Lucy Wood (2)Reseñas

The writing in this collection is really gorgeous, and the tone of the stories really appeal to me. Many of these are bittersweet and not necessarily dark, but not light either. There are magic elements, but they are not treated as fantastic, and most of the stories utilize oceanic imagery. Wood's ability to conjure a scene is fantastic. The details she includes in her descriptions really bring the setting to life.

I do feel that some of the stories sort of end at an awkward spot, almost like they are vignettes more than stories. Sometimes they end before I ever really felt like I had grasped what was happening. The title story, 'Diving Belles,' is really the standout. I think it is the one where the characters feel the most real, and the story feels like a story, rather than a scene. It unfolds slowly, which gives you time to acclimate yourself to the world in which the story exists. I also enjoyed 'Of Mothers and Little People' and 'Beachcombing,' both about the relationship between a child (one grown, one small) and a parent/grandparent.

I'm really excited to see what comes next from the author. She reminds me a little of a combination of Graham Joyce and Karen Russell, two of my favorite authors. And I feel like the world could always use more weird, bittersweet, quirky, magical, fairy-tale, fable-based stories.

I really enjoyed these short stories. By far my favorite is "Notes From the House Spirits," which I have already read again. And will keep reading. It has touched me in unexpected ways! :)

The first few stories were brilliant, 6 star pieces, reminded me a lot of the delightful "The rental heart" by kirsty Logan.
Sadly it went downhill a bit, but only slightly.

Given to me by a friend from Devon who said "this is what it's like here". A small town, boggy fields, rushing river, old trees pushing around old houses. Far from my own world, and I loved being there.

‘’Winters are when people disappear. One minute you’re elbow on the street, the next you walk along sidestepping nothing but the wind. Cafes put down their blinds. Houses are locked and dark. The car parks slowly empty and all that’s left on the beaches are a few forgotten shoes.’’

I came across The Sing of the Shore via Jen Campbell’s YouTube channel, a holy shrine for those of us who love our literature flavoured with a healthy dose of the strange and the misty. This collection of stories set in the wild, beautiful Cornish landscape is rich in bleakness, strange outcomes, misty characters and beautiful, complex prose. I admit that during the first three stories I felt lost in space. I didn’t know what I was reading. I realised that my mental state wasn’t the proper one and I went back, read them again and let the words ‘’flood’’ my confused, occupied- by- tons of issues brain. This collection by Lucy Wood is one of the most beautiful,, demanding and strange works of the Literary Fiction genre. It is an ode to Cornwall, a realistic, harsh depiction of our struggle with nature, with the ones around us and with ourselves.

Cornwall...A name that brings so many images in our minds...In this majestic, ferocious scenery, human seem even more small, temporary, insignificant. The powerful presence of the sea is the heart of the collection. ‘’The Sing of the Shore’’ is the sound of the waves, breaking sands, rock, reefs alerting the sailormen and the fishermen as to their position when darkness and mists cover the land ahead. Here, the shore hides childhood dreams, family relationships, loneliness.

Children try to hold on surface, swept away by their parents’ problems. Young parents try to meet the demands of their offsprings. People search for lost items, brought to land by the currants. Young friends try to make a living through leftovers. Others try to find their way through fields covered in mist, guided (or misled) by the sound of the sea. Two young sisters try to make sense of their changing childhood in a noisy funfair. A young boy grows up in the shadow of a father who desperately tries to tame the waves. Ghosts visit the domains of the mortals…

‘’ ‘They tell themselves they didn’t really see anything. And for a while they don’t see anything else. Everything goes back to how it was, until they come back one day and, as they’re getting out of their car, they happen to look across at their kitchen window. ‘ Fran stops and looks down at her tea. There’s half left but she still doesn’t drink it. ‘There’s hands pressed against it from the inside.’

