Fire by John Boyne
On the face of it, Freya lives a gilded existence, dancing solely to her own tune. She has all the trappings of wealth and privilege, a responsible job as a surgeon specialising in skin grafts, a beautiful flat in a sought-after development, and a flash car. But it wasn’t always like this. Hers is a life founded on darkness.
Did what happened to Freya as a child one fateful summer influence the adult she would become – or was she always destined to be that person? Was she born with cruelty in her heart or did something force it into being?
In Fire, John Boyne takes the reader on a chilling, uncomfortable but utterly compelling psychological journey to the epicentre of the human condition, asking the age-old question: nurture – or nature?
Elements
Having enjoyed the previous instalments in his ‘Elements series - ‘Water’ then ‘Earth’ - I was looking forward to this. I’d say early on that it’s important to read them in order, as a certain swimming coach and footballer get a couple of mentions in this novella. But like the other short installments, which you could read alone, this is another propulsive read.
‘The elements destroy everything. Think of water. When someone drowns, and their body floats back to shore, their features are so bloated it can be difficult to identify them. Think of earth. When a body is buried, it starts to decompose immediately. Think of air. If we’re deprived of it for even a few minutes, we die. Then think of fire. When someone’s physical appearance is damaged by burns, we turn away, repulsed. We don’t want to know.’
Controversial
For a number of reasons, I’d say this is the most controversial book of the series. Freya is both a victim and a perpetrator in this book, and Boyne is showing us that it is possible to be both. There are some scenes in this book that left me a bit uncomfortable, but that doesn’t bother me. It’s good to get a reaction and I’d be interested in hearing how others felt about Freya.
With each chapter I found myself slipping in deeper. I felt more and more uneasy as the book develops, and part of me knew what was coming but Boyne is such a good storyteller that I was never going to stop reading. He had me from the first line - ‘ When I was twelve years old, I was buried alive within the grounds of a construction site.’
Writing
It would have been easy for me to have read this in one sitting, but there’s something so gripping and immersive about Boyne’s storytelling that I had to let it linger. He’s so good an stepping into the shoes of just about any protagonist, and Freya is as complicated as any he’s come up with.
I can’t say anything about the plot, other than to leave the blurb in at the beginning of this review. I get that ‘fire’ will probably divide audiences, but the best books, in my eyes, provoke the most debate. I would say that if you are easily triggered, this mightn’t be the book for you.
Again, Boyne writes about how society has decided who the monsters are, but very often they are hiding in plain sight. But are you prepared to look beyond the headlines and think about what has created these people in the first place? Like I say, this is a confronting and darkly shocking read.
Summary
This is one I won’t forget in a while. It’s made me think a lot, again, about circumstances creating individuals, and of course nature versus nurture. Boyne takes the reader into darker places than I expected him to go, and he leaves us asking a lot of questions, but for me as reader that’s a place I’m happy to go with him.
176 Pages
First Published 11 July 2024