The Sandcastle Girls (book review)

Books that I “like” tend to offer a brief duration of enjoyment for me. The delight in reading them ends not longer after I have turned the last page, the subject matter and characters often forgotten within several months time. Books that I “love”, however, tap into the deep well of emotion inside of me, their effect on me rippling for years afterward. “The Sandcastle Girls” is one of those books.

This poignant 14th novel by Chris Bohjalian moves between present day Boston, MA and 1915 Syria, alternating between first and third-person narratives. One follows a woman doing desperate detective work on her grandparents’ experiences during the First World War and the other follows said-grandparents falling in love during the worst of times, their courtship tainted by a backdrop of suffering and death.

Bohjalian is a masterful raconteur; the hardships and tragedies of war make for gripping stories and in his skilled hands it is by turns enchanting and heartrending. His narrator - an Armenian-American novelist and granddaughter of the story’s central characters - is really himself. There are several moments that give insight into his journey in writing this novel (one he says was almost 20 years in the making) such as this passage on page 237: “My people. I find it interesting that I have used that expression. My people. You people. Apparently, I have fallen more deeply under the sway of what happened to my family than I might have expected to be when I first started this story, given the pride I have always taken in my writerly jadedness.”

His characters are wonderfully complex. Their lives are shaped and - against all odds - strengthened by disaster. Some are muted by the atrocities they witness while others are compelled to speak out and/or act despite the danger it puts them in.

I had strong reactions to the text several times. I cringed at the descriptions of diseased and emaciated people. I gasped at acts of violence that resulted in death and/or dismemberment. My heart ached for someone who after witnessing the last vestiges of his/her pre-war life slip away had lost the will to live. I felt the desperate pull of love that reached across hundreds of miles. One character’s penultimate decision to keep something to himself/herself had my mouth forming a perfect “O” of surprise and shock (and, despite my shock, I understood the reasons behind that decision, making it all the more moving).

The novel is an exception in its subgenre in that it educates its readers about a historical event of which few are aware. The subject matter is grave (Bohjalian refers to it as “The Slaughter You Know Next To Nothing About”) and emotionally charged. There is a general sense throughout of the author being a voice for those who can no longer speak and this is only natural given that the story is rooted in his family history (both his father and grandfather are of Armenian descent, the latter a survivor of the Armenian genocide). The end result is a deeply personal story that is his best and most interesting work to date.

Simply put, this is a must-read. I cannot help but be grateful to the author for the education and the experience. It is beautiful, wrenching, illuminating, and one of the best books of 2012.