The Spare Room--Helen Garner

I have finished my first book of the decade, and I could wish that it had been some other.  Not that this isn't a superb, compact, beautiful, and harrowing book.  It is.  In every respect it is well composed and beautiful executed. However, it is the kind of book that fills me with anxiety and dread--and I can't really say why--only that for me it is so.

A synopsis: Helen invites her friend Nicola to stay with her during a short three-week stint at an alternative cancer treatment clinic.  Mayhem, but not hilarity ensues.  Helen needs to come to terms with both Nicola, and in some sense Helen.  And she does. 

The book is filled with anger--anger that stems ultimately from fear.  Helen is terrified that Nicola may die while she is staying with Helen.  This is never directly voiced, but it is the subtext of nearly everything that happens in the novel.  Ultimately, anger of this sort stems only from the deepest and most fast-rooted fears--and so the book also invokes (and for some like me provokes) a deep anxiety.

The book is beautifully written--simple, spare, almost poetry.  But I had no notes from it.  There was nothing in the prose that caused me to pause for a moment and consider how well-said it was.  There was nothing that stunned me in the arc of the story.  That is fine.  Not every story will or must.  Not every story has something new and different to say.  This is the story of two friends going through a terrible time together--two friends who might be torn apart by the experience.

While I do recommend the book as book a good read and a quick one, it is not with the enthusiasm I have experienced elsewhere.  In this case it is most definitively NOT the fault of the book, but of me and my mood.  I do not care much for books that provoke this sort of bone-deep anxiety. My hesitation and reservation have nothing whatsoever to do with the quality of the book and everything to do with the qualities of the reader.

**** recommended