Safe Return Doubtful

I’ve been meaning to read Lisa Tuttle for a while, and thought I’d start with this novella, recently reissued by NYRB.

Tuttle’s unnamed narrator and protagonist, an author of fiction, is five years widowed and her grief has affected her work output, she is bereft of ideas. She has become a recluse in her coastal Scottish cottage, but receives an invitation from her agent to meet in Edinburgh and discuss her next work, which she reluctantly accepts, as she needs cash coming in.

She takes the opportunity to visit the National Gallery, and is transfixed by a painting of WE Logan, a (fictional) early 20th century artist. The model for the painting was the novelist Helen Elizabeth Ralston, an influence on the narrator’s own career. She realises that she must write the story of the painting, Logan, and his relationship with Ralston, and with her agent’s blessing, she sets off to interview Ralston, now 95 and living in Glasgow.

It’s stylishly evocative, unshackled in its weirdness, and has a particularly potent finale.

First published 2004

NYRB edition published October 2023

My score 4 / 5