Ancestral Truths

Amid many ponderous passages, moments of lucidity and beautiful descriptions shine like rare gems in Maitland's ( Three Times Table ) latest. Despite the novel's sluggish progress, these strange, usually mystical scenes compel readers toward the conclusion. Still, those who feel that amnesia long ago wore out its welcome as a plot device will treat this tale with understandable skepticism. As the book opens, Clara Kerslake has just returned to her home in Scotland from Zimbabwe, where she went with her egotistical lover David. She has been found there alone on a mountainside, her right hand mangled; incoherent, she tells her rescuers that she has killed David, yet later has no recollection of the murder. After Clara recuperates and obtains a prosthetic hand, she joins her family at a country retreat where her memory is jogged by various symbolic incidents. The narrative's most engaging element is its supernatural premise--that African ancestral spirits spared Clara's life but took David's because of his hubris--but Maitland buries it among lengthy digressions into the vagaries of Clara's adoptive parents and siblings. This story tries too hard to be a family saga; its insights into awkward disabilities and powerful flashbacks to Africa are far more intriguing. (Feb.)