A review by scottiesandbooks
O Caledonia by Elspeth Barker
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
“Sometimes Janet thought that life’s sole purpose was to teach one how to die. As in most spheres, so in this, animals did better than people.”
O Caledonia is a stunningly written account of the life of a young girl from adolescence to womanhood, who throughout it all is so misunderstood. A girl doomed from the start due to the generation she was born in, Janet’s short 16 years of life comes to an end at the bottom of a staircase.
There ensues a look back at Janet’s life; just what could have led to this? This is not a whodunnit but instead more like a why… why would someone want Janet dead? What impact can a sixteen year old girl really have had in such a small time on this earth?
This may sound bleak and haunting…. but I promise it is not (at least not for me). This genre bending immersive story had me laughing out loud a lot… and I can’t work out if that was the point! It’s interesting looking back at the life of a wee girl and seeing it through her eyes; the times when she was thought to be bad, eccentric, annoying and seeing her own thought process. How she tries time and time again to do the right thing, to follow her own head and yet fails the role that society has given in this world.
Set in the North of Scotland, Elspeth has written an immersive landscape that really grasps the harsh landscape of Scotland aswell as it’s beauty. I absolutely adore the descriptions of nature, death and life that makes for thought provoking stuff.
Reading O Caledonia felt like a time of reflection. I spent a long time looking back at my own childhood and thinking of the narrative that was written for me. I, like many women could relate to so much of Janet (a character set in 1940s) and highlights the expectations thrust upon us from a very young age. It reminds us we are capable of so much more than everyone thinks.
O Caledonia is a stunningly written account of the life of a young girl from adolescence to womanhood, who throughout it all is so misunderstood. A girl doomed from the start due to the generation she was born in, Janet’s short 16 years of life comes to an end at the bottom of a staircase.
There ensues a look back at Janet’s life; just what could have led to this? This is not a whodunnit but instead more like a why… why would someone want Janet dead? What impact can a sixteen year old girl really have had in such a small time on this earth?
This may sound bleak and haunting…. but I promise it is not (at least not for me). This genre bending immersive story had me laughing out loud a lot… and I can’t work out if that was the point! It’s interesting looking back at the life of a wee girl and seeing it through her eyes; the times when she was thought to be bad, eccentric, annoying and seeing her own thought process. How she tries time and time again to do the right thing, to follow her own head and yet fails the role that society has given in this world.
Set in the North of Scotland, Elspeth has written an immersive landscape that really grasps the harsh landscape of Scotland aswell as it’s beauty. I absolutely adore the descriptions of nature, death and life that makes for thought provoking stuff.
Reading O Caledonia felt like a time of reflection. I spent a long time looking back at my own childhood and thinking of the narrative that was written for me. I, like many women could relate to so much of Janet (a character set in 1940s) and highlights the expectations thrust upon us from a very young age. It reminds us we are capable of so much more than everyone thinks.