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Breath and Bones
In 1884, Famke Summerfugl is ousted from her convent in Denmark for ... sensuousness and pulled from servitude by a second-rate painter named Albert Castle. Loving to be looked at, and able to stand perfectly still without shivering, Famke is the ideal artist’s model.
When Albert takes his eight-foot masterpiece and leaves his model behind, Famke sets out over the Atlantic, convinced that she is his muse.
Following Mirabilis, her highly acclaimed debut, Susann Cokal blends pre-Raphaelite painting, American brothels, Utahan polygamists, a bit of cross-dressing, a dynamite-wielding labor movement, one California millionaire, and the invention of electrical stimulation (as treatment for consumption) into a comic novel that gallops across the American west.
When Albert takes his eight-foot masterpiece and leaves his model behind, Famke sets out over the Atlantic, convinced that she is his muse.
Following Mirabilis, her highly acclaimed debut, Susann Cokal blends pre-Raphaelite painting, American brothels, Utahan polygamists, a bit of cross-dressing, a dynamite-wielding labor movement, one California millionaire, and the invention of electrical stimulation (as treatment for consumption) into a comic novel that gallops across the American west.
400 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 2005
About the author
Susann Cokal
12 books210 followersSusann Cokal is the author of two books for young adults and two for regular adults. Mermaid Moon just came out and is recommended for ages 14 and up. Her previous novel, The Kingdom of Little Wounds, won several national awards, including a Michael L. Printz Honor from the American Library Association.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
June 19, 2011
I don't read much historical fiction (I prefer straight-up biographies), so Breath and Bones was very much outside of my "literary comfort zone." I was expecting the flawless prose and carefully crafted narrative that this novel certainly delivers, but I wasn't really expecting to LIKE it much. Much to my delight, I was wrong! I like to divide my reviews into pros and cons, so here we go:
Pros:
- As I said, flawless prose. The kind that's not overly self-conscious, and disappears when you get sucked into the narrative. Periodically, however, I would encounter a perfectly phrased gem that would make me stop to savor the Rightness of it before reading on.
- Narrative that came together like clockwork. Now and then I would suddenly realize where a particular plot thread was heading, and by the end all of the themes and imagery came to a very satisfying, thought-provoking conclusion.
- Cokal excels at the juxtaposition of the divine and the morbid. She paints a pristine word-portrait of a sublimely beautiful woman posing for a painting - and then follows her to the chamber pot in the corner. This sort of realism hits you like a dash of cold water in the face, and I love it. One of the reasons I don't generally read historical fiction is because even the "gritty" bits tend to be romanticized, but Cokal has this very interesting way of seesawing back and forth. To put it in the context of the book's imagery, it's like a pre-Raphaelite painting with all the naughty bits in focus.
- The extensive and meticulous historical research that had to go into this book absolutely blew me away. Every other page I wanted to go Google something to see what the "real story" was behind a particular device, turn of phrase, place, or historical event. I resisted, not wanting to mar the wonderful blend of fact and fantastic fiction.
- The symbolic story at the heart of the narrative is lovely. I'd call this spoiler territory, but nobody else reviewing this book seems to have paid any attention to it so I'll just spell it out. Famke falls in love not with a man, but a sketch of herself - a possibility of who she might be. She pursues the man who drew this sketch, unconscious of the fact that she's actually pursuing herself, or his vision of her. As she travels, the sketch gradually fades and smears, while Famke herself becomes more and more real. Soon she is following vague images of herself painted onto canvasses - and then she is participating in her own creation by cutting up and restitching the canvasses. Creating herself out of the impressions other people have of her. I'll leave off there; if you can't figure out the rest of the symbolism yourself you probably don't care anyway.
