Clarke Isaacs reviews The Undone
Years
The Undone Years
Jenny Haworth
Wily Publications, $34.99, pbk
New Zealand historic novelist Jenny Haworth takes the
immediate period after the end of World War 1 as the setting
for her story about the travails of the central character,
Caroline Allen, a young Christchurch arts student who finds
love and adventures in Europe.
Caroline, in the care of husband-hunting friend Judy Wilson
and her snobbish mother, revels in exploring the art-rich
purlieus of Paris.
Her heart is smitten when she meets Ashley Carrick-Jones, a
British army officer and journalist who, an observer at
peacetime gatherings, meets perils in the vanquished cities
of Berlin, Vienna and Budapest.
This is a distinctly wooden romantic novel, in which the
characters resemble cardboard cutouts, and the plot is
unimpressively simplistic.
Dialogue sample: "When they had found a seat he said, `You
taste, feel and smell wonderful . . .'" Ashley to Caroline.
Annoyingly, the author has ignored completely the usual rules
of punctuation, a deficiency which her editor should have
remedied.
- Clarke Isaacs is a former chief of staff of the Otago
Daily Times.
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