And so on to the final Mountains to Sea bookclub choice - The Blue Book by A.L. Kennedy.
First, to matters purely superficial - I had seen and admired the beautiful and vintage inspired hardback edition of the book with it's saturated blue cover and was disappointed to see that the paperbook edition has gone in a more pedestrian style - still blue but muted and dark with an image of two people with their back to us - and lacking the charm and slightly mysterious vibe that I liked about the hardback.
Does this rambling have a point you ask?
Well, only to explain why it took me a while to get into this novel - I think I was put off by the cover design and less willing than I usually would be to plunge in headfirst to a brand spanking new book.
I hummed and hawed and made excuses to myself not to get started. Some books need a good hour or two before you're fully engaged and for me this was one of them. I initially found Elizabeth's interior monologue distracting and challenging and I had to keep going back to reread passages that I kept losing the thread of.
Returning home from work on the DART I had to go back and reread the entire second chapter.
BUT...............
Stick with it my friends!
I'm more than a third of the way through now and find myself utterly intrigued - by the characters, the unfolding backstory and the writing which took me so long to get to grips with.
As soon as I realized Elizabeth and Arthur were already acquainted I was hooked.
When I read the section about Arthur's session with Agathe I couldn't put it down till I had reached the conclusion.
One of the beautiful things about this is that I had no idea what to expect when I started reading and I still don't. Which is why I feel compelled to keep reading.
Other books to read if you're enjoying The Blue Book:
Beyond Black by Hilary Mantel - a magnigicently sinister and witty novel about a medium. Gave me the chills.
The Hours by Michael Cunningham - A moving novel with three parralel plot strands that explore a single day in three different women's lives in different eras.
M2C Bookclub Competition - win tickets to A.L. Kennedy event in September
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