A Perfect Explanation

November 4, 2019
In her splendid debut, Anstruther portrays an aristocratic woman’s abandonment of her husband and three young children in the 1920s for life in a British Christian Science retreat, and the subsequent custody battle that followed. That this story is based on the author’s grandmother, Enid Campbell Anstruther, brings veracity to a complex tale. After nearly two years of no communication, Enid writes her husband from the retreat, intending to return to being a mother but wanting a divorce. He agrees with the proviso that he has full custody of their children. The ensuing, dragged-out court case places Enid at odds with her older sister, Joan, who not only holds the family fortune, but has made Enid’s son, Ian (the author’s father), her heir, having taken care of Enid’s two other children during her absence. The story unfolds primarily through Enid’s daughter, Finetta, bemoaning the weekly visits to her mother in a nursing home in 1964, and Enid, who has just learned she’s about to see the son she hasn’t laid eyes on in 25 years, and whom she essentially gave to her sister for £500. This robust story provides insight into aristocratic duties, sibling revenge, and the convoluted feelings that can arise between mothers and their children. This lush family saga will appeal to fans of Ann Patchett.

Emma Gregory gives a subtle yet masterful performance of this decade-spanning story of intergenerational conflict and miscommunication. After her brother's death in WWI, Enid Campbell succumbs to her aristocratic family's pressure to produce heirs. Her unhappiness as a mother makes Enid the eye of the storm as relationships between parents, children, and siblings break down catastrophically. Gregory's portrayal of Enid throughout her life strikes the perfect balance between infuriating arrogance and raw vulnerability. It feels almost inevitable to both hate and pity Enid. Those mixed emotions come through most clearly when the narrative voice belongs to Joan, Enid's unconventional and unsympathetic sister, and to Enid's brittle daughter, Finetta. The listener begins the story expecting heroes and villains--but finds only misunderstood victims of circumstance. N.M. � AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine