Alys, Always

 

    When I picked up Harriet Lane's novel Alys, Always to write the 'first impressions' post the other day, I really hadn't intended to read on to the end there and then, but nor had I expected that just a few pages would be sufficient to make the book 'stick' so that it simply couldn't be put aside. To digress for a moment, I hope that a producer/director of taste and sensitivity will make a television film of this book because I think it would lend itself well to that treatment, and the result - taut, tense and beautifully played out - would be something worth watching.

    But to get back to the book itself, and to re-iterate briefly, Frances Thorpe is a sub-editor on a newspaper's books pages who happens upon a road accident and in going to the aid of the injured driver, hears her last words. What could have been routine subsequent contact with the dead woman's family in fact offers Frances an opening into a world of which, both personally and professionally, she is keen to be a part, and it is how she manoeuvres herself into a position whereby she can take advantage of the chance afforded her that is so compelling and so well done.

    This is a very concise and acute psychological study, at times drily funny ("Her mother is an interior designer. It slowly dawns on me that I've heard of her pioneering work with taupe."), always expertly observed, perfectly paced and smoothly finished off. At one point a visitor to Frances's flat, looking at the contents of the bookshelves, pulls out a copy of Rebecca; a significant moment, I felt, as surely this story pays homage to that book in more ways than one! You'll see what I mean when you read it, as I urge you to do, because this is such a neatly executed, well thought out piece of work, crafted in a different way from Vanessa Gebbie's The Coward's Tale, but to a similarly impressive standard.

    There are lines in which Harriet Lane has used rhythm, e.g. a comma providing a half-beat's pause, to such telling effect, and I love that attention to detail and that feel for how a story should be told. She is very amusing on the characters of literary London, the lionised figures (many with marvellous names), the fawning, the social cachet and the coin of celebrity. She is excellent, too, on things like dress and food and houses and the setting of scenes, and on laying clues to her main protagonist's true character in what amount to throwaway lines. All of these things come together to make a novel of skill, elegance and flair, one in which cool calculation and subtle manipulation move, as a cloud in front of the sun, to chill and unsettle, that suddenly cast shade revealing what in full light had been carefully concealed. What is not hidden is Harriet Lane's talent - this is a brilliant debut!

Comments

[Darlene]

You had me convinced with your 'First Impressions' post! We don't have this showing up on my library's catalogue but I've added it to my Amazon wish list as a way to remember it. And you're right, by the sound of things it's just the sort of storyline we love to watch on a Sunday evening.

[Cornflower]

I hope you'll manage to lay hands on a copy soon, Darlene. It's so good!

[Mr Cornflower]

I was interested in how the character of the narrator unfolds - I was going to say changes, but part of the skill of the book lies in the subtle hints that what we're seeing is not so much Frances changing from from a rather bland, passive individual to a more interesting, devious and manipulative one, more an example of someone gradually revealing different aspects of her nature. This is not an easy trick to pull off.

[Danielle]

I'm adding this one to my wishlist, too. You always have such tempting books on my sidebar. I know to just open another window with Amazon or TBD opened when I visit here to make life easier... :)

[Julie Fredericksen]

Just had to add this to my wish list too.

[Cornflower]

The joy of visiting so many book blogs!

[Cornflower]

I happened to look up the US edition the other day, and I'm sure that the image they have used for the jacket is that of an Edinburgh doorway! Whatever is on the cover, it's an excellent book.

[Deirdre]

Just like you, I thought I'd just read a sample chapter and then the next thing I knew I had "kindled" it and read it until I finished at some early hour this morning! What an interesting person Frances turns out to be and what a great read! The storyline was tight, it moved at a good pace and it was all very clever. I had no idea how it would end and I loved it! Your enthusiasm caught my attention!

[Cornflower]

So glad you enjoyed it, Deirdre.