Vendela Vida's latest novel 'The Lovers' is an unusual and involving examination of marriage and of parenthood and its attendant joys, disappointments and heartaches. The story begins with Yvonne who arrives alone at Datca, in Turkey, a beautiful coastal village where she and her husband, Peter, spent their honeymoon twenty-eight years before. Yvonne is now a widow; her husband was killed in a hit-and-run accident two years previously and Yvonne, who has struggled emotionally since the shock of his sudden death, has come to Dacta in order to try and relive the memories of their early marriage, but also to escape the well-meaning but overbearing sympathy of her friends and colleagues back home.
At first Yvonne feels uneasy in the house she has rented for her stay, especially when she discovers the house is the home of her landlord's mistress who has left evidence of their adventurous sex life lying around in the bedrooms. And then there is her landlord's attractive and unusual wife, Ozlem, who keeps calling in to confide her marital problems and Yvonne begins to find Ozlem's visits both fascinating and intrusive at the same time.
As Yvonne tries to settle in, she finds that although she came to Turkey to relive happier times, more recent memories start to resurface that are far from comforting and she begins to ask herself was her marriage as wonderful as she would like to believe and were her and Peter's parenting skills as good as they should have been. Yvonne soon becomes rather overwhelmed by her memories and so, when she sees a young boy on the beach collecting shells, reminding her of her own children's childhoods, she befriends him and, in his company, starts to enjoy the beautiful scenery and the relaxed pace of life on the Turkish Coast. However, before long her peace is shattered when a tragic accident occurs for which Yvonne feels responsible, and she finds that what had originally been planned as a restorative holiday and a romantic trip into the past, turns into a frantic journey of both physical and mental exploration and discovery.
Vendela Vida writes in a clear, lucid prose with a precise and assured voice and her empathy for her main character is well-balanced and evident. I very much enjoyed this novel which made a refreshing and unusual read and although I have not read any of Vida's previous books, I shall now look forward to doing so with pleasure.
4 Stars.
