Salterton Trilogy [Paperback]

"Tempest-Tost" opens with the organization of an amateur production of Shakespeare's "The Tempest." A motley crew of actors join it, including an exuberent professor, his quiet daughter, a quiet mama's boy, a beautiful rich girl, a womanizing soldier, and an infatuated schoolteacher. Love, ambition, jealousy and infatuation rapidly tangle together, climaxing in an unusually dramatic opening night.

"Leaven of Malice" is half satire and half mystery. The Salterton Bellman announces that Solly Bridgetower and Pearl Vambrace are engaged -- the only problem is that it isn't true. Professor Vambrace sees it as a personal affront, and sues the paper. Pearl and Solly are haunted by false rumors, reports, and claims about who faked the announcement. All they can do is try to find out themselves.

"Mixture of Frailties" opens with the death of Solly's domineering mother. Her will leaves money to Solly's family only if he produces a male heir with his wife Veronica (previously known as Pearl); until then, her money is to be used in a trust for a young female artistic hopeful, who will go to Europe for a few years to study whatever she is good at. And finding the right girl is only the start of Solly's problems.

The tone of the Salterton Trilogy is lighter and less introspective than Davies' other books. Sometimes it's outright hilarious (there's a girl called The Torso, for crying out loud!). The first book is perhaps the funniest and most real-seeming, but it's also rather unfocused because there is no plot. The second and third books are tighter, but a little more rarified in humor and a little more surreal in tone.

Solly Bridgetower is the unacknowledged center of the trilogy. He barely registers in "Tempest-Tost," but becomes the central figure of the second and third books. He's not a strong person, but he is a likable one. Pearl is only a little more prominent at first, but it's great to see her break out of her shell and become her own person. And without a doubt, Humphrey Cobbler is Davies' best character -- a vivid, devil-may-care artistic genius who winks and nudges in every book.

The Salterton Trilogy is often eclipsed by Davies' better-known Deptford Trilogy, but that doesn't mean it's bad. By no means. It's a pleasant and warmly amusing trio of interconnected stories, and ones you won't forget in a hurry. Highly recommended.

Tempest-Tost is about an amateur production of Shakespeare's The Tempest. The Salterton players assume they can have the use of the garden of their most famous citizen, and it is this assumption of community use that leads them into trouble. While no characters in the book undergo a sea-change, several characters do awaken from passive slumber to new lives, sometimes with mixed results. For anyone who has ever been involved in amateur theater, this is an extremely amusing tale. Others might find it belabored.

Not so with the second novel, which is about class and prejudice, but told in a Wodehousian manner. Winner of the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour (a Canadian award for best humor novel--I wish I could find a list of past award winners), Leaven of Malice concerns an engagement announcement in the local paper that was placed by neither bride nor groom. The resulting conflict between the two families brings up old academic rivalry, the worst of the new goody-two-shoe couple in town, and an escalation of lawyers. In some ways it is a mystery, too, as the two "lovers" attempt to find who had the malice to link their names in the public eye.

The concluding volume, A Mixture of Frailties, is about a trust established by Solomon's mother, and how it must be awarded to a specific individual. But finding the individual is only the start of Solomon's trouble, and the story follows two separate lines: one regarding Solomon and his need for a heir to rid himself of his mother's legacy, and one regarding the lucky trust recipient, and her entry into the world of opera.

There were certain things near to Davies' experience, it seems: theater, academic life, and trusts. Trusts can be found in both A Mixture of Frailties and the second and third books of the Cornish trilogy, academic life is featured in Leaven of Malice and The Rebel Angels, and theater productions in Tempest-Tost and The Lyre of Orpheus. I can easily see myself rereading Davies in ten years, and rediscovering all of this once again.

The best characters in Tempest-Tost are Freddie Webster and Hector Mackilwraith, but Humphrey Cobbler is perhaps the most memorable. He manages to assert himself in all three of the books, if memory serves correctly, and it's a good thing. He is the epitome of the mad musical genius without being a complete cariacture.

The Salterton Trilogy is a perfect introduction to a great Canadian author, and a great cheer-up if life has been treating you shabbily.