Fascinating and compelling (Trumpet - Jackie Kay)

Member Name: tinkabubble

Product:	Trumpet - Jackie Kay
Date:	29/05/09 (12 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Interesting, confronting thought-provoking issues

Disadvantages: None, but this isn't really light reading if that's what you are looking for.

This book is great, written by Jackie Kay and published in 1994. The story is very intersting and different (I don't want to give too much a way, but I think I have to say that it is based on the famous jazz musician Billy Tipton).

Basically, it tells of a famous trumpet player, Joss Moody, who is married with a wife with whom he has an adopted son, but only his wife, millicent, knows that Joss is really Josephine. The story follows Joss's death and the revelation of his sex, following their son, Colman, and Millie predominantly as they interact with other characters following Joss's death. The book follows how these characters deal with both Joss's death and true identity.

The son, Colman, takes the new very bady, obviously he is shocked, and now feels that he doesn't know who he is, believing that this revelation of his father figure really being a woman makes her a different person. He travels to meet Joss's mother, whom Joss has continued to write to and send money but doesn't see her anymore for fear of her rejection of him. Colman also seeks revenge on his father by almost writing a book on him and his secret. He feels that he must become more stereotypically male to compensate for his father now.

The major theme of the novel then is identity and what really makes us who we are. It discusses performativity and how people are forced into the performance of assigned roles, such as gender roles; Joss speaks about how liberated he feels on stage, playing the trumpet because he can truely be himself. The title 'Trumpet' therefore becomes significant as it represents Joss's true identity and further more, visually perhaps represents both the male and female phsyicality.

There is also Sophie Stones, who criticises Joss, yet she of all people should understand being a woman in a mans' world; she is a jounalist and feels she has to abandon all her femininity and be ruthless in order to do her job well. She even comments that she has a man's shirt, which makes her almost the same as Joss in many ways.

It really is a fascinating book, but it is also quite a thought provoking one, so if you want some easy reading, then this possibly isn't the book for you. However, there are moral messages and a great respect for love within the book which are touching.

Summary: A great novel