Book Review: The Hearing Trumpet

Written by Leonora Carrington, a surrealist who is mostly known for her artworks, this has to be the most surreal book I've read. It begins almost normally and becomes increasingly bizarre to... I'm not sure what:  supernatural, fantasy, post-apocalyptic? 

It features a deaf elderly grandmother whose obnoxious grandson persuades his parents to put her in an old folks home. She's not allowed to take her cats into the retirement complex so her friend and neighbour  (who spends much of her time in a fantasy world) takes them in. 

The retirement village is run by not-very-nice people but most of the other residents are friendly, each living in run-down cottages that were reminiscent of fairy tale buildings. 

Life progressively gets more surreal and the ending is a complete surprise. 

According to Wikipedia "92-year-old Marian Leatherby lives in Mexico with her son Galahad, his wife Muriel, and her grandson Robert. Upon being gifted a hearing trumpet by her friend Carmella, Marian discovers that her family is planning to put her in an institution, which indeed happens. At the institution Marian finds herself drawn into surreal and occult intrigue, conspiracy and adventure."

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Another post about Books

 I'm currently reading a book about Leonora Carrington. 

But this part of the post is about a completely different book by Stephen King.

Having watched The Shining and seen excepts from other horror films based on his books (e.g. Carrie and IT), I decided to avoid Stephen King's prolific output... until recently, when I learned that the author also disliked the film.

During a discussion of The Shining with someone who had seen the film and read the book, he covered some of the differences and recommended that I read the sequel, Doctor Sleep, which he lent to me.

I admit to some trepidation during descriptions of the antagonists but the rest of the book more than made up for those. The author has the ability to create fully rounded characters who, during the course of the story, become people whom you 'know' and can imagine being from a neighbouring village (if you ignore that it's set in America). And, all importantly, the ending is more positive than you think!

Conclusion: I might try another Stephen King novel soon, possibly Fairy Tale - another suggestion from my 'book-lender'.

Leonora Carrington.

Update: I have finished reading the book about Leonora Carrington by Joanna Moorhead. Leonora led an interesting life and I found many aspects of her character to be admirable. Although I tried to like her art, examples of her surrealist style are not for me.

The next book I have lined up to read is Leonora Carrington's The Hearing Trumpet.