What we thought? Circling the Sun by Paula McLain

Afternoon Book Club  

September 2016

Circling the Sun by Paula McLain

“There are things we find only at our lowest depths. The idea of wings and then wings themselves. An ocean worth crossing one dark mile at a time. The whole of the sky. And whatever suffering has come is the necessary cost of such wonders, as Karen once said, the beautiful thrashing we do when we live.”                 

                             -------Paula McClain, Circling the Sun

Although the author has written Circling the Sun as fiction it reads like a biography of Beryl Markham who  lived in colonial Kenya at the same time as safari hunter and pilot Denys Finch Hatton and Karen Blixen coffee farmer and  writer of  Out of Africa as Isak Dinesen.

Readers were transfixed by the spirit of Beryl and her determination to live the life she chose despite obstacles along the way. They were fascinated about how she was able to take on traditional male occupations like horse training and flying airplanes despite her youth. She decided what she wanted and made a way to get it. She truly was a woman before her time. She didn’t care what people thought of her and weathered scandals and alleged affairs with Edward, Prince of Wales and his brother Harry.

Readers decided that her early childhood influenced her spirit and life path. Although her mother had abandoned her in Kenya taking her younger brother with her to England Beryl made another family and life- long ties with the native Kipsigis tribe who lived on Green Hills, her father’s farm.  Kibii the son of the tribal leader became her brother and she grew up with him in the warrior tradition. She was bold and afraid of nothing not even a lion that attacked and stood on her back. 

Readers admired how Beryl was not tamed by the men who desired her. They were impressed by her free spirit and the fact that she would not tolerate being controlled and turned into a traditional English wife. Denys Finch Hatton was the one man who appreciated her life and did not want to dominate or change her. He was the same soul who could not be contained by Beryl or Karen Blixen. Readers said they wanted to read more about Beryl and her own book, West With the Night.
 

“because you can’t chart a course around anything you’re afraid of. You can’t run from any part of yourself, and it’s better that you can’t. Sometimes I’ve thought it’s only our challenges that sharpen us, and change us, too.”  Paula McLain, Circling the Sun.

Have you read Circling the Sun? What did you think? Please share your thoughts in comments.