And the Word was made flesh

 

    My 'books of the year' list gets a little longer with the addition of Francesca Kay's The Translation of the Bones. If you've read her very impressive debut novel An Equal Stillness (there's a post on it here), you'll be familiar with her studied, measured style, and her new book fulfils the promise of her first being a work of great poise, sensitivity and intelligence.

    The story's focal point is the Church of the Sacred Heart in London's Battersea, and its characters are a disparate group of people loosely connected by their attachment to the place of worship. There is Alice Armitage, praying for the safe return of her son who is nearing the end of a tour of duty with the army in Afghanistan, Stella Morrison, wife of an MP, her older children now grown to independence, her youngest one still needing her, Father Diamond, a former Cambridge mathematician for whom the call to serve God had been sudden and insistent, and Mary-Margaret O'Reilly, a young, slow-witted woman whose faith is deep. When Mary-Margaret appears to witness a miracle in the church, the consequences for all involved will be far-reaching and the lives of some will be forever changed.

    This is a moving book about faith, belief and love, isolation, loneliness and passion, and about motherhood, too - though as a study of that subject it is far-removed from the one we were talking about earlier in the week. Francesca Kay links her central characters to others who broaden the novel's scope, and every strand is given its due weight, carefully balanced and controlled, while the overall emotional pitch is not mawkish or sentimental but fitting and of a compelling integrity. It's a book that shouldn't be rushed - its pace matches its subject-matter  - and one which requires and repays reflection on the part of the reader. Elegant, sad, poignant, it's a very fine piece of work.

Comments

[adele geras]

A woman on the train the other day was reading it and that reminded me that I wanted to read it too. Now you've confirmed my feelings. Am going to order it from the library right now!!

[m]

I'll be looking out for this, too, because I loved her first book.

[LizF]

I have been trying to get this from the library for a while but they still don't have it which is really frustrating.
At this rate I am going to have to wait until it comes out in paperback and buy a copy!

[Mystica]

I do love the sound of this author. I started on Susan Howatch a long while ago and have loved her books always set in the background of the Anglican church (which I know little about). This set in a Catholic background is something I know more about. Sounds just my cup of tea. Thank you for the post.

[Cornflower]

The church is a crucial - and very interesting - part of the novel, I thought. Hope you'll enjoy it if you read it, Mystica.