{"id":5136,"date":"2014-05-15T10:50:03","date_gmt":"2014-05-15T10:50:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=5136"},"modified":"2014-05-19T11:20:04","modified_gmt":"2014-05-19T11:20:04","slug":"frog-music-by-emma-donoghue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=5136","title":{"rendered":"Frog Music by Emma Donoghue"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Published by Picador 31 March 2014\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

403pp, hardback, \u00a316.99<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reviewed by Lucy Yates<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

We\u2019re in San Francisco in 1876 and life in Emma Donoghue\u2019s eighth novel is hazardous. If smallpox, earthquakes or neglectful baby farms don\u2019t get you, then shotgun blasts through an open window will. The latter is what kills Jenny, a cross-dressing frog catcher, at the start of this unusual novel, leaving her friend Blanche frightened for her life and desperate to find the murderer. The prime suspect is Blanche\u2019s ex-lover, Arthur, who is also suspected of abducting her son.<\/p>\n

On her recent book tour of the UK, Donoghue described Frog Music<\/em> as her attempt at crime fiction but the novel both frustrates and transcends this genre. The action is hamstrung by the fact that Blanche, an exotic dancer at the House of Mirrors, is essentially passive in her quest for Jenny\u2019s killer. Donoghue has tried to mask this by including lengthy passages of deliberation where Blanche recasts events in her thoughts and often tries to alter their weight and significance in order to create forward momentum, but ultimately this doesn\u2019t convince. Despite this flaw, however, Donoghue\u2019s unique talent \u2013 her voice and flair for vivid, original description \u2013 compels you to stay in her world.<\/p>\n

The characters in Frog Music<\/em> are highly engaging, each one appropriately complex and rounded: Blanche is thoroughly sympathetic, despite being that most abused literary creation \u2013 a good-natured whore \u2013 while Jenny, engaging and infuriating by turns, is charismatic. Arthur and his friend, the hairy-backed Ernest, are so convincing as charming playboy gamblers that it take a while for the reader to register, in the same way that Blanche deceives herself, that they are leeches, living off her. Donoghue shows her real lightness of touch in the skilful evocation of Pet\u2019t, Blanche\u2019s damaged son, whose mistreatment at a baby farm means he will only show affection towards a wooden doorknob.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard not be beguiled by this cast but the coda Donoghue add to the end of the novel to inform the reader that Blanche lived for less than a year after rescuing her son is a mistake, giving a glimpse of a far more poignant ending than she has managed to conjure with her simple description of Blanche\u2019s departure from San Francisco. Ultimately Frog Music <\/em>ends with a croak rather than the swelling chorus a work of such potential deserves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Lucy Yates<\/p>\n

The characters in Frog Music<\/em> are highly engaging, each one appropriately complex and rounded: Blanche is thoroughly sympathetic, despite being that most abused literary creation \u2013 a good-natured whore \u2013 while Jenny, engaging and infuriating by turns, is charismatic. Arthur and his friend, the hairy-backed Ernest, are so convincing as charming playboy gamblers that it take a while for the reader to register, in the same way that Blanche deceives herself, that they are leeches […] in Reviews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-fiction-and-non-fiction","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5136"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5136\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5142,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5136\/revisions\/5142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}