The Lacuna [Paperback]

Ten years ago, Barbara Kingsolver's Poisonwood Bible revealed the grim politics in the Congo. The Lacuna has a similarly political theme, this time turning her focus on Mexico and The US in the 1940s and 1950s.

I have to confess that I had to look up "Lacuna" in the dictionary. For the benefit of anyone as dumb as me, then it means a gap or missing piece. The title is apt on a number of levels. The book is told as if written by the fictional young boy and later writer Harrison Shepherd, initially though his diaries and later in newspaper articles and letters all compiled by the equally fictitious VB whose identity and relationship to the narrator are revealed later in the book.

Harrison grows up in Mexico (his flapper mother is divorced from his American father who still lives in "gringolandia". Always drawn to writing his experiences, after briefly attending a school in the US (where some parts of the diary are missing - one example of a Lacuna) he returns to Mexico and encounters the muralists and political activists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo joining their household as a cook and mixer of plaster for Rivera. Harrison forms a connection with Frida (though unlike most of her male connections, Harrison is clearly gay and is more of a confidant to Frida) and through this connection gets to work with the exiled Lev Trotsky.

Later in the book more real life characters are introduced including the hunt for communist sympathisers led by J Edgar Hoover.

Another interpretation of the Lacuna is some of the "missing" history of the US - much of it political history that it would perhaps rather ignore. The first instance is when Harrison is at school and encounters the WWI veterans who camp in Washington DC to protest at being denied their bonus payments, and then onto the blindness to the actions of Trotsky's great adversary Stalin and later onto the communist paranoia that gripped the US. Kingsover brings her talent for political fiction onto both the US and Mexico in ways that are unsettling. While some of the articles quoted as press are indeed fictional, the reader gets a cold chill when they check some of the most scary ones and finds that they are in fact genuine - particularly in the tone taken against the Japanese in the mid 1940s - with not even the poor Japanese Beetle safe from Life magazines xenophobia.

Once or twice the clash between fiction and reality is clunky - Harrison asks Trotsky `so what really happened with Stalin' - but mostly it's a fascinating read and reveals much about the effective birth of the modern (ie post war) American ideal as well as the nature of imperialism in Mexico and the relationship between art and politics.

I loved it and recommend it highly. It's a mark of great credit that the fictional characters are as interesting as the real ones - particularly given the cast of Rivera, Kahlo, Trotsky et al.

Since I read Prodigal Summer, Barbara Kingsolver has been one of my favourite writers, and I was not disappointed with her latest effort. Almost entirely written in diary and letter form, it is a private and intimate look at the life of Harrison Sheperd, a half American, half Mexican writer. Most of it is from his own perspective, starting as a young boy and covering the span of his adult life.

It is remarkable because of how reality meets fiction in the cast of people he spends his young life in Mexico with - Painter Frida Kahlo and the exiled potential successor of Lenin, Leon Trotsky. We are given a privileged view of both character's lives, Frida's affairs and health problems, Trotsky's life in exile, and, ultimately, his assassination. In this, the book is unique and extremely interesting. These historical figures take on colourful personalities and depth, and whilst they might be a little romanticised, it never gets too close to trite for comfort.

One criticism I do have is consistency, as the book reads like two separate stories: Before and after the assassination. Sheperd has to leave Mexico after the assassination and book takes on a much slower pace - the story concerns itself with other matters, like the anti-communist hysteria in North America after WW2, civil liberties and gay rights. The colourful characters and the buzzing atmosphere of Mexico was suddenly replaced with stark loneliness in clinical US suburbia. I found this part of the book much less engaging and far too detailed. This section could easily be 100 pages shorter without detracting from the book, and I admit I struggled to work up the enthusiasm to finish it.

Having said that, it is, without a doubt, a beautifully written book based on some unique ideas and with some important messages. It is painful, warm, clever and witty, and the voice of Harrison Sheperd is mature and filled with emotion. His relationship with his stenographer Violet Brown is touching and sweet, and the character in herself is utterly unique and sometimes hilarious.

This is the only book I have read by Barbara Kingsolver, so I can't compare it with her other work. I can see why she has a high reputation from her command of English, but I think 'The Lacuna' requires more patience than some readers will be prepared to give it. It is one of those 'journey through life' novels which, in general, I find too flaccid, and this at first gave me that impression. From roughly a quarter of the way through, however, the story's focus begins to tighten and its momentum continues through to the end.

One quarter is a long way, however, for a book of more than five hundred pages. I disagree with the reviewer who, in his comment thread, remarks that those who can't finish the book should not post their one-star reviews. Keeping the reader interested is of primary importance. Kingsolver does set up conflict on the first page: a woman leaves her American husband in the hope of a better life with another man, taking her young son with her, and finds herself trapped in a Mexican backwater. After this, however, the story meanders through some largely anecdotal exposition. Littered with moments of wisdom and humour, it sets out the background to the childhood of the son, Harrison Shepherd, who is the central character. Though I stayed with it, at times it was like reading a travelogue by a celebrity chef, although in fairness, no celebrity chef is likely to have this author's way with words.

Shepherd's relationship with Rivera is where the novel becomes interesting and the introduction of Trotsky cements it. Shepherd is presented as a rootless man struggling to establish a home and identity; he is part American, part Mexican, friend to revolutionaries, yet passive in his politics, even those of a sexual nature. In almost everything, he is neither one thing nor the other. Just when it appears he has settled and fulfilled his aims, events beyond his control cause more upheaval.

After the Trotsky episode, the novel is played against the background of the so-called 'McCarthy Witch Hunts' which move into the foreground with their attendant paranoia. Kingsolver's portrayal of how authority corrupts and manipulates public opinion is brilliant.

'The Lacuna' ultimately rewards patience several times over. Were it not for its sluggish start, it would be a classic.