Lead Review
- Book: Mother Mother
- Location: Belfast
- Author: Annie Macmanus
When a debut novelist is well known in another field, sometimes their literary efforts disappoint and prompt you to think that they got a book deal because of their fame. This certainly isn’t the case here; Annie MacManus is well known as a DJ and broadcaster but Mother Mother is a little gem, a powerful and skilfully written exploration of a family impacted by grief and addiction.
Mary McConnell’s mother died when she was an infant, leaving her to be cared for by her older brother Sean, as her father seems incapable of any form of adequate parenting and spends most of his time in the pub. She longs to know about her mother but it is too painful for her father to talk about. As Sean reaches adolescence the relationship between father and son disintegrates into violence and both men retreat into their own forms of addiction. Mary becomes a mother figure for both men and there is no love or care for her anywhere. Then Mary becomes pregnant as a result of her first, abusive sexual experience and ends up with her own son, TJ, to raise. Mary battles on, being a good mother to her son as he grows and continues to support her father and brother without any consideration of her own needs, so it is little surprise that, one day, she cracks …
There are two narrative strands to this novel: TJ, as an almost adult, wakes one morning to find Mary missing and recounts his increasingly panicked attempts to locate her. This narrative is interwoven with Mary’s own story from childhood onwards. This structure allows for a poignant exploration of a childhood deprived of adult love and care and also the way in which addiction distorts family relationships but it also helps the reader to understand how adverse childhood experiences can affect our ability to parent.
Set in Belfast, particularly in its parks and cemeteries, where Mary works devotedly, Mother Mother takes us on a tour of the city and its surroundings. MacManus is a Dubliner by birth but studied in Belfast and it is clear that she regards the city fondly. As a native of the city, I found the novel richly evocative of the place and its people.
Mother Mother is a seemingly simple story. MacManus’s prose is pared down and perfectly reflects her central characters’ thought processes. Both TJ and Mary are examples of brilliant characterisation and the reader gets completely drawn in to their lives. This is a well-structured, well-constructed debut novel, in which not a word is wasted. I read it in one sitting and personally can’t wait to see what MacManus produces next.
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