Bone Gap

by Laura Ruby

He'd been drawn here by the grass and the bees and the strange sensation that this was a magical place, that the bones of the world were a little looser here, double-jointed, twisting back on themselves, leaving spaces one could slip into and hide . . .

Everyone knows Bone Gap is full of gaps - gaps to trip you up, gaps to slide through so you can disappear forever. So when young, beautiful Roza goes missing, the people of Bone Gap aren't surprised. After all, it isn't the first time someone's slipped away and left Finn and Sean O'Sullivan on their own.

Finn knows that's not what happened with Roza. He knows she was taken, ripped from the cornfields by a man whose face he can't remember. But no one believes him anymore. Well, almost no one. Petey Willis, the beekeeper's daughter, suspects that lurking behind Finn's fearful shyness is a story worth uncovering. But as we, like Petey, follow the stories of Finn, Roza, and the people of Bone Gap - their melancholy pasts, their terrifying presents, their uncertain futures - the truth about what happened to Roza is slowly revealed. And it is stranger than you can possibly imagine

• ISBN10: 0571332757
• ISBN13: 9780571332755
• Publish Date: 29 December 2016 (first published 3 March 2015)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Faber & Faber
• Edition: Main
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 400
• Language: English

Reviews

[Kat @ Novels & Waffles]

This unconventional book is like a big plate of chicken and waffles – it's an unusual combination of literary flavors that shouldn't work together, but somehow does. Mixing together suspense, small-towns, and surrealism, Bone Gap is an endearingly-strange and quirky example of the Magical Realism genre that will either be a hit-or-miss with most readers.

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[nannah]

I'm sorry to be so ... uh, Minnesotan? But this book was really ... interesting. Did I like it? Not really. Did I dislike it? Not really, either.

Bone Gap is a small town full of ... well, gaps to other worlds and planes of existences. So when the beautiful woman Roza disappears, they're not even surprised. Or so it says on the official summary. I never got an understanding of this--or that the people of the town actually know about this in the book, ever. In fact, I only understood that just one character know about these gaps in Bone Gap at all.

So right away going in I was a little confused.

But anyway, Bone Gap is a town full of gaps. Brothers Finn and Sean O'Sullivan finally find a great life when Roza, a Polish immigrant on the run from a kidnapper, stumbles into the picture. And then just one year later, she disappears. Finn swears she was taken, but Sean (as well as the rest of Bone Gap) don't believe him.

The twist in the book is so good, the writing is great, and the character interaction is even better. I just couldn't ... fully get into it. I'm not sure what it was. The kind of disjointed plot? The lack of the plot (Roza) fully affecting the protagonist (Finn)? I don't know.

Speaking of Roza, though, I really didn't like the way she was written. Her backstory was painfully pale -- and she seemed to be a foil for other characters' development (that didn't even matter, since those characters weren't even brought back). She's the most beautiful woman in the world, but also so sagely wise, so understanding, etc., etc., etc. And that's not even what bothers me. What bothers me is that she doesn't seem to understand how that affects other people. She's an old-world fairytale character that doesn't fit in a story like this.

She's also like ... the most stereotypical Polish folk-like woman character. It's like the author (and I don't know if Laura Ruby is Polish or knows anyone who's Polish so I'm just going off what I read) just went on the basic Polish wiki page for research. Roza's cooking skills include pierogi, gołąbki, babka, and kołaczki - four of the most common Polish recipes/foods. She's gorgeous (Eastern European, of course), cooks everything from scratch, lived on a farm from a town so small it was just called "Here". I don't know, it just got annoying the more I read.

Plus the plot involving her and her kidnapper was so stale. Sooo very stale. I don't want to spoil it, I guess, but I've had enough with this flat-like villain character. Maybe it was done for effect, but it didn't click for me.

[Bianca]

We have gaps in the world. In the space of things. So many places to lose yourself, if you believe that they’re there. You can slip into the gap and never find your way out. Or maybe you don’t want to find your way out.

— Dreamlike and at times chilling. About beauty, love, loss, identity, and perceptions. I really loved the prose, the characterizations, and the many themes/ideas it explored. This book is just STUNNING.

[Kelly]

Finn O'Sullivan is a quiet and reserved young man, reliant on his brother Sean who assumed the position of guardian after their mother abandoned her son's. The reader is introduced to Finn and Sean's relationship in the present, fractured and distant while Sean continues to grieve the loss of his relationship with the effervescent Roza. While Finn continued his education, Sean abandoned aspirations of becoming a doctor to care for Finn, now a paramedic and remaining in the lazy town of Bone Gap.

Roza is found sheltering, bloodied and beaten in the O'Sullivan barn and although hesitant, will reside in the small and self contained apartment on the property. Roza didn't abandon Sean and Finn O'Sullivan. Finn attests he has witnessed Rosa's abduction, a man who has emerged from the silent cornfields, nondescript and unsubstantiated. Finn cannot recall his face and labelled as a simpleton while Sean holds Finn responsible for allowing Roza to leave.

Rosa's journey from Europe to North America is harrowing, violent and confronting, exploring her abduction. Her nonlinear narration blended suspected delusions with magical realism, the unreliability created intrigue, vulnerability and a suspension of disbelief.

Finn and Sean's relationship and interactions with the Bone Gap community were fascinating. While Sean is respected, revered within the community, Finn is tormented and perceived as simple and oblivious, branded by the small, ignorant town. Although I enjoyed Sean's character, he was consumed by grief. Finn is an isolated young man who is dependent on Sean and I was disappointed that Sean disregarded Finn's emotional and mental health.