Cons:
- If there's one thing this book lacks, it's character. Breath and Bones is very plot and thematically driven, and I had a really hard time "bonding" with the protagonist or anyone else. I think this is in part due to the nature of the story. We follow Famke from childhood to adulthood as she awakens both mentally and sexually - which means that she essentially starts out as a blank slate. I do feel she could have been made more sympathetic, though. We get no real insight into her deeper motivations, even if they are unconscious. She's more of a product of her environment than a person.
- Each chapter is prefaced with a quote from what I assume are actual historical texts. Although I read all of them faithfully, I never felt they added anything at all and could have been left out entirely. Not a big deal, though.
Books don't usually strike me this way, but while reading, three other stories often came to mind:
- The narrative distance and clinical tone of Sherlock Holmes.
- The historic timbre and, in particular, the Ellie/Dee Boot plot of Lonesome Dove.
- The self-discovery and endless perseverance of Millennium Actress (this one's a movie).
Add those together and you get Breath and Bones.
Pros:
- As I said, flawless prose. The kind that's not overly self-conscious, and disappears when you get sucked into the narrative. Periodically, however, I would encounter a perfectly phrased gem that would make me stop to savor the Rightness of it before reading on.
- Narrative that came together like clockwork. Now and then I would suddenly realize where a particular plot thread was heading, and by the end all of the themes and imagery came to a very satisfying, thought-provoking conclusion.
- Cokal excels at the juxtaposition of the divine and the morbid. She paints a pristine word-portrait of a sublimely beautiful woman posing for a painting - and then follows her to the chamber pot in the corner. This sort of realism hits you like a dash of cold water in the face, and I love it. One of the reasons I don't generally read historical fiction is because even the "gritty" bits tend to be romanticized, but Cokal has this very interesting way of seesawing back and forth. To put it in the context of the book's imagery, it's like a pre-Raphaelite painting with all the naughty bits in focus.
- The extensive and meticulous historical research that had to go into this book absolutely blew me away. Every other page I wanted to go Google something to see what the "real story" was behind a particular device, turn of phrase, place, or historical event. I resisted, not wanting to mar the wonderful blend of fact and fantastic fiction.
- The symbolic story at the heart of the narrative is lovely. I'd call this spoiler territory, but nobody else reviewing this book seems to have paid any attention to it so I'll just spell it out. Famke falls in love not with a man, but a sketch of herself - a possibility of who she might be. She pursues the man who drew this sketch, unconscious of the fact that she's actually pursuing herself, or his vision of her. As she travels, the sketch gradually fades and smears, while Famke herself becomes more and more real. Soon she is following vague images of herself painted onto canvasses - and then she is participating in her own creation by cutting up and restitching the canvasses. Creating herself out of the impressions other people have of her. I'll leave off there; if you can't figure out the rest of the symbolism yourself you probably don't care anyway.
Cons:
- If there's one thing this book lacks, it's character. Breath and Bones is very plot and thematically driven, and I had a really hard time "bonding" with the protagonist or anyone else. I think this is in part due to the nature of the story. We follow Famke from childhood to adulthood as she awakens both mentally and sexually - which means that she essentially starts out as a blank slate. I do feel she could have been made more sympathetic, though. We get no real insight into her deeper motivations, even if they are unconscious. She's more of a product of her environment than a person.
- Each chapter is prefaced with a quote from what I assume are actual historical texts. Although I read all of them faithfully, I never felt they added anything at all and could have been left out entirely. Not a big deal, though.
Books don't usually strike me this way, but while reading, three other stories often came to mind:
- The narrative distance and clinical tone of Sherlock Holmes.
- The historic timbre and, in particular, the Ellie/Dee Boot plot of Lonesome Dove.
- The self-discovery and endless perseverance of Millennium Actress (this one's a movie).
Add those together and you get Breath and Bones.
May 24, 2014
The heroine of "Breath and Bones" is already dead by the very first scene: a surreal art gallery, filled with various paintings featuring the same red-haired woman, and at last the woman herself, dead and pickled in a jar. The rest of the book winds back the clock to lead us to that point.
