Edna O'Brien (1930–2024)

Book recommendations sites keep steering me towards Edna O'Brien's The Country Girls, but The Little Red Chairs is the first of her novels that I have read. Although it seems to be quite different from her earlier works, on the basis of her wonderful writing and character development, I will definitely be seeking out more.

The Little Red Chairs is not a fun easy read (although it has its moments of humor). The story revolves around a charismatic foreigner who arrives in the small Irish town show more of Cloonoila to set up practice as an alternative healer. The townsfolk are wary of him at first, but when he alleviates a woman's arthritic pain, others begin to visit Dr. Vlad's office. As much as his mystical abilities, his stories, his philosophical conversations, his knowledge of the natural world, and his grounding in the arts all draw them in--one woman in particular, Fidelma, a young wife who desperately longs for a child. As the novel develops, it becomes more Fidelma's story than Vlad's. It's a story of faith, love, betrayal, secrets, brutality, kindness, revenge, perseverance, and, above all, hope.

If you've read anything about this book, you know that the character of Dr. Vlad is presumed to be based in part on war criminal Radovan Karadzic. The book is prefaced by a short paragraph explaining its title

On the 6th of April 2012, to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the start of the siege or Sarjevo by Bosnian Serb forces, 11, 541 red chairs were laid out in rows along the eight hundred metres of the Sarajevo high street. One chair for every Sarajevan killed during the 1,425 days of siege. Six hundred and forty-three small chairs represented the children killed by snipers and the heavy artillery fired from the surrounding mountains.

O'Brien could have taken the easy path and made this a simple tale of Evil (with a capital E) comes to town. Instead, she gives us the more complicated story of Fidelma as a means of showing us precisely how a man like Vlad (or Karadzik) gains people's trust, how it affects the lives it leaves in its wake, and how this one woman comes to terms with what has happened and learns to rejoin the world of the living and (hopefully) the good.

I don't want to give away any more plot details; suffice it to say that this is a totally absorbing read, at times horrifying, at other times frustrating, or maddening, and sometimes even hopeful. I hear from others who are longtime fans of O'Brien that this book is nothing like her others--which is probably why a number of them, their expectations shattered, disliked it. But for me, it's a definite 5-star read. It has been awhile since I've actually felt like I was experiencing a character's emotions and mental states, and even though these were not always pleasant, I was completely wrapped up in Fidelma's progress. That, to me, is the sign of an effective writer. As for comments about the book's three parts seeming disjointed, well, not for me. Everything isn't wrapped up in a happy little knot at the end, and Fidelma's emotions are wide-ranging and often ambiguous. But isn't that really the way life is? There are indeed meaningful connections between the parts of the story and the people in it, but O'Brien wisely leads her reader along, giving him or her the task of finding those connections instead of spelling them out. In other words, The Little Red Chairs is a book that asks you to think, asks you to feel, asks you to intuit. And its an exhilarating task indeed. show less

Edna O'Brien's novel, , is based on a triple murder in the west of Ireland in 1994 that received extensive media attention and horrified the entire country. Upon publication, she was accused of using the events for her own profit. She defended her book, saying, "Is someone going to say Picasso should not have painted Guernica? I have written a book to commemorate and perpetuate the story of this almost Greek tragedy which took place in a forest I happened to know."

O'Brien's writing has the show more feel of poetry about it. She's not interested in the blood and gore, so much as the inner lives of the people involved, beginning with the Kinderschreck himself, Michen O'Kane, who grew up lost and rebellious after the death of his mother. His acting out sends him, as a young child, into reformatory schools, where priests punish and other children either bully Michen or train him in the ways of crime. Then there's the free-spirited Eily, who moves to a remote house with her young son and tries to make a life for herself, teaching at a kindergarten, painting and joining in the artistic community of the area. As their paths converge, Michen imagines a life with her, while Eily is unaware of her stalker.

Is In the Forest exploitive? It lacks the lurid details and unseemly avidness found in "true crime" paperbacks. It also lacks the structure of a crime novel; she is not solving a crime or even explaining motivation, rather she is presenting a picture of rural Ireland, through the story of the lives affected by the events.

This is an odd book. It has a lyrical, almost stream-of-consciousness tone which is at conflict with the subject matter, leaving the reader to peer through dusty glass and shifting dust motes at the story behind the words. I don't think the results were entirely successful, but I am interested in reading more by this author. Her voice is distinct and interesting. show less

This roman a clef is the story of Fidelma, an Irish woman who falls under the spell of Dr. Vladimir Dragan, who comes to their small town as a healer and "sex therapist". His character is based on Radovan Karadžić, the "Butcher of Bosnia". Told from various POVs, including that of Vlad as he tries to escape the consequences of his brutal murderous orders as a political leader in Bosnia, the narrative is at times poetic, at times simple, but always beautiful and moving. At least twice, I show more thought "well, she (O'Brien) has just gone too far afield now," but each time she exquisitely pulled me back to the main narrative thread and the characters, scenes, and story reconfigured as a cohesive whole. Never an easy read, I absolutely recommend it for its insight into the character, Fidelma, both victim and phoenix; she is captured through an impressionistic style blended expertly with pragmatic and vivid scenes of torture and murder. O'Brien's narrative never slides into gratuitous violence but neither does it flinch in the face of humanity's brutality and rage. show less

As ever O'Brien takes us into the darker corners of life, and with her we are in safe hands. A foreign stranger arrives in a small Irish town and as suspicion is overcome he embeds himself into the community. It is not too long, however, before he is exposed as someone who is not what he seems.

O'Brien makes no secret at the outset that the novel (among other things) explores the horrors of Balkan history of the 90's and beyond.

How do people live with their actions? How can those show more responsible for vile acts submerge themselves so fully? How do victims find their resilience and go on? None of these questions are answered in the novel, but it might lead you to pose them, among many others.

The undertow for me was about belonging, about home, and in this novel Edna O'Brien suggests that home is as much, if not more, in the people than in the place. Her characters find solace in each other, even those whose actions have been and will again be reviled.

She also offers us the grace of human kindness as a counterweight to the pain.

I'm sure other thoughts will percolate up in time. Edna's great skill is in the layers she sets down. Her writing appears effortless, but has the depth of the Irish lough beneath. show less