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Sweet Old World
'He goes down the stairs, singing Johnny Cash. It's a song about a man who's fallen real low, but he's not low, he's forty-three years old today, there's still time. You never know what is waiting, you just never know. This morning he can hope. And this is the thing he doesn't ever talk about: He wants to be a father, now, not later, he doesn't want to waste one more minute of his life.' David Quinn's dream of family has for years eluded him. Surely what he wants is simple? It's only what other men have, but there's no woman in his life, and now that he's living on a remote island in the Atlantic, do his hopes still stand a chance?
It's summer on the Irish island of Inishmore, and the tourists are arriving. They're coming for the wild beauty and the five thousand years of history, the Celtic legends and the burial sites of saints. They're coming for the drink and the sex and the craic. Seventeen-year-old Esther Bradley has come from Fremantle, on the west coast of Australia. On harsh Inishmore, where people have always struggled to survive, she is battling the landscape of her own mind. David Quinn is reluctant to catch Esther when she tumbles dangerously into his life, but happiness is about to burst upon him, and every simple thing he's wanted will soon be close enough to touch. But is anything ever really simple any more?
Set among the ancient stories of the haunting Aran Islands, reaching to London in the 1980s and contemporary Australia, this is an unforgettable love story about life's wounds to the spirit and flesh, and the hope we all have for healing, for one more lucky roll of the dice. Following the bestselling and acclaimed CARELESS, Sweet Old World establishes Deborah Robertson as one of our most enthralling and original storytellers, a writer whose tender, fearless vision carries her readers close to the human heart.
It's summer on the Irish island of Inishmore, and the tourists are arriving. They're coming for the wild beauty and the five thousand years of history, the Celtic legends and the burial sites of saints. They're coming for the drink and the sex and the craic. Seventeen-year-old Esther Bradley has come from Fremantle, on the west coast of Australia. On harsh Inishmore, where people have always struggled to survive, she is battling the landscape of her own mind. David Quinn is reluctant to catch Esther when she tumbles dangerously into his life, but happiness is about to burst upon him, and every simple thing he's wanted will soon be close enough to touch. But is anything ever really simple any more?
Set among the ancient stories of the haunting Aran Islands, reaching to London in the 1980s and contemporary Australia, this is an unforgettable love story about life's wounds to the spirit and flesh, and the hope we all have for healing, for one more lucky roll of the dice. Following the bestselling and acclaimed CARELESS, Sweet Old World establishes Deborah Robertson as one of our most enthralling and original storytellers, a writer whose tender, fearless vision carries her readers close to the human heart.
- GenresFiction
304 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2012
2 people are currently reading
31 people want to read
About the author
Deborah Robertson
4 books3 followersDeborah Robertson’s first book, Proudflesh, won the Steele Rudd Award. Her novel Careless received the 2007 Nita Kibble and Colin Roderick awards, and was short-listed for the Miles Franklin.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
August 17, 2019
No doubt but Robertson writes great characters. The people and their interactions leap off the page with authenticity and moving emotion. The book is worth reading for that alone.
Unfortunately, plot is not the book's strong suit. It follows a clever (I avoid the spoiler here) set up that diverts the reader from a later plot development between the main character and two others, but after that the plot seems to drain away to nothing. In the end, I felt a bit let down. No, actually I felt let down, a lot. Like many authors (note to self) Robertson pads her plot with lots of interesting side trips. These are for the most part quite interesting and worth the journey, but by the end, one feels the padding.
Still, for the depth of her characters, Robertson is worth reading.
Unfortunately, plot is not the book's strong suit. It follows a clever (I avoid the spoiler here) set up that diverts the reader from a later plot development between the main character and two others, but after that the plot seems to drain away to nothing. In the end, I felt a bit let down. No, actually I felt let down, a lot. Like many authors (note to self) Robertson pads her plot with lots of interesting side trips. These are for the most part quite interesting and worth the journey, but by the end, one feels the padding.
Still, for the depth of her characters, Robertson is worth reading.
August 29, 2024
I really wanted more out of this book .
I almost DNF it , after the first few chapters, but l did not .
I gave the book the opportunity to surprise me and get better, but unfortunately it did not get there.
The setting and descriptions were very interesting, and informative.
I just could not relate to the characters, there was no depth, in any of them .
