The Pirate Queen, Ariel Lawhon

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This post is part of a blog tour. Thank you to Random Things Tours and Swift Press for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

In this exhilarating new historical fiction Lawhon takes us through Grace O’Malley’s/Grainné Ní Mháille’s eventful life in a non-linear narrative showing her at different stages of life - Mistress, Mother, and Matriarch. Grace is drawn to the sea from a young age and longs to spend her days sailing, seeing other countries, and generally ignoring gender expectations. Unfortunately, living in the sixteenth century, she cannot be her father’s official heir, and is expected to marry strategically. The shifting narrative variously gives us glimpses into her future or shows us how she got to the place we meet her. She is a young girl learning to fight with a knife, a mother with a husband she hates, and a prisoner of her lifetime enemy, Richard Bingham. We can see from the start that her life will not be calm or peaceful.

Grace is an impressive, commanding figure, the de facto leader of the clan, but we do see a softer side of her at times. Her longterm love of Richard Bourke, reciprocated strongly, leads to some of the most touching passages in the novel. Having glimpses into her future also allows us to know when certain things are not going to work out for her, and it’s interesting to see how all the pieces fall into place. Unfortunately, her first marriage is not a happy one. Her husband is unkind and violent and we see how little power she has when those around her refuse to concede to her. The experience makes her wary and determined never to find herself in such a position again. We see time and again throughout that she is more than able to hold her own, and by her teenage years has developed skills in physically protecting herself. 

With a character such as Grace it would be easy for her to become unrelatable, untouchable and distant, but Lawhon keeps her rooted in family, relationships, frustrations, and hopes, making her feel very real and believable. Her parents are kind and affectionate, but make decisions she regrets. She also feels regret at some of the decisions she has been forced to make in the raising of her own children. Her relationship with her half-brother Donal is a close one and we see them grow together. Richard is shown to be there for her from a young age, stepping in to protect her when he can. Quietly attempting to make her life easier without expecting much in return. 

Of course, there is also much swashbuckling action. Ships are boarded, captains killed, and lands change hands at sword point. The politics of Ireland, England, and Spain are examined. A complex story is woven skilfully so you don’t feel lost even if you go in with no prior knowledge. Lawhon maintains a strong mix of action, violence, and more human stories. There are scenes depicting attempted sexual assault, and references to attacks, as is common in historical fiction, but Lawhon does not dwell unnecessarily. We are aware of the danger to women in this period without gratuitous descriptions. A thoroughly enjoyable book about a historical figure I knew nothing about before reading it, but who I came to care for throughout.

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Catherine: A Retelling of Wuthering Heights, Essie Fox

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Fox’s retelling of Wuthering Heights places Catherine front and centre. The book opens with one of the most evocative scenes from the original - Heathcliif having her coffin dug up so that they can be placed together when his time comes. In disturbing her corpse he sets her ghost free and she is then taken through not just her own story but also that of her daughter into young adulthood. Fox’s writing fits nicely with the tone of the original, meaning that when passages are lifted directly from Brontë’s novel they fit quite naturally within the narrative. The story of Heathcliff and Cathy’s obsessive, unhealthy love for each other and the actions that lead to the destruction and misery of not just their own lives but all those around them is a powerful, frustrating, and heartbreaking one. 

A sense of place is so integral to Wuthering Heights; the contrast between the darkness of the Heights and the lightness of Thrushcross Grange. We see the Heights go from a relatively happy family home to one filled with grief and violence, later becoming a prison. The moors are also central, the place where Cathy and Heathcliff feel completely themselves, free from societal expectation or the judgment of Joseph. It is where they are able to come together completely. It is also a dangerous place - even those familiar with the landscape can get into trouble in inclement weather, and for those less hardy there is danger and foreboding in its wildness. Inhabitants of Thrushcross Grange are often banned from venturing beyond their own landscaped grounds. We learn a lot about the characters by where they feel most at home. Fox manages to capture the essence of this throughout.

The main purpose of this novel seems to be to make Catherine a bit more sympathetic, to explain the reasoning behind her actions and the guilt she feels when things go wrong. There are still many unlikeable characters of course, but, as with the original, you feel for them, understanding where things have gone wrong for them, and the ways in which the environments they grew up in have shaped them. Of course, there is a point where Heathcliff tips over into being unrelatable and although you do understand how he has suffered there is a limit to the sympathy you can feel as he seeks to destroy everything Edgar has ever loved. It felt slightly less extreme in this novel, although the same actions took place. The ghost of Catherine is horrified by what he has become, and the suffering he is inflicting on her daughter, but ultimately she continues to love him and there is a feeling of redemption. 

My main issue with this novel was that I didn’t feel it really added much to the story. For the most part you are just reading Wuthering Heights told in different words. Fox adds a few scenes here and there, filling in some of Heathcliff’s backstory, and taking away some of the ambiguity about his relationship with Cathy, but there just doesn’t feel like there’s any great depth being added. Yes, we experience a little more of her emotions as the story plays out, but they can be inferred from the original, so rich in feeling. Most retellings that I’ve read in the past focus on highlighting characters that were otherwise sidelined; in attempting a retelling based on one of the main characters it is inevitable I suppose that not much is gained. The point at which the story continues after Cathy’s death felt like the moment for more additions, to see how she responds to how everything plays out. For the most part this doesn’t happen, we are just told the story without comment. It is only in the last fifty pages or so that we get a little more insight into how she feels, what she thinks of the man she once loved so desperately, how she reacts to seeing her daughter grown up. If there was more of this throughout it would have felt a much stronger novel, as it is I couldn’t help but wonder what the point of the retelling was, and getting frustrated that we weren’t delving deeper with Cathy. That is not to say it’s a bad book, far from it, but I couldn’t help but feel that you’d be better off just reading the original. I adore the original, it is my most-read and favourite book, so perhaps I am coming at it from a critical place. I wonder how this book would be received by someone coming to the story for the first time. I imagine it would be read with pleasure. All the power and emotion of the original but perhaps in less intimidating writing, a bit less confusing with the repetition of character names in the second half. It is a worthy read, and the writing is rich and evocative, but for me I felt the enjoyment came from the strength of the original.

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Well, This Is Awkward, Esther Walker

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Mairéad lives a busy life in London as the head of an influencer agency, which she recently sold to a large conglomerate, giving her the financial freedom to buy a home and decorate it in her dream style. She’s suffering dating fatigue from being on the apps too long, struggling to feel relevant at work where an increasingly young workforce see her as old, and feels the pressure to constantly be ‘on’ in a world of endless notifications. When her estranged sister Lenny has an accident and is unable to care for her daughter Sunny while she recuperates in hospital, suddenly Mairéad’s carefully curated life feels like it’s falling apart at the seams. Lenny and Sunny live off-grid in a cabin in Wales, believe medicine to be poison, and try to live ferociously eco-consciously. When Sunny arrives in London she struggles with the busy-ness, the noise, the choice, the waste. She just wants to spend her time reading, and eventually bonds with the goats at the zoo and wants to spend every waking moment there. Mairéad is at a loss how to cope. She never wanted children, doesn’t know how to look after them, and just wants her beautiful, clean life to return to normal. She hopes to palm Sunny off on her reclusive, tech-obsessed mother, in a house full of eccentric lodgers, but her conscience soon gets the better of her and she realises that she’s the only one who is going to at least try to take proper care of Sunny.

Due to her financial windfall she is able to take some time out of work when she realises it’s completely untenable to try to do both. A disastrous attempt at taking Sunny to work followed by a failed attempt at recruiting a temporary babysitter open her eyes to just how much time raising a child takes. Sunny is comparatively low-maintenance. She is used to having very little and either wants to have her nose in a book or be communing with whatever animals are nearby. She struggles with busy shops and with social niceties however, making it difficult for Mairéad to do simple tasks like food shopping. We see Mairéad begin to crumble under the pressure, unbelievably bored shackled to her niece, yet with time she realises that she has become quite attached and feels something missing when they are apart. A summer holiday orchestrated by her friend Dodie leads her in contact with many more children and young people and her maternal instincts begin to come alive, although she continues to worry whether she’s doing the right things. She’s impressed by Sunny’s confidence in the water and tries to step out of her comfort zone to meet her halfway. There is no magic moment where everything becomes easy but they work together through the difficulties to find a way of living that works for them. 

