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Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2016
Observer Best Fiction of 2016
Den of Geek Top Books of 2016
Timothy Buchannan buys an abandoned house on the edge of an isolated village on the coast, sight unseen. When he sees the state of it he questions the wisdom of his move, but starts to renovate the house for his wife, Lauren to join him there.
When the villagers see smoke rising from the chimney of the neglected house they are disturbed and intrigued by the presence of the incomer, intrigue that begins to verge on obsession. And the longer Timothy stays, the more deeply he becomes entangled in the unsettling experience of life in the small village.
Ethan, a fisherman, is particularly perturbed by Timothy's arrival, but accedes to Timothy's request to take him out to sea. They set out along the polluted coastline, hauling in weird fish from the contaminated sea, catches that are bought in whole and removed from the village. Timothy starts to ask questions about the previous resident of his house, Perran, questions to which he receives only oblique answers and increasing hostility.
As Timothy forges on despite the villagers' animosity and the code of silence around Perran, he starts to question what has brought him to this place and is forced to confront a painful truth.
The Many is an unsettling tale that explores the impact of loss and the devastation that hits when the foundations on which we rely are swept away.
About the author
Wyl Menmuir is a novelist and editor based in Cornwall. His bestselling debut novel,
The Many (Salt), was longlisted for the 2016 Man Booker Prize. In November 2016, Nightjar Press published a limited-edition chapbook of his story
Rounds and in 2017, the National Trust published his story,
In Dark Places. He has written for Kneehigh Theatre, Radio 4's
Open Book, the
Guardian and the
Observer, and is a regular contributor to the journal
Elementum. He teaches creative writing at Falmouth University and is co-creator of Cornish writing centre The Writers' Block.
Summary
On the surface, his move to the isolated village on the coast makes perfect sense. But the experience is an increasingly unsettling one for Timothy Bucchanan. A dead man no one will discuss. Wasted fish hauled from a contaminated sea. The dream of faceless men. Questions that lead to further questions. What truth are the villagers withholding?
Report
The Many unfolds like an unsettling dream, shifting illogically, asking the reader to accept leaps from reality to what seems like it may be fantasy (or may be a matter of perception). But it's not just a strange fable, there is humanity in it too: Ethan's palpable grief for Perran; the locals' struggle to adapt to a world in which their former livelihoods have become obsolete; the touches of tenderness in Timothy and Lauren's scenes together. Its portrayal of a community left behind by technology and bureaucracy, suspicious of the threat represented by 'outsiders', is recognisable and timely - perhaps even more so now than the author may have intended.
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