EATING THE ELEPHANT by ALICE WELLS

 EATING THE ELEPHANT

by

ALICE WELLS

THE BLURB:

A shocking and powerful story of a marriage torn apart by lies, bereavement and abuse.

Alice, a dedicated doctor and mother of two children, bravely tells the story of her marriage to a man hiding a terrible secret- one into which he has drawn their 4-year-old daughter, Grace. As the shocking truth about their family life unfolds at a heartstopping pace, Alice struggles to learn how to survive the impact and piece together her shattered world. The devastation of what Alice is forced to face when her life is hit by catastrophic pain, and the trauma of wondering if she overlooked the signs, is laid bare in a way that will stay with you for a long time to come.

How do you eat an elephant, one bite at a time?

THE REALITY:

I chose this from a reduced basket outside a part-new/ part-second-hand shop, for the princely sum of 50p, intrigued by its title and the fact that it's based on truth. I also bought it because a flick through led me to see the word Cairo (Alice and Mark meet there) and the novel I was reading at the time coincidentally featured a stay in Cairo. On opening the pages I found that it was a total memoir, which I believe is written under a pseudonym (and I can see why). The term “eating the elephant” relates to the elephant in the room: something huge which needs to be addressed. It didn't take me much of a read to realise that I was looking at a story about a woman who finds out her husband has been dealing with pornography online, and child porn- paedophilia- at that. Then he goes and smashes his car up and dies, which is believed by all to be an accident (although I'm not so sure about that).

This book clearly had something going for it, as I read it in a day but... After finding out what the story was about (and the fact that it's true makes it a million times worse) I felt soiled by the content, and didn't want it in my hands any longer than was necessary. Again, I sped through the content (but not so much that I didn't understand what was going on) but felt compelled to read it rather than put it down, and I think that's because this is something that we all need to know about- how these perverted people hide in plain sight. Mark comes alive on the pages as a person, and we have to acknowledge the fact that not everyone is “good” or “bad.” In fact, the average person will have elements of both aspects in their character, and this is sensitively approached. Here we see a woman with a very serious profession- that of a palliative care consultant- which does seem a depressing profession if ever there was one, but someone's got to do it. You also see how she's torn between two cultures, that of the USA and UK, and find out that her romance with Mark is far from ideal and, to me, it comes across as being that way right from the beginning. You do question why Alice married him, and also certain signs (such as Mark liking Alice's teenage figure, and hating her pregnant or post giving birth shape) pop up into her head and ours.

One thing that really kept me compelled was the sheer coincidence of Mark dying on my birthday!!!!!  I found myself wound up by the sheer hoops Alice had to go through to transfer her skills from US training to UK practice- I know we are dealing with the serious profession of healthcare, but does it really have to be that difficult? I was also concerned as to whether Mark had got his daughter involved (he had) and whether she was “moving on” (she seemed to be). The writing moved along but a few paragraphs did come across as rather convoluted and confusing. I did enjoy the elephant references, and do hope that Alice managed to find happiness in real life, as her marriage was certainly doomed from the start.

This is a book that no one will want to read; but everyone should.

THE CHRISTMAS ROSE by DILLY COURT

THE CHRISTMAS ROSE

by

DILLY COURT

THE BLURB:

Standing on London's Royal Dock with the wind biting through her shawl, Rose Munday realises she's been abandoned by her sweetheart...

Rose had risked everything to get to London but, stumbling through the peasoup fog, she has nowhere to go, and no one to turn to.

Scared and alone, Rose steps straight into danger, only to be rescued by two women with even less to their names- a woman of the night and her young sidekick, Sparrow. Left with only a cluster of love letters and all hope of her sweetheart's return fading, Rose finds herself forging a new life with her unlikely companions.

But when a good deed turns sour, a dangerous enemy threatens to ruin them all. Will Rose be able to save her new friends and her future? If she can, a Christmas gift awaits that will change her life forever...

THE REALITY:

I actually started this book just before Christmas, but finished it a couple of months later. Like a soap opera, it was easy to pick up on the thread with only a little backtracking and re-reading after an absence. Rose was a lovely character, but I did find a bit of a cliché going on- it has been mentioned before that too many heroines have red hair and green eyes but, to be fair to the author, it wasn't something that was shoved down your throat.

This was a good study of London life in 1882, but not too detailed, and I think these “feel good” novels are meant to be that way. I did adore some of the characters; such as Rose's boss Eugene, and his sister, Cecilia. I also loved Sparrow, and it was easy to pick up on a lot of her experiences just by the way she came across, and also by the way she spoke and pronounced her words. I do think the bad characters in the book could have been explored in more depth though, and I'm thinking of Gilroy, Piggin and Regan. I'm always interested in what drives such miscreants, and eager to feel the full stench of their characters leap off the page, and it was a wasted opportunity as that didn't happen with this story (again, it's due to the “feel good” nature of the novel, and these reads do tend to skirt over reality a bit too much). It was heartwarming, however, to find that most of the people in this book were inherently good (I'm thinking of Cora, who helps Rose out even though she doesn't know her). Is that a reality? Do people like this really exist en masse in real life? Hmm, I'm not overly sure, but maybe that's just the cynic (or realist!) in me!

The Cairo sections were extreme fun, as was seeing Rose's relationship with Max developing- for the worse. It was easy to see that Rose was going to end up with (spoiler alert!) Eugene, and I can't say that I blame her- physically, his dashing, tall, musketeer looks were more appealing than Max's blondness. I did enjoy these chapters immensely, and found the way Rose seemed stuck between the working and the upper classes very subtly depicted. I also liked that Rose was a pioneer for her time, being a female journalist when women were, generally speaking, banned from having a career. She had to write under a pseudonym; much like Ellis Bell, Currer Bell, Acton Bell and Mary Ann Evans (that's Emily Bronte, Charlotte Bronte, Anne Bronte and George Elliot to you!)

As with these novels, there is a huge element of convenience all round, especially with Eugene being rich and in love with Rose from day one. But I cant say that it soured the novel- just made it predictable. A nice read.