The Braid – Laetitia Colombani (2017)

Translated from the French by Louise Rogers Lalaurie

My book group chose to read The Braid by Laetitia Colombani in June, it was a novel I hadn’t heard of. Suggested by one of our two book group members who live in Bordeaux.

It is the story of three different women, from different countries who each face unique challenges. These women’s lives are destined to be intertwined by a single object. The stories of the three women are told in alternating chapters, and this way of telling their stories made this a really quick and involving read.

I suppose with a premise like that, the reader is always going to be looking for the connection – and I have to say I worked out very early what the connection was likely to be. In fact I was irritated by how obvious I thought it was – though overall I enjoyed the novel immensely. However, talking to the book group on Monday night’s zoom get together, two of the group said they hadn’t work out the connection at all – so perhaps it isn’t that obvious after all and just my brain racing ahead. The wonderful thing about book groups is hearing how other people experience and respond to the same book. Incidentally, our book group has become fairly international now. Due to the pandemic we went over to zoom, and are still meeting that way. So while five of us are from here in Birmingham UK, we have two member in Bordeaux and two in Canada. I must say I think I prefer book group by zoom – but I digress.

Bradlapur, Uttar Pradesh, India, Smita is a Dalit woman (a so called Untouchable) she has spent her life from childhood clearing out the village latrines by hand, it’s horrific, degrading work, which she has never got used to. This is the life she was born to, and is expected to pass on to her daughter.

“Smita wakes with a strange feeling. Urgent, gentle, new; butterflies in her stomach. Today is a day she will remember her whole life. Today, her daughter will go to school. School, where Smita has never set foot. Here in Badlapur, people like her don’t go to school. Smita is a Dalit. Of those whom Mahatma Gandhi called Harijan, the Children of God. ‘The oppressed.’ Untouchable. Unworthy. A species apart, judged too impure to mix with others, rejected and separated, like the chaff from the wheat. Millions like Smita live outside the villages, outside society; on the margins of humanity.”

However, Smita is determined her daughter won’t have the life she has had. She wants her to go to school, to escape the humiliation of her caste and live an entirely different life. Her husband agrees to pay the schoolteacher to take their daughter into school – but when the child is treated badly by the teacher, made to sweep the classroom, Smita insists it is time for them to leave the village and make their way to the city where there will be more chance to escape the traditional rules laid down for their caste. This carries great risk, for if they are discovered trying to run, the consequences for Smita and her daughter especially would be horrific. Smita is brave, and has great determination, she won’t allow her daughter to live as she has.

In Sicily, Giulia works with her father at his wig factory, once part of a thriving industry it is the last of its kind. Giulia has learned the trade from her father and the other women he employs, washing, dyeing and bleaching the hair they buy from regular customers and hairdressers. When Giulia’s father is seriously hurt in an accident, Giulia uncovers the truth about the business’s financial situation and it begins to look like the factory’s days are numbered. However, Giulia is not ready to give up her father’s beloved business, she can’t bear to be the one that sounds its death nell. When she meets a man who is an outsider within the Sicilian community he tuns out to be her potential saviour – in more ways than one. She will need to overcome her family’s fierce hold on the traditional way the business has been run, and convince them to adapt their ways in order to survive.

In Montreal, Canada Sarah is a very successful lawyer. Twice divorced, with two children and a male nanny, she has sacrificed a lot to get where she is. She works in a very competitive environment, she has no personal relationships among her colleagues, many of whom are just waiting to jump into her shoes whenever the chance may come.

“Untouchable: that was what Sarah had become. Relegated to the margins of society. And so no, she would not go back there, to the arena that had condemned her to death. They wouldn’t see her fall. She wouldn’t make a spectacle of herself, offer herself up to the lions. She still had one thing – her dignity.”

Any sign of weakness, Sarah knows would be the end for her. When Sarah faces a personal health crisis, she decides to soldier on, no one will know what she is going through, she will not allow her career and the position she has worked hard to achieve to be compromised. Only, as Sarah finds, this is easier said than done.

Each of these woman though living very different lives are each incredibly determined, showing great fortitude and resilience. Sarah is possibly the hardest one to sympathise with, though her story is just as fascinating as the other two. Aside from these three strong, interesting women, it was really nice to see a couple of lovely positive male characters too.

Next month I have persuaded my book group to read Our Spoons Came From Woolworths by Barbara Comyns and I am equal parts excited and terrified. I love Barbara Comyns so much, what if everyone else doesn’t?