We don’t see much of Lenny directly, merely learn about her through her absence, in the small anecdotes Sunny tells, and in the brief encounters at the hospital and back at the cabin. It is clear that Mairéad has had a difficult family life. As a child she felt a bond with her sister, an equal witness to the particularities of their family life, but as she got older and became involved in eco-terrorism they grew apart. Lenny dreamed of living in a commune in Canada but her pregnancy put paid to those hopes as children were not welcome. When she blows up at Mairéad for having taken their late father to chemotherapy treatment their relationship is irreparably damaged and they no longer speak. Her mother Helen makes constant excuses to avoid her, has never seen Mairéad’s flat and never expects to. She pretends to be willing to help with Sunny but when it comes to it she refuses. It’s clear that even as children they had to battle with the lodgers for attention, and since the rise of smart technology Helen is always distracted, putting her phone or laptop before listening to her daughter. This dysfunctional family life adds to Mairéad’s anxieties about being able to care for Sunny, but it’s clear to the reader that although she goes through the struggles that will be familiar to anyone looking after a child, her heart is in the right place and that they’ll be OK. 

The narrative style is relaxed and informal, and you feel so much that you’re seeing events through Mairéad’s eyes that it is somewhat jarring every time she is referred to in the third person, which remains the narrative style throughout. The story felt a little far-fetched, not because of Sunny’s need for a guardian, but because Mairéad is so able to simply drop her life, to move to a cabin in the wilds of Wales and accepts this as her lot. She completely lets Sunny guide their life, not even considering that they could move into a home with modern amenities nearby so as not to remove Sunny from the life and landscape she knows, but to make her own life less difficult. They also seem to come around to each other very quickly, from complete discontent to quiet understanding, and Sunny gets used to the comforts of Mairéad’s life without too much complaint after her initial surprise at this luxurious way of living. Nonetheless, it’s a nice enough read, with characters put in a situation that would feel impossible to resolve in real life. Walker acknowledges this in resisting a happy ever after moment. We see Mairéad grow into her role, albeit with a few bumps along the way, and Sunny begins to consider a life beyond what she was taught to expect by Lenny.

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Blog Tour: Vagabond, Mark Eveleigh

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Armed with a hammock, some walking memoirs on his phone, and a few bottles of water, Eveleigh sets out to walk 1225km across Spain on what proves to be one of the hottest summers on record. Prior to beginning he spent hours trawling Google Earth to map out the best route, although the reality doesn’t always follow expectation. Along the way he encounters an array of animals, some friendly, others less so, many blisters, and frequently less water than he would like. Certainly, he eats less well than he had fantasised about before setting off, seemingly having a knack of arriving at bars and restaurants just after the kitchen has closed.

He comments that stealth camping has become something of a trend, and yet he has obliviously been doing it for years. He prefers a hammock to a tent as it allows more awareness of what’s happening around you. Trying to go unnoticed does come with its drawbacks though, he admits that the last hour of each day’s walk is his least favourite as he searches for somewhere suitable to set up camp before the light completely fades. It also means long days - resting as darkness settles, and rising before the sun is fully up. 

Despite spending some of the walk on a (less popular) section of the Camino de Santiago, he meets very few others on the path. Indeed, some sections are so rarely trod that he gets to know those ahead by the marks their boots leave in the dirt. It’s a solitary walk but Eveleigh describes those he meets, on the track or in bars, in a lively fashion, giving a sense of the generosity and welcome he receives. He is conscious of his appearance, especially when there hasn’t been opportunity to wash, but he also acknowledges that he is just playing at being a vagabond, that he has the security of his home waiting for him, and the bank card in his pocket. 

Along the way he also reveals historical detail to the reader. The names and sometimes bizarre focuses of saints are a common theme, but so too do we learn about local tradition and custom, and political issues that continue to rage. In this way we get a broader view of the land he traverses. This is an interesting read that doesn’t shy away from the difficulties of a life on the road and the challenges many of the local communities face.

