Back
to back coming of age tales -- or is it three in a row before this month? All
teens: Cat’s Table, Brooklyn Tree, Flower Language.! This time the protagonist is not 16, but 60, and
transitioning through male menopause.
Ms.
Simonson opens with the portrait of a stodgy old fuddy-duddy, an iconic English
“Major”; then the author proceeds to awaken his feminine side, transforming the
Major into an emotional, feeling, caring, amorous, and waltzing multi-cultural
hero after the application of several doses of estrogen.
This
story was pleasant to read because it had a nice balance of plot, narrative,
and description. We, as a group, have
complained recently that this sort of balance was missing from our library
selections. For me, having lived the
better part of a decade in England, there were many reminders of small town English
life.
There
were a great number of quotable bon mots, mostly voiced by the Major, and most
of which I will leave to others to cite, but two that tickled my
English-trained funny bone were: [p.175] in response to “where would we be if
we were honest”, the Major retorts, “On a dry spit of land known as the moral
high ground”; and [p.203] in response to “I’m in love with an unsuitable
woman!” the Major retorts, “Is there really any other kind?”. Simonson has provided us with a read that is
a level up from our recent undertakings: more balanced, more urbane, much more
broadly-based in scope.
If
there is any fault with this otherwise good book, it lies in gender
characterization. And while yes, I feel
the gender portrayals are “spot on” for women; they are a bit off the mark for
men. In “American” argot, she doesn’t
get men. It’s a book written by a middle-aged
woman, for other middle-aged women. The
Major’s transformation: philosophically, physically, metaphysically, and
culturally takes amazingly little time.
The men are all
single-layer stereotypes. This starts
with the Major, who “hates women drivers.”
He is a rock-solid, confirmed bachelor at the onset of this story: golf
once a week with his friend Alec (a name only, never developed); periodic
telephone updates from his son, Roger [who is the epitome of a self-centered
child who think that elders aren’t capable any longer of self-care]; and
passing relationships with the local Vicar and other golf club buddies.
Additional men are
added as the plot develops: the fundamentalist kid, Abdul Wahid; the Major’s
freshly deceased brother Bertie; Mrs. Ali’s deceased husband (Ahmed: a nice guy
we are assured); Colonel Peterson (not quite yet dead); Mrs. Ali’s deceased
husband’s brother Dawid (a fundamentalist sympathizer at least when it comes to
misogynist views on women).
Now with the women, we’ve got a large, yellow,
sweet 2-pound onion to be carefully peeled, layer by layer, throughout the
story. Mrs. Ali is real; so is Grace, so
is Sandy. We empathize with dancing Amina;
despise the old crone, Mummi. We don’t
really like Bertie’s wife Marjorie, nor Sadie Khan but we do root for Alice B
Toklas, along with the women’s club ladies: Alma and Daisy, the Vicar’s wife.
There is no moral – other than, the rich get richer
and
the poor get to have love and babies
