Wednesday, January 22, 2014

The Memory of Love by Linda Olsson

The Memory of Love by Linda Olsson
Published February 2013 by Viking Penguin
Source: my copy courtesy of the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Publisher's Summary: 
Marion Flint, in her early fifties, has spent fifteen years living a quiet life on the rugged coast of New Zealand, a life that allows the door to her past to remain firmly shut. But a chance meeting with a young boy, Ika, and her desire to help him force Marion to open the Pandora’s box of her memory. Seized by a sudden urgency to make sense of her past, she examines each image one-by-one: her grandfather, her mother, her brother, her lover. Perhaps if she can create order from the chaos, her memories will be easier to carry. Perhaps she’ll be able to find forgiveness for the little girl that was her. For the young woman she had been. For the people she left behind.


My Thoughts:
After reading so many rave reviews of Olsson's Astrid and Veronika, when I was offered this book, I was anxious to see what it was about Olsson's writing that appealed to so many people.

Here Olsson blends three time periods of Marion's life - a sad, difficult childhood in Sweden; an aborted chance at love in her thirties; and, finally, life as a fifty-year-old retired physician who has spend the past fifteen years hiding from other people and her own emotions in New Zealand until a young boy who needs help comes into her life.

It was a slow start for me, moving back and forth in time, shifting from first-person to third-person narratives. The more I got to know young Marion (Marianne), the more I came to understand why middle-aged Marion was so fragile and guarded and the more I came to care what happened to her. In helping Ika and in uncovering his horrible past, Marion is finally able to allow herself to slowly let her memories return so that she can, at last, deal with her own pain. These two damaged souls allow each other to slowly, quietly heal in a place where the environment allows them the solitude and peace they need.

There is much about Olsson's writing that is poetic, particularly when she writes about life on the beach. But there is also a tension that starts building, pulling the reader through the book, until all three of the stories come to their climaxes. As much as this story is about love, in its many forms, it is also filled with subject matter that is difficult to read including some that still leaves me wondering about my feelings about this book.

5 comments:

  1. I don't have much luck with books that flip back and forth in time. I tend to lose my patience unless it's done really, really well. The setting is interesting though. I have a thing for Sweden and a childhood in Sweden would be interesting.

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  2. I like the sound of this one, and just from the description can understand your final thoughts on this, and the lingering questions you have. It sounds as if it would be that type of book. I haven't read anything by this author before, but I think I'll check her out.

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  3. Lisa, this book is so much better than Astrid and Veronika. I enjoyed them both but Astrid is a slow, dark story about eldercare, rural life, winter, two neighbors (we read it for the Omaha book club).

    Both books will grow on you. I enjoyed this one, one of the stronger books I read last year.

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  4. Those are the great books, though, right? The ones that leave you mulling it over for a bit. I'll have to check it out once I can handle a more tragic type book ;)

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  5. I absolutely loved the book even though the tough subject matter made my heart break. Olsson's writing is some of my favorite out there and I would definitely recommend reading her earlier two novels (Astrid & Veronika and Sonata for Miriam).

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