Don't you just love this cover design? The famous White Garden of Sissinghurst in the Kent countryside occupying the silhouette of Virginia Woolf. On a lime background with the garden again but this time in muted white watermark. How could I resist this? And a literary mystery to boot, one that seeks to offer a fiction as to what may have happened in the three weeks between Virginia Woolf's reported date of suicide and the actual discovery of her body. What if she had not actually taken her own life on the date believed, but instead, ran away from her husband, Leonard, to friend Vita Sackville-West at Sissinghurst?
The story begins in the contemporary world where gardener, Jo Bellamy, has just received the commission of a lifetime. She is to replicate the famous White Garden for wealthy clients at their estate in the Long Island, but as she prepares for the assignment, her beloved grandfather commits suicide. Raw with grief, she finds a piece of her grandfather in the gardening shed at Sissinghurst in the form of a journal closed with a band that bears his name. She soon realizes that the journal does not contain the writing of her grandfather but that of Virginia Woolf, and that the entry dates begin the day after Woolf supposedly committed suicide.
In a Possession-esque unfolding, this mystery is full of plot twists and turns with academics, librarians, gardeners, the moneyed elite, and best of all, the familiar characters of the Bloomsbury set complete with conspiracy theories surrounding the Apostles. It is a fun, quick read but you may find yourself wincing a bit at some of the poor characterizations of the contemporary characters, the uneven attempts at writing in the voice of Woolf, and the classic stereotypes of both Brits and Americans. But if you love Woolf and atmosphere and English gardens and mysteries and Vita Sackville-West, or if you are preparing for Woolf in Winter and need a little palate cleanser in between books, this might be just the distraction you need. Read it in one easy and pleasant afternoon.
What I loved most about this book were the recurring images of creating something whether that something be a literary work, a garden, a child. The fluidity of that creative process, a fluidity mirrored in the personal lives of the Bloomsbury set notably in their sexual experiences. It all makes me want to make something. For the moment, a better garden. It is in my blood. And those new seed and plant catalogs are everywhere I look right now. And now I have to hunt down a copy of Sissinghurst by Adam Nicolson as it has been recommended by the author, Barron. And I have wanted the gardening books by Vita for so long. Do you know the ones? See below. Sometimes a book is not perfect but is valuable for the ideas that it sets in motion. For the big "hmmm" that follows its closing. Such is the case here for me.