I received a review copy of this title from Hispabooks via Edelweiss. This book was published in the original Spanish in 2015 and this English version has been translated by Jonathan Dunne. Hispabooks specializes in publishing contemporary Spanish books into English translation. For more information about their titles please visit their website: http://hispabooks.com/
My Review:
The author explains to us in the introduction of the book that the Plimsoll Line is a mark on a ship’s hull that indicates the maximum depth a vessel can be immersed into the water when it is loaded with cargo without being sunk. In the 18th century, British merchants would overload their cargo, knowing full well that the ships would sink and then they would collect the insurance money on them. The Plimsoll Line was then marked on all ships to prevent shipwrecks and save lives. The main character in this book bears so much cargo in the form of tragedy that he wonders if he has overstepped his personal Plimsoll Line and will sink into oblivion.
Gabriel Ariz is a university professor and an art critic who loves working and his job even though he doesn’t have to work for a living. His wife’s inheritance would allow them to live quite comfortably with a nice custom-built home in the forest and luxury vacations. Gabriel and his wife’s comfortable world is shattered by the death of their only child, their daughter, who dies at the tender age of twenty in a tragic car accident on Christmas Eve. This event marks the beginning of a series of misfortunes that weigh heavily on Gabriel.
Before their daughter died, Gabriel and his wife seemed to be drifting further and further apart and this tragedy precipitated the end of their marriage. When Gabriel’s wife, Ana, announces that she is leaving he is neither surprised or terribly upset. But the constant loneliness in his big house with no one but his cat Polanski for company starts to wear on him. To top it all off, he doesn’t feel well and his doctor diagnoses him with kidney failure. Because of his illness he is forced to quit his beloved job and go to dialysis three times a week for five hours at a time. Is this what will sink him below his Plimsoll Line?
One of the hardest parts of the book to read are the very detailed descriptions of Gabriel’s dialysis treatments. He talks about insertion of tubes and machines and the cleansing of his blood through this process. I was so uncomfortable when I was reading these passages that I almost skipped over them to spare myself from these graphic scenes. But then I realized that Armendariz is providing for us the a realistic view of what it means to lose one’s precious grasp on health. Our health and our well-being is never something we should take for granted.
In addition to Gabriel, the author also gives us different points-of-view throughout the story. For instance, in order to describe Gabriel and his home the author puts us in the place of an invisible observer whom only the cat can see. We walk through Gabriel’s house as if we are getting a private tour of it’s décor, pictures and personal touches. We are also given the point-of-view of the cat who knows that there is something not-quite-right about his owner who sleeps at strange hours and wanders around the house in his tattered bathrobe. Polanski’s favorite pastime is keeping Gabriel’s garden free of mole’s.
The most intriguing and the lengthiest point-of-view we are given is Gabriel’s daughter who has been deceased for three years when the story begins. Gabriel finds a diary that was hidden in the garden and was dug up when there was a tangle between Polanski and a mole. A large part of the second half of the book includes these diary entries written by Laura. As Gabriel reads her entries, which were recorded during the last few years of her life, he realizes that he didn’t know his daughter very well at all. She had struggles, worries and concerns that were typical of a young woman on the verge of adulthood but his relationship with her only existed on the surface. Laura’s diary also reveals a very shocking detail about her life about which Gabriel and his wife were completely unaware. I haven’t read a book in a long time with such a shocking twist or revelation in the plot.
Finally, I would like to make one more comment about the author’s writing style. I’ve already mentioned the details he gives about Gabriel’s medical treatments, but this style of providing information about minutiae pervades the book. At times the details seem cumbersome and make the narrative feel as though the author has strayed too far from his plotline. For example, towards the end of the book Gabriel makes a decision not to commit suicide because he enjoys light too much. The author goes on for several paragraphs about different types of light we experience. I think he could have made the same point with fewer examples.
Overall, this is a great book for Spanish Lit month and I would recommend it just for the plot twist revealed in the diary entries. But the remarkable resilience and strength of character we encounter in Gabriel makes it well-worth the read.
How is everyone else doing with the Spanish Lit month reading?
About the Author:
Juan Gracia Armendáriz (Pamplona, 1965) is a Spanish fiction writer and contributor to many Spanish newspapers. He has also been part-time professor at the Universidad Complutense of Madrid, and has many works of literary and documentary research. As a writer, he has published a book of poems, short stories, nonfiction books—biographical sketches and a historical story—and several novels. The Plimsoll Line is part of the “Trilogy of Illness”, formed by three separate books that reflect his experience as a person with kidney trouble. The novel was awarded the X Premio Tiflos de Novela 2008.
This story is told in the first person by a forty-five year old man named Germain who describes himself as being “soft in the head.” Germain tells us about his current circumstances and his life as well as his childhood and early years. He vividly describes his experiences in primary school with his teacher, “The strong get off on walking all over other people, and wiping their feet while they’re at it, like you would on a doormat. This is what I learned from my years at school. It was a hell of a lesson. All that because of some bastard who didn’t like kids. Or at least he didn’t like me. Maybe my life would have been different if I’d had a different teacher. Who knows? I’m not saying it’s his fault I’m a moron, I’m pretty sure I was one even before that. But he made my life a misery.” I don’t include very many quotes in my reviews, but when I read this part of the book I had tears in my eyes and I felt like someone punched me in the stomach.
Born in Bordeaux in 1957, Marie-Sabine Roger has been writing books for both adults and children since 1989. Soft in the Head was made into a 2010 film, My Afternoons with Margueritte, directed by Jean Becker, starring Gerard Depardieu. Get Well Soon won the Prix des lecteurs de l’Express in 2012 and will be published by Pushkin Press in 2017.
This interesting tale begins in modern day Paris when Pichón Garay receives a disk with the contents of an absurd story about two doctors in 19th century Argentina whose mission it is to cure the mad. As Garay reads the beginning of the story he learns that no one is sure whether or not this story is pure fiction or has any truth to it. At times the story seems far fetched and ridiculous, but the ways in which these doctors treat the insane is compassionate and for this reason we hope it’s true.
Gavin Lamb is a thirty-one year old virgin who still lives at home with his parents. It’s not that he can’t afford to move out because he has a very lucrative career as a hairdresser in London. But he doesn’t like change and moving out of his childhood home would be more change than he could possibly handle. His doting and old-fashioned mother would also have a very hard time letting go of her son.
This book is set in an apartment building in Mexico City in which a group of elderly retirees live. The residents of the building engage in various activities together in order to fend off boredom, including the most popular activity which is the daily gathering and discussion at the literary salon. Francesca, the building president and leader, is also the head of this salon. As each new member moves into the building, he or she is given a warm welcome and an invitation to the salon. The only person who has ever dared to turn down an invitation to the salon is our witty, clever and crabby narrator, a man who goes by the name of Teo.
Juan Pablo Villalobos was born in Guadalajara, Mexico, in 1973. His first novel, Down the Rabbit Hole, was the first translation to be shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award (in 2011). He writes regularly for publications including Granta and translated Rodrigo de Souza Leão’s novel All Dogs are Blue (also published by And Other Stories) into Spanish. His work has been translated into fifteen languages. He lives in Barcelona and has two children.
The Book Binder's Daughter 