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Blog Tour: The Sky Beneath Us, Fiona Valpy

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It’s March 2020 and Daisy is on her way to Kathmandu in the search of an ancestor’s story when her Mum phones to tell her she’s no longer able to join her as she’s come down with Covid. Daisy is encouraged to keep going, everyone believing the virus will only be an issue for a few weeks and so she does, but when she arrives things begin to fall apart. Treks are cancelled, flights are grounded, and it seems like she’s going to be stuck there before she’s even had a chance to get to Phortse to look for traces of Violet. She’s brought with her the letters and journals she found in an old chest at their Scottish estate that Violet wrote in the 1920s. A strong-willed, independent young woman, she went to Edinburgh to study at the School of Gardening against her family’s wishes. When she fell in love with a fellow gardener neither her family nor his approved, but an opportunity for him to assist on an expedition to Nepal provides hope for them to break free of their families and set up a home of their own. The last journal entry Daisy has is from 1929, when Violet’s story is really just beginning. Will she be able to uncover the rest of her story or will Covid ruin her plans?

Family is central to the story. Daisy’s marriage broke down after she gave up everything, leaving Scotland and a successful gardening business to move to London with her husband, and the trip to Nepal was about more than just searching for Violet, but also about rediscovering herself, finding her way out of the slump she’s been in since the marriage ended. Her relationship with her mother feels very relatable right from the start, with her playing down how she’s feeling with Covid and focussing on Daisy succeeding. Her relationship with her twin daughters, off to University, is transitioning, both as they find their way into adulthood, but also as they navigate the marriage breakdown and all the mess that comes with it. For Violet, family was a source of anxiety and restriction, with social mores being of utmost importance. Her relationship with her sister Hetty, however, was an essential part of her life, keeping her grounded and connected to Scotland long after she set off for Nepal. Her desire to look after her own daughter also showed her the lengths she would go to in order to keep her safe, to protect a part of Callum, her betrothed, with all that she can. We see how family and love can be a source of huge strength, but also a net that constrains if you let it.

Daisy and Violet are connected across the decades with a love of plants and a willingness to step outside their comfort zone. Valpy’s writing is evocative, bringing to life the landscapes they’re in, whether it be a cold and windy Edinburgh, or the glorious mountains of Nepal. You feel as if you can breathe the fresh mountain air and see the spectacular valleys of exotic flowers. It’s also a fascinating look into the practice of plant hunting and how findings were recorded and sent back to the UK.

The two women’s lives mirror each other also in living through periods of global upheaval. Violet lives in the aftermath of the First World War, through the Great Depression, and into the Second World War, whose darkness reaches her even in the mountains. The village of Phortse is also hugely impacted by the first successful attempt to summit Everest. The Sherpas believe it is wrong to climb the mountains, standing on the heads of gods, and so there is reluctance to become guides, despite the financial benefits it brings. The women stay home and pray for the forgiveness of the men and their safe return, but they accept that the tragedies that befall those who climb it are punishments from the gods. Daisy experiences the loneliness and anxiety of a world shut down by pandemic, and the pain of being separated from family at a time of trauma. Valpy constructs the story in such a way that these parallels are very clearly drawn. We see also how they both benefit from the welcoming community of Sherpas that they’re lucky enough to meet and stay with. The realisation that although life in the mountains is hard there is a freedom to it, and a strength in the love they experience. 

This is a gripping read, with the switch between time periods keeping you wanting more. The Covid lockdowns still being fresh in our memories, it can be emotional to read fiction based around them, bringing back the uncertainty and suffering, the isolation and sacrifices people made in being separated from loved ones in their final days. It is a reminder to never take your family for granted, nor to become complacent in the life we lead, which can be utterly unrecognisable in the blink of an eye. At times the plot is slightly predictable, but you are so invested in the characters that it doesn’t matter, your heart is shattered with them. 

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Blog Tour: This Motherless Land, Nikki May

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Funke lives a happy life in Lagos with parents who clearly love each other and a little brother who she bickers with as siblings do, but who she ultimately has a healthy relationship with. She is intelligent and has a promising future ahead of her, but then tragedy strikes and she is sent to live in England with relatives she’s never met, and who disowned her mother for falling in love with a Nigerian man. 

