Who says the epistolary novel is dead? Although the letter format is old-fashioned, it absolutely works in this charming story, and I expect we'll see a revival of this eighteenth-century genre in the future. (Please, no emails. Not emails.)
Think of this novel as Reading Lolita in Tehran meets Island at War, seasoned by a healthy dose of 84 Charing Cross Road. The story, co-written by Mary Ann Shaffer and her niece Annie Barrows, takes place in 1946, as feisty thirty-something London author Juliet Ashton is picking up the pieces of her life after World War II. Casting about for a subject for an article which morphs into her next book, she begins to correspond with several members of "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society," an ad hoc book club formed in the Channel Islands during the five long years of German occupation.
As they write to Juliet,the society members reveal both the hilarity and the horror of the war. Juliet decides she can't get the full story unless she travels to Guernsey to interview these survivors, and of course falls in love with the people and the place and stays far longer than she intends. There is a bit of a love triangle between Juliet, a London rake, and a shy but proud Guernsey farmer named Mr. Darcy Dawsey. Sound familiar? But Jane Austen is not the only great writer whose work is honored here: Charles Lamb, Seneca, Oscar Wilde, Marcus Aurelius, Geoffrey Chaucer, the Bronte sisters, and others pop up like old friends. If there is a theme to this story, it's that great books--and good friends--can get you through anything. As one character says, "We clung to books and to our friends; they reminded us that we had another part to us."
Not only did I love this novel; it gave me Reader Rabbit trails to follow for months. It's chock full of enough literary recommendations for other novels, essays, and stories to keep bibliophiles busy. This is precisely what Juliet loves about reading: "...one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that tiny thing will lead you onto another book, and another bit there will lead you onto a third book. It's geometrically progressive--all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment."
Jana, this novel was my favorite read of 2008. After I finished it, I missed the characters for weeks, and hopefully without giving away too much to your readers who haven't savored the novel, I actually mourned the character I never got to meet, feeling as if I'd lost a best friend.
I've included letters and journals in a number of my novels but have never done a full-out epistolary novel. This one made me want to.
Robin
Posted by: Robin Lee Hatcher | April 16, 2009 at 08:51 PM
Robin, I think you should go for it.
Posted by: Jana | April 21, 2009 at 10:02 AM