Middle-Aged Fantasy: The Winter Sea

The Winter Sea by Di Morrissey

Pan Macmillan

Pp. 416

This novel is pure escapism and wish fulfilment. Cassie decides to leave her high-paid but unsatisfying legal job and husband in Sydney for a holiday on the coast. On a whim she buys a dilapidated restaurant and turns it into a roaring success with the help of the local fishing community. The spanner in the works (of course there has to be one) is in the form of a historic family incident with far-reaching repercussions. Because it's a typical holiday read there is a caring community for affirmation, an abandoned dog for company, and a handsome vet for romance. It contains a lot of stereotypes which are completely undemanding.

One of these stereotypes is the notion of Italy and the history of emigration. There are several flashbacks, which direct the reader to the old country where “Italian families are always there for each other” in a sort of Sicilian Godfather-like way. Italians love fishing and women, and they have romantic notions of both.

Characters describe things to each other in a manner that is clearly meant as exposition for the reader, and historical nuggets are dropped into the narrative with resounding clangs. The transition to being Australian is not easy; as someone worries that their English might not be good enough to pass the test they are told, “It could be in any language. If they don’t want you, they will make it impossible for you to pass.” We are reminded that Italians were put into internment camps during the war. “People are in here just because they’re Italian. Doesn’t matter what their political convictions are – Fascists, Communists, neutral. It almost makes you cry when you think of the poor buggers who left Italy to escape Fascism only to end up here.”

Cassie is a modern woman who decides to make a break, in parallel with these characters from the past. We are meant to see her as an independent woman, who is better-off without her overbearing husband, Hal and patriarchal career. This burgeoning feminism is not extended to other female characters, however – more Italian stereotypes. Moving home and setting up a new business is remarkably easy to do as Cassie buys a place in Whitby Point, by the sea (Ulladulla, NSW coast), with a more relaxed pace of life than in her previous Sydney home, which suits her interests. She extends this minimalism to her restaurant, which she decides to run with no real business plan. It is busy but idyllic and the dream of many a middle-aged idealist.

By trying to force a modern character into a tried and tested romance formula, Morrissey’s character’s credibility strains at the seams, but she has enough fans who will love it anyway and there’s no point in ruining a perfectly good fantasy with realism and detail.

Ulladulla Harbour and Foreshore

Friday Five: Books Read in September

 

And yet again it seems I have read five books in a month. Here are the September offerings:

5 Books Read in September:

1. Astoria: John Jacob Astor and Thomas Jefferson's Lost Pacific Empire by Peter Stark (Ecco) - When there was such a thing as the wild wild West, men thought they could make their fortune by pushing through to the far frontier. It turns out they were wrong. In 1810 John Jacob Astor, the richest man in New York with the backing of Thomas Jefferson, sent out two advance parties to trade in furs and establish a township on the so-far unclaimed coast of North America. More than half of the men died violent deaths; the rest suffered starvation and madness. The colony was a disaster but its legacy was immense, opening the eyes of provincial Americans to the potential of the Western coast and discovering the route that was to become the Oregon Trail. Peter Stark writes in fascinating detail with compelling research to underpin his narrative and expand upon these adventures.  
2. By Blood by Ellen Ullman (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) - When a disgraced former professor overhears his psychiatrist neighbour's conversation with a client, he decides to 'help'. His research into her background leads to information which he shares with her anonymously, such as the fact that her birth mother was a survivor of the Holocaust. Is his intervention a kind assistance or a disturbing need to control? Like a Gothic version of 'Who Do You Think You Are?', the writing is mix of Kafka and Poe with a curiously detached and unreliable narrator who nudges the plot along by drip-feeding his findings into the client's consciousness. This is an intriguing novel about the impossibility of certainty and the fragility of belief.
3. The Winter Sea by Di Morrissey (Macmillan) - This novel is pure escapism and wish fulfillment. A woman decides to leave her high-paid but unsatisfying legal job and husband in Sydney for a holiday on the coast. On a whim she buys a dilapidated restaurant and turns it into a roaring success with the help of the local fishing community. The spanner in the works (of course there has to be one) is in the form of a historic family incident with far-reaching repercussions. Because it's a typical holiday read there is a caring community for affirmation, an abandoned dog for company, and a handsome vet for romance. It contains a lot of stereotypes which are completely undemanding.
4. Wanderers: A History of Women Walking by Kerri Andrews (Reaktion Books) - When women have walked alone in the past they have been considered unfeminine and odd. More recently they have been labelled vulnerable or provocative (just consider the term 'streetwalker'). Kerri Andrews shares the rambles of ten women who have incorporated their walks into their world through their writing, from Dorothy Wordsworth and Virginia Woolf to Anais Nin and Cheryl Strayed. Walking allows time for contemplation and reflection; it can be companionable or solitary; and in certain climates, it can still be considered dangerous. The collection opens up avenues of further reading (I'm going to check out the works of Nan Shepherd), but there is a touch too much authorial intrusion - if we have the women's' diaries, we are privy to their thoughts without the need for further explanation or, in the words of My Cousin Rachael when we read this for Family Book Group, "a bit A-Level course work". 
5. The Yield by Tara June Winch (Hamish Hamilton) - Language is one of the most important means of preserving and communicating culture. In this prize-winning novel (Miles Franklin Literary Award 2020), Tara June Winch spells out the crucial need to collect the words of the Wiradjuri people and pass on the secrets of generations. Just as a mining company threatens the environment at Massacre Plains, the authorised history endangers the true heritage of the people who have cared for the land for millennia. By proving the cultural connection to country, the survivors might just be able to save their way of life. Words have meaning on multiple levels and this incredible novel digs deep to find them.