Women in Evidence
A man lies shot and dying on a beach. The events leading up to this moment are recounted by eight women, all bound together by the love of this man. As each tells her story it becomes clear that not all are interested in the complete truth, and the reader must piece together what is fact and what is fantasy and so come to understand the whole.
Although the settings share the backdrop of WW2, they range from a French brothel to a Burmese military hospital, from a luxury yacht to a desert island. Yet the author does not rely on this device to distinguish between protagonists. He achieves the remarkable and gives each of the eight women a voice entirely her own, and none can be mistaken for another. The final chapter untangles the web and gives the reader the satisfaction of understanding, yet leaving plenty to think about.
The only criticism lies in the early chapters, which are perhaps too confusing. Strangely the plot gets easier to follow the more convoluted it becomes, perhaps because the reader stops trying to sort it all out and simply lets the prose wash over them.
All credit to Ros Schwartz, for conveying a vibrancy of prose that could easily have been lost in a poor translation.