Settling in to England is made easier by her cousin Liv, the only person who seems genuinely happy to have her there. She tries to protect Funke (or Kate, as her English family insist on calling her) from the worst of her mother’s bile and tries to help celebrate the good times. She helps Funke to begin thinking of England as home, and in some ways reminds her of her mother who always made the bad times feel better and went all out in celebrating the good times. 

Margot, Funke’s aunt, and Dominic, her cousin, are overtly racist and treat Funke as if she is a savage who doesn’t know how to speak or swim. Although Liv is kinder she has absorbed some of the prejudice she has grown up around and it spills out at times. Funke has experienced othering for much of her life, growing up with a white mum in Nigeria she was teased for being mixed race. Later, she will return to Nigeria and have to re-learn the norms and behaviours of the country after spending years assimilating to English culture. There’s a sense that she’s never quite fully of the culture wherever she is in the eyes of those around her.

The writing is lively and engaging and you feel you have a good sense of who the characters are within a few pages of being introduced. The interactions between Funke and her family in the opening sections feel so natural and relatable, you instantly feel in safe hands with May guiding you through the story. 

May’s writing really makes you feel for the characters. Funke’s heartbreak and sense of isolation are beautifully written and sensitively handled. Her aunt Margot makes your blood boil in her spitefulness and selfishness. She appears completely without morals and her sense of entitlement is in the extreme. The grandparents have their flaws but you can see a human side to them. They become close to Funke and regret what happened with her mother. Still, Funke is is not treated equally to her cousins. There is always a sense that they are doing her a kindness rather than treating her fully as a member of the family.

Connection to family and familial duty is a central theme in the novel. Funke has many times when she feels abandoned by those she loves yet she doesn’t lose her desire to hear from them, to share her successes with them even after years of cruel silence. She sometimes wishes she were able to forget about them. She searches for connection to her mother when she moves to England, thinking that she will find traces of her there. Instead, she is often left feeling the complete absence. It is heartening to see her find that connection in Lagos where so many were touched by her mother’s commitment to education and her generosity of spirit. 

The Stone family is certainly self-interested and will do what they can to protect the family name (and their inheritance). Margot pulls strings to help her children succeed, or at the very least, give the impression of success. Yet she shows very little love to Liv, constantly criticising her weight and personality. Even as an adult, when she has been through some real trauma, conversations between them are difficult, Margot picking an aspect of her life to pull apart every time they speak. She never sees or acknowledges the light in her daughter nor does she offer support when she really needs it. Despite this, Liv has a sense of duty to her family and has moments of having to choose between doing the right thing and doing what will protect the family reputation. We see time and again how such decisions reverberate across decades, generations. 

This is a brilliantly written, gripping book that is genuinely difficult to put down. A modern re-telling of Mansfield Park, you don’t need to have read the original to enjoy it (I haven’t and was completely hooked. It was interesting to think about how the scenarios might have played out in the nineteenth century.) There is so much depth to this book it would be a mammoth essay that discussed it all. One of the best books I’ve read this year.

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Blog Tour: What Everyone Knows About the British (Except the British), Michael Peel

This post is part of a blog tour. Thank you to Random Things Tours and Monoray for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

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Having spent a number of years living abroad working as a Foreign Correspondent, Peel is surprised by the Britain he returns to. This is the jumping off point into an investigation into the myths Britons tell themselves about their history and current status in the world, and some harsh realities about what’s going on behind these myths. It is as up to date as you can hope from a book, with King Charles’ coronation included and the seemingly endless cycle of Tory PMs the country has suffered under in recent years. This is a no holds barred look at the state of modern Britain. If you’re a staunch nationalist who clings to the idea of the Blitz Spirit you may find this a difficult read, but this is not a rambling opinion piece, Peel’s work is grounded in research, input from experts, and attempts to receive comment from the organisations in question (which often go unanswered).

