Customer Reviews

Astonishing Splashes of Colour (P.S.)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In a weird mood I decided to buy most of the books that were shortlisted for this year's Booker Prize. I read Vernon God Little right after it won, and thought that it was an interesting experiment. Then a couple of days ago I picked up Clare Morrall's Astonishing Splashes of Colour. Is it a better first novel than Vernon God Little? Should it have won the Booker instead? I can't believe how inconsequential the question now seems to me. "DBC Pierre"'s novel was more daring, but it's Clare Morrall's that will remain with me. It's not perfect, but it's astonishingly well written for a first novel (although since Ms Morrall has grown children, according to the blurb, one assumes she has a lifetime of well chosen, deeply embedded reading). There are a couple of plot twists that I should have been anticipating, but frankly I was simply too engrossed with reading the novel to think that far ahead. There are other plot elements toward the end that are not explained at all, although I personally think this may be a strength rather than a weakness: life cannot always be neatly wrapped up in plot denouements. The description in the British paperback I read (with a different, superior cover than the American edition, for what it's worth) describes the novel as a reflection of Morrall's "interest in the dynamics of motherless family life and in synaesthesia -- a condition in which emotions are seen as colours." That makes it all sound very clinical. What it's about is more simply families and children, and the heartbreak you feel when the narrator says four pages from the end, "I don't think I've grown up. I don't feel important enough." If you've ever been a "lost child," or lost a child, or a mother, or a brother, or a sister, read it and respect its hard-earned tears and minor victories.

This first-person novel of a world disintegrating was rightfully short-listed for the 2003 Man Booker Prize. Author Clare Morrall has constructed an unforgettable novel of a woman desperately struggling to make sense of who she is. Kitty sees life in colors - the yellow of motherhood, the pink of her nieces, the blinding white of all colors mixed together in her husband - but these colors, even as they comfort her, remind her constantly that she has lost a child and her ability to have another. Her large family doesn't speak of tragedies and the past, and her husband James is even better at avoidance, as the two live in separate, side-by-side flats. Even though she is loved and protected by her family, she flails through her crisis by herself, with only her therapist to steady her in twenty minute appointments. It becomes apparent from the beginning that Kitty needs a child, and will do or say anything to maintain the illusion that she is a mother. Despite her tottering on the brink of insanity, Kitty's Birmingham, where most of the novel is set, is vivid and alive. Her actions are sometimes chilling and yet they acquire logic through her eyes.

Kitty's voice is consistently believable, and it provides the quiet, driving force of Morrall's novel. Here, insanity has the voice of reason. Even when the plot edges toward the melodramatic, Kitty's narration rescues it. The characterizations aren't always as distinct as they might be, with some of Kitty's brothers melting into each other despite the author's attempts at distinguishing them. Morrall writes, "None of them looked alike, but my memory produced a composite brother," and even this early in the book, it comes across as an excuse. Kitty's husband James is skillfully described through his flat, but when interacting with Kitty, he doesn't always have a shape. Still, the portrait of Kitty's father is sharply realized as are most of the women and girls, most notably the little arsonist Kitty befriends.

In a head-to-head contest with Vernon God Little, the eventual winner of the 2003 Man Booker, this book easily wins my vote. It probes the mind of an emotionally disturbed woman without being gloomy and suffocating and instead opens her world outward and forward. Highly recommended.

ASTONISHING SPLASHES OF COLOUR by Clare Morrall
January 9, 2005

A favorite book of mine from 2004, ASTONISHING SPLASHES OF COLOUR was a great character study about a woman with Synesthesia who has a hard time coping with the world. She seems to have the mind of a child at times, although she lives in her own place (across the way from her husband), earns a living by writing book reviews for children's books, and seems at first glance to be a very normal and stable adult.

However, upon closer look, things look quite differently. Kitty Wellington seems to be on the verge of falling apart. She spends her days looking for her child Henry. She also seems to end up on the bus a lot, going nowhere, sometimes coming home early in the morning. Her need to be awake is sometimes so intense, for she fears her dreams.

