IN SHORT
Sydney Morning Herald
Saturday November 21, 2009
Gregory Maguire has made his name and created his niche with the contemporary rewriting of classic fairy tales and fables. He is the author of Wicked, originally a novel and now a hit musical, which is a quirky re-reading of The Wizard of Oz.Matchless is a similar exercise: it takes Hans Christian Andersen's sad story, The Little Match Girl, and frames it with a parallel plot that takes the emphasis off heavenly rewards and moves it to the communality of humanity and the help and guidance that can be afforded the living by the dead. Obviously the book has been produced for Christmas, as was the original story: Andersen's editor gave him a set of sketches for inspiration, from which he chose the picture of a little girl selling matches.In the tradition of children's books, this text is illuminated on almost every other page by Maguire's own idiosyncratic illustrations, framed by circles that give them the look of coins or snow domes. It's a beautiful book, written to be read aloud.MATCHLESSBy Gregory MaguireWilliam Morrow, 112pp, $32In the small community of Surf City on Topsail Island, North Carolina, young Maggie Lockwood has just been released from prison, where she's served a year for manslaughter after setting a fire for reasons so ridiculous that only a teenage girl in love could have come up with them.This novel explores the various characters' stories, some of which have remained mysterious until now. Small towns are notoriously incestuous but this one goes beyond the bounds of probability; almost everyone turns out to be someone else's biological father or half-sibling and there are old scores to be settled.Diane Chamberlain has been called "the Southern Jodi Picoult" and the plot of this novel, like many of Picoult's, is pure Jerry Springer. But it's one of those books that trouble the boundaries between genres; it may look like a populist family romance but it has been plotted and written using some complex literary devices, such as the several narrating voices, and that has been done with considerable skill.SECRETS SHELEFT BEHINDBy Diane ChamberlainMira, 492pp, $32.99Stock romance heroine Charlotte is both gorgeous and nice, living in London with her well-to-do husband, Ed. But there's a cloud over them: for no reason that the medical profession can discern, they seem unable to have children. Then Ed is arrested and jailed for fraud after an over-optimistic investment and Charlotte flees to her best friend's country cottage, in which she lives, licking her wounds, while she "does it up" on the cheap. Country villages being what they are, Charlotte is swept up into small-town musical chairs as the town's inhabitants arrange and rearrange themselves in various romantic pairings, in between jobs and vocations that are mostly about craft and art.Henry has the sort of narrative sense that can come up with endless permutations of plot and character. She has worked as a writer on the radio serial The Archers and the television series Heartbeat and, in both cases, it shows: this is a frothy but lively story with engaging characters and lots of love interest going in all directions.MARRIAGE ANDOTHER GAMESBy Veronica HenryOrion, 288pp, $32.99
© 2009 Sydney Morning Herald
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