A bit peculiar, but readable, story of life in a Florida retirement "guest house" in St Petersburg FL. There is no single main character, but we are given point of view from each of the residents in the home. Except for the cleaning lady, the staff & owner seem to be as old or dysfunctional as the residents. That's not quite fair...one of the residents is genuinely nice, and some of the others have moments of thinking beyond their own concerns. ( )

(25 December 2011 – LibraryThing Virago Group Secret Santa gift)

Set in a hotel where one goes to retire in Florida, and examining the routine lives of the residents, including cattines, repressed emotions and one annoying old man, yes, it was very reminiscent of “Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont”. The young people, the cleaner and her boyfriend, who works at a tourist attraction in the town, seem as trapped as the older inhabitants, and are somewhat ironically waiting for God (too?), in Joe’s case the Jesus Army, and for Linda, the Virgin Mary in a more abstract form. An ageing celebrity is thrown into the mex and there are some very poignant and painful scenes as a result, and there is a rather odd trip at the end, in which all the cast can be seen to be exbiting their underlying characteristics. Not a particularly comfortable read, and maybe suffered from the comparison with the superb “Mrs Palfrey”, but an interesting one, especially as M was in Florida himself at the time!

Note: putting in unowned category because I'm sending it on to a special book blogger! ( )

I've always wondered why more books weren't written about the elderly, yet so many books are written about the young. Maybe we can all look back on youth, but we don't know much about being old. Maybe we only want to write about being old when we're old, and when we get to be old, we're too tired to write about it. Or maybe being old is too depressing and boring while being young is romantic and idealized. Or maybe these books are being written, but are just not very marketable or "sexy" so you never hear about them.

In any case, if you're interested in insightful, entertaining fiction about the elderly, you really can't do much better than this book (which was written by Jansson when she herself was relatively old, I think). It is sad and funny and intensely moving. If you've read [book:The Summer Book|79550], the only other Jansson book for adults that I've read, and one that's much more popularly read than this one, then you can expect some of the same elements--the episodic nature of the novel (though there is more of an overall arc here, and the final chapter definitely feels like the end of a novel), the simple yet powerful language, the personalities that are very much alive. In fact, this book is just as good as The Summer Book, if not slightly better, and it's sad that it's so overlooked.

Jansson writes about a retirement community in St. Petersburg Florida: the cast of characters are all unique and they all get on each other's nerves in different ways, though they do seem to enjoy it in a strange comforting way. The sadness in this book is very rarely explicit, but skillfully woven inside of the humor and the stories and the mood--there is a general sense of futility, of aimlessness, of the silliness of busy youth contrasted with the emptiness of age.

This book is now sadly out of print. If it weren't for my trusty public library, I would not have read it. I hope some publisher like NYRB Classics (hint, hint) will bring it back into print.

Some quotes:

It was possible that the strictly frontal placement of the rocking chairs, parallel to each other and facing straight ahead, was the only practical arrangement. It is probably difficult, thought Mrs. Morris, to place rocking chairs in groups, that is, rocking toward each other. It would take a great deal of space, and in the long run it might be tiresome. Of course the original, the natural idea was a single rocking chair in motion in an otherwise static room. p. 9

She forgot to mention fear of her room--the room you leave open behind you can be full of pitiful carelessness. You have to hide away the signs and appurtenances of old age, small anesthetic oversights, all the supporting constructions of helplessness, so unnoticed and so obvious. p.10

Dear Madonna, Linda whispered, let me make love to Joe on the banks of the jungle river. And then by your grace we will wade out into the water and swim slowly away together, farther and farther away. She reached up and switched on the Madonna's lamp, not for the light but to pay respect. Then she folded her hands on her lovely stomach and fell asleep. p 22

Because Mr. Thompson was a woman hater, he thought about women a lot. p. 26

I begin to believe that a person really can die from such a thing as grief. Our predicament, Miss Frey, is that that means of making an exit is no longer open to us. Grief, Miss Frey, is very pure and strong, and it requires a great love. It is not the same as being unhappy. p. 74

Tim Tellerton knew that nothing could be squandered as easily as beauty. It was seldom esteemed at its full value while it stood in bloom, and later on it was preserved at the expense of far too much trouble and despair. p. 138

What was a conversation, and what could it mean? Mutual consideration of important things. Communication of experience and memory. Construction of possibilities for the future. To clarify and recognize together, and to observe the changes in a glance, a tone of voice, a silence--the silence of hesitation or understanding. To shape without altering. To laugh, or to sit quietly in common shyness that was never expressed. p. 160

Since Miss Frey, like most people, took slightly longer steps with her right leg than with her left, she moved in a large circle that eventually brought her back toward Silver Springs. p. 209

( )

Although I hesitate to disagree with the eminent Madeline L'Engle, who in a blurb on the back of the book jacket, declares that Sun City is "an indictment of the American way of old age .... a painful book," that is not what I took away from my reading.

Certainly Sun City is a rather curious book in which little happens in the lives of the elderly denizens of the Berkeley Arms, a boarding house in St. Petersburg, Florida, in the 1970s. Miss Ruthermer-Berkeley, the owner, feels she has a mission: "For her, all that mattered was this: Our guests live here and have a right to expect protection. Outside of St. Petersburg, there are all sorts of evil madness running wild, and we can't help that. But I have a built a house over the kind of madness that is innocent, and it will be allowed to persist in peace for as long as I live."

The residents are eccentric and distanced from family by death or choice: Mrs. Rubinstein, profanely awaiting the monthly letter from her son; mousy Miss Peabody who had bought sunshine with her winnings from the state lottery; the ancient sisters Pihalga; Mrs. Morris, recently arrived from Lincoln, Nebraska; Mrs. Higgins with 14 grandchildren; and Mr. Thompson, the deaf woman-hater. The household is completed with Miss Frey, who keeps the accounts and arranges social activities; Johanssen, the Swedish handyman; Linda, a young Mexican woman, who cleans; and her boyfriend, Bounty Joe, breathlessly awaiting the second coming of Jesus. They wander around St. Petersburg visiting tourist sites, dropping in on cafeterias and bars, and attending the annual Spring Ball in great splendour. The climax of the novel takes place on an excursion to Silver Springs when events that seem to portend disaster turn out to be life-altering in small, but significant ways.

While these old people may seem to be measuring out their lives in coffee spoons, they, in truth, are negotiating telling human relationships. I found Sun City to be a gentle, rather humorous, investigation into a stage of life that is often ridiculed, pitied, or derided. It certainly was not a painful book as Jansson grants all of her characters their own individual dignity. ( )

В романе "Город Солнца" знаменитой финляндской писательницы Туве Янссон рассказывается о тех, кто в конце пути нашел себе приют в тихом и спокойном месте, где всегда тепло, а многочисленные пансионаты готовы предоставить клиентам комфортабельное обслуживание. Там, в городе пенсионеров, где на первый взгляд как будто замерло время, жизнь оказывается полна событий, споров и приключений.