Tumbledown Manor

*I received this novel from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review*

Tumbledown Manor by Helen Brown is a meaty contemporary chick lit novel. Yes, maybe I made up a genre just now. It’s not exactly what most people would call “fluff”; a term I actually object to. The main character is about a writer named Lisa, who is celebrating her 50^th birthday when she accidentally finds out her husband is cheating on her. So, considering she’s originally from Australia, Lisa decides to take off and move back there to deal with both the breakdown of her marriage and also writer’s block. The latter part – the insight into her creative process – was my favourite part of the whole novel. She is writing a trilogy of historical novels (with a heavy dose of sexy romance) about the Bronte sisters, and Tumbledown Manor was also infused with random interesting tidbits about their lives. Yes, there were hindsight diagnoses and assigning medical conditions based on descriptions of people, but still, the writing process was fun to read about.

The novel also features a fixer-upper project –obvious from the title. I like these kinds of settings: a dilapidated manor-house, somewhere in the outback, that a single lady with gumption is trying to fix up. I mean, she wasn’t that far from a big city and even had access to takeaway deliveries and hardware stores, so it wasn’t completely unmanageable.

The novel also features a careful romance, it’s subtle and slow-burning with a couple of tropey “simple misunderstandings”. Still, I could get on board with it, and I liked she took her time getting over her 20+ year marriage. Oh, and there was also a slight mystery, but it was completely in the background.

Now, there were some aspects to the novel that I didn’t fully enjoy. Firstly, it featured a couple of odd-sounding metaphors and similes. The text seemed to be completely saturated with them to the point where it was difficult to actually understand what the author was trying to say. It did get better as the novel progressed! Secondly, the main character definitely did not act her age, in the sense that she was really immature at times and even silly. She just plain wasn’t as intelligent as I would expect a grown-ass woman to be. One of my pet peeves: she used an odd abbreviated text speech with her daughter, which I find kind of unlikely for a writer. I’ve met a few, and they all manage to type out most words, and wouldn’t be caught saying “Gr8”. I know she was perhaps trying to relate to her daughter but lady, use your words.

Also, I feel like the novel was trying to handle too many “issues” at once. It just seemed A LOT for one single person. The author did say she knows women (plural!) that these things have happened to, so it felt really artificial piling them all on the shoulders of this one lady. Even though the book outlined these possible issues, they weren’t really dealt with. For instance, Lisa’s son was openly gay and she accepted it as she should, but some other characters had weird issues with Ted’s sexuality and they were never actually addressed or analysed. Sidenote: I don’t think someone being gay is an issue. However, I took issue with the way people refused to accept it. That homophobia wasn’t really addressed within the family, which I find unrealistic. What is more, Lisa’s daughter Portia had a suspected eating disorder and that again was almost ignored by most of her family. Then there was a brief mention of cancer; of course also divorce, disability, racism. It just felt a lot for one woman, unless she’s a character on Grey’s Anatomy.

Thus, I am giving this book 3,5 stars. I rounded it up to 4 on Goodreads, but I actually think I’m right smack in the middle of “I liked it” and “I really liked it”. I know, this makes no sense. Tumbledown Manor wasn’t a spectacular literary masterpiece but it was fun to read, never a trudge, and it helped in getting me out of a reading slump. Cozy, is how I would describe it: I laughed out loud, I teared up. Also, I have gotten a bit more into Australian fiction lately. The author is originally from New Zealand so maybe Australasian fiction then :). If you like contemporaries or chick lit (in the best possible sense of the word), then go for it!

"After a lifetime of enabling others, surely she'd earned the right to make her own choices, no matter how outlandish?"