‘’Actual’’ ghosts and the ghostly presence of the past form a wailing Chorus. Ghostly feelings, unfulfilled wishes and what ifs cast a heavy shadow. And then there is the sea. Always the sea. A friend and a foe. A companion and a reminder of our mortality, of how tiny and unimportant we actually are.

A collection that is extremely difficult to describe. Give it time, be patient and let it haunt you. You won’t regret it…

‘’I even started drawing this book for kids, about a man who forgets where he lives and just wanders around from door to door, knocking. Sometimes people let him in but mostly they don’t.’’

My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com

She spent a long time finding the right spot -- the correct angle of light, complicated colours, something to frame the shots with in the background. Then she set up the tripod, selected a lens, attached it and set the aperture and focus. And then waited. And waited. [ . . . ] Why did she do this? [ . . . ] But she knew why. She could remember exactly why, even now. For the way time seemed to slow down and stretch, measured in the river's ripples rather than by clocks and mealtimes. For the invisibility. For the hush. To forget. To make some sort of record -- but of what she wasn't sure exactly. To notice things she wouldn't otherwise have noticed: dragonflies hunting, the patterns of light, the specific way that water poured over a dipper's back. (page 124)

It has been thirteen years since Ada has seen the house on the river where she grew up alone with her mother, Pearl. Now she has returned with Pepper, her six-year-old daughter, to this damp and derelict place, but--as she's quick to point out to local folk--she's only here to settle her mother's affairs, sell the house, and move on as soon as possible.

The first thing Ada and Pepper do is to scatter Pearl's ashes on the water. Pearl, however, is not ready to leave. There are things she, too, needs to settle. A watery, elemental spirit, she creeps from the river and makes her presence known to her daughter and granddaughter up at the house. She recognizes now how isolated and confused her life had been in those final months. Sinking into a form of dementia, in part from lack of society, she had refused to answer the phone or even respond to knocks at the door. Luke, her closest neighbour, had kept an eye out for her, accompanying her to the hospital when her wrists and fingers could no longer flex to perform the jewelry and watch repairs that had earned her a meager living. Now she needs to be with the remaining two members of her family before taking final leave.

Pearl's appearance does not startle or unsettle Ada or Pepper. She guides her granddaughter in the use of the camera left behind and encourages her interest in the birds that live on and near the river. Pearl's artistic passion for the creatures is evident in the framed photographs that line the lower hallway of the house. To Ada, Pearl communicates her understanding that the life they lived beside the river was isolated, unusual, and difficult. She knows why her daughter decided to leave. There is no bitterness.

Determined though Ada is to clear out Pearl's things and sort through all the paperwork expeditiously, the house has other ideas, raising endless impediments. Just keeping herself and her daughter warm, fed, and clean is a time-intensive business for Ada. The house has a primitive heating system that involves feeding wood into a boiler for heat and warm water. Due to disrepair and turbulent weather (rain, hail, and snow) the power and telephone service are frequently down. The nearest shop is some distance away, and Pearl's rusty old car is hardly reliable. Coping with the place and weathering the ongoing fall and winter storms make Ada appreciate the hardships her mother faced. She also comes to terms with her guilt about not returning earlier to see Pearl before her death.

News spreads quickly that Ada is back, and she finds herself working at the local pub, something she did as a younger woman. An excellent and creative cook, she is soon in some demand at the establishment, and the money is helpful. She is attracted to a sympathetic younger man who assists her with repairs to the house. Quite naturally, it seems, she is becoming "embroiled" in exactly the ways she vowed she wouldn't be.

Wild storms, wind, rain, flooding--the elements--are powerful players in Lucy Wood's poetic novel. Like her mother before her, Ada is changed--weathered-- by her time in the rundown house near the "chuntering" river that muscles its way through the valley. So is Pepper.

