A Biologist's guide to principles and techniques of practical biochemistry Book

In What There Is to Say We Have Said: The Correspondence of Eudora Welty and William Maxwell, Welty and Maxwell mention Elizabeth Bowen quite often, with affection, but also, or so it seemed to me, with amused tolerance as well. Reading between the lines, I got the feeling she could be idiosyncratic, perhaps even difficult, though they both seemed to unconditionally love her.

From the little bit I've read of Bowen, her style seems to reflect the personality I've gleaned. Her syntax is purposely awkward (Yoda-speak, we might call it now), as are her characters and their dialogue. Many times a line needs to be read twice to get at its meaning, though if I rearrange the syntax in my head, it doesn't work as well as what's on the page -- obviously she knew what she was doing. And I certainly don't mind novels that make me 'work.'

In this novel there's the present, then the past (She throws us into the middle of evocative childhood scenes, also not always easy to understand what is going on at first. This section reminded me a bit of The Children of Dynmouth by William Trevor, another Anglo-Irish writer.), then back to the present again, with enough 'mystery' to keep the reader reading.

As the last chapter spools out, I felt an excitement, as I knew all the 'work' would be worth it. Its effectiveness increased as each page was turned, with the last three pages being the loveliest of all.