Book review: The Mapmaker’s Wife by Hannah Evans

Sarah Tanburn

Grenada 1954 and the Empire is still in control, it seems, yet only a few years later Sierra Leone becomes independent. Fast forward to Grenada in 2015, and a world much changed but shadowed by past secrets. Hannah Evans has woven together high politics and family dynamics in a startling story that maintains its surprises to the end.

Back then, racism against a mixed-race couple was extreme. Patrick is an ambitious government surveyor, pinning towns and peaks in place for the King. He arrives in Grenada and quickly falls for Bea, the second of three daughters of a judge. Her family are concerned, especially her militant older sister, but support her decision even as they mourn her departure for Britain where ‘the salty air of Southampton port slapped Bea’s cheeks like an overexcited hound wagging its tongue for attention.’ Bea soon finds that rather than seek her attention, people are actively hostile, from the taxi-driver to Patrick’s father. The couple are glad to leave for rural east Africa, where and in short order they have four children. Patrick is posted to Sierra Leone where he sinks ever deeper into his work and divisions grow between them. Lonely and terrified of the burgeoning conflict as independence looms, Bea is appalled to find she is pregnant again. In 1961, as war begins, the family leave to set up home in Brixton.

In 2015 Grenada, Amelia is clearing her parents’ house and finds a box tucked away holding letters and newspaper cuttings, scraps of cloth and a much-annotated Shakespeare collection. She struggles to unravel its meaning, convinced she will lose herself and her beloved family but determined to understand. ‘Breakdowns were the reserve of the rich and the unencumbered,’ she tells herself as she works out the solution.

Grapefruit cake

Evans handles her complicated plot with aplomb. She shows us the narrow nastiness of mid-fifties Britain alongside the brutal tensions of African countries taking back control from colonisation. Despite its beauty, Grenada is not perfect either. Homosexuality is still illegal, and Bea’s sister faces considerable misogyny in her political career. Evans evokes all these places with the same attention to detail as Bea’s first taste of Southampton: the way heels sound on a London pavement, liquid jazz oozing from a sax and even the tempting recipe for a grapefruit cake.

It was 1980 before the Boomtown Rats sang ‘Another Piece of Red Left my Atlas Today’ , but the process got started in Africa much earlier. Libya gained independence in 1951, followed by Sudan and Ghana before the end of that decade. Despite hard-working leaders and the needs of the people some, like Sierra Leone, entered a period of turmoil struggling with intra-national feuds, fury at what had happened to their country, and famine in many areas. The Mapmaker’s Wife highlights the rapidly shifting politics of its time, seen through Bea’s eyes. She defends other Black British citizens working for the government when they come under attack from over-zealous police but when Patrick is beaten up, she leaves as soon as humanly possible. Evans humanises a story that bled across TV screens at the time but is rarely discussed in Britain today.

The people at the heart of the family drama, Bea, Patrick and Amelia, are also sympathetic but not without flaws. It is hard not to feel for Patrick, a man of his class and generation determined to provide for his family as his livelihood falls to geopolitics. Bea captures our hearts and Amelia is a very interesting character, not only because she seems like a great cook. There are a host of smaller players, from Bea’s parents to Amelia’s daughter. Barkley, Amelia’s brother, and his husband Aidan, who have busy lives in New York, bring a metropolitan buzz, while Patrick’s Aunt Nancy and Bea’s friend Nella add a touch of humour and acceptance at the toughest moments.

Powerful sisterhood

Most of all, this is a book about family bonds. Some are weak, as Patrick’s father proves by rejecting his only son for marrying a Black woman. Others are demanding but filled with love, for instance, Amelia caring for her failing father with undimmed affection. Patrick and Bea both want to make a safe and loving home for their children but the pressures of Sierra Leone nearly destroy their marriage. It takes great courage for both of them to recommit and try again after both feel betrayed by the others’ choices.

The intense relationship between Bea and her sisters is especially moving. I don’t have sisters of my own, but have always rather envied my friends who do, however competitive they become. This book illustrates how important those connections can be. In this story, they are ties of blood, but close friendships between women are amongst the most important ways we build a society.

This book will make a great late summer read but deserves to be more than that. It is a chronicle of a time and a family which will stick in the mind long after you close the covers.

(Bonus: make sure to read the Author’s Note after you finish the whole book. It is worth the wait.)

The Mapmaker’s Wife is published by Orion and available from all good bookshops.