Regular Random readers will know that I love the Clara Vine books of Jane Thynne. I have read them all and then last year sat down and had a re-read right from the first one and enjoyed them all over again. Here is a link to an earlier post. I am delighted that there is another Clara book due this year and I cannot wait to get my mitts on it.
But before that we have a stand alone title The Words I Never Wrote and I can tell you now that it is wonderful. I was visiting the Other Grandparents last weekend so I could not sit down and read it straight through which I would have done, but the OGs are such good friends and we are so in ease with each other that when we sit down in the evening with a glass of wine, we can sit and read and not have to chat if we do not want to. This is a blessing but even so I did not finish this book until I drove home on Monday morning and made a cup of coffee when I arrived and then, blow the suitcases or anything else, sat down until it was done. I admit to having quite a lump in my throat at the final page.
The Words I Never wrote is the story of two sisters and it starts in 1936. Irene marries a German industrialist and goes to live in Berlin. Cordelia, more eager to leave home and make her way in the world, gets a job in Paris where she pursues her journalistic career.
This period of history is one in which Jane Thynne is steeped and knows her stuff. Here is a link to my previous reviews of the Clara Vine titles.
Irene and her husband Ernst are part of the social merry go round among the German elite and night after night attend what seems to me to be bloated vulgar parties, each host striving to outdo the other. She is seated at dinner and is in conversation with Reinhard Heydrich though she does not know who he is at the time.
“I imagine you have read the Fuhrer’s book? As you were recently married”
All newlyweds were sent a free copy of Adolf Hitler’s autobiography My Struggle.
“Mein Kampf you mean?” she laughed lightly “I’ve tried really I have but I can see why it is called My Struggle. I struggled to get past the first chapter”
There was a pause. She had a sense that this might be heresy but the champagne had done its work and she didn’t care.
The masklike visage stiffened.
“Can I advise you Frau Doktor, although you are a newcomer to our Reich, that we are united in our admiration of our Fuhrer and his work. A slight to him is a slight to us all. I’m aware that in England humour about the most revered subjects is almost compulsory, but here in Germany you’ll find that we require respect for our leaders”
The rebuke sliced through her tipsy humour like an SS knife through jelly……”
Cordelia and Irene correspond regularly but it becomes clear that Irene has to be very careful what she says or writes and confines her exchanges with her sister to slight matters discussing parties and fashion and when Cordelia presses her on the treatment of the Jews denies having seen any prejudice. Though she is engaged in self preservation her sister construes this as wilful blindness which causes her to despise Irene and the letters dwindle and then stop.
You will wonder why the book is called The Words I Never wrote. Well, perhaps I am reviewing this title backwards as the story opens in present day New York where another journalist, Juno Lambert purchases a 1931 Underwood typewriter (I admit to loving typewriters and some of these early models are quite beautiful). Though she does not know it this machine belonged to Cordelia Capel who had become a world-renowned journalist. She had recently died, and this machine found its way into a specialist shop.
And when Juno bought it she discovered in the case a manuscript of an unfinished novel and this sent her off on a journey to try and fill in the gaps in the story of the two sisters and the secret that lay between them. And in the final chapter the reason for the title is revealed….
Now this is a corker of an opening and grabs your attention straight away. Who has not dreamed of stumbling upon some neglected masterpiece in the drawers of an old chest you may have bought in a jumble sale or an auction? I know I have…
When I recently mentioned Jane’s book on my blog one of my regular visitors left the following comment:
“I really enjoyed the Jane Thynne novel. I think it would be impossible for her to write a bad sentence”
I could not have put it better myself. I find Jane’s writing so elegant, so smooth, so free of extraneous adjectives and adverbs and it is clean and such a joy to read. I always find it difficult to explain why I like a certain kind of writing. I think in the end it boils down to the words No Fuss.
And to show you what I am talking about here is a sentence which encapsulates my thoughts exactly.
Cordelia starts off her journalistic career by visiting the fashion houses and writing about their creations. She is at the house of Elsa Schiaparelli and this is how she is described:
“The speaker was herself the most elegant woman Cordelia had ever seen, an origami of narrow limbs and elegant lines, folded into a shape of slender nonchalance”
Isn’t that just perfect?
Do read. You will love it and if you don’t then do NOT tell me,
I may not speak to you again…..
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