By Linda Olsson, Ngaio Marsh & Stella Duffy, Vincent O’Sullivan and Libby Page.
An affirming tale of tension between two sisters staying on the Catalan coast.
Ilike Linda Olsson’s fiction. I admire the respectful domesticity of her plots, her careful writing, her close attention to and affection for characters. You’re waiting for the “but …”, aren’t you? It ain’t coming. Jane Austen wrote to her niece Anna, an aspiring writer, that “three or four families in a country village is the very thing to work on”. A Sister in My House is more modest still: two half-siblings during six days in Cadaqués, a Spanish seaside town.
Ethereal, elegant, vulnerable, beautiful Emma comes to stay with Maria, the narrator, who supplies the accommodation and all those adjectives. Both are fortyish, their “flesh in a process of slow redistribution”. Each, in her own way, is adrift and bereft. Throughout the week, they grate and confide, circle and collide.
Don’t expect a viscera-twisting plot. An impulsive plunge into the sea, a distant death in another body of water, a surgical revelation are as lurid as things get. Small measures of time pass, quietly, privately. “We nodded. And we smiled. But our thoughts we kept to ourselves.” Parents are (figuratively) exhumed. So are
resentments. It’s piano, not forte.
And it’s always attentive. Olsson, a New Zealand-based Swede, writes both in Swedish and English, and her novels have been translated into more than 10 languages. She is good at the little frictions that warp half a day. Buying croissants without checking brings a flare of irritation; the choice of a red dress makes Maria go all teary-eyed; an invitation to a boat ride means curt replies and hurt faces.
Small events hold major significance: coffee on the terrace, walks through town, chats with the dishy neighbour are all loaded with tension. They’re loaded with precise observation as well; shrubs, paella ingredients and paintings are itemised so precisely that you occasionally feel you’ve dipped into House & Garden.
It’s not a long book, even when the more than 20 pages of puffs and promos are included. I should mention that it’s already been published and praised in Sweden, where it’s taken off like a Koenigsegg Agera RS. The world’s fastest production car, as you already knew.
I’ll also mention the dialogue. It evokes characters, moods and relationships. That’s good. It’s also extraordinarily formal and measured. Vocabulary and syntax are flawless; exchanges often read like composition exercises. That’s puzzling.
Olsson’s previous novels have been called heartwarming and heartbreaking, which are pretty dreadful labels to slap onto any writer. I’ll call this one affirming. Violins don’t soar, but you may hear a muted grace note. Decent people achieve decent reconciliations with one another and themselves, and
I don’t mean that as faint praise. A SISTER IN MY HOUSE, by Linda Olsson (Penguin NZ, $22)
Time passes, quietly, privately. Parents are (figuratively) exhumed. So are resentments. It’s piano, not forte.