When Persephone Books used to mail out a paper catalog of their entire backlist of books I would study it. Literally. Read it through from front to back. Dog ear pages noting books that had caught my eye. Plan my next order, which was always far too big and had to be whittled down. I still have almost all my catalogs, and while all books can found on their website, it's still a pleasure to browse their paper catalog. I thought I had all but memorized every author they publish, or at least had a familiarity of them and could recognize titles and stories.
So after reading Norah Hoult's 1938 story, "Nine Years is a Long Time", I'm a little surprised I didn't take firmer note of her. I'm going back to my catalog, I think, for a refresher. Truly there are still hidden gems within Persephone's backlist that need to be mined. What I like about Norah Hoult is the unexpectedness of her story. She really surprises me. It makes me sit up and take notice now and sparks my curiosity to learn more. Have I made you curious, too?
You never quite know what to expect with a short story. Titles often are not very revealing of content and it takes a little time to orient yourself to what's happening. As each character is introduced and the action begins to play out you form a picture in your mind of what's happening, what's not happening, and how each character relates one to the other. I'm sure I come to each story with a certain set of preconceived notions--based on the period the story was written, who publishes the story and and my own very general expectations. So when an author throws you for a loop, doing the unexpected (and so matter-of-factly) I am indeed very impressed.
Norah Hoult was an Irish author, though she was orphaned young and went to England to study and live. She began her career as a journalist, moved on to magazine work and then finally took to writing full time after the publication of her first book, Poor Women in 1928. She was quite prolific, publishing twenty-five books in her lifetime. Sadly all but There Were No Windows (Persephone Book #59) seems to be out of print.
"Nine Years is a Long Time" begins rather cryptically and it takes some piecing together to fully understand just what's really happening in the story and what the ramifications are. I thought it quite clever. A woman (of a certain age) mourns the disappearance from her life of a man who has been quite close to her.
"It wasn't until October was well under way that she began to wonder that she had no word from him. Even then she didn't actually worry. He had probably gone on some business trip. Men in good position, like he certainly was, often went away on business looking after his affairs. He might have gone back to London: he was a member of some small club there. That she did know, for he'd let out one day something about an important call being put through to his club in town, and he had to return Rotherfield sooner than he had expected."
What is the relationship between the story's narrator and this man? What happened to him? It's presented almost mysteriously. Hoult feeds the reader information, sometimes little teasers and other times revelatory observations and facts until what is going on in the story is not just surprising but maybe even a little shocking considering when it was published. Not unexpectedly this is a story of the seemingly quiet domestic world of women, but it is also a story with a twist.
I, too, am being purposely cryptic for to give away too many details would spoil the fun of the reader's discovery of how characters and actions are interconnected. If you read "Nine Years is a Long Time" you've have that small moment of an epiphany, too and then all that came before suddenly becomes quite clear. I like Hoult for doing what you don't expect her to do.
As next week's story is very short, I think I'll be pairing it with the story that comes after. So, next up both Angelica Gibbs and Helen Hull. And with these two stories I'll finally be arriving in the 1940s (the stories are arranged chronologically by their publication date). By the way, I am quickly approaching the midway mark in the book. Yes, it is a chunky collection (all the better and a bargain for your money), and I continue to enjoy the varied stories. I may be an awful poetry reader, but I do enjoy a good short story.