The chemistry of tears / by Peter Carey

Two-time Booker Prize winner Carey has crafted a novel about craft, the story of a woman who's lost her lover assigned the task of resurrecting an automaton-a simulation of life-from another century. Horologist Catherine Gehrig of London's Swinburne Museum has long conducted a tender affair with the married head curator of metals, and his sudden death has overturned her world. She cannot be seen to mourn, so her boss, who to her surprise has intuited the affair, gives her a job that will separate her from the staff: reassembling a mid-19th-century mechanism. It turns out to be a quite remarkable duck. At first resistant, Catherine is drawn into the task, reading through notebooks left by Henry Brandling of London, whose ailing son was delighted by the duck's design. Thus, in alternate chapters, we see proud, concerned Henry rushing to Germany to get the duck constructed-an act of love that separates him from the very person he wants to please. Catherine is an entertainingly tart creation, while Henry can be a puzzle, his stubborn ardor somewhat exasperating. Henry's chapters can feel as mechanistic as his duck-surprising from the generally luscious, acutely insightful Carey-but the dedicated prose will still draw in his fans.