Book Stop Corner

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



“A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”



Lynn Cullen, an American best-selling author, pens an interesting historical fiction about Mark Twain and his life around his secretary, Isabel V. Lyon, in her new book, Twain's End that narrates that journey of Twain's life when he ranted negatively about his secretary and her husband in front of the whole world, thereby shedding light to a love affair between Helen Keller and Ann Sullivan Macy and her husband, John Macy.




Synopsis:

In March of 1909, Mark Twain cheerfully blessed the wedding of his private secretary, Isabel V. Lyon, and his business manager, Ralph Ashcroft. One month later, he fired both. He proceeded to write a ferocious 429-page rant about the pair, calling Isabel “a liar, a forger, a thief, a hypocrite, a drunkard, a sneak, a humbug, a traitor, a conspirator, a filthy-minded and salacious slut pining for seduction.” Twain and his daughter, Clara Clemens, then slandered Isabel in the newspapers, erasing her nearly seven years of devoted service to their family. How did Lyon go from being the beloved secretary who ran Twain’s life to a woman he was determined to destroy?

In Twain’s End, Lynn Cullen “cleverly spins a mysterious, dark tale” (Booklist) about the tangled relationships between Twain, Lyon, and Ashcroft, as well as the little-known love triangle between Helen Keller, her teacher Anne Sullivan Macy, and Anne’s husband, John Macy, which comes to light during their visit to Twain’s Connecticut home in 1909. Add to the party a furious Clara Clemens, smarting from her own failed love affair, and carefully kept veneers shatter.


This is a fictionalized tale about world's one of the famous writers, Mark Twain, and the story is laced with dark, twisted lies and mystery that makes the readers believe that in the end Twain was not an admirable human being, who is misled by his daughter, Clara, to humiliate his dearest private secretary, Isabel , under publicly. Twain highlighted Isabel as a liar who schemed for 6 years to get her hands on the Twain's family money as well as to be the wife of Mark Twain. A person who stayed loyal for 6 years, who not only acted as a private secretary to mark twain, but also did odd jobs for his family, is mortified in front of the whole world when Twain submitted an almost 500 pages long manuscript about Isabel and her equally lying and schematic husband, Ralph Ashcroft. Clara too fell on her father's footsteps and went on publicly to humiliate Isabel and her husband.

The author's portrayal is purely fictional and should not be confused with the character of Mark twain in real life. But at times, it is hard to believe when the author says that most of the events and the story is inspired largely from Isabel's diary notes. Moreover, the Victorian timeline is vividly arrested in the story line, thus giving the readers an almost real-life glace into that era. Although at times, the intricacy in detailing felt bit confusing and dull.

The writing style of the author is really strong and evocative, although the narrative is not that articulate or free-flowing, or rather say, the conversation between the characters are not highlighted in the story instead their thoughts are, which no doubt lets the readers see through the characters. The pacing is very slow at times and in fact, the way the story started unrolling right after the first chapter is not that good, instead, at times the focal point shifted from the main story to other trivial parts of the story line.

The characters are well developed and syncs slightly with their real-life demeanor since the author gave fictional life to some of the world famous real-life characters. Mark twain is depicted as someone who is cranky and can only give nasty remarks. Twain's demeanor is so god-damned awful that it will fill the readers' hearts with hate. Isabel is caring, strong and loyal character, whose grief will only make the readers sympathize with her. Clara is another hateful character who plots against Isabel and brain-washes his father's head. The supporting characters are also quite good and convincing. There's a brief description about Helen Keller and her love affair.

The most enlightening part of the book is that the readers are made aware about Isabel's story thus providing the readers with a new perspective to look at world's one of the most celebrated writers, Mark Twain. In a nutshell, the author took an compelling approach in reflecting Isabel's sadness through a fictional tale.

Verdict: A very different and unique story that is balanced both on reality and imagination featuring Mark Twain's life.

Courtesy: Thanks to the author, Lynn Cullen's, publicist for giving me an opportunity to read and review this book.
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Author Info:
Lynn Cullen grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana, the fifth girl in a family of seven children. She learned to love history combined with traveling while visiting historic sites across the U.S. on annual family camping trips. She attended Indiana University in Bloomington and Fort Wayne, and took writing classes with Tom McHaney at Georgia State. She wrote children’s books as her three daughters were growing up, while working in a pediatric office and later, at Emory University on the editorial staff of a psychoanalytic journal. While her camping expeditions across the States have become fact-finding missions across Europe, she still loves digging into the past. She does not miss, however, sleeping in musty sleeping bags. Or eating canned fruit cocktail. She now lives in Atlanta with her husband, their dog, and two unscrupulous cats.
Visit her here

Book Purchase Links:

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