A PLACE IN THE HILLS - Book review

The novel A Place in the Hills is Michelle Paver’s second book, published in 2001.Though 523 pages, it’s a quick read. It’s a time-slip novel paralleling lives in Rome in 53 BC and in France in the 1980s.

It begins in 53BC in Rome during the festivities of the Day of Blood: ‘The air was thick with the smell of balsam and trampled roses, and the salty, metallic undertow of blood’ (p12). Among the crowds are a Roman officer, Gaius Cassius Vitalis, who is also renowned as a poet. His eye has caught the attractive figure of a young woman, Tacita, daughter of Publius Tacitus Silanus, one of the oldest clans in Rome. There is a mutual attraction, though a relationship is quite impossible due to their different stations in society. ‘One long look and I was brought down. She entered my blood.’

Then we briefly shift to 1972 in the French Pyrenees where Toni, eight-year-old daughter of archaeologist Charles Hunt is being bloody awkward, unlike her sister Caroline. Charles is determined to locate clues to back up his theory that the poet-soldier Cassius lived here, at the so-called Source. A book quotes Cassius writing ‘I know a place in the hills where the gods walk the earth’ (p334). In a lucid moment Toni realises that the only way she can win her father’s devotion is by becoming an archaeologist herself.

Next, we move to 1988 and meet a poor American, Patrick McMullan, who is joining his rich university friend Myles Cantellow. Myles is with Antonia Hunt, working on an archaeological site with her father, Charles. Also on the site is eight-year-old Modge (short for Imogen) and Antonia’s half-sister Nerissa.

Myles is not a likeable character. He ‘belonged to the fast set, which took hard drugs, was far too cool to do any work...’ (p51).

Against her father’s wishes, Antonia wanted to prove that Lycaris – the woman Cassius referred to in his love poems – ‘was not some dry poetic construct, but a living woman whom he had loved with all his heart’ (p365).

The dig is claustrophobic, passions are in conflict, there’s a love triangle, a misguided Modge who has a crush on Patrick, an intransigent father, and a tragedy that changes everything, and all seems lost for almost fourteen years.

The parallels between the past and the book’s present are mainly quite subtle – whether that’s a love-bite on Cassius’s neck, a piece of broken pottery in Tacita’s hand, or the convoluted relationships of the characters.

Perhaps there was too much gratuitous swearing. Despite that, the characters’ emotions and the (admittedly all-too brief) slices of ancient Rome are well realised. The writing style is good and Paver’s descriptions put you in many a scene.

And there’s a satisfying end.

 

SECRETS OF MALTA - Book review

 

Cecily Blench’s second historical novel Secrets of Malta was published in 2024. It is set in 1943, primarily in Malta but also in London, Tunisia and Egypt; there are flashbacks to Syria in 1926.

The dreadful plague of air-raids on Malta has lessened by now.

As the title suggests, the story involves intelligence activities of the Allies against the Axis forces. Dennis Pratchett is sent to Malta to root out a suspected mole in the intelligence community of Malta. ‘Chap called Morton runs our networks in North Africa and he’s got several operatives who go back and forth’ (p20). Pratchett’s senior, Sir Harold informs him the suspected agent was active in the last war and used the code-name Nero; and the man was believed to be responsible for a couple of murders in Europe before the war. The presence of Nero in Malta at this critical time is most serious – for reasons that will be explained in the book much later...

Margarita is a cabaret singer in Valletta; she has just ended an affair with Henry Dunn. Mrs Vera Dunn accosts Margarita in the night club and reveals that Henry has gone missing. There is no animosity between them; indeed, they seem sympathetic towards each other.

In 1926 Vera was one of four young archaeology students working on a dig in Syria for Professor Curzon. The relevance of these flashbacks only becomes significant as the book progresses.

Now, Margarita is courting a submarine officer, Arthur. Several submarines are involved in covert missions, landing spies in Tunisia, which was recently occupied by Axis forces.

The two women conduct their own investigations, and secrets are revealed...

Vera is a pragmatist: ‘Nothing does more to stimulate one’s sex drive than a war’ (p131).

The author has captured the period and the situation both in Malta, Tunisia and in Syria. Her characters provoke interest throughout. There were some clever misdirections, too; which only seems appropriate in a book about spying and deception!

Perhaps more could have been made of the awful destruction from the almost continuous bombing of 1942, and the stoic response of the inhabitants; but that’s a minor quibble.

I kept turning the pages; it was a quick read, made enjoyable because the setting was familiar.

Editorial comments:

‘Arthur had complained that Malta had no beaches, but Margarita had taken him to one of her swimming spots, where they swam off warm rocks...’ (p59). I’ve heard this nonsense before. There are plenty of sandy beaches on Malta!

There are a lot of ‘sighs’ and ‘sighing heavily’ – which do not detract from the reading pleasure; but perhaps the editor could have addressed some of them.

‘Her eyes brushed past and then returned to settle on him’ (p366). To avoid the surreal image, it would read better if ‘gaze’ was used instead of ‘eyes’!