Wood has written a highly atmospheric, impressive first novel. Having said that, I should add that it is not for everyone. First of all, there is not much of a plot here. Most of the book turns on how Ada and Pepper face the difficulties of living in a house so worn down by the elements. Furthermore, while the author does provide some of Pearl's backstory--telling how and why she first came to the house and how she felt about the place at the beginning--I would've liked to know more about the time before the isolated valley. I wish the author had offered this instead of dwelling quite so much on Pearl's end: how she is (almost cosmically) absorbed back into the larger, impersonal, natural world.

In the end, Weathering is not so much a novel of incident as an extended prose poem, albeit one with fully fleshed-out characters. I believe fans of Emily Bronte would like this book, as well as readers of Jon McGregor, who (I understand) has been a mentor to Wood. I look forward to seeing what she does next.

These were ok - actually two or three of them were very good. But most of them seemed like sketches. There was an unfinished quality about many of them. And although they are set in Cornwall, I really didn't get much a sense of place.
I'd still keep an eye out for her and see what she does next. i liked the magical elements that were key in many of the plots.

If you are looking for a plot-driven book, this isn't the read for you. If you are looking for a book that is action packed, this isn't the read for you. But, if you are interested in a book with strong character development, then this is a book you might like.

Pearl had a child late in life, that child Ada, grew up without a father when he suddenly left them behind when Ada was just a baby. That Child Ada, also grew up to have a fatherless child. Pepper is sensitive and seems to have a problematic learning disability.

The book is filled with page after page after page of the weather and the river located quite near Pearl's dilapidated, falling apart home.

When Ada scattered Pearl's ashes in the river, little did she know that her mother would return to haunt the house and communicate with Ada. Throughout the book Ada does not seem alarmed at all that her mother's spirit is restless.

As a wet fall turns to a winter of heavy snows, the roof leaks, the paper peals off the walls, and the dampness is ever pervasive. The lights flicker, the wood is wet and smoky, and layer after layer of clothing cannot take the chill out of the air.

Away from society, Pepper longs to sell the house and move along, but Pepper roams through the woods and watches others in the small hamlet.

Slowly, Ada meets local people. And, as a huge storm occurs, Pearl becomes more agitated as her ghostly form turns into the water of the river that pulls her into the swirling torrents and under neath to the bottom of the river where perhaps she can find peace.

Truly, I'm not sure how I feel about this book. The prose is poetic. But, the continual descriptions of the wind, the water, the snow, the cold and desolation filled page after page and page. And, the never ending chill was over the top.

Weathering is such a poetic, nuanced book. It is not plot heavy at all, so if you're big on plot, I suppose I wouldn't recommend it. The blurb and the way the book was marketing give expectations that will disappoint. This isn't a book that can be properly described or put into a genre.
But for those who like books that are more character focused, I find Weathering to be beautiful.
What I liked were the themes of nature, especially the river, which I think mirrored the spirit (so to speak) of Pearl, as well as her daughter Ada, and even Ada's daughter Pepper.
It was touching and real the way Lucy Wood showed the similarities between the three generations, and the writing really painted a vivid picture of the town and its residents.
It's a really calm book, not at all full of action.
The only thing that nagged at me really, was Pearl's ghost, and the way Ada could see her, but it was never shown as out of the ordinary, Ada never being alarmed by it, almost like if Pearl had been alive all along. That's stays unresolved, and so I took a star off the rating for that.
Vivid world building, strong characters, and the importance of the setting are what make this a great story.
But the ending, the ending and the last two paragraphs especially, tie the whole theme together, and is written so lyrically, it took my breath away.

This novel builds on the reputation Lucy Wood established with her short story collection Diving Belles. This book feels darker in tone, a family story set in an isolated and old fashioned house, and a location that shapes the lives of the family that live there - a mother and daughter who return to live there after her mother's death, and the grandmother whose ghostly presence is given equal weight. Brooding and atmospheric, full of startlingly vivid language.

