Can people ever move on? Elinor is vexed by precisely that question; perhaps Barker, given how long she has now dwelt on and in wartime, is beginning to feel the same way. Yet her prose remains fresh, humanely business-like, crisp and unsentimental.
Images are scrupulously vivid, and the plot has real momentum. One strength of her writing, suggested by her title, is the description of spaces and buildings — including the cathedral-like structures of the dissected human body. For instance, when Toby talks to Elinor about an anatomy course, he says: Would two English people have used this American slang word as early as ? Although people sometimes laugh, it is usually in pain or by accident.
It has also to do with her central character. There is little sense of disagreement between heroine and narrator, no ironic ripple travelling from one to the other and back again. Elinor returns to London, still disgusted with Toby and herself. She is distracted in her studies, which is noted by Tonks, her intimidating teacher at Slade.
She begins an anatomy class at the teaching hospital to improve her skills. She is not repelled by this, but the situation is still awkward as Toby, a medical student, was going to tutor her in anatomy, but now a distance has grown between them. This rift is solved by Toby's becoming very ill and ignoring his health while studying for his finals.
Elinor nurses him, they both keep the incident from their family, and they mend their relationship somewhat. In the midst of the First World War, Elinor has returned to the family home.
She has the feeling that Toby, a medical officer at the front in France, will not return home. Several weeks later they find out he is "Missing, believed killed. Finding out that another former Slade student, Kit Neville, served under her brother, she writes to him to find out what happened, but he doesn't reply, which makes her think that there is something more to the story of her brother's death.
She seeks the help of her former Slade lover Paul Tarrant, wounded in battle, and best friend Catherine, to find out what really happened to Toby, no matter what the truth is. They find Neville at The Queen's Hospital, Sidcup , a hospital that exclusively treats facial wounds, and it is also where Tonks is working, using his skills as an artist to depict the wounds, and recovery through surgery pioneered by Harold Gillies , of the injured soldiers hospitalised there.
Jul 02, Pages. Oct 02, Pages.
A masterfully written World War I-era novel about the secrets between a brother and sister, from the Booker Prize-winning author of the Regeneration Trilogy. It is , and Elinor Brooke, a young painter, is studying art in London while her beloved brother Toby serves on the front as a medical officer. When Toby goes missing and is presumed dead, the devastated Elinor refuses to accept it. But Kit has been horribly disfigured and is reeling from shell shock.
Elinor, an art student and one of the main characters of the book, attends anatomy class together with medical students, and studies it by slowly dissecting a body of an unknown man during a period of a few months, until there is nothing left of it but bones. Barker is, as ever, looking at the human response to traumatic events. Dec 30, Bridget rated it liked it. View all 4 comments. I felt moved by the immense courage of the soldiers, and feel that the author writes both authoritatively and compassionately about the mental and physical scars of war.
While Elinor tries to piece together the mystery of what happened to her brother, she uses her drawing skills to aid in the surgical reconstruction of those who have suffered unspeakable losses—of their faces, their memories, their very minds. This indelible portrait of a family torn apart by war focuses on Toby Brooke, a medical student, and his younger sister Elinor.
Enmeshed in a web of complicated family relationships, Elinor and Toby are close: But when World War I begins, Toby is posted to the front as a medical officer while Elinor stays in London to continue her fine art studies at the Slade, under the tutelage of Professor Henry Tonks.
There, in a startling development based in actual fact, Elinor finds that her drafting skills are deployed to aid in the literal reconstruction of those maimed in combat.