Not that Famke's death isn't guaranteed from her first (living) appearance, either. In a period book like this, when a character is introduced with a perpetual hacking cough, the reader can settle back in comfortable anticipation of tuberculosis.
"Breath and Bones" is slow to hook readers. It's hard to engage with Famke when she is mutely, meekly serving as joint muse and bedwarmer for her painter. Her dippy swooning for a man who is obviously and callously consuming her, rather than drawing the reader's sympathy, repels them.
But once Albert abandons her, Famke begins to grow, spilling out of the mold he (and society) has created for her. Her faithless lover's unworthiness becomes irrelevant; what matters is Famke's blind, courageous devotion and the purity of her quest to find him--and "Breath and Bones" is, at its best moments, an epic quest, one woman's odyssey across Europe and America.
On that note: Famke herself, when allowed to be the heroine of her own story, is fantastic. She asks questions of the world, and her naive simplicity becomes her shield against conventional answers. In her kindhearted, daft way, she refuses to accept what does not make sense to her--for her mind, while poorly educated and often misinformed, is entirely logical.
Alas, much of the time she is bound into her narrative role as Our Lady Of Perpetual Objectification. Just as Famke's quest to find Albert is at its most engaging--masquerading as a man, tracking Albert through his paintings of prostitutes, painting over his work to improve it with her own, more honest eye--and the hunt is closing in, the author interrupts her. Instead, the author reintroduces the same heavy, condescending masculine viewpoints that Famke has been escaping. Little by little, Famke's narrative is eclipsed by the aesthetic sexual appreciation of the men that surround her. They form a skeevy boys' club of Men Who Want To Possess Famke, while turning against her for the fact that other such men exist.
It's pretty gross.
I suspect that my negative reaction is the one which author Susann Cokal intended. It's impossible to read the closing lines (as spoken by the chairman of the Naked Famke Appreciation Club) and not put down the book with a sense of rage and frustration. All of Famke's growth, all of her slow struggle to reach her heart's desire and to express her own smothered creative impulses, her defense of the truth about women's bodies and women's minds--everything is censored and redefined by the aesthetic pretensions of other people.
Which is not an unexpected or an unfitting end to Famke's story. It only begs the question: why do such heroines have to die to make the author's point?
Fun bonus content for making the reader queasy: the quantity of unlikely metaphors used for sex (in bizarrely specific detail!) Moreover, the book boasts a hearty helping of talking points tailor-made for English majors. The symbolism of Famke cutting up and repurposing Albert's paintings? The recurring debate about the presence (or rather, absence) of body hair in Art? The essays practically write themselves. Unfortunately, they do so in the midst of an otherwise engaging story.
Despite all this grousing, I greatly enjoyed Breath and Bones. I can't get angry about a mediocre book, after all. I look forward to reading Cokal's other works in the future.
Check out my other reviews over at Book Grumps!
Not that Famke's death isn't guaranteed from her first (living) appearance, either. In a period book like this, when a character is introduced with a perpetual hacking cough, the reader can settle back in comfortable anticipation of tuberculosis.
"Breath and Bones" is slow to hook readers. It's hard to engage with Famke when she is mutely, meekly serving as joint muse and bedwarmer for her painter. Her dippy swooning for a man who is obviously and callously consuming her, rather than drawing the reader's sympathy, repels them.
But once Albert abandons her, Famke begins to grow, spilling out of the mold he (and society) has created for her. Her faithless lover's unworthiness becomes irrelevant; what matters is Famke's blind, courageous devotion and the purity of her quest to find him--and "Breath and Bones" is, at its best moments, an epic quest, one woman's odyssey across Europe and America.
On that note: Famke herself, when allowed to be the heroine of her own story, is fantastic. She asks questions of the world, and her naive simplicity becomes her shield against conventional answers. In her kindhearted, daft way, she refuses to accept what does not make sense to her--for her mind, while poorly educated and often misinformed, is entirely logical.
