Well, this Six Degrees I am in the wilds of north Queensland, somewhere in Cape York. I scheduled this two weeks ago, as I was expecting reception to be poor. I hope to visit your chains, but if I don’t for a few days, you will know why! Now, let’s just get going … but first, if you don’t know how the #SixDegrees meme works, please check Kate’s blog – booksaremyfavouriteandbest.
The first rule is that Kate sets our starting book. This month again, it’s a book I haven’t read, Miranda July’s latest novel, All fours, which has been listed for this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction. It tells of a semifamous artist who plans to drive cross-country, from LA to New York, but who twenty minutes after leaving her husband and child at home, exits the freeway, checks into a nondescript motel, and starts a new life.
My first thought was to link to Anne Tyler’s Ladder of years about a married woman who ups and leaves, on a whim, and starts a new life. But I’ve not reviewed it on my blog, so think again! How about another novel about a woman who goes on a life-changing journey, Glenda Guest’s, A week in the life of Cassandra Aberline (my review). Cassandra has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and she needs to return to her past home to resolve some unrevealed issue.
My next link is draws on the journey theme – that also has a health-related aspect – Raynor Winn’s memoir, The salt path (my review), which sees a newly homeless couple, one with a newly diagnosed degenerative disease taking on England’s South West Coast Path. It’s not only an inspiring story, but it contains some gorgeous nature writing.
Another memoir that draws on nature in a way that brings spiritual renewal to the memoirist, is Helen McDonald’s H is for hawk (my review). Both Raynor and Moth Winn, and Helen Macdonald suffer sudden loss – for Raynor and Moth it’s their home and Moth’s health, while for Helen it’s her beloved father.
This is an obvious link, but I’m sticking with grief memoir for my fourth link. We are, however, returning to Australia, and the grief is for a daughter who died of a known disease, not a father who died suddenly. The book is Marion Halligan’s Words for Lucy (my review).
And now, I hope this is not cold-hearted, but we are moving from a memoir about a daughter’s death, to a novel which starts with a family gathering for the wedding of a daughter, Myfanwy Jones’ Cool water (my review). I am pleased to include this book in my chain because it is set in Far North Queensland, though somewhat south of where I am right now.
My final link is a nice, easy one – the last name of the author. The book is Gail Jones’ Salonika burning (my review) which is an historical novel set in World War 1 and was inspired by the lives of four real people, including Miles Franklin. Perhaps I could argue that it takes us back to Kate’s starting book because some of these characters set off from home with one plan and ended up doing something quite different.
Oh dear, none of this month’s books are by men, but two are by non-Australian writers, albeit both of those are English. Not much DEI (though that’s not the term we use in Australia, I have to say) here this month I’m afraid. I must rectify that for next month.
Have you read All fours and, regardless, what would you link to?
Whispering Gums 
Love H is for Hawk cover !!
Hmm … I did reply to this one, out in the wilds, but clearly the hawks took my answer off with them! I love that cover too MR.
Happy holidays, Sue.
The only book I’ve read on your chain is The Salt Path and I agree, the nature writing was sublime. Wondering if you’re surrounded by beautiful nature at present too, blue butterflies and lush, greenery.
Thanks Rose … yes, we did see some Ulysses butterflies in the Daintree. Wish we could have photographed them!
Hope you are having a great time away! What a great collection of books. I have All Fours on hold at the library and so this prompted to see where I am, in 3 months I have moved up 100 places and am now 42nd!
I also really want to read The Salt Path…
I wonder where you are now, Rach, in the queue! I hope it’s worth waiting for. It does sound interesting.
I am near the top – but I am in France, so I have cancelled my hold… lol – I should put it straight back on so that I am hopefully near the top again when I get home. I also have had to release Eurotrash… oh well, being in France has its own perks, so I am okay with missing out on a few books…
Haha, I’d say so. How long do you stay in France for. The southern winter?
Hopefully till mid to late August, but my mum is very ill, so I may well be home in a few weeks. She has a terminal illness and just started chemo. We will see 🙂
Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that Rach. I lost my Mum five years ago this month and I still miss her so much. I hope the chemo helps her live longer and comfortably.
Thank you and I am so sorry to hear about your mum too… hugs!
I recently saw the advertisement for The Salt Path movie and hadn’t realised that it was based on a book. I read Always Home, Always Homesick recently, and it also contains some beautiful descriptions of nature. I hope that you are enjoying your travels. I just came back from a brief stay at Kangaroo Valley – heaven.
