Through Grenville's perceptive but uncondemning eyes, human failings are revealed as both funny and pathetically endearing. While aptly conveying the pain that comes with mature self-examination (as well as the consequences of failing to see oneself honestly), The Idea of Perfection never loses its gentle sense of irony and humor. Meanwhile, a self-absorbed ex-model named Felicity Porcelline struggles to fend off middle age as she flirts with a Chinese butcher whose ethnic background both disturbs and intrigues her.
Thus far, like the bridge, they have been bent but not broken, but their futures are very much in doubt. She has been divorced twice and, in a most devastating fashion, lost a third husband to suicide. Like the bridge, both have survived potentially crushing blows. Douglas Cheeseman, a large-eared, socially maladroit engineer, has been sent to supervise the demolition of Bent Bridge. Harley Savage, a tall, unfashionable woman with a love of folk artifacts, has come to Karakarook to help establish a heritage museum. Should the bridge be saved as part of a campaign to preserve the region's heritage, or should it be torn down to make room for a more modern structure? This question divides the townsfolk yet brings together two newcomers to Karakarook-a man and a woman who yearn to build emotional bridges but fear that they lack the tools to do so.
Although apparently weakened, the bridge remains structurally viable, and it has become an object of fierce debate in the town. Known to the locals as Bent Bridge, it has been damaged, though not destroyed, by a mass of drifting timber that struck its central supports during a flood.
The Idea of Perfection is literally about a bridge: a fictitious wooden span near Karakarook in rural New South Wales. In the process, she offers an unforgettable study of the fragile structures of emotion that may either connect us to others or collapse without warning. In The Idea of Perfection, Grenville, winner of Britain's prestigious Orange Prize, brings her discerning knowledge of human strengths and frailties to bear upon a pair of unlikely soul mates. Summary | Author | Book Reviews | Discussion QuestionsĪustralian novelist Kate Grenville has won praise from readers and critics alike for her acute psychological portraits and her genius for portraying states of human feeling.
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