Swirling seas

Philosophy, science and history swirl together in engrossing latest from Canadian author.

- BY DAVID HILL

Four centuries back, Francis Bacon opined that certain books should be “chewed and digested”. Add “slowly” after the first verb and you start to get a taste of Madeleine Thien’s fourth novel.

Lina in middle age recalls the rainy season 50 years earlier, when she, at age 7, with her ailing father reached the Sea. Yes, with a capital letter. They're part-way through an unspecified journey; a flight of some sort. There are intimations of climatic and political apocalypse.

Those who have travelled with them soon move on, but parent and child stay, in this place where conventional conceptions of place and time shift, reform, elude; where each window in the shape-changing warren of rooms gives glimpses of a different ocean.