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Mary Ann Shaffer
and Annie Barrows
THE GUERNSEY LITERARY AND POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY New York. Dial/Random House. 2008 ISBN-10: 0385340990 ISBN-13: 978-0385340991 Reviewed by Patrick Killough I. for amazon.com Title of this review: "Would I kiss a rat on the lips? Never!" Reviewer's Rating: * * * * In a December 2007 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS to her 2008 novel, THE GUERNSEY LITERARY AND POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY, author Mary Ann Shaffer wrote: " ... I hope these characters and their
story shed light on the sufferings and strength of the people of the
Channel Islands during the German Occupation. I hope, too, that my book
will illuminate my belief that love of art -- be it poetry,
storytelling, painting, sculpture, or music -- enables people to
transcend any barrier man has yet devised."
And indeed 80% and more of the novel's text is focused either on the Channel Island of Guernsey during and shortly after five years of German occupation in World War II or on love of art, especially books. And nicely focused, let me add. Yet Mary Ann Shaffer's greatest strength, it seems to me, lies not in historical narrative or in boosting for art but rather in bringing fictional characters to warm, pulsating three-dimensional life. And she would do that, I suspect, whether writing about London, Guernsey's Saint Peter Port or Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso. I am particularly drawn to one character, a very young orphan girl named Kit. Her unwed mother Elizabeth was English and had come to Guernsey as a young girl herself. Her father was a German army captain, an M.D. who hated war and and hoped to return to his beloved Elizabeth when fighting stopped. But he died during fighting and Elizabeth was later executed at Ravensbruck Prison, because of her kindness to a Polish slave laborer on Guernsey. Little Kit is quite the pixie. At novel's begin she is being raised in rotation by doting members of the Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. Much of the novel involves Kit's winning the heart in 1946 of 30-something spinster novelist Juliet Ashton during her months long visit to liberated Guernsey, a Channel island. Here are excerpts from the letter in which Juliet described her first interaction with Kit to her friend and publisher in London: "Kit had chubby little legs and a stern
face -- dark curls, big grey eyes -- and she did not take to me one
bit. ... Kit sat beside me in the wagon and sent me many
sideways glances. ... She sat across from me at
supper and turned down her spinach ... 'Not for me,' she
said, and I for one would not care to disobey her. ... I must
have passed some test I didn't know I was being given, because Kit
asked me to tuck her into bed. She wanted to hear a story about a
ferret. She liked vermin, did I? Would I kiss a rat
on the lips? I said 'Never' and that apparently won her favor -- I was
plainly a coward, but not a hypocrite. I told her a story and
she presented her cheek an infinitesimal quarter of an inch to be
kissed."
I found this a hard book to put down. I admired a well disguised romantic main plot and subplots treated as a detective writer might introduce red herring clues. And spunky little Kit and the people who loved her. -OOO- http://www.amazon.com/Guernsey-Literary-GUERNSEY-LITERARY-POTATO -LP/dp/B001TK9CYA/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1243946303&sr=1-5 =-=-=-=-=-= II. for epinions.com Title of this review: "The need to be humorous against the odds" by aohcapablanca, Jun 02 '09 In January 1946 30-something English writer Juliet Ashton is embarking on a tour to tout her new book, IZZY BICKERSTAFF GOES TO WAR, a compilation of wartime newspaper columns. Through fictional Izzy, Juliet Ashton had done her patriotic bit for the war effort: helping Britons to smile through their bombed out tears. As she admits to a new friend on the Channel Island of Guernsey: "I did make fun of many war-time
situations ... humor would help to raise London's low morale. ... but the need to be humorous against the
odds is -- thank goodness -- over. I would never make fun of
anyone who loved to read." (10 Feb. 1946 letter to Mrs Amelia
Maugery)
How did this rising young scholar (a pre-war biographer of Ann Bronte) make herself known to the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society? It is quite a yarn and I dare not spoil your fun in finding out for yourself. This is an epistolary (and telegraphic) novel that works. One of its several implicit morals is: write letters and keep your correspondence; for an editor can make both you and them immortal or nearly so! Dozens and dozens of letters tell the whole story. Letters or telegrams to or from Guernsey, England, Scotland, Australia and France. Letters about literature, publishing, and about the at times comic and betimes brutal German five-year occupation of Britain's Channel Islands. Letters about amours, fraternizing with the enemy, and creation of a literary society designed to fool the Germans and keep islander spirits high in wartime. Letters, delightful letters by many writers. Allow me to focus on just one aspect of the novel: the amours of heroine Juliet Ashton. There are so many more obvious other plots and sub-plots that we might almost fail to notice how often Juliet goes in and out of romantic love. She wrote 12th Jan. 1946 to her girlhood friend and boarding school chum Sophie Strachan, nee Stark, now living near Oban, Scotland: "I
swear, Sophie, I think there's something wrong with me. Every man I
meet is intolerable. Perhaps I should set my sights lower." Juliet
then enumerates an early lot of her Romeos, real or hoped for: "the St. Swithin's furnace-man." He
was followed by "the
Year of Poets," swains introduced by Sophie's
older brother, the homosexual publisher Sidney Stark. "Then poor Adrian." "I can't think
of anything lonelier than spending the rest of my life with someone I
can't talk to, or worse, someone I can't be silent with."
