Don’t you just love the word “vagabond”? It’s a deeply satisfying word to say out loud. And sometimes that’s all it takes to endear me to a book before I’ve even read it.! But whatever title Tracy Scott-Townsend might have given this book I would have enjoyed it.
‘All Maya Galen wanted was a happy family, stifling her inner urges to explore the wider world for the sake of being there for her children. But parenting with her husband, Con, wasn’t always easy. Their eldest son, Jamie, broke off all contact some years ago and now Joe, the apple of her eye, has done the same after an argument with his parents about his chosen way of life. Maya and Con are left rattling around ‘The Cottages’ – their enormous home in a Lincolnshire village, wondering what they did wrong. When they are called to Australia to identify the body of a young man, Maya is given her son’s journal. After a sleepless night, she makes the decision to follow in her youngest son’s footsteps and become a vagabond, leaving her husband and daughters to return to the UK without her. From now on she needs to rely on her own physical and emotional strength. Following Joe’s hand-drawn maps and journal entries, Maya travels from Australia to Denmark and beyond, meeting many young people like Joe along the way and trying to discover what it means to be alive. As months turn into years she can’t bear to go back to the oppression of her perfect home. Slowly, she comes to understand that what she is discovering is her most basic human self. Another family crisis, involving one of her twin daughters, eventually forces Maya to return home. As she treads carefully through the wreckage of her marriage, unfinished business is tied up and the family once again becomes complete, but in a different way from before.’
Having previously read the Eliza Doll I was familiar with the author’s style and there seemed to be some recurring themes and locations, although the story itself is very different. Using a variety of techniques - from journal entries, emails and straightforward narrative storytelling the novel looks predominantly at Maya’s journey but also we have the perspectives of her two sons Jamie and Joe. Fragments of a family. The reader is invited to consider just what family is. What binds and what can sever those binds. There were times when I was reminded of David Nicholls’ ‘Us’ and also of Cheryl Strayed’s ‘Wild’ - if you can imagine a fusion of those two books it gives you some idea of the flavour of The Vagabond Mother. But it would be a disservice to allow a critique to hang solely upon comparison with other works. This story takes those themes and runs with them along some different tangents. And it does so very well becoming its own ‘person’ if you can say that of a book!
Maya’s journey, although punctuated with heartbreak, is ultimately an uplifting one. What I particularly enjoyed about the book was that it showed how one person’s journey does have a knock-on effect on the lives of others and I enjoyed the way the book explored how those issues were ultimately resolved. I suppose there may be those who feel that what Maya did was selfish. But how far do you put your own development and aspirations on hold for fear of disturbing the equilibrium of the family unit? Maya’s journey was a journey of self-discovery but it was also about healing and finding answers. I suppose the other question the book poses is where does “love“ come in, all of these relationship gymnastics. The reader journeys along with Maya and all these questions punctuate the narrative as we travel across borders and time zones.
It’s confident writing. Characters are defined and assert themselves in the mind of the reader. The author shows a perception for understanding people, young and old. And the research is thorough. So much so that I’d love to ask the author if she actually did backpack her way through some of the locations described so palpably! You can hear the night sounds. You can feel that frisson of anxiety of not knowing where you might sleep or eat. You can sense the ‘unwashedness’ ! But most of all you can experience a sense of freedom. Of being unshackled by the trappings of the material world. It’s very refreshing.
And so you have a story. A fictional story to be sure. But you also have some philosophy and some material to get you musing on the meanings of life and love.
My thanks to Kelly Lacey and the lovebooks group for a place upon the blog tour and for a gifted copy of this book. I remain a Tracy Scott Townsend fan.
Buy link
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vagabond-Mother-Tracey-Scott-Townsend/dp/1916489648
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