A M Homes - May We Be Forgiven

Don't you love it when you pick up a book, turn to the first page, and know immediately you have found something special? For me, this was one of those books. I was immediately engaged and remained thoroughly engrossed for the rest of the novel.

With May We Be Forgiven, A M Homes has catapulted herself into a top ten position on my favourite authors list. This is a wild, rollicking adventure of a book, tragic but simultaneously hilarious and moving. Jeanette Winterson calls it the great American novel of our time, and it is certainly the best book I've read this year. Which is saying something, as you know.

The book opens on a family Thanksgiving dinner. While his brother George sits at the table, ignorant of the fact that help is needed, Harold ferries plates back and forth to the kitchen to assist George's wife Jane who has prepared all the food. She interrupts him as he picks at the turkey carcass, 'fingers deep in the bird, the hollow body still warm, the best bits of stuffing packed in' to kiss him full on the mouth. It is a kiss that is described as 'serious, wet, and full of desire', and like Helen of Troy's face, it is a kiss that launches a wild ride. The story takes off, galloping through a fatal car accident which leaves behind an orphaned boy, a very brief adulterous relationship, George's mental breakdown and ensuing hospitalisation, and finally a murder.

All in the first 50 odd pages. At which point I quite honestly wondered where Homes could possibly take the story next, what the next 400 odd pages could feasibly hold. But as Salman Rushdie says in his cover quote, this book starts at maximum force - and then it really gets going. The narrative speed does not stop or slow, nor does the story ever become boring. From here we are shuttled through the sometimes dirty, sometimes downright dangerous world of online dating, to the peculiar realm of alternative correctional facilities; from life at a posh American boarding school to village society in rural South Africa; from the world of academia and whispers of forgotten works of fiction by Richard Nixon to attempted car-jackings, inappropriate teacher-student relationships, a missing girl, a wedding in a senior care facility, a stroke, watered down Judaism, lots of Chinese food and the life of modern immigrants to the United States.

Harold is left bereaved, divorced and caring for George's two children, Nate and Ashley. His life has changed irreparably yet he conducts himself with aplomb. In church at the kids' mother's funeral, he brings out some Gummi bears for the kids and finds a mother behind him leaning in to ask 'how do you know about snacks?'. When Ashley calls from school, in tears and upset, Harold finds her mother's Amazon account and orders books to be sent to her. Touching moments like this are what set this book apart, charging it with humour in the midst of horror.

In the middle of the book Harold realises that he has never tried to do anything with his life, to succeed. He has always been satisfied with mediocrity or less: "...it's all coming back like a kind of psychic tidal wave, and there's a bad taste in my mouth, metallic and steely, and I'm feeling how much everyone in my family hated each other, how little we actually cared for or respected anyone but ourselves. I'm feeling how profoundly my family disappointed me and in the end how I retreated, how I became nothing, because that was much less risky than attempting to be something, to be anything in the face of such contempt." He pulls himself out of this mire, and out of the guilt he feels for his part in Jane's death, to create a family around him that is everything his family was not - loving, supportive, close.

Harold's journey is a new-age picaresque of sorts, but without the cynicism David Foster Wallace and John Kennedy Toole lend to the genre. His story is an uplifting tale of self-discovery and redemption, that is simultaneously unsentimental and deeply moving. And Harold himself is a genuinely sympathetic character, someone whose self-doubt is matched only by his warmth and ability to care for other people. He is the most maternal male character I have ever read, naturally taking in both human and animal strays and treating those around him with compassion and empathy.

I laughed outloud so often whilst reading this that Bibliohubby came to refer to it as 'that funny book you're reading'. But my laughter was as often prompted by astonishment as humour. Homes's writing is fresh and unexpected and compelling. I absolutely loved this novel.

Overall Assessment: 5 out of 5. Outstanding. Homes writes beautifully, and her story-telling is top tier. Such an imagination. I now want to go and find everything she's ever written and read it.

Note: This book also won the Women's Prize for Fiction (formerly the Orange Prize) this year, beating works by Zadie Smith, Hilary Mantel and Kate Atkinson. So I am not alone in my stellar assessment of it!

The Future of Books: What of book sightings and signings?

