THE BROOKLYN FOLLIES
by Paul Auster
Faber & Faber, £7.99
Several of Paul Auster’s recent novels — The Book of Illusions, for example — have dealt with characters engaged on quests, who must meet a series of moral challenges. The Brooklyn Follies is more of the same; but with Auster, one never minds the feeling that one has been here before. So there is the familiar New York setting and the familiar Auster protagonist: Nathan Glass, Jewish, cynical, and in late middle age.
Nathan’s goal, it emerges, is to learn to be a better man. Since he is in remission from lung cancer, he knows that he may be short of time to make amends for his sins — which include not loving his former wife enough, and upsetting their daughter, Rachel, who no longer speaks to him. Redemption is on hand in the form of Nathan’s nephew, Tom Wood, a PhD drop-out who works in a Brooklyn bookshop run by Harry Brightman — another of Auster’s charmingly plausible rogues. In setting out to save Tom from the depression that threatens to overwhelm him, Nathan proves his essential goodheartedness. The appearance of Lucy, the nine-year-old daughter of Tom’s unstable sister, Aurora, offers scope for Nathan’s kindness. In fact, he behaves impeccably throughout; the problem for the reader is to understand what exactly he had to be sorry for in the first place.
This isn’t vintage Auster, but it has its enjoyable moments. Those who have yet to read him should start elsewhere — with The New York Trilogy, for example.
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THE EVENING OF THE HOLIDAY
by Shirley Hazzard
Virago, £7.99
The adjective “Jamesian” is bandied about to describe any writer of more than usual subtlety; in the case of Shirley Hazzard, whose most recent novel, The Great Fire, was shortlisted for the Orange Prize and longlisted for the Man Booker, it seems justified. This short novel, set in Italy, was first published in the mid-1960s, but still seems as fresh as when it was written.
The story is simple: a wealthy, middle-aged man, Tancredi, who is separated from his wife, meets Sophie, a young Englishwoman, at his sister’s house near Florence. There is no instant attraction, but, before the evening is out, the two agree to meet again. An affair begins, but it is clear to both from the beginning that it cannot last. Presiding over this doomed relationship is the — Jamesian — figure of Luisa, Tancredi’s aunt. Even though she sees all too clearly that the romance will end in heartache, she respects the imperatives of love too much to want to intervene. Things come to a climax during a lunch party at Luisa’s house, which is brought to an abrupt end by a violent storm.
The story ends sadly — as such stories often do; but it is so beautifully written, and so full of incidental pleasures, that the overall effect is elegiac, not depressing. Bringing no less precision to its depiction of the human heart than it does to its Tuscan settings, The Evening of the Holiday is a novel that one wants to reread as soon as one has finished it.
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SHE MAY NOT LEAVE
by Fay Weldon
HarperPerennial, £7.99
A new novel by Fay Weldon is always a reason to celebrate, and this has all the ingredients that make her writing so addictive. There is the smug young couple, whose relationship is fraying at the edges, the predatory outsider, the Kentish Town setting and, above all, the acerbic humour. For the past 30 years, Weldon has chronicled the foibles of the North London middle classes, and this deftly structured tale of jealousy and revenge shows her as au fait with contemporary manners as ever.
Hattie and Martyn, a happily unmarried couple with politically-correct tendencies, have just had their first baby and are struggling with the sleepless nights, reduced income and conflicting demands of domestic life and work. Both wonder whether they will get their lives back again. Then Agnieszka, newly arrived from Poland, takes charge of the household. Hattie goes back to work, and both she and Martyn enjoy the benefits of full-time help around the house. Even Baby Kitty seems happier with the new regime.
But — this being a Weldon novel — it is not long before things start to turn sour. Mousy, self-effacing Agnieszka reveals her true nature as a femme fatale, and the sinister promise of the title becomes a reality. Offering an enjoyably waspish commentary on the changing nature of childcare — and of women’s expectations — since the 1960s, She May Not Leave is as funny and dark as anything that Weldon has written.