Readers Group Diary May

The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx
Fourth Estate £6.99

Once again the all-female, late-middle-aged, middle-class, ethnically unmixed readers group from West London reports to you - the same group that read Black Earth City and A Map of Love. You are referred to those earlier diaries to prove, we hope, that despite these disadvantages, we are a liberal-minded, questing bunch and as varied as we can be within our limitations.

We include a former ballet dancer (Pat), a psychiatrist (Jean), probation officer (Jane W), publisher (Jane N), and Board Director (Diana). Sue, Grania and Moira have extensive experience of living abroad in connection with the military, the Foreign Office and journalism. Colette comes from a family of writers and her views are always awaited with anticipation (and sometimes trepidation.)

Our recent book for discussion was The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx. (Why has she recently dropped the E? - there must be a reason beyond any desire from her publisher's publicity machine.) Our method is to go round the room, with each person speaking in turn, and then have a more general discussion.

Diana had chosen the book and she gave a concise but positive resume to kick off. Pat was next - very enthusiastic, her response matched by Jane N's, a long-time fan of Proulx. Jane N couldn't resist treating the group to an overview of the author's work. This was in part triggered by the general worried murmurings about 'darkness' in The Shipping News. 'If you think this book is dark,' Jane N said firmly, 'you should read Postcards, Accordian Crimes and Close Range etc, etc.' and went on to express her view that Proulx's editor must have tried (and failed) to get this marvellous author to temper her bleakness. So far The Shipping News has been much her most successful title - probably because it is the least black of her books.

Pat, Jane N and Diana all agreed on Proulx's wonderful use of language with onomatopoeic words (perhaps made-up?) 'the waves thunged on the shore'. Jean made the comment that she thought the style convoluted at the start and the language idiosyncratic, but then felt the sentence structure became clearer. Jean had found the story difficult to get into (recalling the same problem with Catch 22) - but after trying three (!) times she was hooked.

Grania spoke modestly but enthusiastically about the book and wanted to read more - she borrowed Postcards, which someone had brought with her.

Colette rather grudgingly admitted that she liked the book but kept saying that it was absolutely disgusting - citing seal-flipper pie kisses - ugh, ugh in her opinion. In that Colette's views are usually highly valued, both Jane N and Pat, the book's major champions, felt disappointed in this and felt that her reaction was superficial, and not what we would have expected from her.

Another critic was Jane W who had many reservations. She said that she couldn't regard the dialogue as English (this caused some dismay). She had adored the film and felt it had 'come to her rescue' - she needed it to be able to cope with finishing the book.

Not everyone had seen the film, but those who had disliked it, other than Jane W - and Colette. Colette surprised us a second time by saying that the bleakness of the book led to it lacking credibility - once again hotly disputed by Proulx fans.

General discussion centred round the characters - it was felt that Wavey and her son were particularly sympathetic. Also Partridge, Nutbeam, the aunt, Quoyle himself of course. Didn't this empathy more than counter the blackness? The power of Proulx to create wonderful settings and atmosphere - the newspaper office, the Newfoundland land and seascape, was not disputed. We were fascinated with the way Proulx wove magic into the story. And everyone loved the quotes at the beginning of each chapter, and enjoyed seeing how they related to it.

The discussion was certainly lively and informative. It was not so much that there were disagreements amongst us about the book, but that in the end there wasn't a unanimously positive feeling towards it. The only book so far that has achieved this was The Poisonwood Bible. But for the committed Proulx fans in our group The Shipping News, a brilliantly original story, wins every time.