TATA

Valérie Perrin is a favourite author of the Den’s (Fresh Water for Flowers and Three are both in the Den’s Library). Her latest novel ‘Tata’ is once again a beautifully written multi layered story about two generations of a family set in the provincial town of Gueugnon by this exceptional storyteller.

The story begins with Agnes Dugain, a successful film director and recently divorced mother of a daughter, living in Paris. Agnes receives a call informing her that her aunt (Tata) Collette has been found dead in her home. However, this is the same Aunt Collette who had died and been buried three years earlier. Agnès returns to Gueugnon and the friends she knew growing up to unravel the truth. She finds that Collette faked her death and allowed someone else to be buried using her identity. Collette had never married, worked her whole life as a shoe mender and loved supporting the town’s local football team, Agnes is given a suitcase by one of Collette’s co-conspirators, which contains hours of recorded tapes by her Aunt. As Agnès listens to the tapes, she finds there was so much more to her aunt that she ever realised. The story switches between the present day and the 1950s period of Collette’s childhood, in particular her determination to help her brother Jean (Agnes’s father), become a renowned musician. As Agnès discovers the sacrifices Collette made for other people throughout her life, it allows her to come to terms with her own grief and heartbreak of her failed marriage and begin to see a more hopeful future for herself.

It is so easy to become absorbed into the magical world Perrin creates. There is a beautiful eccentricity to her characters and even for those who seem to live the simplest of lives, she finds hidden secrets and unique moments. She magically combines warmth and grief and exquisitely demonstrates the strong ties that run between families. At times, it is hard to keep track of who is who, which is why at six hundred pages long, allow enough time to immerse yourself into this absorbing story.