Three years earlier Juliet had been one day away from marrying dashing, athletic Lieutenant Rob Dartry, three months before he would go on to meet death in wartime Burma. But she already had her reputation through Izzy Biggerstaff and lived through her collection of books. Love me, love my books! Those books would fill eight cartons when Rob moved his things into her flat -- next day to become their flat. Finding insufficient shelf space for his many sports trophies and mementoes, he simply swept Juliet's books down and packed them for the basement. End of engagement! Next, throughout much of 1946 there came wealthy, ostensibly irresistible American entrepreneur Markham V. Reynolds. Without naming himself, he sent Juliet flowers day after day after day during her book tour in the north of England. Mark had never failed at anything. Weeks after Juliet had settled in a cottage on Guernsey to research a new book, Mark flew in to insist on a plain yes or no to his repeated proposals of marriage. Meanwhile, unbeknownst to him, a little bi-national (English/German) orphan girl named Kit had wrapped herself around Juliet's heart strings. Love me, love my little girl! Kit happened to be staying when Juliet when Mark arrived unannounced. Mark told Juliet to get that brat out of her life and focus on her coming life with him. Juliet's reaction: "Get out." (Letter of 24th July 1946 to Sophie Strachan in Scotland). So who did Juliet propose to (!) and win in the end: her first Channel Islands correspondent, whose letter of 12th Jan., 1946 had begun: "Dear
Miss Ashton, My name is Dawsey Adams, and I live on my farm in St.
Martin's Parish on Guernsey."
Dawsey had accidentally acquired a copy of Charles Lamb's SELECTED ESSAYS OF ELIA which had once belonged to Juliet. Lamb's tale of roast pig made Dawsey laugh, reminding him of just how and why The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society had come to be. As novel develops, Juliet and Dawsey slowly bond through their mutual love of young Kit. The novel's last words, referring to Dawsey Adams, are those of island misanthrope Adelaide Addison to Juliet a couple of days before her wedding: "I
hear you and that pig-farmer are going to regularize your connection.
Praise the Lord."
The novel presents a minimum of historical, geographical and geological background of the Channel Islands. Nor do the nature scenes do much for me. But the people, ah the people! So many. So eccentric. So believable. My personal favorite is little Kit. In their first meeting, Kit asks Juliet to tuck her into bed and tell her a story about ferrets. "She liked vermin. Did I? Would I kiss a
rat on the lips? I said 'Never.' and that apparently won her favor -- I
was plainly a coward, but not a hypocrite. I told her a story and she
presented her cheek an infinitesimal quarter of an inch to be kissed."
(Letter of 22nd May 1946 from Juliet to Sidney Stark).
This novel with a long name is great fun. It succeeds in being both undemanding and unforgettable. -OOO- Pros: Perfect maps locating Channel Islands between England and France. History. Atrocities. Literature. Romance. Three-dimensional characters. Cons: Darn few. We are briefly misdirected toward romance between heroine and her openly homosexual publisher. The Bottom Line: Make time for THE POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY. Follow author Juliet Ashton as she finds love of a man only after wanting to mother an orphan girl. Definitely worth re-reading. Overall Product Rating * * * * * Recommended to a friend: Yes. http://www.epinions.com/review/Book_The_Guernsey_Literary_and_Potato_Peel_Pie _Society_Mary_Ann_Fiery_Shaffer_Annie_Fiery_Barrows/content_472545660548 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- III. biblio This novel is so cleverly constructed that it is easy to miss the fact that at its core it is a tale of romantic love and playing at love. English writer Juliet Ashton is in her early 30s at novel's beginning in January 1946. Three years earlier she had been engaged to marry serving officer Lieutenant Rob Dartry. She broke things off the day before the wedding. Three months later he was killed in Burma. We learn from a letter to her girlhood chum, now her publisher, the reason for the breakup: Rob thought too much of himself. The afternoon before the wedding day, Rob was busily moving his things into her flat. Juliet returned from delivering an installment of her famed Izzy Bickerstaff humorous wartime series to the printer, only to find that Rob had removed and boxed for basement storage all her books. He had replaced them on her shelves with his athletic trophies and memorabilia. End of engagement. Later we are misdirected for a while to think that Juliet might have a crush on ten-years older Sidney Stark, her publisher and mentor; but he is revealed as an unconcealed homosexual, so known to everyone. No romance there. Juliet is then pursued relentlessly by a narcissistic American entrepreneur, Markham V. Reynolds. All he wants is a trophy wife and that Juliet will not be. Meanwhile she has made a new lot of friends on the island of Guernsey off the coast of France. In the end a little half-English, half-German orphan girl wins her maternal heart while taciturn, Charles Lamb-admiring pig farmer Dawsey Adams improbably wins Juliet's erotic side. The book's last words are spoken to Juliet by Guernsey's most priggish female censor of female morals: "I hear you and that pig-farmer are going
to regularize your connection. Praise the Lord!"
Though I personally think the amours of Julie Ashton are what drive the novel, some critics see things differently. And I have written nothing here to spoil those other views of the plot. Beyond 90% of the yarn now remains for you to discover and enjoy for yourself. -OOO- http://www.biblio.com/books/200959972.html =-=-=-=-=- http://www.patrickkillough.com/books/shaffer_guernsey.html file: shaffer_guernsey |