Irish writer Colin Walsh was named New Irish Writer Of The Year four years ago on the strength of his prize-winning short stories. Here is his first novel and it teeters on the edge of being absolutely first-class.
Plot-wise, it doesn't feel that ground-breaking. Three old friends reunite in Ireland for a wedding in 2018. When they were 15 years olds in 2003, the vibrant centre of their circle, Kala, went missing. Just as they come back together a body has been found forcing them to confront their past.
Of Kala's friends, Mush has stayed put in Kinlough, working with his mum at her café. He spends his evenings drinking in the closed up establishment. He has a facial disfigurement but we do not know how this came about. Helen, has moved to Canada, but seems equally hollow. She has returned for the wedding of her father to the mother of another of their circle, Aiden, now dead. Joe, made it away and has made it big in the music business. His return is a big deal for the town. He had been Kala's boyfriend and is still haunted by her disappearance.
It is the reconnection of these characters and their families and the continued presence of Kala which makes this so effective. There's the nostalgia for the past together with the awareness that things had gone so awry which leads to impressive writing and a deftly-handled web of a plot. It's written in sections featuring Mush, Joe and Helen combining past and present. Joe's is written in a second-person narrative ("You…") which does illustrate his distance from reality but did trip me up now and again. It is Kala, depicted through these narratives, who perhaps shines as the strongest character.
As the novel progresses the mystery behind Kala's disappearance intensifies and for a time there is a heady mix of the nostalgic recollections of the past and an increasingly dark, visceral shift. The thriller aspects begins to dominate as the pace ramps up. It does reflect quite a change in tone. I'd been loving the leisurely pace (it's 400 pages in the hardback edition) as the author takes his time with these friends re-connecting and exploring what they knew about Kala that the switch to more standard thriller fare, essential to bring about the resolution of the plot, felt a little jarring. But there is no doubt that this is a very impressive debut novel which should establish Colin Walsh both in Ireland and internationally. Anyone seeking a high quality literary thriller should seek it out. It feels very visual which would suggest tv/film adaptation but I'd be concerned that some of the subtleties of the dynamics between characters, their pasts and presents, might be lost in an over-emphasis on what happened to Kala and whodunnit.
Kala is published by Atlantic Books on July 6th 2023. Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.
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