The day after finishing the previous book, I read “The End of the Alphabet” by C. S. Richardson in one day. It’s listed as a novel, but even before today’s standards, this is a novella at the very most. (I’ve read books marketed as novellas that were longer.)
From Publishers Weekly via. Amazon.Com:
An abrupt death sentence given to a 50-year-old London ad exec forces an uneasy deliverance in Richardson’s smartly setup, poignant tale. Given less than a month to live, Ambrose Zephyr, alphabet-obsessed since childhood, decides to spend out his last days traveling around the globe from A to Z. Ambrose and his wife, Zappora “Zipper” Ashkenazi (the couple is childless), begin in Amsterdam, viewing art by Velázquez and Rembrandt that has been significant to them in their loving marriage, and now looks wholly transformed. The two move between the sweet memories of past love and an unreal present, from Berlin to Chartres, the Great Pyramids of Khufu to Istanbul; when Ambrose begins to falter and they return home to their Kensington terrace flat. Reality and good manners demand that they inform their respective employers and friends of Ambrose’s condition, while Zappora, a fashion editor attempting to keep a journal of the couple’s last moments together, endures until the end.
I never paid attention to how short this book was when I obtained a copy through BookMooch. It was only when it showed up did I see how incredibly small the book was. I suspected it to be much longer. With such a write up as the one posted above, an author could have taken this to 500 pages easily.
C. S. Richardson
Richardson doesn’t linger on the surroundings that Ambrose and Zipper see. It’s about them and their relationship. And even that doesn’t go as far as it could, given the short length of the story. In the end you truly find out what it was mostly supposed to be about. The end of the book is the beginning, starting with the same sentence. It’s about the fleeting final moments of this couple’s marriage. There is no depth to exactly what illness is striking Ambrose down. Quick stories of some meaning behind the places they visit are short and sweet. Whole 20 page chapters could have been devoted to each back story alone. It is rather obvious when holding the book, that kind of depth isn’t what you are going to get. In some ways it is disappointing. So you take it as it is.
Richardson’s prose was quite elegant when it needed to be. It still was rather light at times, but that seems to be the nature of the book. In some respects it seemed to be more of an exercise in writing those moments between two people instead of displaying their entire lives, but focusing it in those final days. The story doesn’t totally propel the book. The writing is a big key.
Given that you can read the entire book in one sitting, or at least in one day, it turned out to be a rather charming book, even if with a death sentence. But it’s still tempered with the disappointment of being so short and lacking the depth I had though was in store.
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