It’s a story of grief and an attempt to find some comfort, peace and possibly oblivion in sexual abandon. The narrator Amelia is already plainly troubled by the fairly recent suicide of a young man locally, although we are not told whether they were lovers or even friends. Working in the family funeral business gives her focus and some fulfilment, but when her beloved mother dies she simply cannot face the communal family grief and runs off to Tasmania, where she becomes involved in the local BDSM scene...which is where I gave up.
Ella Baxter is a talented writer. Her sense of place, Amelia’s work and the other characters are very well done and she portrays Amelia’s internal turmoil very well indeed. The thing is, for me it was so unremittingly grim and self-destructive that when she moves into some pretty serious sado-masochistic stuff it just got too much. Again, it’s very well portrayed and I can sort of see what Baxter is trying to convey here, but in the complete absence of any lightness or hope I just didn’t want to read any more about a woman’s self-loathing and degradation, thanks, and I bailed out about two-thirds of the way through. There may possibly be a message of hope and redemption later, but I couldn’t hang around to find out.
This is a matter of personal taste, of course. The book has considerable literary merit and the portrait of a mind (and body) in a turmoil of grief is very well done, but I probably should have realised from the blurb that overall that I wouldn’t like it. I have given it three stars in recognition of its qualities; others may find it more palatable and rewarding than I did, but it wasn’t for me.
(My thanks to Picador for an ARC via NetGalley.)
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