The Offing

the sense of observation and connection transported into this piece of literature is mind-blowing. A must read for those who still search for a start and an ending of the process of becoming. ...weiterlesen

If you feel like reading an excellent feel-good novel that will enchant you all the way, try this one. It keeps all the promises that come with reading. It’s simply about life. It takes you to a truly wonderful place on the British coast up north. Here you will find the soul of all time. You will dream by another's hand. The magic of this book begins its slow workings and soon becomes extremely powerful. Be happily seduced. One of the main characters of this novel is Literature itself. Other main characters are landscape, nature, the sea: “I looked out across the water as it rose in gentle berms and then curled and rose and broke in waves of hissing white spume, shifting the shale beneath in a hypnotic percussive rattle of stone on stone.” Everything is magical: the story and history, the lovable characters, the beautiful language, a perfect setting and atmosphere. It’s about hopes and dreams that against all odds might become true after all. It’s about honest, sincere friendship. It’s about what's really important in life, since "after all there are only a few things truly worth fighting for: freedom, of course, and all that it brings with it. Poetry, perhaps, and a good glass of wine. A nice meal. Nature. Love, if you’re lucky. And that's about it." It's stock-full of wisdom, mostly presented by the jocular and quick-witted Dulcie, a classic grande dame of literature, in her tiny cottage. And it's about all the goodness of simple food. What is the best thing about being at the receiving end of generosity? That one day you may bestow it on someone else with all your heart. By the time you reach “the poetry”, after small encounters with memories of Noël Coward and John Clare, “White Horses” may even drive tears. But Dulcie will still remain a guarantee for humour: “Bless the Germans. They have a word for everything and when they don’t they craft a bastard hybrid on the spot. Many the mangled word has been grafted to another, Dr Frankenstein-like, and then reanimated into existence.” "It is a reminder that permanence is an impossibility. All is flux. And nature always wins." But there is a trick to stall flux to some extent at least, and it’s called storytelling. The summer narrated here will last forever. "Let's cock a snook at time, for time is just another set of self-imposed arbitrary boundaries designed to capture and control. Let today run forever…" This novel is just superb. It deserves the same sucess as J.L. Carr's "A Month in the Country". ...weiterlesen