She also has a deep need to find out more about her mother. Because her mother died when she was only 3 years old, she has very little memory of her, and what she does remember she believes are false memories. Her brothers won't help her, saying it's been too long ago for them to remember a thing. Even her father refuses to help her out.

While at first her behavior didn't seem too abnormal, it comes to a point where she begins to do things that are totally irresponsible. When she begins to behave erratically, such as taking a baby that doesn't belong to her, her family realizes that she needs help, fast.

ASTONISHING SPLASHES OF COLOUR was a truly fascinating look at a woman whose mental state is slowly deteriorating. It is difficult to like a character such as this, because often times the reader will not know whether to sympathize with her or be angry with her. What I do feel, though, is that this was a great reading experience and it is a book that I will not forget for a very long time. The Ratmammy gives this book 5 stars.

I read the book because of title and I enjoyed the few moments here and there when Clare Morrall played up her book's connection to Peter Pan but for the most part Astonishing Splashes of Colour left me bored. Kitty for a variety of reasons is a thirty-something adult who refuses to grow-up. It's not that she's young at heart or playful, she doesn't want to face the harsh reality that life can sometimes throw at a person.

Of course, there must be reasons for Kitty's withdrawal from the real world because people don't just break, at least that's what Morrall is implying. And rather than come up with anything "astonishing" or "colorful" she goes with humdrum and hackneyed. Kitty's family must be hiding a dead dark secret from her and if that's not enough, she's also suffered a mysterious still birth. Of course she can now, for no apparent reason try again for another child. Instead she is forced to wallow in the life that might have been for her if things had worked out differently. Whatever.

I've ready many positive reviews of the book and it was short listed in 2003 for the Man Booker Prize but I just don't see what all the praise is for. Sure, the book does have some interesting passages and I did love the first chapter, but the story doesn't go anywhere except down a very crowded and cliche ridden path followed by so many other books.

Many books have been written on the subject of grief and loss and the discovery of long hidden family secrets. It takes a skilled author, though, and Clare Morrall is one of those, to make us care very much. Kitty is a woman who in almost every sense has not grown up; she is forced to deal with some of the toughest things life has to offer. Towards the end, as she is teetering on the brink of insanity and then eventually falls into the abyss, we are not mad, we are not fed up with her shenanigans, we have grown to love her and want the best for her. We want her to whole-heartedly accept the love her husband has for her instead of settling for living across the hall from him.

This is a tragic, beautiful and subtle book from a talented writer. I will be reading anything else she writes.

We watch as Kitty, the main character's, life spirals out of control and we hold our breath as her diminishing mental state hits bottom. This book was so compelling. Kitty had an unusual, sad and lonely childhood; her mother died when she was three and she grew up with a distant father and distant older brothers. There are many color references in the book, her life is filled with color and intermittently void of color, the author used vivid (or stark) color references that really work. Kitty and her husband live in adjacent apartments, his is all white and immaculate, hers is bright and messy.

There are several surprises in the book that left me shaking my head, not in disbelief, but at the turn of events. I will be watching anxiously for another book by Clare Morrall.

Astonishing Splashes of Colour was short listed for the Booker Prize - somewhat unjustifiably, because it isn't that good. Clare Morall's writing is sometimes uneven and while her strength is in character development and dialogue, her narrative and sense of structure is often stilted and not as tight as it might be. However, having said this, the book is certainly a good read, and captures with a resounding force the universality of loss and the difficulties of non-communicative families. This is a story of heartbreak and loss, where secrets are maintained for years, and where life can often be a surreal and bizarre kaleidoscope of confusing colour.

