Title: The Steady Running of the Hour Author: Justin Go
Published: April 15, 2014
Genre(s): Literary Fiction
Page Count: 470
Rating:
Summary from Goodreads:Just after graduating college, Tristan Campbell receives a letter delivered by special courier to his apartment in San Francisco. It contains the phone number of a Mr. J.F. Prichard of Twyning Hooper, Solicitors, in London and news that could change Tristan's life forever.
In 1924, Prichard explains, an English alpinist named Ashley Walsingham died attempting to summit Mt. Everest, leaving his fortune to his former lover, Imogen Soames-Andersson. But the estate was never claimed. Information has recently surfaced suggesting Tristan may be the rightful heir, but unless he can find documented evidence, the fortune will be divided among charitable beneficiaries in less than two months.
In a breathless race from London archives to Somme battlefields to the Eastfjords of Iceland, Tristan pieces together the story of a forbidden affair set against the tumult of the First World War and the pioneer British expeditions to Mt. Everest. Following his instincts through a maze of frenzied research, Tristan soon becomes obsessed with the tragic lovers, and he crosses paths with a mysterious French girl named Mireille who suggests there is more to his quest than he realizes. Tristan must prove that he is related to Imogen to inherit Ashley's fortune but the more he learns about the couple, the stranger his journey becomes.
Justin Go’s debut novel is a long, meandering journey across both place and time; it’s a book that weaves together the stories of two men and their relentless drive toward a goal, and the course it takes. The Steady Running of the Hour is deftly written and intelligent, with a lot of subtleties and nuance that seem to cry out for a second reading. It’s a book unlike any I’ve read before.
At first, the book seems like it will be a fairytale. Out of nowhere, Tristan finds out that he might be the heir to an immense fortune, if only he can prove that he’s related to one Ashley Walsingham, WWI veteran and famed mountaineer. Too good to be true, right? But The Steady Running of the Hour isn’t a fairytale, and Tristan’s quest to claim his inheritance turns into a search for the truth: what really happened between Ashley and his lover Imogen?
Go writes the book so that it alternates between Ashley’s perspective in 1916-24 and Tristan’s in the present day. Of the two narratives, I’d say that Ashley’s is the stronger (I’d enjoy a book about Ashley and Imogen in and of themselves), but that’s also because so much of Tristan’s story is wholly focused on Ashley/Imogen. At first, both men’s stories seem very dissimilar, until you can recognize the similarities in their drive toward a goal. With Ashley, it’s his patriotic duty, then his determination to summit Everest. With Tristan, it’s his relentless quest to find out if Ashley Walsingham is truly his great-grandfather or not. Though he did it subtly, Go drew quite a few parallels between the men’s lives, which helped tie things together.
As I mentioned, The Steady Running of the Hour does not follow the course you expect it to take, and that becomes most apparent when you reach the end. In many ways, it is disappointing—it’s not what you expect. But after thinking about it, the end seems more fitting, more just, the way Go wrote it. It’s open-ended and vague, but points readers back towards Tristan and Ashley’s separate quests, rather than the result.
Throughout the book, Go’s prose is delightful. It’s very rich and descriptive, with a cadence and tone to it that sometimes seem almost dreamlike, yet also could be very factual. The scenes depicting Ashley’s time in WWI trenches were starkly real, but many of the destinations Tristan visited were tinged with a nearly surreal quality. I think that really demonstrates the author’s ability to utilize his words and create the atmosphere he desires—a definite sign of talent.
I think some readers might be disappointed by the course Justin Go took in this book—perhaps most readers. The Steady Running of the Hour is not the book you expect it to be, but it’s well-written, memorable, and riveting all the same. I think this is honestly one of the most promising debuts I’ve read all year.
