Man, it's been so long since I just adored a list book. It's such a wonderful feeling, discovering a book through this that I'd never have read otherwise, and then just falling in love with it. Lucy Gault broke a long streak of "meh."
It sort of reminded me of Ian McEwan, whom I adore. Like many McEwan's, it's about how a moment, a small choice, a small mistake, can have huge, life-altering implications and can lead to just absolute devastation. The book is interested in how love fails and how people cope with and are shaped by guilt.
I'm also fascinated by books by adults for adults that involve children and children's inner worlds. It's so interested to compare these to books for children. There's some type of literature course here, I'm sure, on that topic.
Anyway, some favorite quotes:
"It's no good, loving one another"
"Why isn't it?"
"I'm not someone to love."
"Oh, Lucy, you are! If only you know how much you are!"
It was Bridget who had told him how his daughter's limp had lessened with the years and how a stoicism had developed in her as a child when those same years failed her, how faith had still been kept, love shattered.
Hers was a different allocation of time and circumstances from her mother's, from her father's. She could not pretend.
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