Set in the city of Birmingham and using J. M. Barrie's Neverland as a framing device, the story centers on the unconventional Kitty and her disparate, rather eccentric family. From early on it becomes obvious that something terrible has happened to Kitty: we meet her as she waits at the school gates with all the other parents but it is readily clear that she has no child. The reader soon learns that her young son Henry died at birth three years ago and there's nothing but emptiness and barrenness in her life. A children's book critic, Kitty lives in a flat next door to her finicky obsessive-compulsive tidy husband James. They have a kind, decent marriage, but memories of her long lost mother constantly haunt Kitty, and her father and her brothers refuse to talk about her.

Part detective story and part journey of discovery, Astonishing splashes of Colour is about the connection between art, colour, and life. For Kitty, "daytime colour is just a façade, a coat of paint splashed on to fool us into thinking the world is genuine." It's as though Kitty's mother had died and taken everything of herself with her, as if she new in advance and sorted through her personal life, destroying all evidence of her existence. Kitty must uncover the truth about her mother, and also her long-lost sister Dinah, so that she can piece together these missing parts to make her life more whole again.

Kitty is such a complex and beautifully drawn character that readers will immediately emphasize with her plight. She aches to have a child but she only knows children in books, having adventures, discovering things, and thinking things. She likens herself to the lost boys in Peter Pan and because she grew up without a mother, she feels she's lost - "nobody can guide me back to the right place, because there's nobody who can give me what I want."

As the narrative progresses and the family skeletons are revealed, the colours of life begin to blur too fast, shattering Kitty's already rickety and shaky world. And while her father tries to tell her to be bold by putting all the colours in and mixing them up, "because colour is life," Kitty inevitably begins to fall apart and starts to act out bizarre and desperate behaviour resulting in chaos for all around her.

The novel is full of drama, heartache, and lots of surprises that most viewers will not see coming. And while, at times, the novel may read like a trumped up version of the Eastenders, Astonishing Splashes of Colour is still a compulsive and ultimately satisfying read, where the line between sanity, madness, world-weariness and childlike naivety is explored with great creative and literary skill. Mike Leonard February 05.

This is quite a charming book - - the characters are alive and practically jumped off the page, and every line is exceptionally well-written. A sure page turner!

There are many books out there which strike resemblance to this one, or so one would think after the first look on it. What could possibly be new about dissfunctional family, loosing of a child, and psychothic women. Everything that had to be said has been sayed. Where is the difference?

And then one starts to read. And then He understands.

Loosing of a child, excentric painter as a father, brothers who are alienated and whose only bond is Kitty herself, obsessive behaviours, all of them stands for finding the identity. Another author has often wondered: "How do we become what we are?" and this book partly answers that question. In a world where nothing functions as it should, in a world were values have tvisted meanings, and trauma is almost a common thing how can one stand up, and develop onself in a way that society concieves as 'normal'.

Surprisingly (at least for me) this isn't a book about position of women in a evil patriarhal world. This is a book about ordinary people and connections that makes them just that - people.

Struggle for survival can take up many faces and this book presents maybe the most painful one.

Ten chapters you should meditate over.

The main character of this novel, Kitty, tends to view things in terms of color, and she lives in a world akin to Neverland (the title is taken from a description of the same). The book opens with Kitty waiting for her son outside a school, but the reader quickly senses that there is something not quite right about both the situation and Kitty herself. In a manner quite similar to another first-time novel, She's Come Undone, Kitty begins to unravel, with her reality and fantasy worlds becoming hopelessly intertwined. Still, she makes an effort to process her losses, from the more recent shared loss with her supportive yet distant husband (who lives in his own apartment next door and is unable to cope directly with Kitty's grief) to deficits tracing back to her family of origin, which includes a domineering father, an absent mother, and a much older sister who Kitty never knew. Over the course of the story, Kitty's behavior becomes increasingly bizarre, but the conclusion offers a hint of hope and redemption. Although I would be hard-pressed to say whether or not I "liked" this book, I found it to be an interesting, worthwhile read that I would recommend to others, particularly those looking for a unique, thought-provoking reading group selection.