‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum’ is Kate Atkinson’s debut novel first published in 1995 and narrated by Ruby Lennox born in 1952 to a middle-class family who live above a pet shop in York. The plot alternates between chapters recounting significant events in Ruby’s childhood during the 1950s and 1960s and extended “footnotes” about the earlier generations of her family told in non-chronological order. Most significantly, the story of what happened to Ruby’s great-grandmother Alice has implications for the whole family for many years to come.
Much like Atkinson’s most recent novels Life After Life and A God in Ruins, ‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum’ is a multi-generational family saga with a twisting structure which thankfully doesn’t distract too much from her brilliant character observation. With four sprawling generations to contend with, the Lennox family tree is more complex than that of the Todd family in Atkinson’s later novels, but the connections between the characters and the numerous revelations which eventually follow are handled deftly. Based on the careful plotting which is evident in ‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum’, it is not surprising that Atkinson later moved towards the crime fiction genre in her series of novels featuring private investigator Jackson Brodie.
The main set-pieces from Ruby’s childhood include a family gathering for the Queen’s coronation, holidays in Whitby and Scotland, a wedding and a number of deaths. While some significant events are revealed to the reader long before they actually occur, such as the death of Ruby’s older sister Gillian, the fates of certain other family members are much more ambiguous. It later transpires that this is for good reason as while the inclusion of a family tree diagram would help readers get to grips with the large cast of characters, it would also reveal too much too soon. Much of the domestic drama unfolds while Ruby is still too young to fully understand the implications of what is happening around her but Atkinson reveals clues to the reader through her character’s youthful naivety. In a novel largely preoccupied by family tragedy and the trauma of two World Wars, this also helps inject some humour into some not very humorous situations.
‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum’ is an impressive debut novel and a deserving winner of the Whitbread (now Costa) Book of the Year Award. Seeking out more of Atkinson’s excellent writing was definitely worthwhile and while I won’t be setting myself a specific target, I will be making more of an effort this year to explore the back catalogues of authors I have discovered through their recent work.
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Happy New Year!
I’m not a Kate Atkinson aficionado but I have read Life After Life and A God in Ruins. It’s great that you’re a fan enough to go through her backlist of books. It’s a wonderful goal for 2017.
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Happy new year to you too! I really enjoyed Kate Atkinson’s debut so I’m hoping I can make some good discoveries this year that I might have missed otherwise.
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I do love this book! I mentioned it last year as a top Christmas read, but the festive season for 2016 was just too busy – thank you for reminding me of my intentions to go back to the early Atkinsons I love so much.
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Yes definitely a good Christmas read! I will probably read Emotionally Weird next 🙂
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Ooh, I love that one, and it really bridges the gap between the earlier novels and the Brodie series.
In fact ‘Emotionally Weird’ also made it onto one of my book lists – in September when I made a list of books for the start of the university year!
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I’ve loved this book since I was twenty-one, it was such a portent for her skills as a weaver of “what if” alternative storylines. I’m always glad to see people appreciating Kate Atkinson’s unique style.
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I completely agree!
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I love Atkinson’s work. I haven’t yet read this one, but I will have to do so soon!
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Great, hope you enjoy it!
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I read this when it first came out, I think it was word of mouth among my friends, because I know I didn’t read my own copy. But I have bought it for myself since because it is a book that you can revisit. I am an inveterate family tree maker, when relationships start to develop in a book (or books) I always have a pencil amd pad to hand, jotting down marriages, affairs (dotted line) and links (for example in Do not say that we have nothing – there is a bound manuscript that gets handed to different characters, but which is also an important thread – it gets a coloured line). A bit nerdy, I admit, but also helpful . I found it invaluable with the Jane Smiley trilogy, and with the rambling William Nicholson series, the last volume being The Lovers of Amherst and as for War and Peace…
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Yes, because the family tree is quite complex, I’m sure it would be worth rereading as there are probably lots of nuances I missed first time round. I’ve been thinking about reading the Jane Smiley trilogy so I will bear your advice in mind when I get to it!
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I read this when it first came out and have enjoyed her fiction from then on, though I have a few yet to go.
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Yes, I need to catch up on everything in between her debut and Life After Life!
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