Machine Without Horses by Helen Humphreys
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Let me preface this review by saying that this is not the sort of book I’d usually select, but it was the “One Book, One New Tecumseth” pick by the town’s Public Library, and so I purchased a signed copy. The title is based on a dance called Machine Without Horses, and we learn that the subject, Megan Boyd, loved to go to town to dance after a hard week of tying flies for salmon fisherman. Very little else is known about her life, though her flies were sought after worldwide, including royalty.
The book is told in two parts. Part 1 is Humphrey’s telling us where she got the idea to write about a Scottish woman who ties flies (an old obituary) as well as much about her writing process, how authors think, her daily routine with her dog, and so on. While my writing process differs from hers in many ways, I actually enjoyed most of this. That said, there were three things that irked me. In one section, she writes about a novelist who tells two stories about the watch he is wearing. Rather than tell us which story is correct, Humphreys simply says, “I guessed correctly.” As if this “secret” (which story is correct) must be kept from the reader. In another section, she recalls reading novel set in the 1930s, about a woman who walked from New York to Alaska. Once again, she keeps an important detail from the reader: the name of the book and author (readers, or at least this reader, likes to fact check this stuff, and possibly try to find the book). But the thing in Part 1 that annoyed me most was where Humphreys states that she doesn’t want to hurt any family or friends with her fabricated story of Megan Boyd. “I’ll give her another name,” she tells us just before Part 2. Which is absurd, given that Part 2 is in the same book.
Part 2 is the story of “Ruth,” Humphrey’s fictionalized life of Megan Boyd. There’s far more about the intricacies of flies/types of flies/how to tie a fly then I have any interest in, much of it used to pad the word count, which, despite considerable repetition on how she spends her days and the austerity of her life and cabin, is lean (without Part 1, Part 2 simply could not have been long enough or have enough meat on the bone to warrant a novel). As such, the story tends to drag, though there are some nice moments where Humphreys delves into Ruth’s relationships with her father, a man by the name of Captain Asher, and a woman named Evelyn. I also enjoyed reading about her three dogs (at different times of her life), though one dog, Socks, simply disappears from the book without a word of explanation. (We can assume years have gone by and the dog has crossed the rainbow bridge, but a mention would have been nice given several chapters included him).
There are also inconsistencies in the story that her editor should have caught, often entering around Ruth’s daily routine. For example, on one page, Ruth makes her usual “proper breakfast” – eggs, toast, bacon and a grilled tomato – before daylight. Now, she lives without electricity, so she’s cooking in the dark or possibly by paraffin lamp (okay?) but not two pages later, much is made about how she leaves the curtains open a crack so she rises with the sun, the time depending on the time of year. Which is it?
Critics seemed to have loved this book, and you may too. I really wanted to, but in the end, to this reader, it was just okay. 2.5 stars.
GOODREADS RATING SYSTEM:
5: It was amazing
4: really liked it
3: liked it
2: It was okay
1: didn’t like it