In these eleven stories Edna O’Brien
presents not so much distinct saints and sinners but rather the more complex
combination of good and bad in most folk. The tales, though varied, can be considered
for review purposes roughly in three groups.
First, inevitably, there are those that deal
with love between women and men in its several guises: doomed from the start in
Black Flowers; lost and regretted in Manhattan Medley; unrequited in Send My Roots
Rain; and betrayed in Cassandra. Narrated by women, the language is lyrical and
the mood melancholic.
Lighter are a couple of wry observational
pieces. In Sinners a landlady takes a dim view of the morals of her latest
paying guests, and in Green Georgette a young girl accompanies her mother to
tea at the house of a lady of high social standing.
Men do take centre stage in two biographical
sketches of working men. Shovel Kings gives an insight to the trials of an
Irish labourer in London; Inner Cowboy follows a naive would-be wide boy in
Ireland. In both their faults and foibles are balanced by their good nature.
But in Plunder the men come out less well as a young girl gives a harrowing
account of the invasion by soldiers of her country, her home and her body. In
these stories the prose is more gritty and the mood both lighter and darker.
As to be expected from a writer of her
reputation, the stories are well written, put together with skill of such a
light touch as to be unobtrusive. They are about relationships, emotions and
mood, and can be admired as such.
My own taste is for a little more to
actually happen: some dilemma or other to torture the protagonists, or some ironic
twist to leave me thinking.
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