Guest review by Cindy Jefferies: BUDDHA DA by Anne Donovan

 

"I was hooked. Before I’d read the first half a page I knew I was going to enjoy the ride."

First published in 2001 for children, Cindy Jefferies found success with her Fame School series with Usborne Books, obtaining 22 foreign rights deals. Latterly writing fiction for adults as Cynthia Jefferies, her first title The Outrageous Fortune of Abel Morgan was published in 2018, followed a year later by The Honourable Life of Thomas Chayne, set during the English Civil Wars, followed in 2019. Both titles are now available in paperback.

For some reason unclear to me I missed Anne Donovan’s first novel, Buddha Da, the first time around. It was published in 2003, but I didn’t come across it until I was recently away for a few days and found it in an Oxfam book shop.

I wonder if I did notice it when it was published but rejected it because it’s written in Glasgow vernacular? I enjoyed James Kelman’s How Late it is, How Late, but didn’t get on with Irving Welsh’s Trainspotting. Of course, reading the vernacular always demands a bit more effort from the reader. It’s difficult, now, to remember if it was the vernacular or the subject that put me off Trainspotting. Be that as it may, the premise of Buddha Da certainly appealed and I was happy to give it a go.

As a writer, where I find my reading is always of interest. Libraries and charity bookshops enable me to take a punt on half a dozen novels and to discover someone new to me that I love enough to seek out at full price in one of our wonderful independent bookshops. Anne Donovan is definitely now on my independent bookshop list.

So back to the vernacular. Some readers take exception to it. Done well, however, I rather enjoy it and in the case of Buddha Da it really lifted the novel to another level. Here’s the very beginning of the book.

“Ma Da’s a nutter. Radio rental. He’d dae anythin for a laugh so he wid; went doon the shops wi a perra knickers on his heid, tellt the wifie next door we’d won the lottery and were flittin tae Barbados, but that wis daft stuff compared tae whit he’s went and done noo.”

I was hooked. Before I’d read the first half a page I knew I was going to enjoy the ride.

Buddha Da is told by the three main characters. Anne Marie the daughter aged 12, Ma Liz, who works in the local doctor’s surgery and Da, Jimmy, a self employed painter and decorator. Their small family is like countless others, getting on well enough, working hard and enjoying a night out at the weekend. Never in a dozen lifetimes would it have occurred to Jimmy’s family or friends that he would set foot in the local Buddhist centre, but he does. It seems even less likely that he would go back time and again. He hasn’t even been to church for years. What’s going on with him?

This is a domestic novel that comes at one slantwise. There’s no wayward husband having an affair, no daughter getting into trouble; and yet, the family are thrown totally off balance. When Jimmy starts to give up some of the things that were an integral part of their lives, everything falls apart.

The story is funny, sad and sometimes thought provoking. Problems tend not to be solved, questions remain largely unanswered but I found it satisfying in an unexpected way, like much of life.

Buddha Da was Anne Donovan’s first novel, and was at the time shortlisted for the Orange Prize and the Whitbread Award. Taking note of those listings, perhaps you’ll enjoy it too.

Buddha Da is published by Canongate

More of Cindy's choices:

The Wolf Border by Sarah Hall

The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim

Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller

Guest review by Anne Cassidy: IDAHO by Emily Ruskovich

Anne Cassidy writes crime fiction for teenagers. She has published over forty novels for young adults. She writes dark crime fiction and is best known for Looking for JJ which was shortlisted for the Carnegie medal. Moth Girls was published by Hot Key in 2016 and concerns the disappearance of two twelve year old girls. Her new novel No Virgin describes the aftermath of a rape.

Idaho is a startling first novel which centres on a family tragedy. In it we are told the story of Wade and Jenny and their daughters June and May. The tragedy is the explosion at the heart of the story and the writer circles around it for the rest of the book. We begin to understand the events through the eyes of a number of characters mainly those of Ann, the second wife of Wade.

Ann has a pressing interest in the events of that day and it is her discoveries and interpretations that lead to the reader’s understanding of what happened and crucially why. And yet it is only a subjective solution for this is no classic crime novel. It is a story of a family in crisis, of a man who has a chance to live again, of a woman trying to understand the actions that brought it all about.

Mostly though this is the story of family life. Wade and Jenny, a young couple expecting a baby, have to live out a winter marooned in the snowy mountain. Two young sisters June and May play together until June is too old to play with dolls and May’s grief for the loss of her playmate is beautifully and painfully realised. Wade has early stage dementia just as his father had; though the loss of memory brings a kind of relief as he no longer knows what happened to his family.

The tragedy touches many people’s lives; William and Beth who comfort the husband afterwards; Tom Clark, who paints images of the missing daughter as she gets older year by year; Eliot, the boy who lost his leg falling through a dock. We also touch on the guilt of the perpetrator, the self-flagellation of a person who cannot accept any forgiveness.

The writing is assured and poetic and the characters are presented with a tender touch. There is no one in this book that the writer does not care about.

Idaho is published by Vintage.