Rating: 4/5
Review:
Another insightful book from Salley Vickers
The description "family saga" would normally be
enough to send me walking briskly in the opposite direction, but I'll read
anything by the excellent Salley Vickers, and although this is the story of
several generations of a family it's not what would normally be described as a
saga. Much of it was excellent, although
I did have some reservations.
The book opens with the account of 20-year-old Will
suffering a terrible, life-changing fall.
The narrative at this point is by Will's much younger sister (recalling
and writing in adulthood) and at different points we also get narratives by his
grandmother and his aunt. It is hard to
give any idea of the story without giving away far more than I would have
wanted to know before I started. The
book is concerned with relationships within the family from the 1930s to the
present day, with Will's accident as the focus for how they developed and how
the individuals changed. It has Salley
Vickers' usual penetrating but compassionate insight, with plenty of pithy
observations and also some very thoughtful, understanding views of people –
including the difference between how they see themselves and how others see
them.
Each of the voices is excellently done. I found it all very easy and enjoyable to
read and the final section becomes quite gripping as the story comes to a
climax while dealing with difficult moral issues. However, the second section, narrated by the
grandmother, didn't quite seem to fit.
It's concerned with earlier history which, while relevant, I found a bit
of a distraction. I also could have done
with a family tree to keep track of the characters and their locations,
especially as some characters are called different names by different people,
which is very true to life but sometimes hard to keep track of.
At its best (which is most of the time) this is excellent. Salley Vickers is a very fine writer and she
has a genuine, thoughtful insight into how people work. I can recommend Cousins as a very rewarding,
if slightly flawed, read.
(I received an ARC via Netgalley.)
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