Just over a week ago I posted a quote from a book called Judging a Book By Its Lover, by Lauren Leto. I now feel compelled to share another excerpt from that book, which is really a collection of witticisms and anecdotes about books and reading - from one book lover to others. It's a fun read, and my only true criticism of it is that Leto tends to be rather American-centric in her literary references.

I have written before about paper books ('real' books) versus e-books. Leto gives a compelling argument in favour of paper books that I had not previously thought of:

"There's a reason book lovers are the last ones to hold out in this digital revolution. Music and movie lovers have never had the same pleasure that book lovers have in being able to identify on sight a fellow fan of Tolstoy or Didion. What does the e-reader revolution mean for all of us who get a thrill from noting the book in a stranger's hands?

Music devotees meet other fans at concerts or by recognising concert T-shirts. Movie lovers will wait in line together at midnight for the first peek at the new Tarantino film. Readers, however, have it better; they carry around the objects of their worship and roots of their collective bond everywhere they go."

She goes on to point out that: "...in ten years, print books themselves may be a thing of the past. I fear as digital books become ubiquitous, the tradition of reading may remain as strong but the ability to sight fellow minds will be disintegrated. As book covers slip from hands and are replaced by plastic tablets, readers lose the wonderful, clandestine opportunity to quickly create a mutual understanding with strangers. Then what will we be left with? And what about other print traditions? If bookstores vanish, where will an author's book readings occur? And book signings? What will authors sign?"

Oh, this made me sad.

Most of us books lovers will have a story about seeing someone reading a book we love - on a bus, in an airport, on a plane - and connecting with that person, either entirely in our minds or in reality. I love that sweet moment when one is reading a book in public only to look up and find a complete stranger nearby reading the very same book. Often a smile passes between the two of you, a knowing smile, and to me that connection between strangers is a confirmation of humanity. It makes me warm inside, a feeling I might carry with me for the rest of my day. Other times that coincidence and symbol of similar interests is enough to spawn a conversation. Sometimes, through the haze of severe jetlag, I have enjoyed such a moment, perhaps after seeing someone reading a book by a favourite author, or reading a book I want to read, but have yet to pick up. Frequently, I will ask how my fellow reader is enjoying the book, and a conversation ensues which combats the boredom of a lengthy transit or a long haul flight.

The thought of these chance meetings disappearing fills me with preemptive nostalgia. But worse still: book signings. Author readings.

I have been going to these since my undergraduate days, when writers would come to the English department of the University I attended, and have sought them out ever since. With my mother, I saw Margaret Atwood speak at a theatre in Kingston, Ontario, when she was at her feisty best, and experienced for myself that quick wit and sharp sense of humour. I heard Michael Ondaatje speak in Toronto, alongside Anthony Minguella, soon after the film version of The English Patient was released. They spoke of the process of converting the book into the movie, how Minghella fell in love with the book and tracked down Ondaatje, how they collaborated to make the movie that would win the 1997 Academy Award for Best Picture. I heard another of Canada's great novelists, Timothy Findley, speak before his death in 2002. I attended an intimate bookstore reading by the beautiful Arundhati Roy after which I spoke to her and watched her face fall as I gave what I thought was a compliment:

"I like your style of writing," I said to her.
"I don't have a style," she responded, deadpan. I still remember the sound of her voice as she read from that incredible book, The God of Small Things.

In Sydney I heard the great Jonathan Franzen speak about Freedom, and met his handsome gaze afterwards as he signed my well-worn copy.

In fact I still have the signed copies of all of those books on my shelves. They are my treasured possessions. Someone once told me that they were wary of meeting the writers they loved in case they differed from expectations, in some discomforting way. But I have never worried about that. Writing and reading, when interconnected, become two sides of a rather intimate activity - these people, the writers, have already invited me into the depths of their mind. These are people I already know, in some way. I want to meet these people, more so than actors, who are playing a part when we see them on screen. And I have yet to be disappointed.

The thought of book tours and book signings disappearing along with paper books is just too much to bear. But Leto is right: where would Paul Auster sign his newest e-book for me? How would Salman Rushdie sign an electronic version of Joseph Anton? (even the thought of Joseph Anton in e-book form seems somehow sacrilegious)

So join me, please, and let us rage, rage agains the dying of the light.