Review: WAITING FOR TOMORROW, by Nathacha Appanah

Waiting for Tomorrow, by Nathacha Appanah. Published 2018 by Graywolf Press. Translated from the French by Geoffrey Strachan.

Mauritian writer Nathacha Appanah first came to my attention with the release of 2011's The Last Brother, about a friendship between two boys on Mauritius during World War 2. That book was lyrical and haunting. Waiting for Tomorrow is set in present-day France and takes as its subject a tense marriage between a Frenchman and a Mauritian and an uneven friendship between two Mauritian women but lacks none of its predecessor's beauty.

Anita and Adam have been together for twenty years; they live together with their daughter Laura in the southwest of France though they met in Paris, a city where both felt like strangers. Anita came to France as an idealistic young woman dreaming of being a writer; Adèle also comes to France from Mauritius but she is older, jaded and has suffered a great tragedy. Adèle is undocumented and vulnerable. She works for a demanding French family as a nanny when she is hurt in a car accident and finds she can no longer tolerate the indignities of her life. She and Anita meet and forge a bond. Things go well until they don't.

When the story opens Adèle is dead and Adam is in jail. There is also something wrong with Laura. Appanah takes us back and forth through time, from when Adam and Anita meet to the series of events that change everyone's life forever. Since we know something terrible will happen, suspense drives the narrative and we long for that moment when it all goes wrong.

But in the mean time Appanah shows us transformations in all three main characters, their evolution and the changes that take place as they age and interact with each other and the French society in which they live. Through it all Appanah treats us to beautiful prose, lush descriptions of place and of the mindsets of her characters. The strength of the book for me is in these characters and the way Appanah shares their points of view with us one at a time. The only time I felt a little cheated was the act of betrayal that sets off the tragedy at the book's center. It seemed so trite. Or maybe it was meant to.

In any case I'm a fan for life of Appanah's if I wasn't already after the luminous Last Brother. Waiting for Tomorrow is a wonderful, unforgettable book, about the hearts of men and women and what it means to love someone, whether that person be a lover, friend or child. Even at the end, we know the story isn't really over, and these characters will exist in your mind long after you turn the final page.

Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Book Review: SEVEN HOUSES IN FRANCE, by Bernardo Atxaga

Seven Houses in France, by Bernardo Atxaga. Published 2012 by Graywolf Press. Trans. from Spanish. Literary fiction.

Seven Houses in France is not like any book you've read in a while, no matter what you read. Set in the Belgian Congo in 1903 at the height of Belgian colonial presence, it's a satire about a bunch of pretty unlikeable people- racist, violent, ignorant- and the story tells of sex, murder, revenge and greed. Captain Lalande Biran smuggles mahogany and ivory to satisfy his wife Christine's voracious need for money and status; the "seven houses" are hers. Fawning Donatien wants to open a brothel back in Belgium and is haunted by the voices of his possibly non-existent siblings. Coco lusts after the captain's wife after seeing a photo in the captain's quarters and schemes to win her for himself. Livo, their African servant, seethes with hatred and the new guy, Chrystosome Liege, is an uptight and fervently religious sharpshooter from the sticks (Brittany) who throws everything out of whack with his piety and his love for an African girl.

That said, the book is essentially a comic farce in which comeuppance comes in heaping bowlfuls and revenge is a frozen dessert.

I really enjoyed this book for the satire and the character studies. It's like Atxaga threw his characters in a blender, flipped the switch and just tells us what happened. It's more accessible than Obabakoak, the last book of his I read, which was a collection of loosely-related anecdotes and stories, but reading Seven Houses makes me want to give Obabakoak another chance. Atxaga is a Basque writer but doesn't always set his books in the Basque region, although he writes in Basque and either translates to Spanish himself or collaborates on the translation. His books typically come to English from their Spanish translations. Which doesn't mean anything, but it's interesting. Seven Houses isn't a book I'll keep forever, but I'm glad I read it, and I want to read more Atxaga. He's different, and fun.

Rating: BEACH

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

REVIEW: The Last Brother, by Nathacha Appanah

The Last Brother, by Nathacha Appanah. Published 2011 by Graywolf Press. Literary Fiction. Translated from the French by Geoffrey Strachan.

The Last Brother, by French-Mauritian writer Nathacha Appanah, is a haunting and elegiac novel about a friendship between two boys on the island of Mauritius during World War 2. Young Raj is a native of the island and, while ignorant of the war going on elsewhere in the world, fights a battle of his own in a family destroyed by death and violence. His two brothers, who he worshipped, are killed in an accident, and his father, a puny, insecure man, uses his fists to take out his disappointments on Raj and his mother. Meanwhile Raj tries to live day to day, to survive and even thrive.

One day Raj follows his father, a prison guard, to work, and finds that the "criminals" his father guards are in fact emaciated and frightened Jews who have escaped from Eastern Europe on their way to Israel. Years later, Raj learns their story- they were deported to Mauritius after British administrators in Haifa decided they were illegal immigrants. In the mean time, though, he finds a friend- David, a young boy his age. He and David play together; he teaches David the secrets of the island and soon he helps David run away. Their friendship is sweet but unbearably tragic, one that will mark them both indelibly.

The Last Brother is a really beautiful novel and a must-read for literary fiction readers and absolutely anyone interested in World War 2 or the Holocaust; it's one of those gems that illuminates a little-known corner of history and brings it to beautiful life. Having said that, it's Raj's story more than it's David's, the story of how a boy deals with tragedy and death, how he grows up with shame and sadness and how becoming a teacher and a father helps him find peace. And that's a lot to pack into 160 pages or so but Appanah has written an engrossing and economical novel that offers a richly detailed sense of place both physical and emotional, told by a character who will win your heart. I hope you get a chance to pick this one up- you won't be sorry!

Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.