Welcome friend! For the final reading pause, I spent time with pages 249-316 (end) of The Names. Let’s start with what happened in the book in these pages.
In the Book:
It’s 2022. The pandemic happened.
In Bear’s timeline, there are animals, vegetables and minerals. Lily and him have a beautiful life with their daughter, Pearl. Maia, Charlotte, Cora, Mehri, Roland are all part of the everyday. The pandemic time makes for a heartbreaking loss and the writing does a fantastic job of showing the need to give comfort and shared grief. Life goes on through. Maia gets a letter from her dad. Lily and Pearl get Cat. Cora meets Felix again.
In Julian’s timeline, his past still haunts him. He isn’t able to discipline his children because he is afraid he will start to become his father. He doesn’t sell his jewelry to England because it’s a country that has his father. The pandemic shakes up everything. Unable to keep going on, Orla leaves with the children. For the first time in his adult life, Julian experiences grief for his mother. He and Maia connect about the past and he is finally able to realize that he is nothing like his father and slowly pull himself together. This is the story of a love almost lost. It is also the story of love gained. Maia and Meg. Cian and Sílbhe. What it is like to “have shared their lives with someone magnificent”.
Gordon’s timeline shows Cora alone and enjoying herself. Gordon had moved back with his parents and this had changed everything. The relationship she hadn’t had with him came to be over time and he helped her earn her freedom. Her children worried for her during the pandemic but after the decades she suffered in her marriage, the pandemic was nothing she couldn’t handle. Gordon himself found love and started to separate himself from the sins of his younger years and become someone he liked.
Reflection on the Story so Far:
In all these days, I haven’t had a kind thought towards Gordon. But when I read his letter to Maia in Bear’s timeline, I wondered if he could have changed for the better. He was in prison for years after all. The fact that he did not reach out to Maia until 2022, almost two decades after their encounter in the traffic jam, says something about his changed character. I respect Maia’s decision in wanting to discover more.
For Bear’s timeline I want to say that it has always been the most beautiful, tender and warm. There have been challenges but everyone has been able to pick up their pieces and make something of themselves. I wanted more of this one as it read the last sentence.
While Bear was easy to love, Julian was harder because he didn’t love himself. He functions from a place of fear of becoming his father and, having lost his mother too at such a young age, he was closed off for a long time, to the point that he couldn’t connect with Maia either and both siblings found themselves drifting together but not confiding in each other. His love story with Orla was the making of him and it took years. Such is the imperfection of life and by the time I read the last words, I love him very much and rejoiced in his strength to choose happiness.
Hardest of all was Gordon. It took him longer than Julian, more personal demons to fight, but his decision to get to know Cora when he moved back home and ultimately get her freedom were heartwarming and emotional to read. He also won my heart.
So much can change in 30 years and I think that is a big message of The Names. A split decision can also change everything. As the epilogue depicted, there could have been so many other ways their lives could have unfolded. There may not have been Bear, Julian or Gordon — Cora may have named her son Hugh after her father. The possibilities were endless. We got to live with three of them.
A Quote:
Films made it seem as though love was hidden in the petals of red roses and a view of the Eiffel Tower, but he’s relieved to find it sitting side by side in the trapped warmth of a glass potting shed in Willesden, nestled in the steeped scent of compost and the first green globes of fruit on the vine.
The Names, pg ?
Thoughts:
Love is in simple moments. Catching up over coffee on the weekend. Eating a snack in bed at 9.30 pm. Giving a quick massage to aching limbs and neck. Wiping the counters. Mowing the lawn. Petting the cats. Refilling the nut dispenser. Love is in general upkeep of the home. Love is sharing a space and having someone on my mind.
In My Life:
Lily tells Maia of a recurring dream Bear used to have in which he would be running towards the finish line and would find Maia cheering for him. This reminded me of the one time in my school life, in grade 8, when I was part of a relay team and my best friend cheered me from the sidelines. I could not help grinning and running harder.
As Julian refurbished his home, I thought about a journaling exercise I did some weeks back. I wrote a letter to my home. This house that I found the listing for and the moment I walked through the door, I knew I wanted to live in.
Cora leaving bundles of salad leaves and fresh herbs on her front wall for passerbys to help themselves reminds me of the little free library. Like her produce, my books are in excess that I share with my local community and I related to her nervousness of putting things out, wondering if anyone will accept these gifts. My friend and I checked the LFL today and it was lovely to see all my recent drop offs gone. I hope people enjoy The Goldfinch (mentioned in this book actually), Letters Across the Sea, All the Colors of the Dark and Falling Back in Love with Being Human. There is something very special in random strangers taking what I chose to share.
The Names has come to an end but I’m not done yet. This journey of six days was glorious. It was an exercise in reading and writing every day. I immersed myself in slow reading, savouring masterful writing and taking the time to think about my life and these characters and their lives. I haven’t done this before. Next, I’ll dedicate a full post about the broader ideas in this book and we will close off this readalong. Stay tuned or click the next post link to keep reading!
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