The gentle friendship between Finn and the beekeepers daughter Petey was lovely. Both teens share an understanding of the harm placed upon labels and being ostracised by their peers, labelled as promiscuous. Petey is a formidable character who refuses to conform to the ideals of the Bone Gap community, intelligent, perceptive and wonderfully abrasive.

Bone Gap is fantastical and enigmatic. A fusion of contemporary, magical realism and a beautifully written, lyrical narrative that will enchant readers until the final page. Simply breathtaking.

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[Jo]

Originally posted on Once Upon a Bookcase.

I thought Bone Gap by Laura Ruby sounded incredible when I first heard about it earlier in the year when it was published in the US, so I was really excited to discover that it was going to be published over here, too. It's completely captivating!

Bone Gap is such an intriguing story. It's told for the most part from the perspective of Finn and Roza, though occasionally we'll get chapters from Petey, the girl Finn is interested in, and Sean, Finn's older brother. We, the readers, know that Roza has been abducted, and you can't help but be frustrated that no-one is looking, and terrified of what will end up happening to her. Finn is the only one who knows the truth, but no-one will believe him, and what can he do? He's forever on the look out for the man who took her, but he just can't find him. He is carrying so much guilt over not being able to do anything now, over not doing more at the time, and so much fear of what will happen - or has happened - to Roza.

Roza is being kept by a man with strange powers, a man who can change where Roza is kept while she sleeps. She's in a house one day, and the next a castle. She has no idea where she is, and her attempts to escape always fail - it seems the man has thought of everything. He comes to see her each day to ask her the same question; "Do you love me yet?" He is obsessed with her beauty, a beauty she has come to hate. Roza remembers a time before - before she was kidnapped, before she was in Bone Gap, back when she was at university in the US, and back when she was home in Poland, and the way she was treated by boys because of how she looked.

There is a strong feminist theme that runs throughout Bone Gap on how women are seen. Roza attracted attention the attention from guys because she was very beautiful, but these guys felt they were entitled to her because she was so beautiful, or that her beauty made her think she was better than them when she decided to end things. The abuse she received is disgusting and terrifying, and she came to see her beauty as a curse, trying to make herself as unattractive as possible, to become invisible, so she doesn't attract the attention of men. It isn't until she arrives in Bone Gap, broken and bruised, that she experiences kindness from guys, when Sean and Finn help her and give her the keys to their apartment so she has somewhere to stay to rest and recover where she can lock the door. She is initially scared of them, more so of Sean, but it doesn't take long for her to realise their kindness and care is genuine, and they won't hurt her. It's something she's never known before, and slowly, slowly, she starts to fall for Sean, who sees beyond her beauty to the person inside.

There's also Petey, who has larger than normal features. The people of Bone Gap think her ugly, and rumours have spread that she is so desperate for attention that she'll have sex with anyone. This is not helped by the fact that her body has changed and become desirable to men, even if her face isn't. Because of how she's treated, she's become quite fierce, strong, and angry. She's always ready to defend herself as become accustomed to verbal abuse, and the hurtful, disgusting, cutting things people say to her are just awful. Underneath her fierceness, however, she is vulnerable; what people say hurts, she doesn't have a great opinion of herself, and when things start happening with Finn - who is extremely good looking - she's so hopeful but also waiting for things to go wrong; to discover he's using her, or not really interested. But Finn is genuinely interested in her; he doesn't see an ugly girl, he sees a pretty girl, someone he has feelings for.

There's another aspect of the story I really want to talk about, but it's kind of spoilery, so don't read ahead if you're planning on reading Bone Gap and don't want it spoilt for you.

Finn has Prosopagnosia - face blindness, which is why he's unable to describe the man who abducted Roza. But this only comes out towards the end of the book, because Petey pieces a few things together and does some research. This is so sad, because Petey reads that people with Prosopagnosia are attracted to those who have unusual features, so this confirms to her in her mind that she is ugly, that it's the only reason Finn can see her, that he is attracted to her. It's so sad, and it's heartbreaking for Finn to discover there's something "wrong" with him. A reason why people think he's weird, why he always seems distracted, and never looks anyone in the eye. He is as "strange" as everyone thinks he is, he is different.

This is the second book I've read where a main character has prosopagnosia, and it was such a different story. In Holding Up the Universe by Jennifer Niven, Jack knows the whole time something is wrong, because he used to be able to see people's faces properly, before an accident. But it looks like Finn was born with Prosopagnosia, because he knows no difference, and doesn't realise that other people don't see people the way he does, or that they're able to see and remember people's faces. So, with hindsight, looking back over the story, it's interesting to see someone live with this disability and how he learns how to recognise people.

Despite how much I enjoyed Bone Gap, I did feel like there was something missing. Magical realism stories never explain the fantastical elements of the story. There are no answers to "How?" or "Why?", but there are no questions, because the way it's written just has you accepting that these things just happen. There's an enchantment to the storytelling that sweeps you along with it. But that was missing from Bone Gap. I did think "How?" and "Why?" and although I knew I wouldn't get any answers, I was still a little annoyed that I wasn't told. I was totally captivated by the story, but I wasn't lost in the storytelling.

But it's just a small gripe in what is a really wonderful story, that will leave you on the edge of your seat, with no idea how it will end. It will break and warm your heart several times over,

Thank you to Faber & Faber for the proof.

[Stephanie]

This was a weird book, but I learned a lot about bees. And the ending was pretty ho-hum. I wanted more PERSEPHONE MYTH!