A review by fictionfan
The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher by Hilary Mantel
5.0
Ten out of ten...
Having previously only read Mantel's Booker Prize-winning historical novels, [b:Wolf Hall|6101138|Wolf Hall (Thomas Cromwell, #1)|Hilary Mantel|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1336576165s/6101138.jpg|6278354] and [b:Bring Up the Bodies|13507212|Bring Up the Bodies (Thomas Cromwell, #2)|Hilary Mantel|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1330649655s/13507212.jpg|14512257], both of which I loved, I was intrigued to see how her rather slow-burning style in those books would convert to short, contemporary fiction. I'm pleased to say the answer is very well indeed – Mantel shows she is a mistress of this format just as much as the novel. Although the ten stories in this book weren't written specifically as a collection, there is a common theme that runs through them of women somewhat trapped in their lives, usually either by physical circumstances or by social constrictions; and several of the stories feel quite autobiographical in tone, giving the impression that Mantel has perhaps drawn heavily on her own experiences.
I was expecting beautiful writing and I was hoping for some moving, thought-provoking subject matter and the book has both in spades. What came as a surprise to me though was the rather wicked humour that appears in many of the stories – Mantel uses her keen observation of human nature to make us laugh out loud with the characters at some points, and at others traps us with a kind of wry cynicism into laughing at them. She brings an almost conspiratorial edge to some of the stories, where she and the reader know more than the narrator, allowing us to share a deliciously guilty feeling of superiority.
I won't go through all of the stories individually, but here are a couple that particularly stood out for me -
Harley Street is a story of a group of women working in a doctors' practice in Harley Street (where the posh people in the UK go to have their hypochondria pampered). Told in the first person by a narrator who thinks she understands people but really misses the big things right under her nose, this humorous story, like many of the others, has a bittersweet edge. The three women are fundamentally alone and lonely and we see the ebb and flow of their attempts to connect with each other. In the end, though, the humour wins out and I found myself chuckling merrily as Mantel and I winked knowingly at each other behind the poor narrator's back.
How Shall I Know You? is a brilliantly told story of a once successful author visiting literary societies in obscure places to give talks on her work. The descriptions of the shabby hotels, the aspiring writers thrusting their manuscripts at her, the questions she has answered a hundred times before, are so cringe-makingly funny they must be based on truth! But there is a much darker side to this story and in the end Mantel left this reader at least rather wishing she hadn't found quite so much to laugh at in the narrator's life. A fine example of how a couple of sentences can change the reader's perception.
Not all the stories are as quirky as these. The first one, Sorry to Disturb, very autobiographical in feel, is a longer story of a woman living as an ex-pat in Jeddah and finding herself having to conform to the very different expectations of women in that society. Another, The Heart Fails Without Warning, is a dark and rather disturbing story of a young girl watching her anorexic sister starve herself close to the point of death.
The final story is the one of the title, The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher, and the only one written specifically for this collection, I believe. It seems to have raised a storm of criticism because of the subject matter and to be honest Mrs Thatcher is too recently dead for me to feel that it's in the best taste (her children are, after all, still alive). However, it's an interesting take on just how hated Mrs Thatcher was by a large minority in her day, and while personally I thought it was one of the weakest in the collection, it is still well-written and very readable.
Overall, as with any collection, some of the stories are stronger than others, and occasionally there's a twist at the end which is just a little too neat. But overall this short book is a great read. The stories are varied enough that almost everyone is bound to find something to their taste, and the quality of the writing and characterisation is so good that it outweighs any weaknesses in the plots. Dare I say it? The perfect Christmas gift...
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
Having previously only read Mantel's Booker Prize-winning historical novels, [b:Wolf Hall|6101138|Wolf Hall (Thomas Cromwell, #1)|Hilary Mantel|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1336576165s/6101138.jpg|6278354] and [b:Bring Up the Bodies|13507212|Bring Up the Bodies (Thomas Cromwell, #2)|Hilary Mantel|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1330649655s/13507212.jpg|14512257], both of which I loved, I was intrigued to see how her rather slow-burning style in those books would convert to short, contemporary fiction. I'm pleased to say the answer is very well indeed – Mantel shows she is a mistress of this format just as much as the novel. Although the ten stories in this book weren't written specifically as a collection, there is a common theme that runs through them of women somewhat trapped in their lives, usually either by physical circumstances or by social constrictions; and several of the stories feel quite autobiographical in tone, giving the impression that Mantel has perhaps drawn heavily on her own experiences.
Mary with her scrawny arms, her knee-caps like saucers of bone, her bruised legs, her snigger and her cackle and her snort. Some unknown hand, her own perhaps, had placed on her rat-tails a twisted white ribbon; by afternoon it had skewed itself around to the side, so that her head looked like a badly-tied parcel.
I was expecting beautiful writing and I was hoping for some moving, thought-provoking subject matter and the book has both in spades. What came as a surprise to me though was the rather wicked humour that appears in many of the stories – Mantel uses her keen observation of human nature to make us laugh out loud with the characters at some points, and at others traps us with a kind of wry cynicism into laughing at them. She brings an almost conspiratorial edge to some of the stories, where she and the reader know more than the narrator, allowing us to share a deliciously guilty feeling of superiority.
I won't go through all of the stories individually, but here are a couple that particularly stood out for me -
Harley Street is a story of a group of women working in a doctors' practice in Harley Street (where the posh people in the UK go to have their hypochondria pampered). Told in the first person by a narrator who thinks she understands people but really misses the big things right under her nose, this humorous story, like many of the others, has a bittersweet edge. The three women are fundamentally alone and lonely and we see the ebb and flow of their attempts to connect with each other. In the end, though, the humour wins out and I found myself chuckling merrily as Mantel and I winked knowingly at each other behind the poor narrator's back.
How Shall I Know You? is a brilliantly told story of a once successful author visiting literary societies in obscure places to give talks on her work. The descriptions of the shabby hotels, the aspiring writers thrusting their manuscripts at her, the questions she has answered a hundred times before, are so cringe-makingly funny they must be based on truth! But there is a much darker side to this story and in the end Mantel left this reader at least rather wishing she hadn't found quite so much to laugh at in the narrator's life. A fine example of how a couple of sentences can change the reader's perception.
Not all the stories are as quirky as these. The first one, Sorry to Disturb, very autobiographical in feel, is a longer story of a woman living as an ex-pat in Jeddah and finding herself having to conform to the very different expectations of women in that society. Another, The Heart Fails Without Warning, is a dark and rather disturbing story of a young girl watching her anorexic sister starve herself close to the point of death.
The final story is the one of the title, The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher, and the only one written specifically for this collection, I believe. It seems to have raised a storm of criticism because of the subject matter and to be honest Mrs Thatcher is too recently dead for me to feel that it's in the best taste (her children are, after all, still alive). However, it's an interesting take on just how hated Mrs Thatcher was by a large minority in her day, and while personally I thought it was one of the weakest in the collection, it is still well-written and very readable.
Overall, as with any collection, some of the stories are stronger than others, and occasionally there's a twist at the end which is just a little too neat. But overall this short book is a great read. The stories are varied enough that almost everyone is bound to find something to their taste, and the quality of the writing and characterisation is so good that it outweighs any weaknesses in the plots. Dare I say it? The perfect Christmas gift...
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com