Brexit naturally makes a repeat appearance and early discussions involve a look at the misconceptions that may have contributed to the referendum’s outcome. It comes as no surprise that people over-estimate the levels of immigration, and underestimated (quite drastically) the amount of investment the EU provided. Peel also looks at the prevailing myths around the type of voter who opted to leave, and their motivations, all signs of political parties twisting the narrative to serve their purposes. Divisive rhetoric may have short term gains for them but ultimately will do more harm than good. 

Myths around Britain’s role in history, as epitomised in the Life in the UK test, taken by anyone who wants to settle here, are examined. The propensity to downplay the contributions of people from other countries in what are seen as successes contrast to the complete absolving of any guilt or participation in the darker parts of history. The role of Britain in colonial history is increasingly being brought to the fore by organisations such as the National Trust, but they receive a huge amount of pushback, not because what they are highlighting is false, but merely because many would rather pretend it didn’t happen. 

This ties in with the following section on monarchy, a popular topic for debate in recent years with the jubilee, passing of Queen Elizabeth II and the coronation of King Charles III. Although many try to push down questions about the place of inherited privilege in the modern world and the Royal Family’s historic ties to colonialism and everything that came with it (as well as their less than transparent finances), the truth remains that there’s a lot to unpack. Throughout the book Peel compares Britain’s position to that of other countries, often ones that people would think of as more corrupt or less democratic, but which make apparent that there are a lot of similarities.  

This is a fascinating, well researched book which is likely to enrage you at times. I enjoyed learning more about the history and current political situations in other countries alongside reconsidering the current climate in the UK. For a book that deals with some heavy topics it is remarkably easy to read.

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Blog Tour: The Quality of Love, Ariane Bankes

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When Ariane's mother Celia dies she inherits a trunk full of letters, diaries, and photographs. These document the life of Celia and her twin sister Mamaine and the remarkable loves and friendships they had. Their life started modestly, their mother died a week after their birth and they spent a quiet childhood in the Suffolk countryside with their father and nanny. Sadly, at the age of eleven, they lost their father too and were sent to live with their uncle near Richmond. They struggled to settle into their new life, the shock of their grief feeling at times insurmountable. When they began the debutante ball circles they were incredibly bored and had no interest in any of the men they were there to impress. Before long they were forging their own path, travelling Europe and making friends with some of the leading intellectuals of the day.

The book focuses largely on the men in their lives, who frequently fell in love with them, and with whom they had the knack of remaining friends with despite rejections or break ups. Mamaine spent several years with Arthur Koestler, a fairly erratic relationship with high tempers and depressions. They lived for some time in a remote home in Wales where the weather was miserable, they were without water when it got too cold, and whose damp atmosphere did nothing to help Mamaine’s recurring asthma. She also had a whirlwind romance with Albert Camus during her relationship with Koestler. They were besotted with each other, their shared weeks being held on to as some of the best of either of their lives. They remained in each other’s circles but tried to remain a healthy distance for a time while their hearts settled down. She was not with either of them at the time of her death but both felt the loss heavily, and anxiously awaited news during her illness.

Celia was no less popular, having been proposed to by George Orwell. Again, they remained close despite the proposal having been rejected. He enjoyed her genuine interest in his son and it is clear that both twins were able to hold their own intellectually in the most formidable company. Celia eventually found a stable relationship with Bankes’ eventual father, who came to the relationship with existing children. It must be a slightly odd experience writing about the love life of your mother but Bankes handles it without apparent discomfort.

The twins come across as kind and intelligent. Mamaine helps edit Koestler’s work and Celia works on History Today. Despite their busy, international lives, they always prioritise each other. Letters go back and forth and it is a great pain to them when logistics keep them without news of the other. At one point delays in the post prove almost fatal when news of a shared medical allergy can’t be communicated efficiently. The book is rooted in the letters they wrote and received, not only between each other but with their friends and lovers. At times Bankes admits to only having one half of the correspondence, but much can be gleaned from the responses. 

An incredibly easy read covering a tumultuous period in European history. The narrative moves at a pace, with brief introductions to the various characters before we move on to the next acquaintance. At times we jump forward in time and are told how a relationship resolves which can be a little confusing, but it is rare. Overall an evocative look at remarkable lives which offers a more personal side of some of the biggest names of the age.

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