I commented last week (I think it was) about how I didn't read many "modern" novels because of the whole Cavalcade of Dysfunction! thing.

Well, I guess I prove myself wrong because the book I just finished is a "modern" novel, and yeah, it's pretty much a Cavalcade of Dysfunction.

It's called Behind the Scenes at the Museum. Author is Kate Atkinson. Apparently it's a highly-lauded (though I had not heard of it before it came in a cheapie "grab bag" of books from Bas Bleu.

It starts out auspiciously enough - I think it is the only novel I can remember reading where the narrator describes herself as "present" moments after her conception.

The format of the book is odd, and at times confusing - she includes "footnotes" of family history, which are then inserted between the chapters of her life.

The book is described in various blurbs on the cover and opening pages. I will agree with "darkly comic." However, I think the "out-Copperfields David Copperfield" HAS to be hyperbole, even though you may note that David Copperfield is one of the books I started and did not finish.

Mainly, the book is a story of Ruby's family - going back to her great-great grandmother, who ran off with M. Armand the traveling photographer. And it seems that dissatisfaction with their lot in life is bred into the genes (or perhaps a function of the choices made) of the women in her family - Nell and Bunty and Ruby and her sisters.

There are some rather cringey moments in the book. Ruby, at two different points, catches each of her parents in flagrante delicto (with someone other than the person to whom they are married). There's a lot of mistreatment of people by other people.

It's rescued a bit by the "darkly comic" sense that I alluded to earlier. And yet, there are points where the book is kind of a slog, there are some rather depressing bits.

There is also something - and this is perhaps a small spoiler, though I won't reveal TOO much - that happened early in Ruby's life, which is VERY important and changes everything once you learn it - I actually went back and re-read the section that took place around the time that the BIG thing happened, and while there are clues, they're somewhat easily missed (or perhaps, easily missed by someone like me who doesn't tend to expect that kind of event). If this were a "Golden Age" mystery, all of the author's fans would be yelling "Cheat!" because one of the "rules" established (at least in that genre) is that you do not withhold important information from the reader.

At any rate.

The book more or less annoyed me (then why did you keep reading, you ask? I do not know, I answer - perhaps I thought it would all be fixed at the end).

However, there's an interesting line late in the book, which maybe makes all of the descriptions of thrown crockery and ruined holidays a bit more worth it.

It is very nearly the end of the book. Patricia and Ruby - now grown, now very changed from who they once were - are parting, Patricia to return to Australia where she is a Buddhist veterinarian and Ruby to the northern Shetlands where she lives in near-seclusion translating technical books for a living - the assumption is that they will never see each other again, all the other family ties are long gone.

Patricia, is flying home with her great-grandmother's clock and her childhood toy panda as the only mementos of her past life. Ruby is preparing to hop on the northbound train.

"'The past is what you leave behind in life, Ruby,' she says with the smile of a reincarnated lama. 'Nonsense, Patricia,' I tell her as I climb on board my train. 'The past's what you take with you.'"

Interesting thought, that. Where do you fall on that continuum? I have to admit I am very strongly in the "take with you" camp - I can see how things in my past shape (for better or worse) how I react and behave today. Even how some of the "bad things," things I'd rather forget (the long eight years of brutal teasing from peers in grammar school) have benefited me in some way (I tend to be a more compassionate person now and am less likely to ridicule someone who is different, knowing how it feels). And yet, there are also the bad sides to those things: I am much more guarded and cautious about being friendly with people because of the times that "broke bad" on me when some little snot of a popular kid did the "let's pretend to be friends with the weird kid because then we can turn on her" thing.

So no, I don't see my past as something I easily leave behind me.

But I can see how it would be kind of refreshing to be able to see the past as what you "leave behind" in life. Especially if that life has been rather difficult or unpleasant or you made bad choices along the way.

So while I didn't love the book the way I love some, I do think it had its moments.

I will say I'm grateful I didn't grow up in a family like the Lennoxes. I realize it's played as somewhat broad slapstick-ish humor, and I realize it's meant to be viewed through the lens of someone's childhood memories, but still - as I said, some cringe-y moments in the book.