Alas, much of the time she is bound into her narrative role as Our Lady Of Perpetual Objectification. Just as Famke's quest to find Albert is at its most engaging--masquerading as a man, tracking Albert through his paintings of prostitutes, painting over his work to improve it with her own, more honest eye--and the hunt is closing in, the author interrupts her. Instead, the author reintroduces the same heavy, condescending masculine viewpoints that Famke has been escaping. Little by little, Famke's narrative is eclipsed by the aesthetic sexual appreciation of the men that surround her. They form a skeevy boys' club of Men Who Want To Possess Famke, while turning against her for the fact that other such men exist.
It's pretty gross.
I suspect that my negative reaction is the one which author Susann Cokal intended. It's impossible to read the closing lines (as spoken by the chairman of the Naked Famke Appreciation Club) and not put down the book with a sense of rage and frustration. All of Famke's growth, all of her slow struggle to reach her heart's desire and to express her own smothered creative impulses, her defense of the truth about women's bodies and women's minds--everything is censored and redefined by the aesthetic pretensions of other people.
Which is not an unexpected or an unfitting end to Famke's story. It only begs the question: why do such heroines have to die to make the author's point?
Fun bonus content for making the reader queasy: the quantity of unlikely metaphors used for sex (in bizarrely specific detail!) Moreover, the book boasts a hearty helping of talking points tailor-made for English majors. The symbolism of Famke cutting up and repurposing Albert's paintings? The recurring debate about the presence (or rather, absence) of body hair in Art? The essays practically write themselves. Unfortunately, they do so in the midst of an otherwise engaging story.
Despite all this grousing, I greatly enjoyed Breath and Bones. I can't get angry about a mediocre book, after all. I look forward to reading Cokal's other works in the future.
Check out my other reviews over at Book Grumps!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 3, 2019
I’m so glad I bought a copy of this because it definitely needs a reread. The narrative voice is so damm sly and sarcastic!
I’m a student of history, so the bits about the pompous and slightly sad male doctor inducing um, “spasms “ *snort* in women with ahem, electric massages “ had me rolling.
(I also thought of Dr Mac, and points to you if you get the Miss Fisher reference)
I disagree with some of the reviews on her. Yes Framke spends the novel chasing after men, but she endured a lot of hardship without anyone around at all. We’re also given glimpses of a world of female solidarity that is super wonderful, although not between the Mormons for some reason.) which offset this idea of a male dominated world, particularly with the Old West prostitutites who are portrayed as actual people, rather than some “heart of gold” bullshit.
I’m a sucker for a book where women are actually flawed people, and you’d be surprised how few there are out there.
I’m a student of history, so the bits about the pompous and slightly sad male doctor inducing um, “spasms “ *snort* in women with ahem, electric massages “ had me rolling.
(I also thought of Dr Mac, and points to you if you get the Miss Fisher reference)
I disagree with some of the reviews on her. Yes Framke spends the novel chasing after men, but she endured a lot of hardship without anyone around at all. We’re also given glimpses of a world of female solidarity that is super wonderful, although not between the Mormons for some reason.) which offset this idea of a male dominated world, particularly with the Old West prostitutites who are portrayed as actual people, rather than some “heart of gold” bullshit.
I’m a sucker for a book where women are actually flawed people, and you’d be surprised how few there are out there.
October 9, 2022
Like many others have done, I've been sitting on this review for a while. Reading this book was unsettling - don't simply ignore the small point at the beginning of the book!
I very much enjoyed reading this book; the story and detail and writing were excellent. The characterizations were all on point as well, any criticisms people have had can be pointed to the 'purpose' of the book perhaps. A familiarity with victorian poetry, especially 'The Angel in the House' will set the reader in good stead concerning the tone of the novel itself.
