I'm still not sure how I feel about this one - the writing is lovely and the story has many layers. But I don't always love the epistolary format and I just couldn't sink into it. I think I might try it again later.

This is a story of colonialism, inherited guilt, power, manipulation and restorative justice told through the letters of a benefactor and his former protege. I am still mulling over the questions raised in this book, and I'm recommending it to others hoping to discuss it with others. A great book for book clubs interested in questions of post-colonial identity & reparations,

Review published on the website Booklover Book Reviews : http://bookloverbookreviews.com/2018/06/in-the-garden-of-the-fugitives-by-ceridwen-dovey-book-review.html

The epistolary structure of In the garden of fugitives by Ceridwen Dovey makes for a fast paced read. It begins with a death bed letter from Royce to Vita (the object of his obsession). Royce and Vita's relationship is the starting point but it becomes their individual stories after. This is a hard book to explain. It's a slow burn and so worth it. The themes are guilt, obsession, art, white privilege, youthful mistakes, history, forgiveness, and basically being human.
"I was reminded that each and every one of us contains a whole world of suffering." I loved this book.

A timely and relevant novel that weaves together disparate stories of ambition, passion, creativity as shaped and driven by historical context. Touching on questions of white guilt and privilege, the legacy of apartheid on the one hand, and the ethical ramifications of archeological excavations of lives lost, Dovey's novel vibrates with disquiet and lingering questions.

This is a layered, puzzle of a story. A back and forth between Royce and Vita. Vita was once Royce's most promising protégées. Royce is now ill and Vita's career is on it's last breaths and they start exchanging letters...full of past history and shame. It's repressed guilt at it's best.

The style that this book is written makes it feel like you, the reader, are a snoop. You are reading intimate stories and thoughts, a battle of words between two people who are bringing a reckoning to themselves.

Chilly, cerebral, uncomfortable, this is a novel of ideas structured cleverly around kinds of suspense although far from any kind of genre. There’s death, and obsession and kinds of creepiness, but that’s not what you remember in the exchange of correspondence between two outcasts. Did I enjoy it? No, but I admired the technique and the intellectual terrain mapped out.

Correspondence between a stalker and the object of his affection make up this book. A unique concept that fell flat in its execution. Both characters were so irritating and self-righteous that I couldn't care less about their story.

Intriguing but less satisfying that I thought it would be. Part of this is because the story, such as it is, is told in an exchange of emails, which distances you from the real emotions of the characters and shows only what they chose to put forward. Royce and Vita have a tortured history and by the end you might want to tell both of them to get over themselves. That said, there's some very interesting information about Pompeii and post- apartheid South Africa. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Try this one for a tale of two people trying to overcome their remorse.

Did not like this book at all. The way it is written made me completely uninterested. I couldn't make it through the letters back and forth.

This is an intelligent and accomplished novel, but one which I found ultimately unsatisfying. It chronicles the revival of correspondence between two characters, the links between whom are only slowly revealed. They have not been in contact for 20 years, but now Royce is on his deathbed and feels impelled to get in touch once again with Vita. He wants to explore their shared past and put to rest, perhaps, the ghosts that haunt him. He is a wealthy philanthropist who has been funding Vita, a filmmaker half his age. The ensuing exchange of emails allows Royce to reflect on his first great love, Kitty, an archaeologist in Pompeii, and allows Vita to look back on her own troubled past and her guilt at her white South African heritage. What exactly do these two want from each other? Forgiveness? Understanding? Connection? To me it wasn’t really clear. Although the emails go back and forth they don’t seem to be communicating in any meaningful way. Each seems only concerned with telling his or her individual story. There are obscure reasons for their long silence, and only gradually do the facts emerge. Too gradually for my liking, as the end seems rushed. Throughout the book there is the rather heavy-handed metaphor of the excavations in Pompeii, where Kitty was exploring the eponymous Garden of the Fugitives, and as the layers peel away, the reader begins to uncover the truth. I enjoyed the book up to a point, but remained detached throughout and sometimes felt the novel was little more than an intellectual exercise. It’s curiously devoid of emotion in spite of its themes of loyalty, loss, guilt and power. Good but flawed.

In its representation of two psychological character studies, In the Garden of the Fugitives is superb. From the start, I was swept into both Royce's and Vita's tales, and their gradual confessions held my interest until the end. Although epistolary in nature, the letters didn't dwell on salutations and goodbyes, getting straight to the nitty gritty each time, which worked well, as it almost made you forget this was correspondence, rather than an intimate conversation. The only thing that stopped me giving his five stars was the lack of real conclusion. I finished feeling that, yes, we've glimpsed into the darkest parts of these two peoples' lives, but where has that led us? However, The Garden of the Fugitives is a fascinating read and one that will certainly stay with me for a while. I recommend it to readers who like a deeper, psychological edge to their literary fiction, with a focus on character rather than plot. 4.5 stars