Book Review – The Hand That First Held Mine by Maggie O'Farrell
26 Feb
When the sophisticated Innes Kent turns up on her doorstep, Lexie Sinclair realises she cannot wait any longer for her life to begin, and leaves for London. There, at the heart of the 1950s Soho art scene, she carves out a new life. In the present day, Elina and Ted are reeling from the difficult birth of their first child. Elina struggles to reconcile the demands of motherhood with sense of herself as an artist, and Ted is disturbed by memories of his own childhood that don’t tally with his parents’ version of events. As Ted begins to search for answers, an extraordinary portrait of two women is revealed, separated by fifty years, but connected in ways that neither could ever have expected.
The Hand That First Held is Maggie O’Farrell’s fifth book and Winner of the Costa Novel Award 2010. The novel focuses on the lives of two women; Lexie and Elina. We first meet Lexie as a young girl in the 1950s, living with her parents and longing to escape her rural confines to experience life. Elina, lives in present day London and has recently given birth to her first child. As their stories unwind it becomes clear that despite their different backgrounds, Elina and Lexie have more in common than their independence of spirit with ties that bind them across half a century.
The novel alternates between Lexie’s and Elina’s stories, starting with alternating chapters that focus on the events that bring Lexie to London and her developing relationship with journalist Innes Kent and Elina’s feelings about her new role as a mother following a traumatic birth. The two stories are seemingly unrelated but as the novel gathers pace, past and present threads come ever closer to revealing a dramatic truth connecting the two women making this an unputdownable piece of contemporary fiction.
This is a story on many levels and through Lexie and Elina and their relationships, Maggie O’Farrell explores themes of love, parenthood, jealousy and loss and the repercussions of actions in time. As with her last book, The Vanishing of Esme Lennox, O’Farrell seems to capture moments and emotions in time perfectly; taking the reader on journey into the future to see the repercussions of said actions and events and illustrating that life can change in a second. I really enjoyed the descriptions of London, and particularly Soho in the 1950s and this book appealed to my love of history (and particularly recent history) as well as my love of a good story.
Maggie O’Farrell really gets inside the mind of her characters and this is an emotional read. I liked Lexie, her strength of character and fighting spirit, but it was Elina that I identified with most as she tries to come to terms with the life changing experience that is becoming a Mum for the first time. O’Farrell has really captured the mix of emotions and highs and lows of the first few months of parenthood warts and all.
I found Elina’s husband Ted’s perspective on fatherhood fascinating. The arrival of his son causes him to reflect on his own childhood, revealing complex memories that have been long hidden and creating a mystery to the story that had me engrossed and kept me guessing throughout.
O’Farrel is a clever author and just as I thought I’d worked out the linkage between past and present, the story would twist and I’d find myself having to guess again. Despite being a book that largely focuses on relationships and emotions, The Hand That First Held Mine has an excellent pace and enough twists to leave me wondering if the full answer would ever be revealed.
This is a thought provoking novel; one of those books that stays with you long after you’ve closed the final page. I’ve now read all of Maggie’s books and her writing goes from strength to strength. The Hand That First Held Mine is her best yet and I can’t wait to see what she has in store for us next!
5/5
With massive thanks to Helena at Headline for sending me a copy of this book for review.
You can find out more about Maggie and her books at: http://www.maggieofarrell.com/
A version of this review also appears at: www.libripopulus.co.uk
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They’re Young, Fabulous and Fanged…
I didn’t get as much reading done as I’d have liked either but I managed to read six books. My book of the month for January is Beautiful Creatures which was something a little bit different for me and pure escapism. It had me gripped for all of its 600 plus pages!
n my Kindle and the rest in hard copy 
and two of my choices counted towards the British Books Challenge that The Bookette is running.
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