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Review
"Hypnotic... Curiously beautiful and strikingly original." - "Spectator"
"Rose Tremain writes comedy that can break your heart... Funny, absorbing and quite original. I've read nothing to touch it this year." - "Literary Review"
"Brilliant... . A strong, complex, unsentimental novel." - "TLS"
Daily Telegraph
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Customer Reviews
This is an enchanting story of people in a small village in the south of England trying to make sense of their lives.
It is not a book of tragedy. There is sadness, but there is joy. There is death but there is life. There is hopelessness but there is also the urge to become.
In its depiction of the complex network of relationships, there is probably more real truth about the way people are, than in a thousand psychology texts.
Walter with his dream of becoming a singer and songwriter believing that his dreams can never be fulfilled. Jimmy also nearly becoming trapped in a life not of his choosing. Both breaking out in their own special ways. Edward Harker, with his hat held discreetly in front of his trousers, believing that his feelings, at 61, for Irene are improper. And Irene never realising that a man could find her attractive as a woman.
Sonny, withdrawn inside himself occupied only with the farm that provided the family living. Estelle retreating into fantasy to escape a life of emptiness.
But, most of all, Mary who is really Martin, displaced in the family's cognisance by the arrival of the younger brother, despising him for his scrawny weakness, going through school to adulthood, meanwhile finding her true love and losing it, but growing triumphantly in her, then his, own individual way.
"Sacred Country" is about a young girl, Mary Ward, who, at the age of six, realizes that she should be boy. The book is a chronicle of her life from that point on. I found the detailed descriptions of the odd things that captured Mary's curiosity as a child (and as an adult, in a different way) intriguing. I won't lie, this is a very sad story at times, and is hard to read in some parts because of Mary's loneliness. The loneliness is never stated and packs a harder punch because of it. All in all, this book explained to me in stunning writing, the process of finding all of the right worlds in oneself. And, dealing with them when they don't fit or express into a manageable form to the outside world. It is a coming of age story to the self and to life. I like to read to learn - about happiness, sadness, life - this book delivered in a big way for me.
Something similar could be said of Mary's mother, Estelle, whose lifelong struggle against depression isolates her too in a world that only transiently relates to what actually goes on around her. Mary's father Sonny handles his apartness in a different way - with belligerence and dogmatism, becoming over the years ever more inward-looking and taciturn. Her brother Timmy is another character who doesn't dovetail into school or life; he too seems to be on the outside looking in. In fact, all the characters in this book reflect the intrinsic solitariness that all humans experience at some point, but which perhaps we don't easily recognise in a crowded world. From Mary's Scottish primary school teacher who grew up in a windmill, via the butcher's son who was trapped in his inheritance, to the lovely but naive Pearl (Mary's "precious thing") we see this innate loneliness again and again, the faulty connections that people make with others even in the most intimate of relationships. And yet, it isn't a sad book (though it has some very sad moments). I found Mary's life journey not only very interesting but also quite inspiring; her spirit is indomitable.
There are also lots of side issues interwoven into the story that introduce the reader to all kinds of fascinating and diverse facts: farming, life in the 1950's, protest journalism, country music. And the writer's eye for detail is meticulous. I felt that the drama in the book had a more powerful impact on the reader because it was so understated. A gentle book that doesn't deal with gentle themes, but hopefully leaves its readers with more compassion towards the people they meet every day. There is more to everyone than meets the eye!
I heartily recommend this book to those who enjoy a thoughtful read.
I first read this book many years ago, soon after Rose had amazed me when she was on Desert Island Discs - she sounded so intelligent and interesting... Read more
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