs. Dalloway invites disappointment—Kathryn lacks Clarissa’s simple dignity and concentrated sense of the just and the true. The similarities between the two are thin, consisting more in Kathryn’s endless enthusing over autumn leaves or watching light play on the fountain rather than any inherently intelligent observations on life and purpose. She lacks the deep human relation to people and life that shines so clearly in Mrs. Dalloway’s character. Though meant, I believe, to be a sympathetic character, especially to women of a certain age (of which I am one), Kathryn as a person is shallow, needy and self-centered, and the “courage” she musters at the end of the story to face a particular fear seems contrived and empty. LeBrun, as a portrait artist of the French aristocracy, lives through uniquely dangerous times and personal tragedies that inform her character and understanding with honor, love and a brave optimism. As much as I have loved Naslund’s previous books (especially Ahab's Wife, which was spectacular), this one falls short, or at least, half of it does.

This review first appeared in the Historical Novel Society's "Review" journal of February, 2013.

Book Review: The Max Liebermann Mysteries

Sixth in a series starring psychoanalyst Max Libermann, a “consulting” psychiatrist to the Prague police department, Death and the Maiden does not disappoint, whether you’re new to Max or have been long acquainted with him and his detective friend Oskar Rheinhardt. If you’ve never read one of Tallis’ mysteries, I urge you to start with the first one (A Death in Vienna) and read them all, although I started with the sixth and it was so immediately engaging that I quickly went to the library and got all the previous books and read them, one after another. In Death and the Maiden, as in all the books, music and opera—with real-life conductor/composer Gustav Mahler at the helm of the Vienna Opera House—play a major role. The plot circles around a dead diva and widens to include high-placed politicos and even royals, creating treacherous sinkholes that threaten to engulf both Max and Oskar.

Tallis clearly loves Vienna, and he spares no mouth-watering detail when describing the pastries and whipped-cream-coffees that Oskar and Max frequently devour while pondering the clues and suspects. The city of Vienna, some ten years before the Great War begins, is also described so colorfully and clearly that you truly feel you are there, even including the growing threat of anti-Semitism, for which we shudder on Max’s behalf. In addition to Mahler, Sigmund Freud is a recurring character, the “great man” of his field whom Max visits and admires—and he’s always telling groan-worthy Jewish jokes, very funny. Well-crafted mysteries and murder stories, serious and very likeable characters (including a very interesting love interest for Max) and complete immersion in early 20th century Vienna combine to make this series a really satisfying read—and it’s been optioned for television, which should be fun, too.

Review originally appeared in the Historical Novel Society Review, 2013.

Death and the Maiden (Early 20^th Century Prague) A Max Liebermann Mystery
Frank Tallis (Random House: New York, 2012)
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8334-0

Vietnam-Era Novel - Surprisingly Good

The Man from Saigon
by Marti Leimbach, Doubleday, 2010     

Here's another review I wrote for the May Historical Novel Society Review:

An absorbing, often gripping novel of a young woman reporter on tour in war-torn Vietnam in 1967, The Man from Saigon is gritty, realistic and poetically written. Leimbach is a master at describing the visceral: the humidity and heat of the jungle, the ache of hunger, the recoil of the body and the brain under fire, the insanity that comes from being surrounded by bombs falling for hours and bullets like hot rain.
    The protagonist, Susan, works for a woman’s magazine in Chicago and is sent to the war to gather human interest stories. She’s not supposed to leave Saigon, but of course she does. She gets drawn in to the addiction of war reporting, inching ever closer to the heavy action while putting light years of distance between her and the ‘normalcy’ of life back in the States—until life in the war zone becomes what’s normal. Two men, the Vietnamese photographer of the book’s title, and another reporter, an American, weave in and out of Susan’s mental, emotional and physical existence in a country too far from home.
    The images are often disturbing, but the insights into war and human frailty, love and courage are meaningful and intelligent. An excellent read.
-- Mary F. Burns

The Swan Thieves - A Review

As a book reviewer for the Historical Novel Society Review (in print and online at www.historicalnovelsociety.org), I sometimes get really lucky and receive a great book that is more than just fun to read, it's a truly literary experience. That's the way I felt about Elizabeth Kostova's latest novel, The Swan Thieves, and this is what I wrote about it earlier this year for the HNS Review:

An enchanting story and a deeply human experience. At the end of it, one feels compelled to paint, or write, sing or make music, or simply live with greater intensity. The crisis of mind—and soul—of a famous artist that begins the story leads the narrator,  psychiatrist Andrew Marlow, on the reluctant hero’s journey as he unravels the haunting obsession that has caused his patient to attack a painting with a knife. Kostova deftly weaves two stories of love and art from the Impressionist era in Paris to contemporary rural Maine and New York. The larger-than-life figure of Robert Oliver, the artist-patient, looms over the narratives of the women who have loved him and the doctor who is determined to free him from the silent cage he has chosen to inhabit.

Kostova’s writing is always good, and sometimes exquisite. Here’s a sentence describing how Andrew feels upon seeing his 90-year-old father for the first time in a few years: “When I saw him waiting for me in his good summer clothes…I felt as always both his reality and the thin air that would one day replace him.” She uses letters, narrative, dialogue and exposition with ease. The story is weighty, and moves slowly, thoughtfully—not a book to rush through, but to savor and ponder as you read it.

There is a little unsteadiness in the plot. The fortuitous connections seem just a touch too easy, and the last chapters almost rush to the conclusion. But these are minor issues compared to the over-arching quality of the writing and the humanity of the characters. The Swan Thieves is a deeply involving story, and one that will resonate for a long time after you’ve closed the book, like the sound of a very old church bell at dusk.