Small tale is big entertainment

In "An Imaginative Experience," British novelist Mary Wesley shows us that the shortest distance between two hearts is not a straight line.

The "distance" begins on a train that timelessly romantic form of transportation. Two men, author Sylvester Wykes and former private detective Maurice Benson, look out their windows to watch Julie Piper, who has pulled the emergency brake, leap from the train to rescue a sheep. This unlikely Bo-peep in a black coat and black hat wins their interest immediately, with Sylvester noting: "She had seemed a creature more vulnerable than the sheep she was rescuing. She looked bogged down in despair."

It doesn't sound like much of a story, does it? In some ways it isn't. It isn't a thriller. The characters aren't based on the lives of celebrities. There are no nude romps. And the only real bedroom scene involves a sleepless Sylvester, tossing and turning over his disastrous last marriage, who tries counting sheep but can only think of "one sheep in that field. . . . Just the one sheep and the girl."

But Wesley's fine pacing of small moments and keen understanding of the suspenseful nature of romance keeps the reader enchanted.

Maybe the ending is anticlimactic, maybe some of the characters aren't fully drawn, maybe some of the plot lines never quite add up. But Wesley shows us what love isn't, and finally what love is.

Underlying this small tale is the gentle reassurance that some wonderful instinct within each of us inevitably takes us down the right path at the right moment if we are truly traveling with the best intentions.

Copyright 1995
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