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About the author and blogger ...

Anne Goodwin writes entertaining fiction about identity, mental health and social justice. She has published three novels and a short story collection with Inspired Quill. Her debut, Sugar and Snails, was shortlisted for the Polari First Book Prize. Her new novel, Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home, is rooted in her work as a clinical psychologist in a long-stay psychiatric hospital.

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Three novels about people whose brains work differently

18/7/2017

10 Comments

 
Okay, perhaps not the most elegant title to sum up the common thread between these three debut novels from small and innovative independent publishers. But they’re all, in very different ways, about life with a brain or mind that functions a little differently from average. In the first, we meet an elderly voice hearer on a mission to bring hope to his granddaughter. In the second, a retired teacher with dementia is convinced a former pupil can save him from the persecutory antics of his deceased father. The third takes the reader even further into the realms of fantasy as a teenager with unexplained blackouts is drawn into a world she thought existed only in her dreams.

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The Uncommon Life of Alfred Warner in Six Days by Juliet Conlin

Approaching eighty, and convinced he has only six days left to live, Alfred Warner travels from his English nursing home to spend Christmas in Berlin with the granddaughter he’s never met. But, when Brynja fails to turn up at the Hauptbahnhof as promised, he’s taken in by Julia, a lonely middle-aged teacher whose own father has just died. When they discover that Brynja is in a coma, having fallen – or jumped – from her apartment balcony, Alfred insists on telling Julia his life story so that she can pass it on to his granddaughter when she recovers.
 
His early years in Germany were tragic: both parents dying in an accident when Alfred was six, he was separated from his siblings when the superintendent of the orphanage to which he was destined discovered he was a bit odd. Saved from the lunatic asylum, he pitches up in a much more pleasant Jewish children’s home, although he’s not of the faith. Years later, he makes it to Scotland although not, as originally intended, via the Kindertransport, but as a German prisoner of war. Eventually he settles in Britain, marries and is gainfully employed as a gardener.
 
What makes Alfred Warner’s life uncommon, is less the historic events he witnesses, but as someone who, from early childhood, hears voices of people who are not physically present. Alfred’s experience of the three women who benignly occupy his mind, supporting and guiding him through decisions, large and small, is contrasted with the experience of his granddaughter, who also hears voices, but of a persecutory nature.
 
If you read my previous post on the unconscious, dreams and hallucinations in fiction, you’ll probably realise that it was this that attracted me to Juliet Conlin’s second novel. Although normally averse to postmodern textual devices, I really enjoyed how the strangeness of Alfred’s first encounter with his “voice women” is shown through the arrangement of the text on the page.

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But my professional experience of working with people disturbed by auditory hallucinations does not make me a typical reader. While it’s commendable that the author has shown, through this novel, that people do hear voices without needing intervention from psychiatric services, I’d have liked more depth and more variation in Alfred’s relationship with his. After his mother, who also hears voices, explains their origins in Icelandic mythology, he shows little curiosity about their contribution to his life.
 
The Uncommon Life of Alfred Warner in Six Days has also provided another
fictional therapist for my collection in a short scene when Brynja is dismally failed by a woman who starts the session by telling her to remove her shoes in order not to dirty the carpet. Unfortunately for Brynja, her therapist lacks the necessary patience for forming an alliance with an adolescent, or any hard to reach client, telling her, “If you don’t cooperate, there’s no point in you being here, is there. Then you’re wasting both our time.” (p279).
 
Despite the complex structure (three point of view characters, with one going backwards in time), the novel is a comfortable read if, at over 400 pages, rather long. Thanks to Black and White Publishing for my review copy; my first from this publisher but probably not my last.

The Giddy Career of Mr Gadd (Deceased) by Marie Gameson

Thirty-one-year-old Winifred Rigby is a Buddhist convert and translator into English from Chinese. Intruded upon in her London flat by her mother and bad-tempered sister, Winnie longs to return to Taiwan where she felt much more herself. Meanwhile, she strives to stay mindful through meditation, emptying her head of the “damp socks” of memory and a succession of post-it notes urging her to (among other things) eat a banana, drink water and use the toilet before leaving the house.
 
When she meets Fred Fallowfield, her former history teacher now suffering from dementia, he’s convinced that a story she wrote at school, “The Giddy Career of Mr Gadd (Deceased)”, contains the key to resolving the chaos in his own life, which he attributes to the unsettled ghost of his father. Although she has no memory of her teenage years, Winnie readily accepts the challenge of researching Chinese ancestor worship and funeral customs, a subject in which she already takes more than a passing interest. Around the same time she bumps into a former boyfriend and his partner, Karen
a psychotherapist, and readily agrees to see them separately for sex without strings.
 
I wasn’t sure how to take this novel initially. There’s certainly humour in the chaos underlying Winnie’s surface serenity, and I definitely enjoyed the playful take on mindfulness and its current popularity in the West. Perhaps because I identified too much with Winnie’s absorption in the moment (although, unlike her, I don’t forget to eat), it took me a while to find the heart of this story in what the narrator isn’t telling us about herself. When I did, it was immensely satisfying.
 
After
The Clocks in This House, and, of course, as the publishers of Alison Moore, Salt (who provided my review copy) is becoming my go-to publisher for original, ambitious yet accessible fiction that defies classification. Although I’m not sure Marie Gameson manages to connect all the dots she’s laid out in her debut novel, her perspective on memory, difference, death and the enigma of identity, in conjunction with her expertise as a storyteller makes The Giddy Career of Mr Gadd (Deceased) an extremely worthwhile read.
 
For my own perspective on forgotten schooldays, see my short story,
Kinky Norm.

