Books

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

Though he may not speak of them, the memories still dwell inside Jacob Jankowski's ninety-something-year-old mind. Memories of himself as a young man, tossed by fate onto a rickey train that was home to the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. Memories of a world filled with freaks and clowns, with wonder and pain and anger and passion; a world with its own narrow irrational rules, its own way of life, and its own way of death. The world of the circus: to Jacob it was both salvation and a living hell.

Jacob was there because his luck had run out -- orphaned and penniless, he had no direction until he landed on this locomotive "ship of fools." It was the early part of the Great Depression, and everyone in this third-rate circus was lucky to have any job at all. Marlena, the star of the equestrian act, was there because she fell in love with the wrong man, a handsome circus boss with a wide mean streak. And Rosie the elephant was there because she was the great gray hope, the new act that was going to be the salvation of the circus; the only problem was, Rosie didn't have an act -- in fact, she couldn't even follow instructions. The bond that grew among this unlikely trio was one of love and trust, and ultimately, it was there only hope for survival.

Surprising, poignant, and funny, Water for Elephants is that rare novel with a story so engrossing, one is reluctant to put it down; with characters so engaging, they continued to live long after the last page has been turned; with a world built of wonder, a world so real, one starts to breathe its air.

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It's such a shame to waste time. We always think we have so much of it.

It is July 1962. Florence is a talented musician who dreams of a career on the concert stage and of the perfect life she will create with Edward, an earnest young history student at the University College in London, who unexpectedly wooed and won her heart. Newly married that morning, both virgins, Edward and Florence arrive at a hotel on the Dorset coast. At dinner in their rooms they struggle to suppress their worries about the wedding night to come. Edward, eager for rapture, frets over Florence's response to his advances and nurses a private fear of failure, while Florence's anxieties run deeper: she is overcome by sheer disgust at the idea of physical contact, but dreads disappointing her husband when they finally lie down together in the honeymoon suite.

Ian McEwan has caught with understanding and compassion the innocence of Edward and Florence at a time when marriage was presumed to be the outward sign of maturity and independence. On Chesil Beach is another masterwork from McEwan -- a story of lives transformed by a gesture not made or a word not spoken.

For my first bite at the McEwan apple, I was quite impressed. On Chesil Beach was beautifully written and I loved what he wrote...for the most part. I feel the book is best talked about in two parts: 1) the wedding day 2) the rest of the book.

In that first part, the wedding day, we have a man and woman who are as awkward with each other as they are in love. They fumble through conversation before fumbling at each other's clothing. They have never had difficulty communicating, but there is one glaring oversight in their conversational past: he could not wait to get into bed with her and she did not want to ever get into bed with him. The chapters that chronicle that day were rife with sexual tension and apprehension, and they were often pretty descriptive.

(I can accept that Americans are typically considered prude by the rest of the world, and if you have ever been uncomfortable by adult situations and bizarrely literary sexual euphemism in text you may have to skip over a few paragraphs.)

To characterize the second part of the book, that which did not occur on the couple's wedding day, I would consider it beautiful in its simplicity and innocence. The care with which McEwan handled their relationship as it budded through the soil was perfectly gentle. I really enjoyed how much of the story revolved around both Edward and Florence's families. Their separate family dynamics showed how they found solice in each other's company; they were each other's escape into a new-found reality.

On Chesil Beach was wonderfully tragic, if tragedy can be wonderful; (a little) funny; and all-around superbly written. Ian McEwan has been a celebrated author for many years and if On Chesil Beach is representative of his earlier work it is not difficult to see why he has received such praise.

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"Have you ever noticed yourself smile? You look like an old soldier." He shifted slightly in his seat, embarrassed. "I don't know how an old soldier smiles." "Well, I do." The girl's eyes darkened. She was searching in her memory. "Once I knew ten thousand men who were looking for the sea."

The Man Booker Prize for Fiction represents the very best in contemporary fiction (from the UK, Ireland, and the Commonwealth). One of the world’s most prestigious awards, and one of incomparable influence, it continues to be the pinnacle of ambition for every fiction writer. It has the power to transform the fortunes of authors, and even publishers. In 2004, not only did Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty reach the bestseller lists, but previous winners The Life of Pi (2002) and Vernon God Little (2003) were also amongst the bestselling books of the year. Congratulations to last year's winner Kiran Desai for her novel The Inheritance of Loss.

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