I think, for me, this is one of those books that some people (ahem, males...) might call 'comic' and that strikes me (non-binary, but female) as 'horrific' - black humour often does that for me as it calls up the prejudices and criticisms of how humans have been treated.
Anyway, all this to be said, read the book. There is a lot of learning here.
I very much enjoyed reading this book; the story and detail and writing were excellent. The characterizations were all on point as well, any criticisms people have had can be pointed to the 'purpose' of the book perhaps. A familiarity with victorian poetry, especially 'The Angel in the House' will set the reader in good stead concerning the tone of the novel itself.
I think, for me, this is one of those books that some people (ahem, males...) might call 'comic' and that strikes me (non-binary, but female) as 'horrific' - black humour often does that for me as it calls up the prejudices and criticisms of how humans have been treated.
Anyway, all this to be said, read the book. There is a lot of learning here.
Read
November 19, 2022I enjoyed more than her YA titles
December 7, 2008
This book is different. I tend to gravitate to books with unusual dark tendencies, not murder and mayhem though I do like a good mystery, I mean dark in the sense of exploring the anti-social side of human beings. In many ways that is what this book does. Famke is a teenager, young beautiful and afflicted with tuberculosis in the 1880's. She serves as the model for an artist and falls in love with him to the point that she follows him from Denmark to the American West. The darker side of it all is that he has abandoned her, she is following the dream that he loves her, and along the way a lot of people get hurt. The thing is these people getting hurt aren't exactly naive nor do they despise her for what she did, they actually seek her out so that it becomes this pied piper event across the American West.
In reading this book you learn a lot about the west at that time in history, everything from the brothels to the Mormons silk worm trade. There is also a lot about tuberculosis but not in the medical sense of analyzing it but in the way that the disease affects Famke and how she perceives this persisent cough with blood. At one time one of the prostitutes tells her that her throat is septic. It isn't until she runs into this rather odd and wealthy man who has some self education in the medical field that she learns this is tuberculosis and so as a modern reader we learn about some rather unusual choices for how to get rid of the little tubules that afflict her lungs.
It's worth reading the book to find out what the doctor's methodolgy is.
From the outset you know how the book will end, it is in the first chapter, the opening scene. "It was a large cylinder with thick, slightly green walls. The ends of the cylinder were of glass, too, and the craftmanship was so fine that the joinings were scarcely visible. But it was what the cylinder held inside that constituted the great wonder: the body of a woman, floating in a clear liquid with a blue velvet gown and hair such a brilliant red that at first glance it appeared unnatural." pages 4-5
Throughout the book I kept thinking she died a slow agonizing death from the disease so the spectucular ending was unexpected. It was one worthy of being embalmed in a glass jar.
In reading this book you learn a lot about the west at that time in history, everything from the brothels to the Mormons silk worm trade. There is also a lot about tuberculosis but not in the medical sense of analyzing it but in the way that the disease affects Famke and how she perceives this persisent cough with blood. At one time one of the prostitutes tells her that her throat is septic. It isn't until she runs into this rather odd and wealthy man who has some self education in the medical field that she learns this is tuberculosis and so as a modern reader we learn about some rather unusual choices for how to get rid of the little tubules that afflict her lungs.
It's worth reading the book to find out what the doctor's methodolgy is.
From the outset you know how the book will end, it is in the first chapter, the opening scene. "It was a large cylinder with thick, slightly green walls. The ends of the cylinder were of glass, too, and the craftmanship was so fine that the joinings were scarcely visible. But it was what the cylinder held inside that constituted the great wonder: the body of a woman, floating in a clear liquid with a blue velvet gown and hair such a brilliant red that at first glance it appeared unnatural." pages 4-5
Throughout the book I kept thinking she died a slow agonizing death from the disease so the spectucular ending was unexpected. It was one worthy of being embalmed in a glass jar.