I was immediately struck by the complete immersion that I felt into the worlds created in the 12 short stories of this collection. They're each a little bonkers in their own way, but the beauty and wistfulness of the language tames the bonkers down a bit. Two strong forces intertwining the stories in this collection - The Sea and Supernaturality. Either one or both of them appear in each story. After reading these, I desperately want to take a beach vacation, but wait until autumn. Seems more fitting to the mood of this collection.

More a collection of vignettes than short stories, an enthralling blend of realism and surrealism, moving easily and seamlessly from one to the other. The author has evoked Cornwall and her folklore, blending contemporary stories with just the right note of otherworldliness. A woman is turning to stone while house hunting with a boyfriend. A phantom wrecker--one who lured ships onto rocks and stole their cargoes--appears and occupies the house of a couple who has recently moved in. A mother has a phantom lover. Shapeshifting in a nursing home. House spirits watch over its charge, first empty then through the years of a family living there, then the house gradually empties again. Ghostly dogs on a nighttime moor, explored by father and daughter.

Unsettling but somehow hypnotic in its lyrical writing.

Highly recommended.

Three generations of women, all wanting a home, a place they feel they belong. Ada, arrives with her young daughter Pepper, back to the house she had left many years ago. Her mother Pearl has died, and she intends to stay only long enough to put the house in order, to sell.

When I first started reading this the prose was so lovely, almost haunting, dreamlike, it kept me reading, still wasn't sure how I felt about the story. The descriptions of the river that plays a crucial role in this novel, were amazing. The wildlife, descriptions of the house, that needs so much more work than even Ada realizes. Truthfully this is a slow burner of a book, a quiet seducer that creeps up on the reader. Not much happens, but what does is set against the surroundings, the town and pub, the few characters that live there.

Pearl comes back, kind of and tells her story, a sad one. Her love of photography which young Pepper will continue. At the end of Chapter 24, there is such a tender moment, it almost brought me to tears, just a few lines but for me it encapsulated what this novel is relating. Love shown in different ways, and where you least expect it whether for a person, nature or a home. Almost without realizing it I came to love this tender, exquisitely told story and all its characters.

ARC from Netgalley.

What a lovely collection of short stories! Wood takes old myths and legends from Cornwall and places them in more modern settings. The way she describes the landscape of Cornwall - the sea, the moors, the fields, the towns - transports the reader right to these places. And the stories themselves are fantastic; in the title story, wandering husbands get lured into the sea by mermaids, and the abandoned wives can pay a fee to go down in diving bells to get them back. In another story, two children play in a graveyard of ancient giant's bones. In another, a woman who can feel herself begin to turn into stone goes with her ex-boyfriend to look at a house in a snowstorm. In perhaps my favorite story in this collection, house spirits keep track of the comings and goings of its inhabitants throughout the years, making sure the lights are turned off and the carpets look nice.

A lot of these stories are presented without any real explanation or conclusion, and that makes them all the more powerful. It's as if these events actually happened in this mysterious land of Cornwall, and Wood is writing them down as history.½

This is a very promising debut collection of short stories, many of which seamlessly blend modern life with elements of Cornish folk-tales - full of imagination and very intriguing.

I have been spellbound by this beguiling and bewitching book; a book that speaks of mothers and daughters, of memories and ghosts, of the way people and places can hold us and form us, and of other thing – fundamental things – that I can’t quite put into words.

The story that the Lucy Wood spins is quite simple.

Ada has come home for the first time in thirteen years with her small daughter, Pepper, in tow. She didn’t really want to come, but her mother has did and it has fallen to her to go through her mother’s things and to clear the house. She had nowhere in particular to go back to, she has nowhere in particular to move on to, but she doesn’t plan to stay.

The house lies deep in a valley that has been carved out by a great river; a river that is replenished by rain that never seems to stop.

The house is dilapidated, it is isolated, and it has no home comforts. Ada just wants to do what she has to do and then go.

But so many things say that she should stay.

Pepper has never had a place to call home and she is captivated by the house full of relics of her grandmother’s life, by the power and the beauty of the river, and by the small community that welcomes her.

