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A review by megansianedwards
The Shipping News by Annie Proulx
3.0
This is one of those books I've heard about for years, seen on numerous "must read" lists, so thought I'd give it a go. The story line revolves around Quoyle, a large, shy man whose waste-of-space wife has just been killed in a car accident, escaping off with her lover, leaving him with their two daughters and an elderly aunt who's come in to mop up the mess. To try and start over, they move to Newfoundland, where the family hails from originally, to the old, tumbledown family home. A journalist by trade/accident, Quoyle gets a job covering the shipping news for the local newspaper, whilst his aunt busily establishes her boat upholstery business. They face hardships whilst settling into the little community that is reliant heavily upon the fishing trade, but eventually find love and happiness.
The story is a common one, told in an uncommon way, with a hero that you never feel is truly a hero, but is constantly weak , allowing everyone in his life to push him around. Proulx writes deliberately in an often disjointed way, with incorrect syntax and words missing from her sentences to convey a brusqueness, no doubt reflective of the need for economies of time in the brutal Newfoundland winter.
Whilst I enjoyed the basic events of this book and even the occasional dry humour, the novel overall did not impress. I didn't enjoy the post-modern style of writing, where you are made to constantly feel aware that you are reading a book through its broken sentence and paragraph structure. Quoyle's children were not charmingly mischievous, just ill-mannered brats who spent most of the book behaving appallingly towards their father. I did enjoy the character of the aunt, but her terrible back story is revealed in passing, with a few words you could almost miss in the middle of the sentence. The aunt also disappears off for a decent portion of the book, removing the one character I looked forward to hearing from.
I can appreciate the skill it no doubt took to write this book and the concept is one that interested me, but my personal taste does not lean to this style of writing.
The story is a common one, told in an uncommon way, with a hero that you never feel is truly a hero, but is constantly weak , allowing everyone in his life to push him around. Proulx writes deliberately in an often disjointed way, with incorrect syntax and words missing from her sentences to convey a brusqueness, no doubt reflective of the need for economies of time in the brutal Newfoundland winter.
Whilst I enjoyed the basic events of this book and even the occasional dry humour, the novel overall did not impress. I didn't enjoy the post-modern style of writing, where you are made to constantly feel aware that you are reading a book through its broken sentence and paragraph structure. Quoyle's children were not charmingly mischievous, just ill-mannered brats who spent most of the book behaving appallingly towards their father. I did enjoy the character of the aunt, but her terrible back story is revealed in passing, with a few words you could almost miss in the middle of the sentence. The aunt also disappears off for a decent portion of the book, removing the one character I looked forward to hearing from.
I can appreciate the skill it no doubt took to write this book and the concept is one that interested me, but my personal taste does not lean to this style of writing.