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A review by cheryl1213
The Comet Seekers by Helen Sedgwick
3.0
I must confess to start that I finished this book, provided to me by the publisher is exchange for a review, several weeks ago. Sometimes I think delays (which I admit are quite common these days!) hamper my ability to write a review, other times I think that a delayed review can be far more telling...esp with my very odd memory..and capture the essence of a story more than an immediate write-up could.
This novel has two primary protagonists but also touches down in moments across several centuries. At the simplest level, it is the love story of Francois and Roisin. At another level, it is an ode to comets. At its core, it is about time, about love, about memory, and about the past that is always present in, well, the present. It begins at the end of the story, when Francois and Roisin are (finally, an odd word for a preface but an accurate one) connecting under the Antarctic sky. The reader is then taken back in their lives. Roisin's arc centers on a love of the night sky and a complex relationship with a cousin, a relationship that is intense in youth (intensified by being taboo) and teeters on the edge of soul-matehood but is tested by different destinies and dreams. In Francois's story, the focus is on his tie to his mother who is either insane or possesses a deep, inherited gift that allows her to see deceased relatives whenever a comet passes overhead (it is these predecessors whose stories are told in the chapters dating back much further in time, always tied to the appearance of a comet).
There are moments in this book that feel so very intense. And there are moments that feel desperately disappointing, when the writer falls back on what feels like too-simple tropes (e.g., near-misses in the histories of the two protagonists). There are moments of magic and others that feel forced (including the connection to a famous tapestry and the characters depicted thereon). I did enjoy the lessons about history and science and appreciated the research that went into the book. And overall, and I recognize this is such a wimpy statement, I think I liked it. But, like a comet blazing across the horizon and then disappearing into the dark, it faded very fast.
3.5 stars (and I'll pick 3 when forced to choose). Readers should be looking for love stories that can be more about history than romance, for a heavy dose of magic, for a little bit of science, and for a lot emotion....but also ready to accept a few literary foibles and a story that burns hot at moments and fades near-to-dark at others.
This novel has two primary protagonists but also touches down in moments across several centuries. At the simplest level, it is the love story of Francois and Roisin. At another level, it is an ode to comets. At its core, it is about time, about love, about memory, and about the past that is always present in, well, the present. It begins at the end of the story, when Francois and Roisin are (finally, an odd word for a preface but an accurate one) connecting under the Antarctic sky. The reader is then taken back in their lives. Roisin's arc centers on a love of the night sky and a complex relationship with a cousin, a relationship that is intense in youth (intensified by being taboo) and teeters on the edge of soul-matehood but is tested by different destinies and dreams. In Francois's story, the focus is on his tie to his mother who is either insane or possesses a deep, inherited gift that allows her to see deceased relatives whenever a comet passes overhead (it is these predecessors whose stories are told in the chapters dating back much further in time, always tied to the appearance of a comet).
There are moments in this book that feel so very intense. And there are moments that feel desperately disappointing, when the writer falls back on what feels like too-simple tropes (e.g., near-misses in the histories of the two protagonists). There are moments of magic and others that feel forced (including the connection to a famous tapestry and the characters depicted thereon). I did enjoy the lessons about history and science and appreciated the research that went into the book. And overall, and I recognize this is such a wimpy statement, I think I liked it. But, like a comet blazing across the horizon and then disappearing into the dark, it faded very fast.
3.5 stars (and I'll pick 3 when forced to choose). Readers should be looking for love stories that can be more about history than romance, for a heavy dose of magic, for a little bit of science, and for a lot emotion....but also ready to accept a few literary foibles and a story that burns hot at moments and fades near-to-dark at others.