Interpretations of Love

Campbell’s dreary first novel (after the collection Cat Brushing) starts off with a corker of an ethical dilemma before drifting into the meandering musings of a cohort of Oxford-based academics. Retired Old Testament professor Malcolm Miller reflects on a letter his dying sister gave him 50 years earlier, which she asked him to pass on to Joe Bradshaw, the man she believed was the father of her daughter, Agnes, who was four at the time. For whatever reason, Malcolm didn’t do so. In the decades since, Joe became a psychoanalyst, and through a remarkable coincidence, took on Agnes as a patient when her marriage was falling apart and developed romantic feelings for her. Now, Agnes’s daughter is getting married, and Malcolm and Joe are going to be at the wedding, prompting Malcolm to wonder whether now is the time to share the letter’s contents. The novel shifts between the points of view of Malcolm, Joe, and Agnes, but each of their voices sound confusingly similar, and they’re all disposed to statements like “Somewhere is the unalterable, irradicable truth and I need not fear it.” Only the most patient readers will want to enter the minds of these circular thinkers. Agent: Eleanor Birne, PEW Literary. (Aug.)