We had a great trip Becky. But, I love Kangaroo Valley too. It’s a gorgeous part of the world isn’t it.
Have you seen The salt path? I didn’t think it did the book much of a favour at all. That’s often the case, but here, with its being a memoir, I expect them to have done a better job than they did (for some reason that perhaps is silly).
Hi Sue, All Fours nearly tore my book club apart: the person who chose it loved it, another loathed it; most of us were somewhere in between. Still not sure how I felt about it myself. As auto fiction, I’d probably link to Christos Tsiolkas’s 7 1/2 and take it from there. I loved H is for Hawk and Cool Water. Keen to see the film of The Salt Path—might have to read the book, too.
Oh my, Angela … that sounds amazing. I don’t think I’ll recommend it to mine then!
Have you seen The salt path? We saw it this week, and I was disappointed. I expected it to pick up something and run with it, and film it beautifully, but I didn’t feel it did – and I think that for people who haven’t read the book it would make little sense. Mr Gums had not read it and didn’t really get a lot out of it. I don’t blame him – and I don’t usually say that about an adaptation. Adaptations are tricky but can make a good film whether or not you agree that they’ve captured the original. I didn’t think this did. But the two actors were great.
A great chain, Sue: and it reminded me that I’ve been meaning to read the Salt Path as well as H is for Hawk. I didn’t think the wedding link cold–rather a change of mood from the heavier theme of grief that preceded.
Thanks Mallika – I’m glad you didn’t think I was cold-hearted!
And, I can recommend both those books if they ever fit into your schedule.
I have not read All Fours. In a local bookshop, I overheard a woman of roughly my age saying it was the raunchiest book she had ever read, and that (I think) she had blushed while reading it. It seemed to me that this spoke well for the restraint of her previous reading.
Anyway, on the theme of disappearance and reinvention, degree one is Lila by Marilynne Robinson. One could pick out more than one of Robinson’s novels with such a theme.
Degree two, as connected with Robinson’s work, is The Plot by Jean Hanff Korelitz.
Since much of The Plot takes place in New York, degree three is The Wicked Pavilion by Dawn Powell. One woman in particular is good at self-reinvention; unfortunately I can’t find the book just now to come up with her name.
Degree four, with characters largely from upstate New York though set in England, is Alison Lurie’s Foreign Affairs, in which women and men discover aspects of themselves not previously suspected.
Degree five (and it is a jump from New York to New Orleans) will be the novella Old Mortality by Katherine Anne Porter. A women (long dead) is reimagined over the years.
Degree six will be Rona Jaffe’s short story “Rima the Bird Girl”, about an American young woman with perhaps too great an ability for adaptation.
Love your opening salvo, George!
Lila is an interesting link. I am keen to read that novel/novella. I am still keen to read Dawn Powell whom you have recommended before and is on my list. I like the way you’ve developed the theme of reinvention here.
Fun links as always. Hope you are enjoying the wilds!
We did Stefanie … hence the very late response to this!
All Fours has been referenced in far too many corners of the literary world for me to NOT read it at this point, even though I had decided that Miranda July and I aren’t a match, but I haven’t gotten to it yet. I might have been inclined to connect to a novel by Lisa Taddeo, also an American writer, whose books have been similarly divisive with readers, for what-souond-like-similar reasons. Your comment about shifting from a funeral to a wedding made me laugh (so I guess we are BOTH cold-hearted then lol). And this is the first time that I read about Gail Jones and knew that you weren’t talking about GaYl Jones. Go, me. /eyeroll Enjoy your holiday!
I’ve read a couple of these – H is for Hawk, and A Week in the Life of Cassandra Aberline (which I adored!), and have the Gail Jones in my TBR. I’ve read a couple of Halligans, but not this one, and I remember really liking an early Myfanwy Jones novel but can’t remember what it was called – this one sounds good!
As for DEI, I beg to differ — it *is* a term used in Australia – or it has been in the past three jobs I’ve had here in WA. The organisation I work for now, in fact, runs DEI courses for hospitality managers and they are very popular.
Oh thanks Kimbofo. What happened to Glenda Guest I wonder? She wrote one or two before this and then seemed to disappear – but I must admit that I’ve written this without checking!
Re DEI, thanks too. It’s probably a case then of my having been out of the workforce and not being up on acronyms etc. I know the issue is big in employment but didn’t know we used DEI to describe.