Brooklyn

Ellis Island

Just finished this book, by Colm Toibin and I had to write straight away whilst my impressions are still fresh. 'Brooklyn' has featured many times in various 'Best of 2009' lists and I can see why.
The feelings you have when reading this book are no less and sometimes more than a constant, edge-of-tears lump in your throat. Toibin so accurately describes feelings of homesickness that you start to be really glad if you are at home when reading this.
Eilis is an Irish girl in her early twenties who sets off to Brooklyn just after WW2. When you think about the kind of girl who may have done this, Eilis is not the sort of character you imagine to give everything up for a new life in a new country. She is reserved but not shy, very cautious and quiet. She seems so young, you start to really worry about her, but not in an annoying way.
She is such a well formed character in the truest, purest sense. She seems to let things happen to her at the beginning, and the reader begins to worry that she lets other people make decisions for her and goes along with it. For example, her journey to Brooklyn is something she is pushed into. As someone who at times finds making decisions horribly paralyzing, I can really sympathise with this, as I'm sure most people can. The choice of one thing over another, always terrifying, is ultimately liberating for most, but not for Eilis, who always decides for duty, which as is the way, seems to always be at war with personal freedom and intuition.
Toibin writes masterfully of duty. Eilis is so strongly tied to her duties she always puts them above her own happiness. This is heart-rending stuff for the reader, as you read played out in front of you a life you can tell will not end up being the one the person chose. Well, the one they chose, but while believing they did not have another choice.
A bit rambling, this review!
The story moves slowly, meditatively almost. It is really strange reading about the life of a girl my own age, spooky almost. As Eilis gets older in the two or so years that this book is set, she gains so much strength. However, this ultimately means that she is strong enough to do her duty, and to deny herself an uncertain and elusive happiness.
Utterly brilliant.