#BookReview ‘Widowland’ by C.J Carey

About the book…

An alternative history with a strong feminist twist, perfect for fans of Robert Harris’ Fatherland, C. J. Sansom’s Dominion and the dystopian novels of Margaret Atwood

To control the past, they edited history. To control the future, they edited literature.

London, 1953, Coronation year – but not the Coronation of Elizabeth II.

Thirteen years have passed since a Grand Alliance between Great Britain and Germany was formalized. George VI and his family have been murdered and Edward VIII rules as King. Yet, in practice, all power is vested in Alfred Rosenberg, Britain’s Protector. Britain is the perfect petri dish for the ideal society, and the role and status of women is Roseberg’s particular interest. Under the Rosenberg regulations women are divided into a number of castes according to age, heritage, reproductive status and physical characteristics.

Rose belongs to the elite caste of Gelis. She works at the Ministry of Culture rewriting literature to correct the views of the past. She has been charged with making Jane Eyre more submissive, Elizabeth Bennet less feisty and Dorothea Brooke less intelligent. One morning she is summoned to the Cultural Commissioner’s office and given a special task.

Outbreaks of insurgency have been seen across the country. Graffiti has been daubed on public buildings. Disturbingly, the graffiti is made up of lines from famous works, subversive lines from the voices of women. Suspicion has fallen on Widowland, the run down slums inhabited by childless women over fifty, the lowest caste. These women are known to be mutinous, for they seem to have lost their fear. Before the Leader arrives for the Coronation ceremony, Rose must infiltrate Widowland and find the source of this rebellion.

But as she begins to investigate, she discovers something that could change the protectorate forever, and in the process change herself.

Huge thanks to Milly Reid for inviting me to join the publication day blog blast for ‘Widowland’ by C.J Carey, out in e-book and hardcover formats from Quercus Books! And thank you for my gifted e-book review copy from which I have untangled my honest, but possibly poorly written, opinion! It’s so hard when a book hits you with such emotional resonance to find the words when you just want to say ‘Do yourself a favour and get a copy’.

In an alternative to what we know as the 1950’s, Edward VIII is marrying Wallis Simpson, the book opens with the coronation ceremony and the sense of tangible excitement as a television is wheeled in for all in the Ministry of Culture to witness this historic moment.

When you realise that it is not our queen, and to all intents and purposes her lineage has been ended, the impact on the reader and the society of the UK is immensely sobering. In a clever and thrilling yet deceptively simple swap, CJ Carey has not only removed the longest serving monarch in British history, she also forces us to re-examine her effect on the way women are viewed through a political, historical and societal lens.

For here we have a society where women outnumber men, thereby ‘necessitating’ a means of control, a divide and conquer rationale if you will, which includes the banishment of older, childless women to a barren (pun intended) wasteland.

It is here that our protagonist, Rose, whose purpose is to rewrite books with feisty heroines to make them more subservient, is sent undercover in order to spy on this rogue group of women who hold fast to the those literary heroines, the ones that stood their ground and became beacons of choice and hope.

The appropriately named heroine- ‘rose’ as a verb as well as implying the blooming or blossoming of consciousness-leaps from elite class to outcast and as she sees the way that these women have elected to step outside the norm, to be their own person, will she betray the women she has been sent to spy on? How far will she go to retain the status quo which keeps her trapped?

This is a brilliantly executed and moving novel with the added poignance of the author’s widowhood, parallel with the Queen, so recently bereaved. It throughs into significance the way that the function of women becomes almost invisible once they enter the menopausal arena (and I call it that because it feels like a daily battle) and are no longer perceived as of value.

Their voices are shut down, the fight to retain youthfulness is on, to keep a semblance of desirability and to straddle that no (wo)man’s land that so many seem to be stranded in (Is she 40?50? 60? Was she blessed with great genes or maybe it’s Maybelline?)

Once reproductive function has gone, it seems that women are discarded or intended to be the ones looking after the next generation -the granny/nanny debate.

So much in this novel resonated hard and fast with me-as someone has grown up with a perception of girls as pointless, useless and there to be seen and not heard (from my mother!) and who is now the proud mum of 5 wonderful and very fearsome daughters, I can absolutely appreciate the way that heroines from books were very much figures that have been in my head and heart since childhood. The influence of books and the implication that they lead to insurrection and dangerous think is not a new one but the way that this written, and brilliantly imagined, hit home so much more than novels like ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’, in this reader’s humble opinion (I never could get on with Margaret Atwood, sorry it just never really gripped me).

Hugely moving, very much recommended and leaving the reader pondering over so many things after reading, ‘Widowland’ is one of those special books that you will find yourself recommending over the coming years.

About the author…

C.J Carey is a pseudonym for author Jane Thynne who wrote ‘Widowland’ as a response to her early widowhood from author Phillip Kerr.

Jane Thynne was born in Venezuela and educated in London. She graduated from Oxford University with a degree in English and joined the BBC as a journalist.

She has also worked at The Sunday Times, The Daily Telegraph and The Independent, as well as for numerous British magazines. She appears as a broadcaster on Radio 4 and Sky TV. Jane has three children and lives in London.

Links-http://www.janethynne.com/

Twitter @QuercusBooks @JaneThynne