I find Penelope Lively‘s books next-to-impossible to review. I recently read How It All Began, her most recent novel dealing with the consequences of a mugging, and while I enjoyed the book I really don’t have much to say about it. Lively always writes beautifully, creates realistic, fascinating characters and offers up striking commentary on all manner of subjects, from relationships to aging, but her very dependability is what causes the difficulty for me as a reviewer. With Lively, I know exactly what I am going to get. Sometimes she reaches levels of brilliance that are certainly deserving of further comment but she doesn’t quite reach those heights here. I know that a few months from now I will remember some of the more striking insights but not the names of the characters or the details of the plot. That is an entirely agreeable way to experience a book; I don’t need every reading experience to be extraordinary.
What I do want to remember particularly, and what I wanted to share, is this quote, talking about retired English-teacher Charlotte’s passion for reading. It is detailed, relatable passages like this that make me value Lively and her creations so highly:
Forever, reading has been central, the necessary fix, the support system. Her life has been informed by reading. She has read not just for distraction, sustenance, to pass the time, but she has read in a state of primal innocence, reading for enlightenment, for instruction, even. She has read to find out how sex works, how babies are born, she has read to discover what it is to be good, or bad; she has read to find out if things are the same for others as they are for her – then, discovering that frequently they are not, she has read to find out what it is that other people experience that she is missing.
Specifically, she read bits of the Old Testament when she was ten because of all that stuff about issues of blood, and the things thou shalt not do with thy neighbour’s wife. All of this was confusing rather than enlightening.
She got hold of a copy of Fanny Hill when she was eighteen, and was aghast, but also intrigued.
She read Rosamond Lehmann when she was nineteen, because her heart had been broken. She saw that such suffering is perhaps routine, and, while not consoled, became more stoical.
She read Saul Bellow, in her thirties, because she wanted to know how it is to be American. After reading, she wondered if she was any wiser, and read Updike, Roth, Mary McCarthy and Alison Lurie in further pursuit of the matter. She read to find out what it was like to be French or Russian in the nineteenth century, to be a rich New Yorker then, or a Midwestern pioneer. She read to discover how not to be Charlotte, how to escape the prison of her own mind, how to expand, and experience.
Thus has reading wound in with living, each a complement to the other. Charlotte knows herself to ride upon a great sea of words, of language, of stories and situations and information, of knowledge, some of which she can summon up, much of which is half lost, but is in there somewhere, and has had an effect on who she is and how she thinks. She is as much a product of what she has read as of the way in which she has lived; she is like millions of others built by books, for whom books are an essential foodstuff, who could starve without.
The Captive Reader 
I too have read that book this year and my favourite quote was part of the portion you quoted. My life too has been “informed by reading” and enriched by those, such as you, who share so generously of their readings. The agony of Rose as she copes with her mother’s change in circumstances resonated with me as I have my elderly mother living with me. I like Rose, feel the guilt as I see my mother “still herself but diminished in some way”. Thank you for the reminder of this book.
I’m interested to read this, I love the extract that you quoted.
I read this several months ago myself, and what sticks in my mind is Charlotte herself, her dignity & stoicism in coping – and most of all her love of reading, her need to read, so perfectly expressed in your quote.
I still haven’t read any Penelope Lively books, although I own a few and have heard speak twice (she’s very, very good) – I know exactly the sort of feeling you describe, about books which are perfectly good but don’t somehow become more memorable than that.. hmm. I’ll give her a go soon.
I read this and really enjoyed the experience, but (as you say) can’t say exactly why. My favourite and most memorable books of hers tend to be her ones for children esp The Ghost of Thomas Kempe which I re-read every now and again. Perhaps I came to that at the right age myself though – the historical bits and the sense of place real still resonate though.
I think you’ve described one of my problems in reviewing also, the dependability. And it doesn’t matter whether the author is great, bad, average, if they are so often the same in that way each book it becomes so difficult to review because there’s nothing to develop on. The passage you quoted is lovely, though, and true for so many of us.
I read her early book, starting with what I think was her first novel for adults, The Road to Lichfield, and enjoyed them. Maybe this is one I might try.
I always find Lively’s books incredibly diverting, and I found this one no different. But like you, the thing I liked best about How It All Began was the insights into the importance of reading and literacy, how it can sustain us and how it connects us to the world around us. I really liked as well how Lively can take the commonplace and prompt us to take a step back and re-evaluate the importance of our choices and how we approach life.