Pseudotooth by Verity Holloway

When doctors (in both mental and physical specialties) are unable to explain seventeen-year-old Aisling’s blackouts, they prescribe a period of rest. For her mother, it’s an opportunity to dump her on Aisling’s paternal great-aunt in Suffolk and spend time with her dodgy boyfriend. As both the aged aunt and the vicarage she’s inhabited since childhood are equally cold and creepy, it doesn’t bode well for Aisling’s mental health. Seeking solace in the work of William Blake, and filling her journal with the story of feral Londoner Feodor, with teacups of whiskey dispensed by the aunt’s disabled brother, things get even stranger when she discovers a Tudor priest hole with writings from the past. Her world seems to brighten when she meets the enigmatic Chase turning cartwheels in the garden. After another seizure she revives in a secluded place that seems like paradise, a refuge from what seems to be a mediaeval dictatorship, where anyone different risks being put to death. But what’s the relationship between this place and the contemporary England she’s left behind? How much is fantasy, fiction or hallucination and has Aisling, as she asks herself, gone mad? How will she return to the familiar world? Does she even want to?
 
Mostly because it’s so unlike my usual reading, I did struggle to follow Aisling’s journey the further she ventured from her home. But Verity Holloway’s writing is strong enough to carry along a realist like me and ensure I enjoyed the ride. With, to quote the blurb, themes of “trauma, social difference and our conflicting desires for purity and acceptance, asking questions about those who society shuns, and why”, I think it might appeal particularly to readers of YA. And William Blake. (Although I’m far from a knowledgeable about either.) Thanks to Unsung stories for my review copy.

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I finished reading this novel just in time to link my review to a new 99-word story based on this week’s Carrot Ranch prompt. See what you think of my take on an unexpected landing.


Post-seizure

Like stepping back from a pointillist painting: distance gives sensation shape. On a scale of one to ten  not the worst I’ve suffered: I might have wet myself but I’m uninjured, and I’ve come round in my own bed. The room whirls, but only slightly, as I get to my feet.
 
On the landing, my vision blurs again, the carpet a kaleidoscope of colour. Brushing the wall for balance, I stagger towards the bathroom and a reviving shower. Ouch! My shoulder dislodges a framed photo. That’s not my family staring out of the picture. This isn’t my house.

Thanks for reading. I'd love to know what you think. If you've enjoyed this post, you might like to sign up via the sidebar for regular email updates and/or my quarterly Newsletter.
10 Comments
Deborah Lee link
18/7/2017 02:39:33 pm

This unexpected landing gets more disturbing the further we go into it!

Reply
Annecdotist
19/7/2017 05:13:56 pm

That's what I'd hoped, Deborah :-)

Reply
Derbhile Dromey link
19/7/2017 08:51:52 am

Demonstrates that people are hard to categorise, and that the brain is one of life's most compelling mysteries.

Reply
Annecdotist
19/7/2017 05:13:05 pm

Indeed, but we do like to try and categorise, don’t we? Which can then stop us from seeing the genuine differences.

Reply
Charli Mills
20/7/2017 05:40:35 am

You are a brave reader, giving books or new publishers a go to chase down a point of interest. Seems you fared well, and Salt is gaining your respect for its quality of unique books. I feel plugged into whats evolving in literature, vicariously reading through your reviews. And I've read a fair number of these books, too, after discovering them here.

What a disorienting flash and a story that can go down different genre paths upon explanation of why the seizures, how the different house, when does he actually come to. I like the depth you give the unexpected landing.

Reply
Annecdotist
20/7/2017 06:56:29 pm

Actually, being with a very small publishing myself, I feel I ought to support the independence in my reviews. And they do publish some of the quirkier stuff that’s less easy to categorise. I haven’t enjoyed everything I read from Salt, but so are extremely impressive. And I’m so glad that you’ve picked up some quirky reads yourself from finding them on my blog.
Glad the flash worked for you and thanks for the prompt. It actually took me a few days to get an idea I wanted to write about, so of course the book helped.

Reply
Norah Colvin link
20/7/2017 11:58:23 am

Hmm. Interesting way of linking the books, Anne. I'm surprised at your enjoyment of Alfred Warner. Obviously I'm a bit quick to pass judgement. I immediately didn't like what seemed like an artificial device for Alfred to tell his story. Maybe it is less annoying in the book than I think it would be. Likewise, Mr Gadd's story seems to be rather complex, but you identify it also as a good read. The cover and title of Pseudotooth put me off immediately, so I wouldn't have even picked it up. I have to agree with Charli, you're a brave reader!
And writer. What a flash! Not a nice experience, and one I wouldn't want to land in.

Reply
Annecdotist
20/7/2017 06:51:48 pm

Mmm, I do agree that Alfred Warner could have been shorter and more straightforward without having to tell his story to Julia, who is a central character yet we don’t know enough about her, but I found it an entertaining read. Nevertheless, I chose this for my book group where people were genuinely underwhelmed. I think the thing about Mr Gadd is that my review underplays what most liked about it because it might constitute a spoiler. But that was actually the favourite of the three. And as for Pseudotooth, it doesn’t indeed look like my kind of book from the cover – and probably wasn’t really as it turned out, although I did enjoy it – but I was intrigued that it was about the experience of blackouts. I’m not sure if I’m a brave reader or a foolhardy one, but I suppose I like to open myself up to diversity, as long as it’s well written.
Glad you thought the flash captured the experience successfully.

Reply
Norah Colvin link
25/7/2017 12:33:14 pm

I like to read a diversity of books too. That's what's missing from my audit (from another of your posts). I spend too much time reading blogs and not enough reading lengthy works!

Annecdotist
25/7/2017 05:47:55 pm

Blogs are great but I only read screen in the daytime. That’s how I manage to make some much time for novels.




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