{"id":7016,"date":"2016-12-22T07:30:33","date_gmt":"2016-12-22T07:30:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=7016"},"modified":"2016-12-23T12:14:37","modified_gmt":"2016-12-23T12:14:37","slug":"sandlands-by-rosy-thornton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=7016","title":{"rendered":"Sandlands by Rosy Thornton"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/sandlands1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-7018\" title=\"sandlands\" src=\"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/sandlands1-195x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"195\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/sandlands1-195x300.jpg 195w, http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/sandlands1.jpg 326w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 195px) 100vw, 195px\" \/><\/a>Published by Sandstone Press 21 July 2016<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>320pp, paperback, \u00a38.99<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Reviewed by Alison Burns<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/affiliates.abebooks.com\/c\/99367\/77798\/2029?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.abebooks.com%2Fservlet%2FSearchResults%3Fan%3Drosy%2Bthornton%26bi%3D0%26bx%3Doff%26ds%3D30%26servlet%3DImpactRadiusAffiliateLinkEntry%26sortby%3D17%26tn%3Dsandlands\">Click here to buy this book<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Layers of history, myth and superstition provide rich loam for novelist Rosy Thornton\u2019s first collection of short stories, all set in Suffolk.\u00a0 Her sandy landscape draws both eye and ear, as she weaves her tales of fatal passion, hauntings and nostalgic return.\u00a0 Butterfly-hunters, bell-ringers and archaeologists rub shoulders with the ghosts of wartime pilots, drowned fishermen, lost children.<\/p>\n<p>Thornton\u2019s canvas here may be a small one (the environs of one small parish, in the main), but the inner worlds she reveals are various and surprising.\u00a0 In \u2018High House\u2019, a charlady speaks kindly of her employer, Mr Napish, who is exercised about flood precautions:\u00a0 he understands the land, which outsiders (\u2018seedypuffs\u2019, just blowing through) always think is flat.\u00a0 In \u2018Silver-Studded Blues\u2019, a young museum curator explores the different meanings of the Latin word <em>curare <\/em>as he takes an elderly friend with dementia out for a walk with the dog.\u00a0 The fine story, \u2018Ringing Night\u2019, links childhood with extreme old age through the parish bells and two Jacks, one of whom is a girl.<\/p>\n<p>Mackerel and curlews and Martello towers provide specifically local narrative threads, rooting the characters as they work back and forth through their emotions.\u00a0 A level crossing, a pub, a place called Silly Hill\u00a0 &#8211;\u00a0 these could be anywhere in England, indeed anywhere at all.<\/p>\n<p>These are delightful, delicate, celebratory stories, indicative of a strong and unusual narrative imagination in the tradition of Jane Gardam, Rose Tremain and Barry Unsworth.\u00a0 This author\u2019s novels should be better known.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>*A 2016 Notable Book<\/p>\n<p>Reviewed by Alison Burns<\/p>\n<p>Thornton\u2019s canvas here may be a small one (the environs of one small parish, in the main), but the inner worlds she reveals are various and surprising.  In \u2018High House\u2019, a charlady speaks kindly of her employer, Mr Napish, who is exercised about flood precautions:  he understands the land, which outsiders (\u2018seedypuffs\u2019, just blowing through) always think is flat [&#8230;] 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":[18,19,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-fiction-and-non-fiction","category-notable-books","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7016","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=7016"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7053,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7016\/revisions\/7053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}