Asta's Book by Barbara Vine

I rarely read book reviews but I came across a review for this book when leafing through an old magazine and it made me curious enough to buy the book. It is an extraordinary book that moves effortlessly between the past and the present. It spans almost all of the twentieth century and almost all the main characters are dead. The narrator Asta’s granddaughter inherits diaries written by Asta and made famous by Asta's daughter. Asta and her husband Rasmus came from Denmark to settle in England in the early years of the new century (1905) and her diary records the loneliness and isolation of an immigrant. Asta is strong proud and passionate, but she has to face many painful losses. The book is really about identity and loss of identity. It works on several levels Asta feels she has lost her sons when they become too English and like so many mothers of the time her worse fears become reality and she does lose them. Some of the pages of her diary are acutely sad, some are mundane and some are unbelievably arrogant, but hidden among it all Asta may have the solution to an unsolved disappearance. It is a wonderful, clever book with a twist in the tale.