Pearl, Ada’s mother, hasn’t quite left the place that was her home for so long, and her spirit rises up from the river that has claimed her to reclaim her place in the lives and the memories of her daughter and her granddaughter.

And even Ada herself begins to wonder as she recalls and begins to understand the past and as she is drawn back into the life of the world that she thought she had left behind thirteen years earlier.

All of this happens in one time and in one place, but the story is timeless and it could play out anywhere in the world.

The world that Lucy Wood creates lives and breathes; and it’s a world where nature is very, very close. I could feel the rain; I could hear the river. The river and all of the life in and around it has much of a place as the people who move through the story.

The story ebbs and flows, it moves backwards and forwards in time, and it works beautifully. One every page there’s an image, an idea, or a memory, and this is a book to read slowly, so that you can pause and appreciate every one. And so that you can appreciate how profoundly this novel speaks of mothers and daughter, how our relationships and the roles that we play evolve, how our understanding of each other and the world around us change overtime.

The emotional intensity, the clarity and the beauty of the writing is so wonderful. I loved Lucy Wood’s voice when I read her short stories, and it was so lovely to recognise it as soon as I opened this book and started to read. Her voice is distinctive and her prose is glorious and utterly, utterly readable.

This book explores themes that are close to my heart; I love it for that and I love it for its artistry.

I’ve read comparisons to authors like Angela Carter and Margaret Atwood. I understand them, I think they’re fair, but I also think that that Lucy Wood isn’t quite like anybody else.

I think – I hope – that one day she will be held as much as esteem as they are.

I’ll be very disappointed if I don’t see Lucy Wood’s name when literary prizes are awarded later in this year.

I know I’m not wholly objective, but I really do think that this book is in that class.

Lucy Wood’s debut short story collection is haunting, dreamy, and so, so beautiful. I’m not familiar with Cornish folklore, but my understanding is that each of these stories involves some aspect of this folklore, from wisht hounds to droll tellers, husband-stealing mermaids to buccas. Now, let me stop you before you decide, “I don’t know what any of those things are, so I don’t care to read this.” It doesn’t matter. You will be so fascinated and curious that you will spend hours reading up on Cornish folklore, and you will love it.

The stories in this collection feature a woman who goes under the sea in a diving bell to retrieve her husband, who was taken by the mermaids many years before; a woman who feels herself turning to slowly to stone and knows she will soon stand atop a cliff over the sea with the other stone people; a nursing home for witches; a story told from the perspective of the spirits inhabiting a house; a wishing tree; a boy searching for his father in a giant’s boneyard; and a wrecker telling stories of an underwater town.

I’m pretty sure Lucy Wood is actually a will-o’-the-wisp herself, because she has this crazy mythological ability to draw you relentlessly, helplessly off the beaten path and into the wild moors of her imagination. I really loved the way she weaves together folklore and reality in an absorbing, dreamy, whimsical way. She is a wonderful talent, and her words made me feel the mournful damp of the moors, hear the pulsing surf, and taste the salt in the sea air. Her stories have a strong voice and a cohesive tone throughout the collection.

Diving Belles is a gorgeous, surreal collection of stories merging modern life and Cornish folklore. Although short story collections are perfect for savoring, I couldn’t put this book down, and I read it over a span of 30 hours. I needed full immersion in these murky, maritime stories! Do yourself a favor and dive into these beauties headfirst. But take a deep breath first, because you’ll never want to surface.

Read the full review at Books Speak Volumes.

Magical, mythical, a little quirky, sometimes creepy, and just plain fun!

