LITERARY FICTION
ABOVE THE WATERFALL by Ron Rash
ABOVE THE WATERFALL
by Ron Rash
(Canongate £12.99)
The American author Ron Rash is known as a writer’s writer but don’t let that put you off his wonderful latest, a savage, environmentally-charged hymn to the inhospitable beauty of the Appalachian landscape and the difficult, damaged lives within.
A river poisoning at a local resort is occupying Les, the county sheriff, more than perhaps it ought, for the main suspect is the elderly, reclusive close friend of his erstwhile girlfriend Becky, a park ranger.
Also on his mind is the daughter of another friend, whose short life has been swallowed up by the blossoming meth epidemic that is rampaging through the local trailer parks.
Then there is his forthcoming retirement to be reckoned with, stretching ahead of him like the pages of a vast, empty book.
Rash’s economical writing belies the expansive depths of this novel with its cast of flawed, solitary people and which, like the poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins so adored by Becky, is powerfully alert to the rhythms and consolations of the natural world.
For such a short book it takes a surprisingly long time to read, but since on one level this is a novel about the rewards to be found in paying attention, that seems only fitting.
THE COMET SEEKERS by Helen Sedgwick
THE COMET SEEKERS
by Helen Sedgwick
(Harvill Secker £12.99)
As anyone acquainted with War And Peace will know, a comet is a wonderful metaphor for the cosmic mysteries of love. And there are many historic comets swooshing like celestial emissaries through physicist-turned novelist Helen Sedgwick’s debut novel, their appearance in the skies coinciding each time with — or perhaps even determining — significant moments in the restless lives of her characters.
There’s Roisin, a young, ambitious research scientist determined to see as much of the world as possible, but who is pulled by their illicit love affair to her cousin Liam, who in turn is rooted to the family farm.
And then there is Francois, who has ambitions of his own but is emotionally tied to his mother Severine who thinks she can hear the voices of her ancestors talking to her, and for that reason refuses to ever leave their home town of Bayeux.
The contradictory impulses of a comet, its need to keep moving but also to return, is a richly suggestive framework for the orbiting lives of these variously unfulfilled characters as they rebound and intersect, from Ireland to northern France to the snowy wastes of Antartica.
You hope that for her second novel Sedgwick doesn’t tie herself quite so strongly to a single poetic conceit: her writing might be all the freer for it.
DIVORCE IS IN THE AIR by Gonzalo Torne
DIVORCE IS IN THE AIR
by Gonzalo Torne
(Harvill Secker £13.99)
Literature is littered with the rambling, rancorous thoughts of voluble male protagonists in the throes of a mid-life crisis. Here comes another such character, Joan-Marc, an unemployed middle-aged Spaniard with a heart condition who, when we meet him, is on a make or break weekend with his estranged American first wife, Helen.
Yet he is actually addressing his story to his unnamed second wife and is soon on a highly digressive, stream of consciousness journey, not only through the history of his turbulent relationship with Helen — a borderline alcoholic — but pretty much his entire life, including his many sexual encounters (naturally); the traumatic suicide of his father, and his numerous professional disappointments.
Part of the fun of novels like this is the schism between the narrator’s distorted view of himself and the reality, while Torne’s sharp, spiky writing (translated by Megan McDowwell) contains enough mordant wit to ensure much of Joan-Marc’s disenchanted life story is relatively entertaining. But Joan-Marc really is a tiresome creature — boorish and narcissistic — and you might find yourself quickly tiring of his company.
