Some of the time shifts felt stiff, the plot and characters feel dated at times and the various threads of the plot are wrapped up a bit too quickly and tidily to do justice to what had preceded it. While not an uplifting story, it is a revealing tale of how love and pain and hurt and guilt can coexist in a family. I found myself ignoring chapters and just reading. I was therefore even more surprised as I began reading to discover how engaging the story and characters were. As I explored my options for reading The Elected Member, I was surprised that I could get neither a Kindle nor Audible edition.
The Elected Member was the first I had read by her and prior to reading this novel, I had never heard of her. She was the first woman to win the Booker Prize. The Elected Member by Bernice Rubins, her fourth novel, was awarded the Booker Prize in 1970. Are Norman’s problems the cause or the result of the family’s disintegration? The other sister, Esther, has married outside the Jewish faith and is estranged from the family.
One sister, Bella, still lives at home and continues to dress as a young teenager, even though she is in her late 30’s.
When we meet him in the first few pages of this novel we learn that his career as a barrister is in ruins and he is experiencing drug-induced hallucinations. Ultimately Norman decides to pursue the law as a profession and becomes a very successful barrister. His mother liked to show him off by having him speak in the various languages to her friends and acquaintances. He was fluent in twelve languages at which point he decided that was enough.
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