So this is a breathtakingly bold conceit that could have gone disastrously wrong, which is partly what prompted me to pick it up. I did start it with a bit of an attitude of waiting for it to fall apart, but it never faltered, and it carried me with it right to the end. So the idea is this - Vigininia Woolf, the very actual, living breathing person, is, by some fantastical literary magic, willed back into existence by an author researching her work for a conference paper, in New York circa 2014. She has all her memories up to and including the moment she dies, and she quickly becomes aware that she has skipped forward in time. Her reactions to this, apart from a certain lack of curiosity about how it came to have happened, which she accepts fairly placidly, seem absolutely spot on from what I know of her life, and at times are portrayed with heart rending emotional insight. The first person viewpoint switches from Virginia to the author who conjured her into being, who acts as her tour guide to twenty first century life. There's a sub plot involving the author's rather neglected daughter's rite of passage quest to track her mother down, which felt like the least vital part of the story, and there's an attempt to explain it all to some extent at the end that felt unnecessary. It also, at times, perhaps takes too many liberties with Woolf's inner life, but then I think it has been meticulously researched, so perhaps I should bow to Gee's superior knowledge of her subject, and also, she acknowledges in a foreword that part of the reason for writing the book is to tackle Woolf, to, in an affectionate way, bring her down from her sacred pedestal as the champion supreme of women writers. It's an enormously bold undertaking, and despite the odd flaw, I have to award it full marks for sheer chutzpah I think. It's also a hell of a ride. Highly recommended for all Woolf fans. ( )

I found this novel out of the blue, had seen no publicity about it, but grazing in the London Review of Books bookshop, there it was. Yay! As a big Virginia Woolf fan I just had to have it, and Maggie Gee was surely not going to let me down, and she didn’t. A reason to support our increasingly rare independent bookshops.

It is a multi-layered exploration of a lot of things (some of which I am sure I missed and will find in later readings). The novel’s backbone is that a 21st century writer goes to NY on her way to a conference in Istanbul, to see the originals of Virginia Woolf’s work, but when she gets there, what she encounters is the woman herself, reborn in the 21st century, and all that entails. Angela takes it upon herself to marshal this reincarnation of her literary heroine, and it isn’t exactly what she expects.

The novel is about literary icons, and how they both succeed and fail us, it is about how outsiders are sometimes more adept than insiders at survival, often Virginia’s curiosity makes her far more able to tolerate the 21st century than Angela can. Worn down by the barrage of modern life Angela has less patience and misses so much.

Angela also has a daughter she constantly tells us she loves, but rarely spends time with, and a husband with very much his own life (their relationship is under strain). In some ways the daughter, Gerda’s story interested me less, but it had aspects that mirrored the main narrative, and certainly came together with the central story at the end.

In contrast, Virginia was childless due to her health issues, with a husband who worshiped her, but a complicated relationship that hinged mostly on intellect. Complicated but equal, possibly rare for her era.

Virginia persuades Angela to take her to the conference about herself in Istanbul, and as well as exploring the emotional and sexual world of Virginia, there are the comparisons of the city, as Virginia had visited Constantinople, as it then was, twice in her twenties.

The conclusion is very much about how literature of the past can teach, enliven and be relevant to the present. In this case how Virginia’s work and life can inspire and challenge new readers in the 21st century. ( )