Diving Belles, an engaging new short story collection by Lucy Wood, grabbed me from the opening passage:
"Iris crossed her brittle ankles and folded her hands in her lap as the diving bell creaked and juddered towards the sea. At first, she could hear Demelza shouting and cursing as she cranked the winch, but the as bell was cantilevered away from the deck her voice was lost in the wind. Cold air rushed through the open bottom of the bell, bringing with it the rusty smell of The Matriarch's liver-spotted flanks and the brackish damp of seaweed. The bench Iris was sitting on was narrow and every time the diving bell rocked she pressed against the footrest to steady herself. She kept imagining that she was inside a church bell and that she was the clapper about to ring out loudly into the water, announcing something. She fixed her eyes on the small window and didn't look down. There was no floor beneath her feet, just a wide open gap and the sea peaked and spat. She lurched downwards slowly, metres away from the side of the trawler, where a layer of barnacles and mussels clung on like the survivors of a shipwreck."

The collection features women turning to stone, husbands disappearing with mermaids, a house with an attitude, leprechauns, and more. It's no wonder Wood has been compared to Angela Carter. My natural tendency is to breeze through a collection like this in a single day, and a peaceful hotel balcony in Lake Placid proved to be an ideal reading spot. However, I'd recommend that you dole the stories out over several days, or even a week, instead. You'll enjoy returning to Lucy Wood's wonderfully weird world again and again.

Whimsical, magical, and full of wonder, Wood’s stories beguile the reader into a version of England’s foggy Cornwall coast in which the unexpected not only can happen but usually does. Characters in these stories live side by side with creatures out of mythology, sometimes becoming those creatures themselves. In the title story, staying husbands have become mermen and their wives must brave the depths to bring them home. In Countless Stones, a young woman helps a former lover as he house-hunts while slowing and inexorably turning to stone. In another stand-out story, Of Mothers and Little People, a daughter discovers that her mother is a fully-formed human being in her own right, with secret joys that daughters seldom imagine in their parents—in this case, a faery lover.

These are truly grown-up fairy tales, with touches of magical realism and outright enchantment never obscuring the very real stories and characters underneath. There are few easy answers or pat morals in these fairy stories.½

"Wood blurs the line between reality and myth taking many of her cues from Cornish folklore."
read more:http://likeiamfeasting.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/diving-belles-lucy-wood.html

My full response to this collection appears here, at Buried In Print.

Whimsical and lyrical: Lucy Wood's short stories will touch the curious and sensitive reader who is willing to believe.

If you like your stories to be rooted in realism, Diving Belles is not for you, but if you enjoy discovering the extraordinary in the ordinary, these stories will certainly satisfy.

Take this bit, from "Lights in Other People's Houses":

"His skin looked waxy, almost blue in places and she knew immediately that he was a ghost by the strange restlessness he'd brought with him into the room, a restlessness and a clamouring, as if he had disturbed a colony of nesting seabirds."

A colony of nesting seabirds?

Sure, we can all picture that.

(Especially those who share an experience of the author's Cornwall.)

Though not all readers will want to spend time, even on the page, with a restless ghost; the stories that Lucy Wood tells are populated by the unexpected.

In Lucy Wood's worlds, standing stones can move.

"There were fifteen stones there, but the number changed all the time. Some of them looked new, others were covered in lichen, which was white and webbed and looked as if the snow were creeping up the stone." (Countless Stones)

Standing stones? If you shut your eyes, you can imagine the scene. In Lucy Wood's stories, these scenes are vitally important.

In "The Giant's Boneyard":

"Nothing moved across the moor except the rain, which appeared as suddenly and soundlessly as a face pressed against a window."

And, in "Wisht":

"Most nights she heard the wisht hounds howling across the moor, maybe following her father, maybe further away than she thought."

Catch that note of anticipation? That's not unusual. Take the opening of a segment in "Beachcombing": "This was going to be a summer of storms and no doubt about it."

And, quite often, the stories revolve around a particularly dramatic event, a pure moment of change.

Occasionally, this is apparent from the story's opening, as is the case with "Lights in Other People's Houses": "The morning the wrecker appeared was the hottest so far."

Although sometimes the action quietly builds throughout the story, as with "Diving Belles":

"Demelza was sure there would be a sighting. She said that she'd recorded a lot more movement around the wreck in the past few days, but to Iris it seemed as empty and lonely as ever."

