Dirt Music

Tim Winton fills Dirt Music with severely damaged characters - and I'm not sure I was able enough to like them enough for the novel to work for me.  Georgie Jutland is a natural carer who isn't caring for anyone, including herself, and is on a downard slope to alcoholism and self destruction.  The man in her life is Jim Buckridge, a blokey Western Australian who may never get over the death of his wife.  And, after a one night stand, the other man in her life is the much younger Luther Fox, who should be a soleful musician but who makes a living as an illegal fisherman because he is haunted by violence and loss.  Its not clear how any of these characters can be redeemed, and they certainly try to find redemption and healing through each other.  But plot twists take us into implausible waters and Winton ultimately did not hold my attention.

What did captivate me about this book was Winton's beautiful sense of place - the coasts and interiors of Western Australia.  Perhaps because I spent some time living and traveling in Western Australia, I felt his images were evocative.  I could really picture the light - the harsh mid-day glare, or the golden dusty sunsets permeated nearly all of his scenes. He captured perfectly the essence of small town Western Australian life without relying on stereotypes or characatures, which I really appreciate.  Still, I didn't enjoy it enough to recommend it to anyone I know.

The Story of Lucy Gault

Yet another Booker book with a fantastic set up that fails to deliver.  Lucy is mistakenly, through a series of unfortunately events, abandoned by her parents at the tender age of seven.  Under the impression that she has been downed, her parents abandon their home, flee Ireland, and in their grief do not look back for over 30 years.  But Lucy has not died - she remains in the home waiting hopefully for her parents' surely imminent return.  And the reader waits with Lucy.

 

But as time progresses, it becomes apparent to the reader well before it is understood by Lucy or the small community supporting her that the return of her parents can only be a disappointment.  Lucy is no longer a litter girl but a grown woman, whose choices have left her isolated and outside of the sphere of the living for entirely too long.  No reunion can achieve what either Lucy or her parents secretly wish for - for everything to be made whole. 

 

But because it is primarily a book about waiting, about life slipping by unlived, it is ultimately not a very engaging story.  Perhaps this was William Trevor being too good at achieving what he set out to do.  Sure, Trevor's prose is clear and descriptive, but it was not enough to keep me wanting more.  I was consumed by the isolation and hopelessness, and the sense of wasted life that were the themes of this novel, and no ending could have reinvigorated me enough to induce me to recommend this book very highly  to others.