I've enjoyed Cleeton's novels so far, and I enjoyed this one up until a certain point. When I explain why, I'll try not to spoil too much.
Margo lives in London in 2024. She's recently divorced and has a business where she tracks down lost treasures for clients: furniture and artwork and the like. A client contacts her about a book, apparently very rare. There is only one known copy in existence and it's called "Time of Forgetting" by Eva Fuentes, a Cuban author.
Margo reaches out to a bookseller she works with to see if he's familiar with the book. He's not, but he gives her information about a woman who's tracking lost Cuban possessions from families who had to flee Cuba. And then he's murdered. Margo's office is ransacked and she's wondering why this book is wrecking havoc and considers telling the client she's out.
The book is told from three points of view: Margo, Pilar, a librarian in Cuba in 1966 who is hiding books from families fleeing Castro's regime, and Eva herself, in 1900. Eva was a schoolteacher who participates in a program to travel to Boston for the summer to attend classes at Harvard.
All right, here's the dicey part. About 2/3 of the way through the book, a character is introduced who says he's Eva's grandson. His mother, her daughter, was born in 1901. He's in the 2024 part of the book, and he's in his sixties.
My brain screeched to a halt. How is that possible? I started doing math in my head: if he's in his sixties, he was born in the 1960s, right? And his mother was born in 1901, meaning she was in her *sixties* when he was born?
Huh?
I hoped I misread, that he was actually Eva's GREAT grandson, but no, very clearly, grandson.
Did no one stop and do the math? Surely I'm not the only one who picked up on that, right?
At any rate, I barely paid attention to the end of the book because I was so flummoxed trying to figure out the math. I hate when things like that happen. It ruins an otherwise good story.
"Chorus of the Union" was pretty good. It reminded me of a book I read a few years ago about the 1860 Republican convention, "
The Lincoln Miracle".
Lincoln and Douglas were longtime political rivals in Illinois, with Douglas always beating Lincoln. They debated often and both of them were great speakers. They went head to head in the 1860 Presidential election and Lincoln won due to the Democratic party splitting up into three separate faction over the issues around slavery. Despite not even being on the ballot in most of the Southern states, Lincoln still carried the day, and the South immediately started talking secession.
Despite losing, Douglas was a Unionist through and through. He cautioned the states to give Lincoln a chance and not secede. He was willing to work with Lincoln (and Lincoln was willing to work with him) to save the Union. Unfortunately, Douglas died just a few months into Lincoln's first term and the nation broke out in Civil War. It was a fascinating look at how men who were different in almost every other way could come together on a topic that they both felt strongly about. I don't know much about Stephen Douglas but I'm interested in reading more about him now.
