Menu #3: Unlikely Adventures

Starter

Silver: Return to Treasure Island - Andrew Motion

Serving suggestion: With apples, as an homage to the infamous apple barrel of the original.

Andrew Motion's unofficial sequel to Robert Louis Stevenson's beloved 1883 Treasure Island is a wonderfully grown up tribute. Motion's version is a lot darker, although this blackness is cleverly hidden in the subtext for the majority of the novel, making it equally suitable for children as for adults who grew up with the original. With utmost respect for the story told by Stevenson in the nineteenth century, Motion introduces new issues ignored by the original, most importantly that of slavery.

It perhaps lacks the charm of the original; Motion's writing is beautiful, but a contrast to the old-fashioned simplicity of Stevenson's. His treatment of the characters of Jim Hawkins and Long John Silver, held dear to the hearts of so many, is harsh and unresolved. Readers may find themselves indignant at the undignified fates of characters that had so proudly stood the test of the last two centuries. The novel's ending is abrupt and uncertain. Perhaps this is with a further sequel in mind, but it appears unnecessary, and indeed unsuitable for a novel that is clearly aimed at an audience that includes children seeking an adventure tale before bedtime.

Overall though, it is an engaging and unexpected return to the island that has formed part of so many English childhoods.

3/5

Main Course

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry - Rachel Joyce

Serving suggestion: With bread and butter sandwiches.

Take a deep breath, and a big box of tissues, and curl up on the sofa. Rachel Joyce's debut novel goes from touching to heartbreaking as her protagonist, Harold Fry, walks from Devon to Berwick-upon-Tweed to save a woman from his past from cancer. All she has to do, he says, is wait. He will keep walking, and she must keep living. It is a pilgrimage across England, but also through a lifetime of buried memories, through his own feelings for his distant wife, and through pain and anger to find acceptance. 

The novel is filled with so much human tragedy that it is often hard to bear. Joyce tackles inevitabilities such as shame, loss, and the fear of forgetting the memories that once meant everything, that we usually try to hide from. She is not afraid to show the reader the things they don't want to see.

This is all beautifully and powerfully woven together, however, by a glorious hopefulness. Harold Fry's extraordinary journey up England means something different to everyone he encounters, and readers will find that it means something deeply personal and hopeful to them too. The pain and heartache suffered by each character leaves Harold Fry, and the reader, with no judgement towards others, however different their lifestyles may appear. Joyce's powerful insights into human experience mean that Harold does not appear remotely cliched when he muses that 'the world is made up of people putting one foot in front of the other.'

4.5 /5 (loses .5 only for a scattering of unnecessarily cheesy lines)

I hope they don't make it into a film, because I want to do it first!

Pudding

The Hundred Year Old Man who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared - Jonas Jonasson

Serving suggestion: Consume in bite-sized chunks, with no background music - this one's noisy enough. Enjoy with a bottle of vodka, and if you take a drink every time the hero Alan Karlsson does, you'll barely even notice by the time the elephant joins his entourage.

This is Sweden's answer to Forrest Gump, and it's completely ridiculous (if you watched Eurovision - what else were expecting from Sweden?). It's also brilliantly clever. I read it translated from its original Swedish, but that didn't detract from the humour that fell, deadpan, from every page.

Jonasson's novel combines two parallel storylines: one begins on Allan Karlsson's 100th birthday, when he escapes from his nursing home, inadvertently steals a suitcase of money, and nonchalantly begins the most charming crime spree since Thelma and Louise; the other tells the story of his life so far, and how he finds himself accidentally responsible for the biggest historical events of the last century.

I'm giving this one a shorter review, as you deserve to be as surprised as I was by each outlandish plot twist. Suspend your disbelief, and take your time with this one - it's a rare treat.

5/5 doesn't even cut it!

Leave a message in the comments if you have thoughts on any of the books in this menu!

- Reviews by Emma Oulton