Princes of Ireland, by Edward Rutherford

When I was in college, I studied for a semester in Dublin, Ireland, at Trinity College in a program run by the poet Thomas Kinsella. It was a good program in which I had classes taught by some prominent Irish scholars such as Seamus Deane (who I considered one of the most brilliant teachers I'd ever had), Proinsias Mac Cana, Liam de Paor, and, of course, Kinsella.

From them and others I learned a great deal about the development of Ireland from the pre-Celtic era through the Troubles that were quite in force while I was there. [As a side note, during a long trek across the country in the spring, our leaders -- Kinsella and de Paor -- debated whether to head into the North. A day before we were to head up, there'd been an explosion on one of the railways. Understandably and correctly, they decided not to send a group of American students in a bus marked 'Eirebus' into the North. We were disappointed, but I have no doubt it was the right decision.]

All that is meant as preface to describe the book I'm currently reading: The Princes of Ireland: The Dublin Saga by Edward Rutherford. It's historical fiction and the characters I've met so far (I'm about 270 pages into it; the book covers 770 pages) are all interesting and fairly well drawn. In short, I'm enjoying it and I'm happy I'm reading it. The history is good and appears accurate to my recollection. I'm happy to mentally pronounce words I've not seen in many years once again: Uishnech, Ath Cliath, Cuchullain.

Indeed, I'm enjoying the book. But there are times when I feel Rutherford could have used a better editor -- and it's distracting. Too many times he leaves a reader having to guess which person a pronoun refers to. Sentences jump from perspective to perspective within a paragraph. And the sentence structure is so plain as to be almost sleep-inducing. Thank God the characters are engaging, especially in the opening tale of Dierdre and Connall.

Theirs is a love story set in the pre-Christian fifth century. Christianity is a little-known religion of the British slaves that wealthy families own. Connal, the nephew of the High King, is torn between the life of a warrior and that of a druid. But everything changes after he meets Dierdre, the green-eyed daughter of Fergus, chief of Dubh Linn ('black pool' in Old Irish, pronounced Duv Lin). The lovers' escape from the High King and his wife -- who had threatened to kill Dierdre -- coincides with bad harvests. And in the pagan era, that's a political minefield for the king that requires a sacrifice.

All the ingredients are there for a wonderful tale, and it doesn't disappoint. In looking at a 2004 review of the book in the New York Times, I certainly recognize the same book. Indeed, comments like "sprawling" and "easy to read" are entirely accurate. My gripes may be more a matter of my literary snobbery coming to the fore, once again.

My criticisms are not meant to discourage anyone from reading this engaging group of stories. Anyone with a love of Ireland would find it fascinating, whether you studied there or not. I just wish the book had been tightened up a little.

Literary Discovery

I think I've become a literary snob. Perhaps I already knew this but chose to ignore it. What has struck me is how I now distinguish between "good" literature and "mediocre" literature (forget "poor" literature, which is a contradiction in terms).

For instance, during the past two days I've started and quickly stopped reading two different novels. Two nights ago it was John Irving's Until I Find You and yesterday afternoon, Marly Swick's Evening News. I usually love Irving's work. The World According to Garp and A Prayer for Owen Meany are two of my favorite books (well, Garp and Owen are among my favorite characters). But within the first few pages of Until I Find You, I found myself in a maze of ill-constructed paragraphs; this is an 800+ page novel! Sorry John, I don't have time for that.

And Swick's work. Well, I can't say I enjoyed the creative writing-class style of introducing characters, but I could have gotten past that if the subject weren't so disturbing. I started reading it because my novel is about a family in a difficult situation; hers is about a family coping with the death of a small child. But in her novel, a young boy and his friend from next door are playing with the friend's dad's handgun, which mom keeps hidden in a Kleenex tissue box. A few predictable moments later, BANG! and the little baby sister is bleeding out into her inflatable swimming pool while mom's reading a book. I'm sorry, I don't have much patience for idiots in real life, I don't need to read about fictional morons. Here's a life story for you: Kids, don't play with guns! Parents, don't leave loaded guns where your kids can get to them, especially if they don't know what the hell they're doing!

Now I'm reading Whitney Otto's Now You See Her. Heading into the story is a nice little acknowledgement page. She thanks her family and friends and her editor and agent. All good and proper. But then within the first couple pages there's a subject/verb agreement problem (i.e., the subject is singular, but the verb used was plural). This is basic, grammar school English class red-pen stuff. Ok, if it only happens once, we can chalk it up to an amazingly odd snafu (though you don't usually find these things on page 3). But then, another couple pages later, there's something even more egregious. The protagonist lists things she has: Gainful employment; three good friends; two living parents... Four short paragraphs and a few lists later, the protagonist has telephoned her mother, "now a widow..."

When did that happen? In the past 100 words? Did mom dump dad in a bitter divorce a few years ago? Who knows, it hasn't been mentioned.

I think I'd thank this agent too, because she hooked you up with an editor who can't read. Since this book was published in 1994, I presume these flaws have already been pointed out and I'm simply slow on the draw. And considering I received this book for free through a book exchange, and its Barnes & Noble discount price of $5.98 is still attached to the front cover, I don't think too many people are overly concerned about who's going to fix it.

To be fair, since I didn't have any other books with me and I'd already read the One Story item I did have with me, I decided to read further in Otto's book. [Nota bene, One Story has a new address and it hasn't been corrected on their Web site -- so if your renewal was returned because the Post Office can't find them, don't fret, they've not gone out of business.]

And what I found is a story with promise. From what I can tell, it follows through on the fanciful "What if women over 40 actually do become invisible." I'll give the book a second chance. When there aren't glaring grammatical or continuity problems, it reads easy (well, actually, she seems to have a love affair with annoying fragments; not the literary types that are easily comprehensible), and if I hate it after tomorrow, there's always a Friday crossword puzzle to piss me off.

Oh yeah, I discovered another thing tonight on the train: I really love pizza. A man on the train was eating a slice and I couldn't help but wish I had one too. Again, this may be something I already knew. Sometimes life is cruel.