Two novels of interest

Hide Me Among the Graves, by Tim Powers

Restoration, by Olaf Olafsson

This is the second Tim Powers novel I’ve read this year.  If you’d told me I’d be reading a book set in London in the mid-nineteenth century, featuring Christina Rossetti (author of  In the Bleak Midwinter), her brother Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and the poet Algernon Swinburne, I’d have been intrigued.  If you had added that there were vampires, I’d have said, “I don’t think so!”  But after reading the author’s Declare, and on the strength of a recommendation from Happy Catholic, I tackled this book.  It’s rather long, over 500 pages, and not always easy going, but well worth the time.  Tim Powers gives depth to the supernatural happenings in the novel that transcend the sensational horror genre and make this a serious novel that explores our attraction to evil and our reluctance to sever all ties to it.  He creates a London in which ghosts and ancient spirits seeking to gain power seem perfectly ‘normal’.  I recommend this without hesitation.

I picked up Restoration at the library with no prior knowledge.  It is set in Italy in World War II, and weaves together the stories of Alice Orsini, mistress of a rural estate north of Rome, and Kristin Jonsdottir, a talented art restorer who takes shelter there.  Each has her secrets and her regrets.   The secrets intertwine, but are not the main focus of the novel.  We see how the war brutally disrupts the quiet life of the estate and we witness Alice’s strength in caring for orphaned children and the farmers on her land. I enjoyed this novel.  3 star (out of five).