Running
out of reading material while on vacation (at least of the cheerful variety – I
couldn’t face another depressing book….),
I picked this paperback up at the Grand Rapids MN library’s book sale at “Tall
Timber Days.” I had never read anything
by her and she had just recently died. I
was taken by her self-depreciating assessment as quoted in the obituary, “I’m
mainly an airport author, and if you’re trying to take your mind off the
journey, you’re not going to read ‘King Lear,’ ” she told The Irish Times
in 2000. “I’ve seen a lot of people buy my books and then fall asleep on the plane
soon afterwards.” Although I found the
first 150 or so pages of the book a bit saccharine and slow, I soon was caught
up in her storytelling and the tale of an Irish-American businessman coming
back to Mountfern, Ireland, the town that his drunken ne'er-do-well father was
forced to leave, to buy up and restore the burnt out remains of the mansion belonging
to the town’s gentry. His dream of
opening it as a fine hotel has unintended, and sometimes tragic, consequences
for the rural townsfolk. I will consider
her work for future plane trips! 662 pp.
No comments:
Post a Comment