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A review by sjgrodsky
Gateway to the Moon by Mary Morris
2.0
My unenthusiastic reaction to this book marks me as an outlier.
To give some context: this book was selected by my reading group. And I agreed to facilitate the discussion. (Everyone has to be the facilitator at least once during the year’s reading.) I usually like to be the facilitator, but I found this novel completely uninspiring. Still, I pushed on with it, wondering how I would manage to facilitate a discussion with a dozen or so sharp-witted women who, I was afraid, would perceive my lack of enthusiasm.
Fortunately, when the book club leader sent out her final list of the year’s assignments, she somehow had not included me as the facilitator. Cosmic justice! I negotiated a different book with her, and I’m now relieved of the onerous duty towards this book I thought I had.
So, why did I find the book so uninspiring? Well, the concept is fascinating: people in New Mexico who call themselves Catholics but follow customs that are typically Jewish. It’s just that the evidence for these people being the descendants of conversos is sketchy. In fact, there is counter evidence that these supposed conversos are actually descendents of an obscure Christian sect that follows some customs (such as observing Saturday sabbath) that are similar to Jewish customs (see https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/378454/).
So, I am not too happy with Mary Morris for perpetuating a romantic belief that has only a sketchy factual basis.
But more to the point, I just don’t enjoy Mary Morris’s story. She is a wonderful prose stylist. But she can’t plot her way out of a barn door. We are introduced to Miguel, we are introduced to Rachel and her dysfunctional family, and then, what? The story goes back in time to Columbus‘s voyage and then back to Miguel who is nearly killed in a rain storm, and then back to the 16th century again with a new set of characters…
Her handling of the Miguel in the storm subplot was manipulative. We learned that Miguel, who is only 14, drives his car into an arroyo just before a major rainstorm turns the arroyo into a turbulent river that could drown him. Then it’s several chapters of early Spanish history before we get back to Miguel. And then we don’t really learn what happened to him. He continues in his role as a major character, so we conclude, without knowing any of the details, that he somehow survived the arroyo.
Mary Morris also get some details just plain wrong. For example she has a Taino Indian offer a mango to one of the European explorers on Columbus’s ship. But the mango is an Asian fruit, introduced to the new world by Europeans. A Taino would not have had one.
Well, I have vented my spleen in this review. During the discussion, I am going to be as quiet as I can manage. I’ll tell about the counter narrative that offers a different explanation of the supposed converso descendants. Other than that, I’ll try not to disturb the enjoyment other book group members may have derived.
To give some context: this book was selected by my reading group. And I agreed to facilitate the discussion. (Everyone has to be the facilitator at least once during the year’s reading.) I usually like to be the facilitator, but I found this novel completely uninspiring. Still, I pushed on with it, wondering how I would manage to facilitate a discussion with a dozen or so sharp-witted women who, I was afraid, would perceive my lack of enthusiasm.
Fortunately, when the book club leader sent out her final list of the year’s assignments, she somehow had not included me as the facilitator. Cosmic justice! I negotiated a different book with her, and I’m now relieved of the onerous duty towards this book I thought I had.
So, why did I find the book so uninspiring? Well, the concept is fascinating: people in New Mexico who call themselves Catholics but follow customs that are typically Jewish. It’s just that the evidence for these people being the descendants of conversos is sketchy. In fact, there is counter evidence that these supposed conversos are actually descendents of an obscure Christian sect that follows some customs (such as observing Saturday sabbath) that are similar to Jewish customs (see https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/378454/).
So, I am not too happy with Mary Morris for perpetuating a romantic belief that has only a sketchy factual basis.
But more to the point, I just don’t enjoy Mary Morris’s story. She is a wonderful prose stylist. But she can’t plot her way out of a barn door. We are introduced to Miguel, we are introduced to Rachel and her dysfunctional family, and then, what? The story goes back in time to Columbus‘s voyage and then back to Miguel who is nearly killed in a rain storm, and then back to the 16th century again with a new set of characters…
Her handling of the Miguel in the storm subplot was manipulative. We learned that Miguel, who is only 14, drives his car into an arroyo just before a major rainstorm turns the arroyo into a turbulent river that could drown him. Then it’s several chapters of early Spanish history before we get back to Miguel. And then we don’t really learn what happened to him. He continues in his role as a major character, so we conclude, without knowing any of the details, that he somehow survived the arroyo.
Mary Morris also get some details just plain wrong. For example she has a Taino Indian offer a mango to one of the European explorers on Columbus’s ship. But the mango is an Asian fruit, introduced to the new world by Europeans. A Taino would not have had one.
Well, I have vented my spleen in this review. During the discussion, I am going to be as quiet as I can manage. I’ll tell about the counter narrative that offers a different explanation of the supposed converso descendants. Other than that, I’ll try not to disturb the enjoyment other book group members may have derived.