Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor ISBN: 0-14-200331-X Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 26 August, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.66 (38 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: ONE OF HIS BEST WORKS
Comment: It saddens me to see another reviewer call THE STORY OF LUCY GAULT a 'failure' for William Trevor - I think it's one of his most beautiful, satisfying works. There is a gentle, patient quality to Trevor's writing - it seeps into the mind, heart and soul of the reader, emerging into a fullness that envelops and surrounds. The reader experiences the story as if surrounded by it. As in most of his other works, there are no frantic action sequences here - the pace is almost languid, but it is never uninvolving. I liked the comment by another reviewer that this novel is really an epic poem - it certainly has the language of that form, as well as the sense of the eternal about it.
In the story, we follow the life of Lucy Gault from her childhood through most of the rest of her life. At the outset of the book (in the 1920s), she lives with her parents in relative privilege and security on an estate in the Irish countryside. They are good people - but resented by those in the growing Irish independence movement for their English ties, and the fact that Lucy's father served in the English army. After a frightening incident in which arsonists attempt to burn down the Gaults' home with the family inside, the parents come to the painful decision that it would be best for them to close up the house and move to England until the 'troubles' blow over. Lucy, being a nine year-old girl, is not consulted in this decision, and resents it greatly - and on the eve of the family's planned departure, she decides to run away and seek out the family's recently-dismissed maid as a refuge, thinking that the time it takes them to find her will give them the opportunity to change their mind about the move.
The nearby village is very dependent on the sea for much of its income - and knows first-hand and all too well that the sea is an unforgiving and powerful partner. The sight of women keening on the strand over husbands who have not returned from a stormy night is not an uncommon one. When Lucy disappears, and a couple of articles of her clothing (actually lost by her on earlier trips to the shore) are found in the subsequent search, the family and the village assumes that she has been taken by the sea, that she is dead. Plunged into grief over the loss of their only child, her parents accept their assumption as fact and determine that the only thing for them to do is to leave the country. They set out on a pilgrimage of healing and mourning that takes them through several countries in pre-WWII Europe, settling at last in Italy.
After Lucy's survival comes to light back in the village, repeated attempts are made to contact the parents - none of which meet with success. She is taken in by the old couple who have been assigned the task of caretakers for the estate in the absence of the Gaults, and she grows into an adult under their care. They love her dearly, and are wonderful surrogate parents to her.
I'll leave off describing any more of the plot here - I'll allow the reader to experience that firsthand.
The beauty of this book - as with all of Trevor's works - lies in his language and pace. Being of Irish descent himself, he has a loving first-hand knowledge of the Irish people. The characters depicted in the novel are not the crass stereotypes found in too many places - neither are they overly romanticized. They come across as simple, honest people - uneducated and unexposed to the world at large, perhaps - who try their best to live their lives to the fullest in the surroundings to which they were born. Their values are never preached - they are lived, which makes them all the more honorable. In the capturing of their speech patterns and cadences, Trevor is particularly successful - there are no catchphrases from ridiculous Irish jokes here, just everyday conversations made real by their honesty and simplicity.
It's a joy to read anything that William Trevor produces - and it's a joy to see that his creative powers are as strong as ever. His work is some of the best in 20th century literature - experience it and you'll see that's not an overstatement.
Rating: 5
Summary: A MASTER OF HIS CRAFT AT THE PEAK OF HIS POWERS
Comment: A master of his craft at the peak of his powers, William Trevor continues to pen stories that captivate. His spare prose sparkles, and his limning of the human heart inevitably brings a rush of recognition. Such is surely the case with his latest work, The Story of Lucy Gault.
We first meet Lucy when she is nine-years-old, and living a privileged life in 1920s Ireland. Her father's family home is Lahardane, a spacious estate with orchards, woods to explore, and a beach that she especially loves. Captain Gault, her father, is justifiably proud of his family's domain, but feels forced to leave when there is an arson attempt. They will go to England, he decides, to Lucy's mother's home.
As distressed as he is at the thought of leaving, the Captain tries to convince himself that all will eventually be well, "'Oh, all this will fall into place,' he murmured more than once, confident in his reassurance to himself. Leaving, arriving, the furniture one day settled around them again: time and circumstance would arrange their lives, as in exile so many other lives had been arranged."
If Captain Gault and his wife, Heloise, could come to terms with the family's upheaval, Lucy could not. So desperate was she to keep her family at Lahardane that the day before their planned departure she ran away, hoping this will convince her parents to stay.
Her father remembers the flawed reassurances they had offered Lucy, the promises to return that might not be kept. "Disobedience had been a child's defiance," he mused, "deception the coinage they had offered her themselves."
But rather than forcing her parents to remain, Lucy has unintentionally initiated a dreadful series of events, years of loss and recrimination. Upon finding the girl's summer vest snagged on a rock by the shore it is believed that Lucy has drowned herself rather than leave her beloved Lahardane.
Grieved and bereft her parents move on to travel from place to place throughout the world, always seeking the solace of a new beginning, forgetfulness in an unfamiliar place.
Unbeknownst to them Lucy has survived and is taken in by trusted servants, Henry and Bridget, who have no idea how to contact the Gaults. Lucy grows to young womanhood, very much alone until she meets Ralph and falls in love. It is a love that will never be, as Lucy has consigned herself to a life of waiting for her parents' return so that she might be reunited with them and ask their forgiveness.
As young womanhood gives way to middle age Lucy comes into contact with a mentally incompetent man, the same man who had tried to burn her family home so many years ago. In scenes rich with forgiveness she visits him in the home to which he has been assigned.
William Trevor has been called "the greatest living writer of short stories in the English language." Words of praise pale beside his wonderfully lyric prose, as he reveals longings shared by all of us and paints luminous word pictures of Ireland.
Read "The Story of Lucy Gault" for pure pleasure; keep it as a treasure of English literature.
- Gail Cooke
Rating: 3
Summary: Even and Dreamy
Comment: For some reason, the review of this book in the New York Times put me in a real frenzy to read it. I think because it reminded me of Atonement by Ian McEwan, a book from 2002 that I really loved. Although I have read and enjoyed many of Trevor's short stories, I just couldn't get into this book. It was too even. There is a dramatic event at the center of this story but it is too buried by the passage of time to be a driving force.
 |
Title: Middlesex : A Novel by Jeffrey Eugenides ISBN: 0312422156 Publisher: Picador USA Pub. Date: 16 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
 |
Title: Unless : A Novel by Carol Shields ISBN: 0007154615 Publisher: Fourth Estate Pub. Date: 29 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
 |
Title: Family Matters by ROHINTON MISTRY ISBN: 037570342X Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 18 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
 |
Title: The Piano Tuner : A Novel by DANIEL MASON ISBN: 1400030382 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 19 August, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
 |
Title: Brick Lane: A Novel by Monica Ali ISBN: 0743243307 Publisher: Scribner Pub. Date: 09 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
Thank you for visiting www.AnyBook4Less.com and enjoy your savings!
Copyright� 2001-2021 Send your comments
