The three children represent three wildly differing attitudes towards the island. Through them Ladd offers no judgement on the paths taken by them or their stubborn but goodhearted parents. Barry, bullied on a mainland school, is severed irrevocably from the innocence of the island. Flora remains conflicted between the artistic inspiration she draws from the island’s wildness and a need to validate her life by seeking approval beyond its shores. Only Trevor, the youngest, retains a sense of wonder at the human and natural history of his home, and a desire to explore and preserve it.
Ladd's prose has flaws – there is some clunky dialogue and images bordering on cliché that undermine an otherwise thoughtful novel. In tone he evokes the quietude of John Banville (although does not reach Banville’s linguistic virtuosity). And Ladd’s angry, lyrical mourning of a lost community echoes Brian Friel’s great Irish play Translations, even in the shared storyline of starstruck lovers, one native trying to escape and one foreigner desperate to assimilate a dying way of life.
It feels as though Ladd develops as a writer even through the course of the novel. At its beginning, he struggles to inhabit a young child’s mind convincingly; by the end, he presents a stunning vision of dementia, rendered stylistically with such precision and flair that it leaves the reader wishing he had exhibited this more. Using the trope of crossword clues once beloved of the afflicted character, the narrative intertwines his thoughts with poetically concise thoughts-as-clues, which are as multi-layered and satisfying to ponder as crossword puzzles themselves. A powerful end to an intriguing, understated debut.
This review was first published on We Love This Book.
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