Air And Fire - Hardcover

Thomson, Rupert

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0679425063 ISBN 13: 9780679425069

Publisher: Knopf, 1994

Synopsis

At the end of the nineteenth century, Theo+a7phile Valance and his wife Suzanne sail into Santa Sofi+a7a, a remote Mexican copper-mining town. By the author of The Five Gates of Hell.

About this title

Reviews

Thomson is an English novelist whose Dreams of Leaving and The Five Gates of Hell have been well received on both sides of the Atlantic; and Air and Fire is quite a tour de force. Set in an acutely observed Baja California, Mexico, just before the turn of the century, it is the story of a French engineer, Theo Valence, an associate of the great Gustav Eiffel, sent out to set up a prefabricated iron church to the glory of the French colony in a remote mining town. His beautiful wife Suzanne, an adventurous soul who loves her husband much more powerfully than he can ever love her, is at once appalled and entranced by the grindingly hot, dusty town and its Mexican and Indian inhabitants. A rootless young American prospector, Wilson Pharaoh, falls passionately under her spell but cannot bring himself to interfere with what he thinks of as a happy marriage, and rides off blindly into the desert. She also comes to obsess the local Mexican army commander, who writes her a florid love letter, takes her for a trip in his private submarine and, to show his suicidal passion, shoots his horse for her sake. These events give only a hint of the remarkable blend of surrealism and romantic extravagance, dreams and harsh reality, that Thomson achieves. His writing is at once spare and rich, evoking a dazzlingly strange world with humor and terror; and the dying fall of the ending is poignantly exquisite. Air and Fire is that unusual combination, a powerfully felt romance that is also literature.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Fantasy and reality coalesce in a cauldron of passion and pathos, fired by the heat of a searing summer in coastal Mexico: a formidable fin de siŠcle tale from the wide-ranging author of The Five Gates of Hell (1991) and Dreams of Leaving (1988). To a remote French mining community in Baja California are sent the numbered cast-iron pieces of a new church, designed by the creator of the Eiffel Tower and entrusted to the care of Theo Valence, one of Eiffel's engineers. Theo's mind and heart are devoted to the church's construction, leaving his young wife Suzanne to feel restless and unfulfilled. She befriends Wilson, a piano-playing American prospector pursuing his father's failed dream of gold; her charms dazzle both him and the hotblooded Montoya, the Mexican militia captain charged with keeping the peace in town. While Wilson wistfully accepts Suzanne's friendship, Montoya declares his love, mistaking her kindness toward him as a license to woo her. She alienates her American friend by showing him Montoya's love letter, then, as Indian miners angered by a deadly mine accident revolt, spurns her would-be suitor, enraging him to the point of shooting his own horse and threatening the natives. Suzanne rides off into the desert alone, seeking solace, with Wilson dispatched to find her before she dies of thirst. The two return to find the church destroyed, Montoya butchered, and the revolt savagely crushed; but before they can recover from their ordeal, Suzanne is on her way back to Paris with Theo, who has rediscovered his love for her. Thomson's surreal sensibilities, challenged by the cross- fertilization of cultures and desire, elevate standard melodramatic fare into a saga richly atmospheric and satisfying. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Thomson--author of the surrealistic Five Gates of Hell (1991)--has written a deeply entertaining, richly textured tale featuring characters who are a bit twisted, unique, hard to imagine and forget. At the end of the nineteenth century, Monsieur Valence is sent by master builder Eiffel to Santa Sofia, California, to build a church. His young wife, Suzanne, travels with him. In Santa Sofia, they meet the small clique of Frenchmen and women who run the mines and try to be civilized while steering clear of the locals, especially an American prospector named Wilson Pharaoh. As Wilson and the high-spirited Suzanne become fast friends, troubles befall the group--Where to get a baguette? How to build a church when the workers don't have the same concept of time? How to suppress the evil and romantic designs of the commander of the military garrison? The dailiness of life in Santa Sofia is lusciously detailed, and Thomson proves again that he is an exceptionally talented and versatile author. Eloise Kinney

Thomson's lyrical new work opens at sea as Suzanne Valence travels with her husband, Theopile, to Santa Sofia, Mexico. There Theopile, a protege of A.G. Eiffel, is directing the construction of a church. Much younger than her husband, who neglects her for his work, and unconventional without quite realizing it, Suzanne creates quite a stir in Santa Sofia: the French community doesn't know what to make of her, and she is relentlessly pursued by Captain Montoya. The one person who truly appreciates her is an American prospector named Wilson Pharaoh, who eventually risks his life to save hers--without, however, winning her love. Suzanne's growing alienation from those around her is paralleled by native resistance to outside domination, directed as much at the Mexican government as the Europeans, though the church is eventually destroyed in an uprising. Celebrating dignity in the face of disillusion, Thomson's exquisite tale boasts finely detailed settings, rich and apt characterization, and a flood of beautiful writing. His ability to get inside a woman's skin without turning her into a cause is particularly impressive. Recommended for most collections.
- Barbara Hoffert, "Library Journal"
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Knopf
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0679425063
• ISBN 13: 9780679425069
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 309