David the main character, dreams of having a family, his lonely, life is a bore he feels restless and sad .
His living on a remote Island in the Atlantic, and does find peace, but at the same time he feels helpess, and weaves a desperate flee for longing , acceptance and love ❤
I almost DNF it , after the first few chapters, but l did not .
I gave the book the opportunity to surprise me and get better, but unfortunately it did not get there.
The setting and descriptions were very interesting, and informative.
I just could not relate to the characters, there was no depth, in any of them .
David the main character, dreams of having a family, his lonely, life is a bore he feels restless and sad .
His living on a remote Island in the Atlantic, and does find peace, but at the same time he feels helpess, and weaves a desperate flee for longing , acceptance and love ❤
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 25, 2023
3.5 stars from me - a Bookclub book for this month. Easy enough read but doesn’t really go anywhere. One of those where I will forget what it was about quite quickly because there isn’t a strong plot at all.
August 14, 2012
David, a freelance journalist and writer, lives on Inishmore, a harsh island off the coast of Ireland. A place where people come ‘for the wild beauty and the five thousand years of history, the Celtic legends and the burial sites of saints. They’re coming for the drink and the sex and the craic.’ David has come to live there in order to help his divorced sister, Orla, run a guesthouse.
David is forty-three years old. With many unfulfilling relationships behind him, he is now yearning for something more. Not satisfied with being a much-loved uncle to his three nephews, he wants a child of his own. ‘He is full of hope. And this is what he doesn’t talk about: he wants to be a father, now, not later. He doesn’t want to waste one more minute of his life.’ David is conscious of aging – he has a back injury incurred on the same night he realised his desire to have a child – but thinks there is still time. He imagines a phantom child running through the house.
When Ettie, a seventeen year old Australian girl, has a serious accident after leaving David’s house, her mother, Tania, comes into his life. As a tentative love unfolds between them, David dares to imagine a long-desired future – a baby in his bed. But Tania starts to question his motives and, even to the reader, they are not totally clear. Small events begin to erode her trust.
The author has said that she started this novel as a story about three sisters grappling with infertility, but became bored with it, realising that the male view on this subject was one that interested her more. The desire of single, heterosexual men to have children is not one that is much explored in our culture.
Sweet Old World is Deborah Robertson’s second novel. Her first, Careless, was short listed for the Miles Franklin in 1998 and she has also published a book of short stories, Proudflesh.
I read this book in one flu-bound day in bed and shed a few tears at the end. Like all good fiction, Sweet Old World drew me deep into another reality. Beautifully written, complex and subtle it explores a little known emotional realm. A lovely, lyrical, heartfelt story about loss, longing and hope.
David is forty-three years old. With many unfulfilling relationships behind him, he is now yearning for something more. Not satisfied with being a much-loved uncle to his three nephews, he wants a child of his own. ‘He is full of hope. And this is what he doesn’t talk about: he wants to be a father, now, not later. He doesn’t want to waste one more minute of his life.’ David is conscious of aging – he has a back injury incurred on the same night he realised his desire to have a child – but thinks there is still time. He imagines a phantom child running through the house.
When Ettie, a seventeen year old Australian girl, has a serious accident after leaving David’s house, her mother, Tania, comes into his life. As a tentative love unfolds between them, David dares to imagine a long-desired future – a baby in his bed. But Tania starts to question his motives and, even to the reader, they are not totally clear. Small events begin to erode her trust.
The author has said that she started this novel as a story about three sisters grappling with infertility, but became bored with it, realising that the male view on this subject was one that interested her more. The desire of single, heterosexual men to have children is not one that is much explored in our culture.
Sweet Old World is Deborah Robertson’s second novel. Her first, Careless, was short listed for the Miles Franklin in 1998 and she has also published a book of short stories, Proudflesh.
I read this book in one flu-bound day in bed and shed a few tears at the end. Like all good fiction, Sweet Old World drew me deep into another reality. Beautifully written, complex and subtle it explores a little known emotional realm. A lovely, lyrical, heartfelt story about loss, longing and hope.
January 20, 2016
Deborah Robertson’s first novel, Careless, (2006) burst onto the Australian literary scene with a swag of award nominations and terrific reviews both here and internationally. It’s a superb book, one that held my attention throughout and which richly deserved its place on the Miles Franklin shortlist. (It might well have won it if it had not been up against the ground-breaking Carpentaria by Alexis Wright).
