 First edition (publ. Jonathan Cape) | |
| Author | Bernard MacLaverty |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Norton |
Publication date | September 8, 1997 |
| ISBN | 0-393-04542-0 |
Grace Notes is a novel by Bernard MacLaverty, first published in 1997. It was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for Fiction, among other honors.
The book centers around the postpartum depression of its female protagonist, Catherine McKenna, a Northern Irish music teacher and composer living in Scotland. She faces preparations for her father's funeral, endures disturbing visions regarding her recently born daughter, Anna, and suffers restrictions imposed by the Catholic Church on her family and her childhood. She engages her depression through the cathartic and intuitive composition of music; later in the book, she begins to craft a master symphony. The novel ends with a powerful live radio broadcast of her symphony.
The title is an explicit reference to grace notes, which a character in the novel terms as "the notes between the notes". The redeeming power of art is indeed a prominent theme. In addition, critics have considered the concept of fleeting and minute musical notes as descriptive of the novel's style.
Kirkus Reviews viewed the novel as a "lyrical novel" that ambitiously attempts to speak about "the interior life of an artist struggling to balance the urgent demands of creating music and the equally pressing demands of life." The critic(s) praised the complexity of Catherine's character, while also balancing this with an acknowledgement that this overall did "overshadow everyone else in a novel guided less by 'story' than by musical tides and perturbations;" they also noted that "MacLaverty's mildly impressionistic approach [results in the] slow, even anticlimactic pace of some scenes." [1]
The reviewer for The Washington Post, Ambrose Clancy, found the excessive clerical and saintly characterization of Catherine's life and predispositions to be overly persistent, distracting, or frustrating. Even though a "subtle, naturalistic stylist, MacLaverty is anything but deft in proclaiming Catherine heaven-bound without sin. The novel is saturated with, practically drowned in, religious images and emotions." The examples they give include descriptions by characters on how music is connected to religion, the history of figures like St. Cecelia and St. Gerard, and the sacred feeling that Catherine experiences when her works are performed in a retrofitted chapel. Clancy admits that he's "a gifted writer, with great control, beautiful rhythms to his prose, and insight," and that the novel has some authentically powerful elements, which "peak with Catherine trying to raise her child, write music, and stay sane... Catherine, like many first-time mothers, is overwhelmed by motherhood." However, "the novelist's art doesn't save this book. Catherine is cloyingly pure, and MacLaverty's sledgehammer notions about art as religion run from the quietly sentimental to the loudly shamanistic." [2]
In The Richmond Review, there was much less emphasis on the religiosity of the book, though an agreement on MacLaverty's capability in writing: "the text is made of bite sized, staccato sentences of short, quiet authority that build brick by brick amidst gloriously naturalistic dialogue; this precision of language avoids all sentimentality." Instead of criticizing the ecclesiastic elements in it, Dickson heralds the "musical metaphors [that] fill [it]", with "tone, texture and form recombining as [Catherine] gets better, rebuilding the links to her past." [3]
| Year | Award | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1997 | Booker Prize | Shortlist | [4] |
| James Tait Black Memorial Prize – Fiction | Shortlist | [5] | |
| Saltire Society Literary Award for Scottish Book of the Year | Winner | [ citation needed ] | |
| Whitbread Award for Novel | Shortlist | [6] |
Bernice Rubens was a Welsh novelist. She became the first woman to win the Booker Prize in 1970, for The Elected Member.
Bernard MacLaverty is an Irish fiction writer and novelist. His novels include Cal and Grace Notes. He has written five books of short stories.
Monica Ali is a British writer of Bangladeshi and English descent. In 2003, she was selected as one of the "Best of Young British Novelists" by Granta based on her unpublished manuscript; her debut novel, Brick Lane, was published later that year. It was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. It was adapted as a 2007 film of the same name. She has also published four other novels. Her fifth novel, Love Marriage, was published by Virago Press in February 2022 and became an instant Sunday Times bestseller.
Cal is a 1983 novel by Bernard MacLaverty, detailing the experiences of a young Irish Catholic involved with the Provisional Irish Republican Army.
