Sunday 14 October 2012

The Vanishing Act

A magical, mystical tale for fans of The Night Circus or The Snow Child. Written in the style of a traditional European folk story, The Vanishing Act is narrated by a young girl called Minou who lives on a bleak, isolated island. She is coming to terms with the sudden disappearance of her mother and as she tells her story, we find out more about the events leading up that fateful day.

The story begins with Minou and her father finding the body of a young boy and Minou becomes fascinated with him, telling him her stories of the island. There is a very small cast featured in this book, but they are all interesting characters. Minou and her father share their island with Priest, Boxman and a scarf-wearing dog called No Name. They are Minou's family and her relationships with them all are very interesting.

This is a story full of mystery about Minou's mother as we guess whether she was involved in an accident, or left the island by choice. A perfect, relatively short story to curl up with on a winter's evening...

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

This book has been intriguing me for a long time and I finally received it as a birthday present. The synopsis on the back of the book is quite vague and this book's narrative was a lot more than I thought it would be.

Retired Harold receives a letter out of the blue from a old work colleague who reveals that she is dying from cancer at the opposite end of the country. He quickly writes back and walks off to the post box to send his reply, but he gets into his head that if he keeps on walking from his Devon home towards her, she will keep on living. And so begins his 80 plus day journey, encountering all sorts of people and becoming the centre of a media storm.

As Harold walks, we find out more about his complex relationship with his wife and son, the mistakes he has made throughout his life and how he is trying to atone for them with his walk.

I enjoyed reading about Harold's journey, which is so much more than just covering distance. He has lived quite an isolated existance, not quite understanding the rest of the world and has an element of innocence and misunderstanding which is most evident when he finally reaches his destination. Although it sounds like an old-fashioned style of pilgrimage, the author updates this traditional kind of tale with media interest and social networkingm, which is really effective in showing the contrast between Harold's life and the modern world. This is a warm and poignant read, which is made all the more real with locations that all readers across Britian will recognise. Recommended!