This book
is about memories, about family and about who owns your history. Everybody has
their own version of the things that happened, especially in families. Is an
author allowed to use your memories for their own story and more specifically,
if these are not just your own memories, but the memories of all the people
involved?
Commonwealth starts somewhere in the sixties when Beverly
and Fix have their daughters christening party. Albert Cousins is not invited,
but shows up anyway and at the end of the party he kisses Beverly and this is
the moment when everything changes.
Sometime
later Albert and Beverly live in Virginia with Beverly’s daughters, who long to
be with their dad in LA and Cousins’ children live in LA, but want to be in
Virginia. During the long Summer holidays the children have to look after
themselves and this has some far-reaching consequences.
It is
daughter Frannie who tells this story to a writer she has an affair with and he
turns it into a book and this is the next layer in this beautifully written
story.
I have read
State of wonder by Ann Patchett before and utterly
disliked it, but I wanted to give her another change with this book.
The way the
story moved in time and through time is beautiful. It is done in a very natural
way, like you talk to different people and somewhere in a conversation you get
another little piece of the puzzle. It is not forced, like the author wants to
show her readers how clever she is, but is really flows.
I also
loved how much layers the characters have and how the teenagers grow up into
adults. You do recognize the teenager in the adult, but you can also see how
much they have changed and how they see the things that happened when they were
young in a different light.
The big
dramatic moment was in the end something different than I thought, but that
made it even more painful, since it was something that could have happened to
anyone.
I bought
this book in Bologna because I had already read the books I brought with me,
and I finished it in 1 ½ days. I think Commonwealth
will end up in my top 5 of this year.
Published
in 2016
I didn't like State of Wonder either! Good to know that this one is better. :)
ReplyDeleteYes, it really was a lot better than the previous one (and I am glad to know I was not the only one who disliked State of wonder!). I think you will like Commonwealth as well!
DeleteKind regards,