This is Paradise

What a great read this was, one that will stay with me for a long time after I finished the final page. I’m going to liken the writing to a strong wind, one that picks you up and buffets you around with great gusts of text. It had that bracing, energetic feel. The story of a family of six, visited at key moments through their lives, it was notable for the gaps it left. Looking back, we are shown relatively little of their day to day doings – but the bits we do see are done in detail, intelligently, perceptively. It’s often the gaps that an author leaves that allow a reader to fill with their own thoughts, that make a story great.

Characterisation is strong – though curiously many of the happenings are seen though the eyes of show more Benjamin, the youngest child, an ‘afterthought’, who was perhaps the least charismatic of all of them. What a contrast with his brother Clive, whose violent temper has the rest of his family living in fear. In the early sections when Clive was young it struck me how many children I have known with similar traits, not least my own youngest. He was such a complex character, and fascinating though he was it was impressive that he wasn’t allowed to dominate the narrative.

This story of family life –and death – could easily have turned out sugary and soapy, but this was always satisfyingly literary. show less