Isabelle the Navigator

by Luke Davies

In her schoolgirl days, Isabelle Airly mastered the high jump, sailing over the bar, weightless, above it all. She moved like the wind that drove the ships of old, an elusive, invisible force carefully charted by mariners. Now, in her thirties, she's having more trouble staying afloat. Her father, a gentle physician, has taken his own life, and Isabelle is sorting out the facts about his arrest for insurance fraud, his descent into madness - and how much he really knew about what was going on all those years between his wife and his brother. At the same time, she is mourning a loss of her own, and exploring her memories of a childhood that might not have been as idyllic as it seemed. If Isabelle can chart her father's course, maybe she can chart her own. And if she cannot stop the force of the wind - or be that force herself - maybe she can at least hitch a ride on it until she lands safely on solid ground.

Genres: Fiction

272 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

Luke Davies is an Australian writer of novels and poetry. He has published two novels, Isabelle the Navigator and the cult bestseller Candy, which was shortlisted for the NSW Premier's Literary Awards in 1998. A film version of Candy, starring Heath Ledger, was released in 2006 and won the AFI for Best Adapted Screenplay. His novel God of Speed, about the life of Howard Hughes, is due for release in April 2008.
Information / http://www.hlamgt.com.au/
Davies has published five books of poetry, including Running With Light, which was the winner of the Judith Wright Poetry Prize 2000, and Totem, which won the 2004 Age Book of the Year Award. He was also awarded the Philip Hodgins Memorial Medal for Poetry in 2004. He has completed several residencies around the world, including at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre for the Arts, Ireland, The Australia Centre, Chiang Mai, Thailand, the Centre d'Art

Reviews

[Michele]

I was not a fan. I expected to like this because I enjoyed the writing in the movie Lion, but I did not. I found that there was very little of what the book set out to do - namely, have Isabelle come to some kind of understanding about her father and his descent into depression and ultimately suicide. There were too many moving parts in it. Isabelle is, at different points, a high jumper, a cook for fishermen in quite a solitary space, a widow, a wanderer, a lover, a bereaved daughter. However, as she embodies one trait, she seems to escape the rest. The high jumper, so well written about in the beginning, is only revisited one other time - and just in passing. How much could it really have meant to her? More than anything though, I was expecting Isabelle to use her father's diary and what she knew of his life and his suicide to really come to terms with it, to wrestle with it, and delve into it. I felt the book was rather lacking in that regard.

[Colleen Buras]

Isabelle is resilient, confident, and sturdy. Life throws her blows, and she suffers as all humans do, but she keeps on moving forward, trying new relationships, embracing forgiveness, and challenging herself. It’s a refreshing story, as we drag through this sketchy pandemic recovery. It’s a reminder to hold fast to memories that serve us and let go of the rest. Life moves on.

[Jennifer]

Didn't like it. Far too much waffle, too introspective, couldn't get interested in it.

[Alison]

Enjoyed this everyday life and death book. Convincingly written through a female protagonist.

[Ann]

Difficult to maintain my interest in this. Too much navel gazing

[Michelle]

3.5 I am renaming this book “Isabelle the self obsessed navigator of her own tiny bubble”. A self indulgent look at love and loss…. Indulgent but well written.

[Helen]

I was enthralled by the first half of this book but felt mostly bewildered in the second. Davies has an impressively poetic command of imagery and melodic rhythm which I appreciated. The nods to so many Sydney landmarks was a rare treat too.

[Rich Gamble]

Davies second novel lacks the focus of Candy and seems to be a cut paste of childhood memories and travel experiences from the slew of writing grants given after the success of his more famous first novel. There are some ripper passages - the story of a female sailor in New Orleans in particular, but other aspects seem odd like all the star wars references for instance. I found myself not caring about the characters much but enjoyed the chronicles of her early life in Sydney and of visiting the fishing villages along the WA coasts. Its a very conventional Australian book with its beach and sea imagery (also name checking the obvious Bondi for the beach and Sydney’s home of cool King St Newtown) and while I would read anything Luke Davies writes this feels safe and is not his best work

[Tracy]

An early novel by the screenwriter of "Lion". His druggie novels are, apparently, more famous. This is not one of those.

The timeline of the story in this novel is a bit erratic and disruptive. But as usual, for me, a few well-written, three-dimensional characters can make up for a multitude of other shortcomings in a novel. Isabelle is a bit of an exceptional character, not one I would normally be able to relate to. But the author does a good job of revealing, slowly, her vulnerabilities as well as her strengths.

A hard book to read, in an oddly satisfying, comforting way. Lots of pain and loss, and a major bit of betrayal, but also lots of love and redemption.

Not a lot to learn here, but quite a good read nonetheless.

[Charlene]

2.5