There were eight of us at our meeting on Tuesday 18th October when we considered “The Heat of the Day” by Elizabeth Bowen. Our reaction to the book was probably best summed up by Barbara’s choice of three words, “a curate’s egg”. Other three word responses to the book were:
- Slow Motion Story
- Annoyingly Tortured Syntax
- Incredibly Class Conscious
- Claustrophobic, Long-winded
- Over complicated
- Challenging Intriguing Exasperating
- Atmospheric Convoluted Plotless
- Atmospheric, Muddled Characters
- Needs an Editor
Some of us really liked the opening chapter, others hated it and wondered when the real story would begin. We thought the descriptions of wartime London were very evocative. Most of us were exasperated by the long disquisitions on what the characters were thinking, why they were thinking it, what they thought other people were thinking, why they thought other people were thinking what they were thinking, and what they thought about what other people were thinking about what they, themselves were thinking. Without these sections we thought the book had the makings of a cracking short story!
We wondered whether the book was a halfway house between stream of consciousness and modernism; whether it was actually a thriller, or a ghost story.
Ultimately we enjoyed an interesting discussion and were grateful to Karen choosing a book we probably not have otherwise chosen to read.
There’s a comments section below. You know what to do.
Harbury Village Library & Biblios Cafe 