October 6, 2009
This novel had a good beginning with Famke the orphan growing up in a Catholic orphanage and running off with the sudden appearing Albert, an artist. Her and Albert have a love affair while he paints her picture. Albert leaves her for parts unknown but Famke is obsessed with him and marries a Mormon man to gain passage to America, where Albert was last known to head. She becomes a third wife and lives in Utah briefly and then suddenly runs off to Colorado looking for Albert. Here it gets ridiculous. While Albert runs all over Colorado painting pictures of the local prostitutes in each town, Famke is running after him, coughing constantly and repainting all of his pictures. Running after Famke, is a reporter in a green suit and a fellow orphan from her home country. Then, a Mormon lady named Mrytice begans to join the "musical chairs" and follows Viggo, the fellow orphan. When Famke runs into a strange doctor that holds her captive and uses a vibrator on her a couple times a day, he too, joins her obsessed followers. Oh and let us not forget her former employer back in her homeland that is also obsessed with her and trying to find her. Finally, after spending most of her years simply looking and chasing, Famke finds Albert only to meet with unpleasant and appalling circumstances.
December 7, 2008
I really liked Susann Cokal's book Mirabilis. She does well writing about dark and somewhat mystical matter. Famke, the main character is so very tragic from the beginning, but I cannot help thinking that she was very one-dimensional until the very end. All of the people in her life seem to want to possess her in some way. ***SPOILER*** She is always part of someone else's story and it is sad that she really never gains her own self until the end. I am not sure why it took so many pages and never really came to any satisfying point. I did not give it five stars for that fact. I really enjoyed the writing, but I was never sure what was driving each supporting character, and other than Famke's looks, what they really wanted from her.
June 1, 2008
What I liked: the ending. Interesting to find out who the characters were at the "present day" setting.
What I didn't like: storyline, outcome for the main character. I hate to think a young girl would seriously travel the world for some guy she thinks loves her (although I totally see the teenager in myself doing that sort of stupid thing 10+ years ago) and it was just tragic to see **SPOILER** her die at the moment when she finally recognizes her own spirit. Hate that. But I normally love tragedy so maybe I just wasn't in the mood. Or maybe I simply saw too much of my own youthful stupidity in her to be accept her fate.
What I didn't like: storyline, outcome for the main character. I hate to think a young girl would seriously travel the world for some guy she thinks loves her (although I totally see the teenager in myself doing that sort of stupid thing 10+ years ago) and it was just tragic to see **SPOILER** her die at the moment when she finally recognizes her own spirit. Hate that. But I normally love tragedy so maybe I just wasn't in the mood. Or maybe I simply saw too much of my own youthful stupidity in her to be accept her fate.
January 15, 2009
Great story of a beautiful Danish woman who makes her way through life using her astonishing beauty. She travels to America by marrying a Mormon sight-unseen. Then experiences the goldrush in the American West. THe book title comes from her weak lungs, a result of growing up in a cold stone orphanage.
April 13, 2016
A lovely, well-researched ode to 19th century Europe & America. Famke is at once sensual, naive, headstrong, and poignant. This is not the type of book that will pull you in, but rather the kind where you have to be patient- and trust that the author has you in good hands. If you crave eccentricity in your historical fic, then this is for you.
April 26, 2009
Not quite a Victorian bodice ripper or the historical thriller I was hoping for.
Not even good an underwear inspiration, but it has a few smutty parts and some fun descriptive historical events that may be worth the read.
Not even good an underwear inspiration, but it has a few smutty parts and some fun descriptive historical events that may be worth the read.
October 29, 2012
This book blew me away. From convents to saloons, hostelries to whorehouses, "Breath and Bones" is a whirlwind tour of the world that will leave you wanting more. At once humorous and repulsive, it held me pinned to the pages even when I couldn't stand to read another line. Highly recommended!
August 11, 2008
Oddly compelling.
May 22, 2011
It was a page turner & held my interest. But when it was done I said "that's it?!". I didn't empathize with the characters.
December 19, 2012
Would make a good discussion novel.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews