The redoubtable Simon Van Booy has performed another small literary miracle. In fact, smallness matters exceptionally in his new novel. Its protagonist – rather, its supporting actor – is a mouse.
“Sipsworth” By Simon Van Booy Godine. 223 pages. $26.
95 WHAT: Writer Simon Van Booy discusses his novel “Sipsworth” with Sarah Braunstein, author of “Bad Animals” WHERE: Back Cove Books, 651 Forest Ave., Portland WHEN: Thursday, 6:30 – 7:30 p.m.
Wait: Don’t turn away! As with all Van Booy’s work, “Sipsworth” gathers you in fast. It is a deep, moving and vibrant saga. While compact in scope, it gets a lot done and (somehow) never comes near its most obvious risk – sentimentality.
The novel’s arc is compressed into two short weeks, told in present tense. Following a sudden, tragic loss (at first unspecified), an 80-something widow, Helen Cartwright, moves from her life in Australia back to the humble English town of her girlhood, as her final act, “now that the business of life had been settled.” Assuming her own end is imminent, Helen prepares for it in calm, calculated ways.
Her world has flattened and bled out – like her spirit. And it’s to Van Booy’s immense powers of empathy and insight that we owe his unflinching clarity about the loneliness of aging: “Just as she had once been singled out for happiness, she was now an object of despair. But .
.. such feelings were simply the conditions of old age.
...
For her as for others, a great storm.
