Italian Shoes by Henning Mankell

Once you start analyzing a book in an objective way--does a book lose its power to move you?

When the sponsor of the book gave the background talk, it was clear that underlying the "text" she read, was the story of her formative year spent in Sweden--in the 1960s.  How lucky to find a book that connects deeply with your personal history.

Others enjoyed the book; but were able to point out flaws in this story about a man, Fredrik Wellin, who slowly and fitfully reawakens to life. Some felt that the second half of the book was implausible...two major events even disturbing and unnecessary.  We compared Fredrik to Kurt Wallander, Mankell's detective, and enjoyed noticing how similar they are.    And we enjoyed speculating about why the author seemed to be drawn to writing about  men who live in self-imposed isolation.

We got intellectual satisfaction from uncovering a possible connection between Mankell's mother's abandonment of  him and Mankell's creation of a character who despised his mother. (Oh...perhaps the abandonment of his first love...his deepest love...was the author's way of trying to come to grips with his own loss? his father's loss? Fredrik, the abandoner in this novel says: "There is no abandonment that can be excused or explained.  So I said nothing.")

 Connecting this character to Julian Barnes' Tony in A Sense of an Ending, was a heady discovery. And, also enjoyable was  sharing some of the clever ways Mankell created his characters, for example:  using a few sentences to sum up Wellin's  two marriages.

A good, fun discussion and mental exercise...

But, how much better if we all could have relived moving memories...

Hmmm...

Can anyone recommend a book set in Martha's Vineyard in the 1960s?

This comment from B.B.:  In our discussion of "Italian Shoes," we forgot to talk of Caravaggio. The main character's daughter was very taken with the painter and mention of him kept coming into the story. He, I find in a history of art book, was an outsider and a rough sort whose paintings, as opposed to the fashionable ideal, were gritty and real--like Mankel's works?