BROTHERLY LOVE

by Gabriel Fielding ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

The author of In the Time of Greenbloom and Through Streets Broad and Narrow continues his chronicle of the Blaydon family in this third novel. The central character is John Blaydon's older brother David, destined to follow his father into the ministry, but much of the action is seen through John's eyes; indeed the scope of the novel covers the time from his eighth year to his Dublin internship. Whereas the earlier books dealt with John at length, Brotherly Love includes more detail about the four other Blaydon children but does not give enough information about the unhappy David for a satisfactory portrait. This is the book's main fault. It was mother's moral coercion which forced the spirited David into the Church, as a substitute for his father's weakness, and though David is fully her match in many ways (and her fondest child) he remains dominated by her throughout his short life. Resembling his grandfather in his weakness, and perhaps as his own form of revolt, David, though in the Church and married, becomes involved in a series of shabby affairs which cause himself and his family great anguish and which are a scandal in his parish. Eventually he's killed on a hiking trip with John and though the fall is supposedly an accident there are previous intimations in David's own behavior that he sensed his impending doom. Largely episodic in nature, the book lacks the dramatic force of Greenbloom and the narrative pace of Through Streets Broad and Narrow but still exemplifies Fielding's gifts as a storyteller.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Morrow

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1961

Categories: FICTION