And that note of loneliness? It's a recurring theme as well, although the gaps between people can be bridged, just as the gaps between worlds, in these stories, can also be crossed.

"When she places her hand on the small of her back to guide you downstairs, towards the kettle, towards your favourite biscuits, you feel your own loneliness banished, you feel saved, which you don't think is exactly the right way around. It isn't exactly as you planned it. But in any case, you have arrived." (Of Mothers and Little People)

Stories for willing believers.

Here is, essentially, my experience with this book: one) I thought, 'awww, funky cute cover!'; two) I flipped to the back and thought, 'awww, cute author!'; three) I opened the book and read the first few stories and thought, 'ohhellyeah!'.

I raced through this slender volume in a day -- managing three stories on my commute, two at lunch, three before dinner, the rest after dinner -- and while I probably should have moved a little more slowly -- savored -- I didn't want to stop swimming in Wood's world of invisible lovers, sentient houses, hungry oceans, and unending damp. I suppose my only complaint is that while the stories are very atmospheric and very moody, there's some bite missing. Wood beautifully evokes the claustrophobic and maddening sense of her scenarios, but ends the stories just as we've acclimated. I finished many of her stories bemused, or sad, or curious -- but never with the shattering sense of unease that makes my skin crawl, like when I read Aimee Bender or Angela Carter.

BBC Radio 4 Extra did a reading series of her stories, so if you want to get a sense of her writing, be sure to give them a listen. The five stories featured were among my favorites -- they feature Wood's deliciously damp settings (literally, in some cases!) and quirky, paranormal-y, magical realism-y plots.

A perfect summer escape, if you're in a funk or want something less sunny to dip into, easy stories with dark soul -- because we all have those moments!

“Diving Belles” is the first book by Wood, but it doesn’t seem like it. She writes with a maturity that is rare in a new author.

These short stories are set in her native Cornwall, and the sea plays a part in some of the tales. A long dead ship wrecker takes up residence in a young couple’s house, bringing salt and sand and shells in with him. A woman deals with her guilt over her husband’s and son’s deaths by giving up most everything and living in a cave on the shore. Husbands leave home to become mermen. Not all the stories are of the sea, though, but they all deal with the paranormal world- but with the most everyday manner. We see the inhabitants of a house through the eyes of the house itself. An assisted living home specializes in magical beings. An unimaginably old droll teller (a Cornish wandering story teller) finds himself forgetting the historical things that have happened in the town even though he personally saw them.

I’ve seen some reviewers likening Wood to Angela Carter, but I disagree. Carter’s work frequently had a bloody mindedness to it that Wood’s lacks. I’d say she was most like Alice Hoffman, but, really, she is not a copy of anyone. Highly recommended for anyone who likes some surrealism and magical realism with their literary fiction.

Often the books you love are the most difficult to write about.

How do you capture just what makes them so very, very magical?

Diving Belles is one of those books.

It hold twelve short stories.

Contemporary stories that are somehow timeless. Because they are suffused with the spirit of Cornwall, the thing that I can’t capture in words that makes the place where I was born so very, very magical.

Lucy Wood so clearly understands what it is about the sea, what it is is about the moorland. The beauty, the power, the mystery… I don’t have the words, but she does.

And she threads all of this through scenes from contemporary life. She catches turning points, moments to remember, stories that should be retold.

There’s a pinch of magic too.

So one woman may travel in a diving bell to bring home a husband lost at sea. And another may be called back home when spirit of the sea permeates her inland home.

It feels strange, it feels other-worldly, and yet it feels utterly real.

I was unsettled and I was enraptured.

I turned the pages back and forth, not wanting to leave, and because there was something elusive that I couldn’t quite hold on to.

Such lovely writing, and such a wonderful spirit.

An extraordinary debut.

I am struggling for words but, make no mistake, I am smitten.