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Skopelos A narrative about a quest for Ithaca edition by Els Boot Literature Fiction eBooks

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Skopelos A narrative about a quest for Ithaca edition by Els Boot Literature Fiction eBooks

Paul is an elderly sixty year old man who has lived his life controlled by the constraints and regulations forced upon him by his parents and his environment. His life works like a clock, ticking in pace with set times and days. But deep inside him he knows he has passed through life without experiencing the journey. Then a phone call changes everything.

Els deals with Paul's emotional struggles in the life he has set for himself and his journey to freedom in an interesting manner. She captures the key moments when he is able to relate to other people, to feel loved and feel pain and makes the transformation a lively narration. Right at the end when he makes the final decision you can't help but feel the tears spring up. You realize Paul might have had his own battle, but so many people fail to face other important battles in their lives out of fear. Until they realize it is too late.


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Skopelos A narrative about a quest for Ithaca edition by Els Boot Literature Fiction eBooks Reviews

An out of the blue phone call informs Dutch businessman Paul van den Berg that an unknown benefactor has left him a house in his will. Who has never dreamed of such a situation, especially when the house in question is on the beautiful Greek island of Skopelos?
But, unlike most of us, who would probably be jumping for joy, Paul’s reaction is radically different. In Els Boot’s skilful portrait, built up of hundreds of tiny brushstrokes, we discover a man whose life has been dictated by his upbringing, and the expectations of others. Now 60 years old, he is rich and successful, lives in a beautiful home, is dependent on no-one and sufficient unto himself. The bequest is an unwanted disturbance in his perfectly organised and predictable existence. Worse still, it is a reminder of something in his past of which he is deeply ashamed and which he has managed to repress.
Who is the mysterious Dimitris who has left him such a gift? Little by little, Paul begins to remember…
Just one anomaly stands out as we get to know Paul in his garage, next to the conservative Mercedes in which he goes to work, there is a silver Corvette he never drives. Gradually we discover there are two Pauls, two personalities, the one who has dominated his life and the other a repressed homosexual. Brought up in a God-fearing Calvinist family, it soon became clear to the adolescent Paul that whatever his hormones were telling him, admitting he was gay was not an option in a family he describes as ‘loving,’ but where the concept of homosexuality is unacceptable, ‘an illness that could be cured’. And so, in spite of yielding to his impulses from time to time at ‘parties of a certain allure, with sultry nights’ and ‘orgy-like one-night stands’, Paul leads a life that is lonely, inhibited and emotionally barren. The one person with whom he might have found lasting love and happiness was in fact Dimitris, who vanished from his life years ago and whom he has managed to efficiently ‘erase’ from his memory.
But suddenly Dimitris is back, in the form of a legacy. A struggle ensues between the two Pauls ignore the bequest, or go to Skopelos, and find out what happened to Dimitris? The silver Corvette wins out over the Mercedes. Paul embarks on a quest, a physical and metaphorical journey following in the footsteps of those other literary pilgrims who, abandoning the cold, predictable, organised North, suddenly find themselves in a head-on collision with the vibrancy and chaos of the hot South. It is no accident that Greece, bequeathing to the global imagination the archetypal journey of Odysseus, is frequently the ultimate destination. Recalling his mother, who died several years ago, Paul tells us more about his relationship with her, adding
‘…my magnificent quest for the true meaning of the Odyssey began…with her.’
Paul speaks, as he says ‘using numbers, numbers are like words to me.’ There were times in the novel when I found my attention wandering a little because of the repetitiveness and lack of affect in Paul’s style of narration. But this is part and parcel of the author’s empathetic depiction of her character, her ability to imaginatively get inside his head.
Early on Paul tells us ‘I do not like adventures.’ But by the time we reach Els Boot’s moving finale, he will have shown himself capable of pursuing an adventure, of confronting his difficulties, embracing new sensations, and in his search for his ‘home’, his personal Ithaca, of learning how to speak with words again instead of numbers.
Skolepos follows the main character Paul, a sixty year old man who has struggled with his homosexuality & his capacity to show and feel emotions with the people around him for his entire life. It isn’t until a phone call from a small island in Greece radically changes his life of comfort and routine.

While the book is quite short, it manages to capture & describe the character of Paul van den Berg so well. The author also paints a beautiful picture of the island of Skelepos and reading about the descriptive scenery made me long to travel there to experience it for myself.

I particularly liked the way in which the book is written, as Paul is telling us the story as if in a one-on-one conversation, trying to express himself for the first time in his life. You truly feel his emotional struggles through life, and I couldn’t help but feel sad for the character that seemed so real. The author does a tremendous job of bringing Paul to life as I can easily picture him within his world of seclusion, surrounded by his material objects.

I would certainly recommend this book to anyone and everyone. It beautifully captures one man’s journey to self-discovery and acceptance. It shows you just how important it is to be honest with both the people you care about, but more importantly yourself. It reiterates the point that life is short, and should not be squandered. This book is simply beautiful.
This story was pleasantly meandering. A combination love story/travelogue/journey of self-discovery, it takes its time developing the character of the lead, describing his background and idiosyncrasies with nice detail. The writing style is simple and direct (perhaps because it’s a translated work), which sets a confident tone. Despite the lead’s apparent autism/Asperger’s, he’s surprisingly appealing, offering many insights that are both witty and whimsical.

There are faults. The translation isn’t perfect—grammar, punctuation, and structural errors dot the narrative. The format includes no paragraph indentations (which causes some parts to read as long, run-on thoughts), although there are section breaks within chapters to divide up the story. And the subtitle is a bit generic. The lone narrative fault regards the lead’s climactic decision, which didn’t seem to have much grounding for why it should be a difficult one.

Overall, I enjoyed the story. Unlike traditional Hollywood movies where late-in-life changes feel forced and trite, the lead’s coming of age at 60 feels well-earned.
Paul is an elderly sixty year old man who has lived his life controlled by the constraints and regulations forced upon him by his parents and his environment. His life works like a clock, ticking in pace with set times and days. But deep inside him he knows he has passed through life without experiencing the journey. Then a phone call changes everything.

Els deals with Paul's emotional struggles in the life he has set for himself and his journey to freedom in an interesting manner. She captures the key moments when he is able to relate to other people, to feel loved and feel pain and makes the transformation a lively narration. Right at the end when he makes the final decision you can't help but feel the tears spring up. You realize Paul might have had his own battle, but so many people fail to face other important battles in their lives out of fear. Until they realize it is too late.