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Fragmented Past
a review
Many authors turn out variations of the same book with each new offering, or a continuation of a well-practised style and flavour. Toni Jordan is not one of these. The Fragments is fresh and very different from all her previous novels in its structure, style and story.
Actually, there are multiple stories weaving through this novel, occurring in two distinct periods and locations: 1980s Brisbane and 1930s New York. Distinct and intimately connected.
The title of the book refers to a few enticing fragments of a lost novel by a celebrated American writer of the earlier twentieth century and a display of those fragments at an exhibition in Brisbane in more modern times. The main protagonist in 1986, Caddie, meets Rachel, an older woman, at the exhibition. Rachel quotes part of a line from the lost novel that does not appear in any of the fragments yet sounds absolutely right to Caddie, who has made a long study of the author, Inge Karlsson. Rachel is the main protagonist from the 1930s.
The Fragments alternates chapters between the two places and periods. As it progresses, the two interleaved periods seem to come closer together. The mystery of Rachel quoting the unknown line prompts Caddie to delve into whether it is possible that someone rad the novel before all copies were destroyed in a fire in which Inge Karlsson and her…
