Annabel

Title: Annabel
Author: Kathleen Winter
eISBN: 978-0-88784-276-4 

The first page - i.e., the prologue – is captivating. A few lines amounting to sheer poetry in style etching vivid, beautiful pictures in the mind. I understood this is how a good book must start. It looks like a great rule. Give shape to a great picture in the mind’s eye of the reader, and he/she is going to feel like reading further, till the end.

I thought I loved the fine language. Balanced language. I instantly felt that this is my kind of writing style. But soon I felt I was wrong. The read became a drag as it progressed. I guess the other book I read about a similar theme Middlesex was far better. My recent reads have been so boring that I had to abandon one of them half the way (sadly), which I had never done for years. I guess I now understand why these books are boring. They all lack the art of literature. The artistic play of words. The stylistic use of language. The amusing rambling of ideas. The interesting jumble of chronology.. They just concentrate on the plot and keep narrating the story in a straight line. I miss Rushdie. It must not be for no reason they have started the Folio Prize. Booker prize isn’t enough. Popular fiction isn’t enough. There is a need to revive Literary fiction. There is perhaps a dire need to rescue fiction from being looking like non-fiction.

I guess no reader who has read Middlesex can read this book without thinking of it even for a moment. But, however, as far as I could find out, there is hardly anyone who thinks this book is redundant. Despite being aware of the existence of the other book on the same theme, the author might have been wanting to write this to show a different perspective or style or just plainly, tell a different story around the same theme.

However, I found the last quarter of the book highly appealing. There were so many subtle factors working together towards bringing it to perfection. And the book was coming of age in those last pages. I guess I found more enthusiasm in reading the book at the point. And I now know the book is equally important as Middlesex, even though I hesitate to rank it any high in stylistics.