There’s something very satisfying about the beginning of A.L Kennedy’s Paradise. Albeit we are unsure of our surroundings, of who we are or what’s happened, there’s that realisation that you’re in very safe hands, that you should go with it, that this apparent lack of control is anything but. It’s funny too, in that barbed but also self-deprecating way. It’s a little bit dangerous. A safe sort of dangerous. Doing no real harm. At least not to us.
There’s something equally satisfying about the rest of the book too. I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s an enjoyable story; the sense of immersion and the play of events simply can’t allow it. The enjoyment to be had is in the crafting, in the way you laugh at things and yet sense how brittle that laughter is, in the way you hope when you know deep down how likely it is that hope will go unspent. The easy-going, fun-night-out farce has to give way to the wrenching realisation that this may not be doing any real harm to us but it is definitely doing harm. Whether you start by laughing at, or laughing with, by the end you’ll be laughing because if you don’t, well…
I love Hannah’s mother and father. They are perfect. Of course I don’t mean they’re actually perfect (although in Hannah’s eyes her mother is) but as characters they’re perfect. The sense of the roads they’ve travelled with their daughter, the opportunities taken, or missed, or wasted drips from their every move, their every word. And two scenes particularly stuck in my mind: of Hannah with her mother in the presence of the new neighbour; and Hannah with her father, taking the bus home. If I could scoop them up at those points and tell them it’ll all be okay. But I can’t, and there’s the rub.
Paradise by A.L Kennedy is a piece of work indeed, most definitely worthy of your time. Pull up a chair and nice cup of tea, and appreciate it in all its glory.
Paradise was published by Vintage in 2004 ISBN:9780099433491
You can find A.L. on Twitter @Writerer or at her website, a-l-kennedy.co.uk
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