Shooting Butterflies by Marika Cobbold: book review

Shooting Butterflies (2003, this edition 2011) is set in London, England, in contemporary times.

Grace Shield is a controversial, award-winning photographer. On her 40th birthday, she receives a parcel from her dead lover, two years after his death. It is a picture. On the same day, she reads an article about herself, and it is not kind – journalist Nell Gordon describes Grace’s life as ‘tragedy lurking beneath the successful facade.’ Grace prefers to view her life as ‘happiness lurking behind the tragic facade.’

Grace was born in America, but after her mother died, her father took Grace and her older brother Finn to England. Before she turned 18, her brother moved to Australia and their father died. Receiving her dead lover’s parcel brought back many memories about her tragic life. She misses everyone – her parents, her brother, her dead lover, and even her divorced husband.

Who sent the parcel? It is clearly her dead lover’s handwriting. Why did her lover think she would like the painting by A.L. Forbes? Who is the artist, A.L. Forbes? What is the painting’s significance?

This is not a tragedy in the literary sense, even though Grace experiences tragedies. Neither is this a light and happy novel. There are moments of revelation and learning that Grace undergoes as she comes to terms with her single life, while crossing the line between a person’s private life and the public world of exhibiting her photographic works. It’s an okay read, but not gripping enough, and a little too melancholic for me.

MARTINA NICOLLSis an international aid and development consultant, and the authorof:- Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom(2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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