The Girl From Simon's Bay

Title: The Girl From Simon's Bay
Author: Barbara Mutch
Edition: Allison & Busby, 2017
Setting: South Africa
Genre: Historical Fiction

"Simon’s Town is a vibrant and diverse community in a picturesque part of the Union of South Africa, with a Royal Navy port at the town’s heart. Louise Ahrendts, daughter of a shipbuilder, nurtures the dream of becoming a nurse and in a world of unwritten, unspoken rules about colour, she has the strength to make it a reality. As the port becomes a hub of activity following the outbreak of the Second World War, Louise crosses paths with a man she is determined to be with – despite all the obstacles life and conflict throw in their way. But when a new troubled moment of history dawns, can they find their way back to each other?"  

That blurb would lead you to think that this novel is a romance novel.   While there is a romance element to this story of star-crossed lovers in South Africa during World War II, it's really much more about Louise's attempt to live a better life than the society she lives in allows her.   And that story is far more interesting than the romance, which never really rang true to me (an Earl, really?  He couldn't just be, oh an accountant or teacher or something more ordinary and realistic?).  But Louise's journey from school girl to nurse and her struggle to make more of her life while remaining true to her family, friend Piet, and her community is engaging and well written.  Also well written are author's descriptions of her community and especially of the sea Louise loves, even as a small child:

"Infant waves curled towards me over the crystal sand.  Footsteps thundered from behind.  I reached out both hands to seize the oncoming water with its lace of bubbles and fell forward.  Cold, green liquid gurgled into my mouth, lapped at my forehead and just as it started to trickle into my ears, a pair of familiar hands grabbed me around the middle and pulled me clear."

Those hands belong to her father Solly.  Solly, Louise's mother Sheila, her friend Piet and her neighbors all live in the seaside town of Simon's Bay.  As "coloured" people, they have little money and the most difficult jobs, but they have carved out lives for themselves - quite literally out of the steep hillsides that threaten to slide their homes into the sea on occasion.  Louise, a bright child whose parents support her throughout the story, dreams of bigger opportunities than being a maid.  After many struggles she becomes a nurse in the British naval hospital in the town and that is where she meets the story's love interest.  As I said earlier, this part of the story didn't work as well for me (and I felt very sorry for her friend Piet, a boy who cares for her but has no parental support and nothing in the way of opportunity).  Still, it is a fine story with vivid writing, strong characterization, and without going into spoilers, emotionally stirring scenes, like the one in which Louise's family is forcibly moved: 

"The loaders became, if anything, more frenzied in their unpacking than in the packing.  The police had already abandoned our miserable procession at the limits of Simon's Town, so there was no one to watch or possible temper the loaders' attitude if they'd been open to persuasion.  But it was already late afternoon, and clocking off was upper most in their minds.  Our possessions were hurled off the vehicles with no care at all.  Furniture splintered, bags split, suitcases burst open.  The Gamiels, in the truck alongside, had used up all their anger at the start of the day and worked silently, gathering up the disarrayed possessions as best they could."

I'd read about such things in history books, but this is a case where fiction is better at showing the cruelty and harshness and unfairness.

If you're interested in historical fiction on a subject - and indeed, country - that seldom features in such books, or are looking for a novel with strong characters and some lyrical writing, you'll be glad you read The Girl From Simon's Bay.

Library Loot

This week's haul:
 

Wickwythe Hall, by Judithe Little.   Historical fiction about the home front in WWII Britain?  I'm in.  
















Miss Boston and Miss Hargreaves, by Rachel Malik.  Inspired by the author's family history and filled with beautiful prose.  Review coming.  

Bone Meal for Roses, by Miranda Sherry.  Set in South Africa, a story of love and loss.   














Library Loot is courtesy of the Silly Little Mischief blog

Sacrifice and Survival in the Boer War

Title: The Lost History of Stars

Author: Dave Boling

Edition: Algonquin Books, June, 2017

Setting: Southern Africa, early 1900s

Genre: Historical Fiction

How many of us know much of anything about the Anglo-Boer war of 1899-1902? Before reading this fine novel, I knew that it was fought in what is now South Africa, that it was a war between the British and Afrikaners, and that concentration camps were somehow involved. One of the marvels of good historical fiction is that it can educate and illuminate and bring history to life. The book did just that.

The narrator, Aletta (called “Lettie”) is a young girl from a Boer farming family whose grandfather, father, and older brother have gone to war. The opening of the story is riveting: Lettie describes the raid on their farm by the British forces who brutally destroy everything on the farm and burn their home, threatening Lettie’s young brother Willem with a firing squad to try to get him to tell them where their men have gone. Lettie, Willem, her young sister Cecelia, and her mother are then forced into a concentration camp. The camp is a miserable, unhealthy place. Lack of food, poor sanitation, and overcrowding lead to disease and death (over 20,000 Boer women and children died in these camps).

Lettie survives through stories: by making up stories to tell her little sister, by imagining stories for herself and remembering those told to her by her grandfather, and by reading whatever she can get her hands on, including a copy of David Copperfield, given to her by a British camp guard, Tommy Maples. Maples is a nineteen year old guard who joined the army for adventure. He finds that he hates the war, and is ashamed and miserable guarding women and children in the awful circumstances of the camp. Lettie hides her growing relationship with Maples from her mother, who is steadfastly and violently opposed to anything to do with the British, including family members who have cooperated with them.

Boling explores issues of loyalty, imagination, sacrifice, and cost of survival in this finely written book. His descriptions of both the beauty and harshness of the land, and the misery of the camp are memorable. And while it sounds grim (and it is), the final chapter is a beautiful and hopeful resolution. Highly recommended.