In his Author’s Note, Patrick Gale describes this novel as a ‘very loose retelling of the early life of the Cornish poet Charles Causley and his mother, Laura’. One of the joys of reading historic fiction is being introduced to people and events that you know nothing about. I’ve now fallen down the rabbit-hole of exploring Causley’s writings, and it’s a delightful rabbit-hole in which to find myself.

Laura is a poor Cornish girl who meets her husband Charles when they are both in service in 1916. Their life together is torn apart by the war: Charles returns from the front a changed man whose lungs are ruined and nerves are shattered. Tuberculosis takes him soon after, and Laura must make a life for herself and their young son, Charles.

Laura’s ‘fantasies were all about motherhood’. But, ‘nothing had prepared Laura for the deep comfort and satisfaction motherhood had brought her….the pleasure she took in Charles was so intense that she felt it almost indecent, a thing she needed to hide.’ She works relentlessly as a laundress to provide a safe and comfortable home for Charles. She is determined that her son will be given every opportunity, even though they are the working poor in a town where class is paramount.

Charles grows into a very private man and when war breaks out, takes the opportunity to leave the stultifying small village of Launceston, signing up for the navy as a coder. What he experiences during the war will affect him for the rest of his life.

Mother’s Boy is a story about love: mother-love, the love of a son for his mother, and love that, at the time, was a crime. It honestly explores the multi-faceted nature of love. Laura ‘had always hoped for a clever, special boy and he had grown into a clever, special man, which meant he could be prickly and difficult and knew exactly how best to wound her with his sharp tongue’.

Sometimes, Gale just swept me away with his ability to place me in the scene with the characters:

It was a perfect late summer evening, the light golden, swallows on the wing. She saw the train’s steam as it headed off and the second shrill of its whistle drew over her the Sunday evening sadness that the spell of evensong had briefly held at bay.

Rachel Joyce describes Mother’s Boy as ‘a compassionate, sublime piece of storytelling’. I totally agree!