Jayne Anne Phillips is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and short story writer who was born in the small town of Buckhannon, West Virginia.
Murder in E Minor is a 1986 Nero Wolfe novel written by Robert Goldsborough. The action takes place in New York City, primarily New York County, better known as Manhattan.
Joy Williams is an American novelist, short-story writer, and essayist. Best-known for her short fiction, she is also the author of novels including State of Grace, The Quick and the Dead, and Harrow. Williams has received a Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Arts, a Rea Award for the Short Story, a Kirkus Award for Fiction, and a Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction.
A grace note is a kind of music notation used to denote several kinds of musical ornaments.
Jane Simone Mendelsohn is an American writer. Her novels are known for their mythic themes, poetic imagery, and allegorical content, as well as themes of female and personal empowerment. Mendelsohn's novel I Was Amelia Earhart was an international bestseller in 1996 and was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction.
A Good House is the first novel by Canadian writer Bonnie Burnard, published by Picador in 1999 and later by Henry Holt and Company in United States of America. It was the winner of that year's Scotiabank Giller Prize. The novel narrates the story of a family in three generations, five houses starting from 1949 until 1997.
The Boxer and the Spy (2008) is a crime novel for young adults by American author Robert B. Parker.
The 101 Dalmatians Musical is a musical produced by Luis Alvarez, directed by Jerry Zaks, and sponsored by Purina Dog Chow. The music written by former Styx member Dennis DeYoung, who also co-wrote the lyrics with the musical's book author B. T. McNicholl. Based on the 1956 children's novel The Hundred and One Dalmatians written by Dodie Smith, the musical follows a pair of Dalmatian dogs as they search through London in search of their litter of fifteen puppies, which were stolen by Cruella DeVil to make dog skin fur coats. The musical features Rachel York as the infamous Cruella DeVil, and has actors sharing the stage with fifteen real Dalmatians and using stilts to simulate the novel's original canine perspective. The musical has no relation to Disney's 101 Dalmatians franchise, although Disney A to Z on the D23 website has an entry for this musical acknowledging it.
A Little Life is a 2015 novel by American writer Hanya Yanagihara. Lengthy and tackling difficult subject matter, it garnered critical acclaim and became a best seller.
Do Not Say We Have Nothing is a novel by Madeleine Thien published in 2016 in Canada. It follows a 10-year-old girl and her mother who invite a Chinese refugee into their home. Critically acclaimed, in 2016 the author was awarded both the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Governor General's Award for this novel. It was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize as well as the Women's Prize for Fiction.
Howard Owen is an American author. He is a writer of literary fiction, mystery, and thrillers. He was the winner of the 2012 Hammett Prize awarded annually by the International Association of Crime Writers.
Tillie Walden is an American cartoonist who has published five graphic novels and a webcomic. Walden won the 2018 Eisner Award for Best Reality-Based Work for her graphic novel Spinning, making her one of the youngest Eisner Award winners ever. She was named Vermont's Cartoonist Laureate for the years 2023 - 2026, making her the state's youngest-ever Cartoonist Laureate.
Southern Discomfort is a 1982 novel by Rita Mae Brown. Through comedy and farce, it explores the theme of hypocrisy, especially that based on social status.
The Rabbit Hutch is a 2022 debut novel by writer Tess Gunty and winner of the 2022 National Book Award for Fiction. Gunty won the inaugural Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize and the Barnes & Noble Discover Prize for the novel.
Himawari House is the debut graphic novel written and illustrated by artist Harmony Becker. It tells the story of a group of teenage exchange students who are spending a gap year in Japan. Himawari House focuses on Nao, the daughter of a Japanese immigrant, who goes there to learn more about its culture and language. Published on November 9, 2021, by First Second Books, it was the recipient of a Kirkus Prize in the "Young Readers' Literature" category, receiving praise for its art and creative use of speech balloons, which was used to represent the language barriers between characters.
Biography of X is a 2023 alternative history novel by American writer Catherine Lacey published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.