FICTION: Once in a Lifetime, by Cathy Kelly, HarperCollins, 439pp. £12.99, Finding Home, by Róisín McAuley, Sphere, 296pp. £19.99
THE SUCCESS of Irish writers of popular fiction has been a feature of the international publishing trade over the past 15 years. Given that an optimistic ending is one of the primary conventions of the romantic novel, Ireland’s pre-eminence in this field of literary production reflected the country’s newfound prosperity and confidence.
Appealing accounts of Irish women’s pursuit of love in a time of plenty chimed perfectly with the spirit of the age, in which the ubiquitous luxury spa replaced the more traditional ballroom of romance.
Now, with recession upon us, the feel-good factor of these books may just protect the genre from the worst effects of the economic downturn. After all, while readers may no longer be able to afford their daily cappuccinos, weekend city breaks, and exotic summer holidays, a reasonably priced romantic novel still offers the possibility of enjoying those pleasures vicariously.
On the evidence of the latest offerings from Cathy Kelly and Róisín McAuley, though, it seems popular novelists have not chosen to insulate their readers against current uncertainties but instead have adapted the conventions of romantic fiction to reflect changing social realities.
Cathy Kelly's Once in a Lifetimeintertwines the stories of two generations of Irish women. Unsurprisingly, the pursuit of love is a major theme, and anyone who likes formulaic fiction will not be disappointed by the description of Natalie's first dance with Rory: "His body was hard and muscular up close, and she felt light as thistledown in his arms". Yuck! Such conventional moments, however, are overshadowed by the insistent focus on ageing, betrayal and loss.
At the heart of the novel stands Ingrid Fitzgerald, a successful television journalist who seems to have everything, until the untimely death of her beloved husband, David, causes her world to collapse. Already devastated by her bereavement, Ingrid becomes even more distraught when she discovers David had been having an affair. Gradually, she realises that the perfect world she seemed to inhabit was neither totally genuine nor completely a sham, but instead a mixture of the real and the ideal that has now vanished forever.
Essentially, Once in a Lifetimeexplores what happens when the bubble bursts and survivors struggle to cope with the fallout.
Survival and the pursuit of love are also central themes in Róisín McAuley's Finding Home, an intelligent, often witty and insightful novel that recounts the challenges faced by Diana, a 62-year-old widowed Englishwoman, and Louise, a single, 40-year-old film producer from Belfast. The action centres on Wooldene House in Oxfordshire, where Louise's company hopes to film an Elizabethan costume drama. This now-decrepit house is the once stately home of Diana and her brother Henry, an artist and ex-army officer who served in Northern Ireland during the Troubles.
Louise and Henry fall for each other, but the path of true love is complicated by the legacy of Northern Ireland’s violent past.
Eschewing the saccharine excesses of some romantic fiction, McAuley convincingly interweaves politics, romance and social commentary in a story which shows compromise to be an essential ingredient of future happiness. Ultimately, love conquers all, but Finding Homesuggests this happy outcome is not a foregone conclusion but rather represents the triumph of individual hope over collective experience.
Through the mouthpiece of Miss Prism, the moralistic governess and aspiring author in The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde pithily described the basic formula of the popular novel: "The good ended happily and the bad unhappily. That is what fiction means".
In Once in a Lifetimeand Finding Home, Cathy Kelly and Roisin McAuley generally respect that principle but do not shirk from showing that bad things happen to good people. Despite the optimistic endings, these novels' shared acknowledgment of the inevitability of loss and the necessity for compromise means they are not escapist fictions but engaging reading for these recessionary times.
Anne Markey is a postdoctoral researcher on the IRCHSS-sponsored early Irish fiction project at TCD