Sweet Old World has a similar theme: what is love, and why does it have to be so hard to find? But while the complex issues in Careless were centred on an eight-year-old innocent called Pearl who was trying to make sense of the impact of random violence on her messed-up mother, Sweet Old World is a less tangled story. The main character is an adult: David is an expat Aussie journalist living on the island of Inishmore, near Galway Bay in Ireland, looking for love because he’s grown tired of the shallow relationships he’s had so far. And it’s not enough to be an affectionate uncle to his sister’s three children, he wants a child of his own.
The trouble is, he’s heading for middle-age, and it’s harder in middle-age. And when he falls for a woman whose 17-year-old daughter he might, or might not have, been interested in, there are trust issues that need to be resolved.
Somewhere, I’ve read that many cases of sexual abuse occur when a woman takes a new partner and he becomes attracted to her teenage daughter. It is thought that there is some kind of biological inhibitor that prevents most fathers from being attracted to their own children, but this inhibitor isn’t present in a step-father. This may be why we hear so many cases of adolescent girls fleeing the family home, the situation often made all the more fraught because the mother – in love with her new partner - is in denial. Obviously, any woman who knows about this phenomenon would be very wary of a new partner who shows any sign of being overly fond of a daughter.
To read the rest of my review please visit http://anzlitlovers.com/2012/03/15/sw...
Sweet Old World has a similar theme: what is love, and why does it have to be so hard to find? But while the complex issues in Careless were centred on an eight-year-old innocent called Pearl who was trying to make sense of the impact of random violence on her messed-up mother, Sweet Old World is a less tangled story. The main character is an adult: David is an expat Aussie journalist living on the island of Inishmore, near Galway Bay in Ireland, looking for love because he’s grown tired of the shallow relationships he’s had so far. And it’s not enough to be an affectionate uncle to his sister’s three children, he wants a child of his own.
The trouble is, he’s heading for middle-age, and it’s harder in middle-age. And when he falls for a woman whose 17-year-old daughter he might, or might not have, been interested in, there are trust issues that need to be resolved.
Somewhere, I’ve read that many cases of sexual abuse occur when a woman takes a new partner and he becomes attracted to her teenage daughter. It is thought that there is some kind of biological inhibitor that prevents most fathers from being attracted to their own children, but this inhibitor isn’t present in a step-father. This may be why we hear so many cases of adolescent girls fleeing the family home, the situation often made all the more fraught because the mother – in love with her new partner - is in denial. Obviously, any woman who knows about this phenomenon would be very wary of a new partner who shows any sign of being overly fond of a daughter.
To read the rest of my review please visit http://anzlitlovers.com/2012/03/15/sw...
March 11, 2012
Some of us approach our love lives in a purposeful, confident way whereas others are more passive and tentative. Sweet Old World is a mid life love story about David and Tania. David is very much from the second camp. Frustratingly so at times. There's some lovely writing in this book especially towards the end.
October 14, 2014
I found it hard to connect with this book about a man who is driven entirely by his desire to have a kid. Maybe it's my own plans to remain child free, but it didn't ring true to me. I also had trouble empathising with David because it felt like he was dishonest and tried to take advantage of Tania...
January 6, 2016
The character of David Quinn is an Australian ex-pat living in Ireland. He meets a young Perth tourist, Effie, who suffers a terrible accident. David is her hospital visitor until Effie’s mother arrives. David longs for a child of his own but is acutely aware that life has passed him by. Or has it? This is a well-told tale of loss, love, hope and resignation. Bittersweet.
September 14, 2012
Upon finishing reading this effortless novel, I am charmed by its eloquent sincerity and genuineness. Deborah Robertson scrapes the cliched grime off description and recreates original clarity. I was entranced.
January 24, 2016
An easy read. Although I didn't really warm to the main character, I enjoyed a familiarity with the way he moved through his adulthood, his longings and his obligations. The writing is crisp and sensuous. However, I found "(he) gets in touch with his inner fat housewife." offensive.
February 23, 2013
Haunting and bittersweet. A lovely, quick read.
February 21, 2014
Would ideally have given this 4.5 stars. The content (a man's desire for fatherhood) is not something I especially relate to. But the writing is just beautiful! A very talented writer.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews