Review: The Secret Scripture - Chapter 1 to Chapter 5

 Personally I have found this book very suspenseful and dramatic; the focus is about the mysteries and queries of the past and how they can be the answers to future. The reader is first introduced to an elderly Irish woman called Roseanne. She is living in the ruins of a derelict mental hospital, Roscommon Regional Mental Hospital set in modern day. The hospital, because of it's condition, is scheduled for closure therefore each patient is being assessed to see whether they should be transferred or 'let back into the community'. Roseanne is around 100 years old and has lived in the institution from a young age and therefore is reluctant to leave. Although, she does not consider the place to be her home, she is fragile and has nobody to care for her. She has decided to write her story onto an unwanted piece of paper. The paper  symbolises what she is to society, unwanted. Her vulnerability and difficulty is a recurring motif in the story.\\ Meanwhile, the book is also written from the perspective of the senior psychiatrist Dr Grene. He is finding it hard to assess his patients' health and send them away. He admits he is a bit 'maternal' towards them. The hardest patient he is trying to evaluate is Roseanne. To him she represents the place. He is also having marriage problems with his wife Bet. \\ The next chapter alternates back to Roseanne, where she reveals some the details of her origins. She explains that she was brought up in Sligo, near the borders of Northern Ireland. Her father was the caretaker of the grave yard and her mother was 'the most beautiful woman in Sligo', a former chamber maid in a Southampton boarding house. As the civil war of Ireland begins, it is evident that trouble is foreshadowed for Roseanne's family. With this each family member is affected.\\ In my opinion this book is deep and very symbolic that gives the book a very interesting style. At first I thought the book was a bit over-thought and exaggerated however slowly the plot has been building and subtly joining together making the story very gripping to read.