Prophet Song (2023)
Why this one?
This is another one on the 2023 Booker Longlist, from which I’m cherrypicking a few books that grab my attention. Contrary to appearances, I didn’t choose this one just because it was written by an author named Paul (third in a row, what?) but rather because its dystopian theme tickled my fancy. Also, pretty cover.
Paul Lynch (1977- ; active 2013- ) was born in Limerick, Ireland and grew up in County Donegal. He initially worked as a journalist, including a stint as chief film critic for The Sunday Tribune. His debut novel, Red Sky in Morning (2013) was the subject of huge demand from publishers and featured on several (mostly French, interestingly) prize shortlists. This, like most of his subsequent works, drew inspiration from real-world events with a connection to his Irish homeland. He has since published four further novels, including 2019's Beyond the Sea, which later won France's Prix Gens de Mers. Prophet Song is his fifth novel and first Booker listing.
Thoughts, etc.
Prophet Song focuses on Eilish, a microbiologist and mother of four (ranging in age from a baby to a seventeen year old) living in Dublin. In the background is the looming threat posed by a new authoritarian government in Ireland. Her husband Larry is an official in the Teachers’ Union, at the start of the novel still absorbed in his work and organising protests against the new government, believing the protections he has been used to in a democratic society still apply. Relatively rapidly, though, we learn that this is a new and significantly darker world, in which protests are violently suppressed and Larry himself is taken in for questioning by the stasi-esque Garda National Services Bureau (GNSB). Within days, he has disappeared, along with many other men in Eilish’s immediate circle.
Through the novel, the crisis escalates slowly and inevitably, with media suppression, travel bans, food and utility shortages, soldiers building barricades on residential streets and ultimately aerial bombardment of the city. This all happens with an unnerving subtlety, a gradual erosion of freedom and security that creeps up on those who remain, powerless, in the country, not technically imprisoned but increasingly not at liberty either. A resistance builds, taking with it Eilish’s eldest son Mark, and offering a glimmer of hope but also escalating the violence.
I initially found this a very difficult novel to connect with. It is written in lengthy sections with no breaks for paragraphs or speech. It is also laser-focused on Eilish and her inner world, to the exclusion of any wider focus on the background or context of the ascension of this new authoritatian power. We don’t, for example, go back to see its roots, explore its leaders or motives, or hear much of the outside world’s response.
Eventually, I came to see this tunnel-vision as the novel’s masterstroke. Both the style and focus give it an extremely claustrophobic intensity, which is uncomfortable but ultimately mesmerising. And the absolute focus on Eilish serves a number of important functions, both in terms of lending even more power to the novel’s hugely powerful conclusion, and in throughout exploring Eilish’s dedication to her responsibilities as a mother and as the lynchpin of her family. While the novel is of course about the slow creep of fascism that comes to dominate a country, it’s also about how all of this can seem to take a background role as a mother attempts to contend with her everyday challenges, that absolutely do not go away, whatever may be occurring in the background. Nappies need changing, teenagers need calming, an aging father in the early stages of dementia must be safeguarded. All of this leaves Eilish barely any time to engage in the realities of the new world, until they literally arrive (and keep arriving) on her doorstep. Her sister Aine, safely emigrated to Canada, repeatedly encourages her to escape but she is unable to conceive of this as a feasible idea, seeing it as an abandonment of her responsibilities to her family and those around her.
It remains a difficult read as it progresses. Tragedy piles upon tragedy for Eilish, and the intensity only ramps up. It becomes more and more gripping and impossible to put down as it persists, though. And its payoff is spectacular, horrific and crushing. Without giving the whole thing away, as you emerge, shattered, from the novel’s final pages, you realise that the whole thing has been an exercise in building empathy, and empathy specifically for those who are often described and dismissed as ‘other’ and not as versions of ourselves that could all too easily come to pass - parents, children, humans, all adrift to the whims of forces way beyond our control.
Score
9
This is a really difficult one to rate. It’s a book that I would love to see win the Booker because I would love for as many people as possible to read it and absorb its incredibly important and timely message. At the same time, it is not an easy, comfortable or straightforwardly enjoyable read. For half of its length, I struggled to find the energy to pick it up, for the other half I couldn’t put it down.
What a great longlist so far, though, hey? Everything I’ve read to date has been absolutely top tier stuff.
Next up
Another Booker longlist read, in the shape of debut novel Pearl by Siân Hughes.
