by Eleanor Catton
Mira and Shelley run Birnam Wood, a free-lance collective of guerrilla gardeners, taking over waste land to grow crops., but their relationship is becoming fraught. When their paths cross with a ruthless billionaire their eco-ideals are put under pressure.
Set in a fictionalised New Zealand, ‘Birnam Wood’ is a genuine page-turner but also highly literary, with some very funny psychological observations, worthy of Austen. One minor character is described as: ‘a failed celibate, he regarded the existence of his wife and children with disappointment and profound regret’.
Technology plays a large role in the story with smartphones, tablets, drones and apps all part of the plot. Shelley wonders at one point ‘when exactly she had become so technologically dependent that her first instinct in every unpredicted circumstance was to outsource her imagination to her phone.’
This is a taut and well-written novel with fascinating and flawed characters. It’s long but so is the recent Oscar-winner, Oppenheimer. You don’t have to read it in one sitting! Eleanor Catton has written a great book that flags up the conflict of trying to be environmentally conscious in the real world of big business. And the ending is spectacular…
*****
Ali Thurm 