Book jacket
synopsis:
“Thirty-nine, recently
divorced, jobless, Benedick Hunter is an actor heading in the exact opposite direction
of happily ever after: everything from spending time with his own children to
the prospect of dating brings him down.
So when he comes across a children’s book his mother, Laura, wrote, he
decides that her life and work – haunting stories replete with sinister woods
and wicked witches and brave girls who battle giants – holds the key to
figuring out why his own life is such a mess.”
“Setting out to find
out why Laura killed herself when he was six, Benedick travels from his native
England to the U.S. in search of her friends and his own long-lost
relatives. As he grows obsessed with
Laura’s books and their veiled references to reality, Benedick enters into a
dark wood – a dark wood that is both hilariously real and terrifyingly
psychological. It is then that his story
becomes an exploration not only of his mother’s genius but also of the nature
of depression, and of the healing power of storytelling in our lives.”
I picked this book
up during a book sale. I suppose
anything with references to fairy tales will easily catch my eye. It’s not the kind of book I’d usually go for,
but I’m glad I gave it a chance. This is
not going to make the list of my top fifty favorites, but I found it quite a
worthwhile read for a number of reasons.
First, the narration is good and involving. The narrator’s voice is brutally intense at
times and poignantly fragile at others; it is very easy to get absorbed into
the persona’s voice and thought process.
My second reason is the presence of those wonderful fairy tales (or
adaptations of fairy tales) that are integral to the progression of the
story. Some of them may seem familiar at
first, but through each tale lies an undercurrent of darkness and fear. I found it wonderful that the author of this
book managed to create the atmosphere of the story through these eerily scary
stories that were supposed to be meant for the enjoyment of children. And then there are scattered throughout the
book little pieces wisdom and clarity that I couldn’t help but
acknowledge. To quote a couple:
“What is the law but a vision of how life should be? Isn’t that what the fairy tale – which was
originally for adults as much as for children – is deeply concerned with? With justice?
What is the phrase every parent hears most often from a child? It’s
not fair.”
“When you fall in love with someone you see them through a palimpsest
of all their former selves. It’s as if
you’ve always known them and always will, as if time itself has collapsed.”
The imagery in the
story is so clear and beguiling. In the
picture book of my mind I saw each leaf, each castle, and every witch’s
hut. I smelled the polluted air of big
cities and the green-brown earth smell of forest floors. The pictures drew out
my empathy for the persona. I felt drawn to Benedick and could very well relate
to his confusion and anger, how lost he is and how I wished he’d be all right
in the end.
The end of the
story came as a surprise. I never
thought things would turn out the way they did; the author of the novel did
well by not really hinting at the twist towards the end. And I felt glad at such an unexpected and
unconventional ending. I thought that
the ending of the story put all the events that happened before into much
clearer perspective. It was
well-executed, to say the least.
I recommend this
book to anyone who would appreciate something that could be quite difficult to
categorize. It’s not really a “drama”,
not really a romance, either. It’s not a
mystery, not horror story, nor a fantasy.
Suffice it to say that it’s a good book that will be appreciated by a
discerning reader who shies away from the mundane and shallow, and appreciates
a tale that stirs the imagination and provokes the contemplation of happiness,
loss, sanity, the inner child, and life.
Life, above all.
