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A review by theurban_reader
Talland House by Maggie Humm
3.0
Talland House takes inspiration from Virginia Woolf's, To the Lighthouse. You will also be surprised to know that Talland House is also where Woolf spent 13 summers with her family.
Centering on Lily Briscoe’s coming-of-age and offering a plausible resolution to one of the twenty-first century’s greatest literary mysteries - the sudden death of Mrs. Ramsay - Talland House partly follows the time structure of Woolf’s novel, but weaves into this frame a prequel, and many fictions of Woolf’s life including her family, the artists and friends she knew, and Lily’s fictionalized life and career outside of the novel.
The book was a beautiful description of the town of St. Ives and the life of the protagonist Lily. The entire story revolved around Lily, Mrs, Ramsay and of course the Talland House. It's a very slow paced book going back and forth between the present day life of Lily and the of her time before and during the first World War.
Many a times you may almost feel like Lily thinks too much but I feel that is an apt depiction of her artistic mind. The character development of Lily is also appropriate to a time when women in the western world were trying to become independent beings.
The book will take you through her journey as a student in Paris, to a student in St. Ives where she first meets Mrs. Ramsay, to journey of coming back to Talland House as an artist, as a suffragette, as a nurse during World War 2 and finally having her artwork being displayed at the Royal Art Gallery being almost lost and clueless through it all.
The story carries with itself the mystery of Mrs. Ramsay's death and Lily's determination to complete her portrait as well as figure out the reason behind he sudden untimely death which gives you something to look forward to. If you have an interest in art, you'll also be in awe of the artistic descriptions in the book because I sure was.
I rate the book 3.5 bookmarks out of 5 because of the slow pacing of the book, of course the book has instigated and even inspired me to look into more of Virginia Woolf's works, but this title itself could've been slightly fast paced as some details felt unnecessary.
Centering on Lily Briscoe’s coming-of-age and offering a plausible resolution to one of the twenty-first century’s greatest literary mysteries - the sudden death of Mrs. Ramsay - Talland House partly follows the time structure of Woolf’s novel, but weaves into this frame a prequel, and many fictions of Woolf’s life including her family, the artists and friends she knew, and Lily’s fictionalized life and career outside of the novel.
The book was a beautiful description of the town of St. Ives and the life of the protagonist Lily. The entire story revolved around Lily, Mrs, Ramsay and of course the Talland House. It's a very slow paced book going back and forth between the present day life of Lily and the of her time before and during the first World War.
Many a times you may almost feel like Lily thinks too much but I feel that is an apt depiction of her artistic mind. The character development of Lily is also appropriate to a time when women in the western world were trying to become independent beings.
The book will take you through her journey as a student in Paris, to a student in St. Ives where she first meets Mrs. Ramsay, to journey of coming back to Talland House as an artist, as a suffragette, as a nurse during World War 2 and finally having her artwork being displayed at the Royal Art Gallery being almost lost and clueless through it all.
The story carries with itself the mystery of Mrs. Ramsay's death and Lily's determination to complete her portrait as well as figure out the reason behind he sudden untimely death which gives you something to look forward to. If you have an interest in art, you'll also be in awe of the artistic descriptions in the book because I sure was.
I rate the book 3.5 bookmarks out of 5 because of the slow pacing of the book, of course the book has instigated and even inspired me to look into more of Virginia Woolf's works, but this title itself could've been slightly fast paced as some details felt unnecessary.