Book #56 The Whole Day Through by Patrick Gale

The Whole Day Through

Length Of Time In Possession : around 8-12 months

This book is the third Patrick Gale I have read, following sister novels 'Notes From An Exhibition' and 'A Perfectly Good Man' both of which I greatly enjoyed.  Separated into different intervals in everyday life (such as Lunch Break, and Evensong) it covers a longer, yet not wholly specified period.

I did struggle to identify why the book should be separated out in such a way as a device to weave the plot around, having considered it I think perhaps it is there to reflect how the life of a carer is often mapped out in such a way.

Laura and Ben find themselves reacquainted after a twenty year hiatus after each comes to Winchester to look after a relative, Laura her ailing mother and Ben his vulnerable younger brother.

Restrained and elegant, The Whole Day Through is a novel about yearning and loss, how tiny coincidental acts meant that the stars kept two people who were perfect for each other apart.
The writing is as high quality as I have come to expect from him, and he may eventually come to be one of few writers whose entire output I've read.
As a reader I understood the emotions conveyed so well, and yet, I felt almost cheated, cheated on, by the ending which was highly unsatisfactory!

I understand that real life is messy, and so it many ways it is an honest story about reality: real people, real situations. Life rarely turns out the way you plan, God laughs!

And yet, Patrick Gale, REALLY? Did you HAVE TO?

Verdict : 7/10

Destination : Shelves  

Book #47 Memories Of My Melancholy Whores by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Memories Of My Melancholy Whores

Length Of Time In Possession : 2 weeks

I have wanted to read Marquez for some years but on each occasion I have tried to read either Love In The Time Of Cholera or A Hundred Years of Solitude, I have failed in the early stages of the novel. This failure is an ongoing source of personal embarrassment and I do still fully intend to read both.

I came across Memories Of My Melancholy Whores in the library and given that it is relatively slight, just over 100 pages thought I'd give this a crack at finally losing my Marquez virginity.

The novel concerns an elderly journalist, unnamed throughout the novel who has only ever had sex with whores. On his 90th birthday he decides that what he most wants, as a gift to himself, is to deflower an adolescent virgin.

At the beginning of this novel, I thought I was about to read an extremely distasteful tale of a dirty old man, engaging in a vile abuse that was tantamount to rape. I was fully prepared to throw the book aside in disgust.

But then, when he meets his again unnamed whore, whom he christens Delgadina, she has taken valerian out of fear, and has fallen into a deep sleep, and the two do not have intercourse.

What follows as a result of this failure to fulfill his plans turns into a love story of incredibly unusual parameters and is on occasion very touching and fable-like.  

I don't think I've read a story like this before, and I really admired and enjoyed it.

Odd and unique, I think I would recommend this to people who enjoy reading stories that are a bit different from the norm and the mainstream.

I hope that in the rest of this year, I can finally read one of his larger novels.

Verdict : 9/10
Destination : Return To Library