The dark hull of a shipwreck, beached and rotting on the sand, provides the powerful symbolism in award-winning poet and author Susannah Dickey’s third novel Into the Wreck. Five members of a family mourn the death of a gentle but distant father: a man shaped into silence by the Troubles, and whose absence leaves each of them trying to comprehend a family truth that was never fully articulated.
The story is set in a coastal town in modern-day County Donegal, delivered to us in five separate narratives. Gemma, the middle child of three, is studying for A-levels alongside an awkwardly timed new obsession with boys; she harbours a self-imposed responsibility to maintain the fragile equilibrium of the family home. Anna, the eldest, fled to London at 16 to escape constant confrontations with her mother and is now forced to return for her father’s funeral, while Matthew, the youngest, silently and heartbreakingly carries the weight of the world’s and the family’s problems on his 15-year-old shoulders.
In addition to the three siblings, we also hear from matriarch Yvonne, still sticking to the emotional script she has written for herself over the years and unable to find the words to describe her current position of widowed ex-wife. Finally, there is Aunt Amy, a poet. By her own admission, this larger-than-life and seemingly comedic character is brought into the family circle whenever mediation and light relief is required. She has danced on the periphery for years (“they thought bisexuality was straightness that hadn’t been finished correctly, like a skirting board”), but that position has offered her a unique viewpoint. Like many outwardly playful people, she is in possession of dark truths which could see an already fractured family become irreparably broken.
Dickey’s background as a poet is more than evident in this exploration of grief. The language is sharp and spare, yet deeply affecting; the five voices each unique and necessary, each one helping the reader better understand the fragile architecture of a family at odds with itself. There are no wasted words in this novel. The humour is observational and pithy. Even the ponderings of Aunt Amy, who questions why human beings afford such importance to words above any other form of communication (“imagine if dictators and statesmen had to dance their agendas, like bees”), do not distract the reader from being anchored to the story.
One of the reasons the reader remains immersed is that many strands weave between the five narratives. They share not only a bereavement, but a collective dread of the impending funeral and Yvonne’s insistence on a post-interment family meal, involving a roast chicken you just know is going to come to a sticky end. Most significantly, at some point each character finds his or herself on the beach, circling the symbolic shipwreck. Held back by fear and yet tantalisingly lured inside by their own curiosity, they each must challenge their own perceived limitations in order to navigate both the shipwreck and the grief it represents.
Into the Wreck does not provide the reader with any neat resolutions. However, it does offer a tentative conduit for hope, and in a story that questions the efficacy of language, Dickey’s powerful words encourage us to explore our own buried tragedies and unspoken truths. After reading it, we may find ourselves better prepared to tiptoe, very tentatively, into our own dark shipwrecks.
• Into the Wreck is published by Bloomsbury Circus (£16.99). To support the Guardian, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.
