Sipsworth by Simon Van Booy
Helen Cartwright was born in a small English village but lived the last sixty years in Australia. When she turns eighty and with nothing to hold her in Australia she returns to the place of her birth to die. Now three years later as each day passes Helen realizes that “even for death there is a queue.”
In Simon Van Booy’s latest novel Sipsworth, Helen lives a life of isolation. She tries to walk each day as that’s important, she drinks her tea, listens to the radio in the mornings and watches the television in the afternoons. She makes the walk to the grocery each Monday but she interacts with no one unless it is a necessity.
Her practice of watching the world go by has led to an oddity, Helen has become curious about what people throw away. Several times she has gone out to inspect what her neighbors leave out to be picked up. Late one night she sees the man next door bring out two bags then a large box. Even though it’s midnight Helen needs to know what’s in the box.
The box turns out to be a fish tank full of small boxes with a toy diver on top. She bought her son a diver just like that when he was thirteen and she recalled it was part of a set. She struggles to bring the tank into her house but on the coffee table it goes. By now she is cold and tired; unpacking the boxes will wait until morning.
The next morning she carefully cleans the diver before looking to see what the boxes hold. Disappointingly they are empty. After inspecting each one she is left with a few toys in the bottom and one large water soaked box. Since it is wet and smelly she leaves it in the tank. Just as she is ready to put back the other boxes and tote it outside a small gray face peeks out of the soggy box.
She brought a mouse into her house and that just won’t do. After covering the fish tank with plastic wrap so the mouse can’t escape, Helen leaves for the hardware store to find something to deal with the mouse. That is after she goes back inside to put air holes in the plastic wrap.
She thinks all of the remedies on offer are barbaric but takes the glue traps. That night before going to bed, Helen takes the fish tank with the mouse inside out to her back patio. But outside doesn’t mean out of mind and Helen keeps rescuing the mouse. First from torrential rain then from the neighborhood cat. Plus the only thing caught by the glue traps are her slippers.
Within a couple of days the mouse is living in her kitchen sink in a new home she fashioned from a pie box. Finding a shelter to take a mouse proves problematic. Of course she’s not going to keep it but she has to care for it in the interim and call it something. Its name becomes Sipsworth.
Caring for Sipsworth involves trips to the library and back to the hardware store where she finds people willing to help. Helen’s life changes as the mouse becomes the companion she didn’t know she wanted and those willing to help are becoming friends. Then Sipsworth becomes ill and Helen springs into action and surprises from her past surface.
With its premise the novel could have been too sweet but Helen is cantankerous and her inner musings are worth noting. I enjoyed this appealing story – when I finished it I smiled.
Review written by: Patty Crane, Joplin Public Library Reference Librarian
