The Swedish-born author of Island Of Wings, a memorable debut about a newlywed minister and his wife on St Kilda in the 1830s, has followed that up with even more involving novel, set on present-day Dartmoor and looking back through a life heavily burdened with guilt.
Retired academic Gabriel Askew - the clue is in the name - has returned to his childhood home of Mortford to live in a manor house, Oakstone, which is far too big for a man living alone. He's come back to reconcile himself with his demons, make amends to the dead and set right, as best he can, some old wrongs.
Through flashbacks, we come to learn what's driving him. Born with a cleft palate, Gabriel was a target for the local bullies, until the day that a slightly younger boy named Michael, from the wealthy family who lived in Oakstone, stood up for him. The two became inseparable. However, when his mother forbids him to go to Michael's house, Gabriel starts to suspect that there are things he's not being told, and over the next few years he pieces together what it is that the grown-ups won't talk about. That knowledge is little comfort, though, as the bullying has already reached its peak in a horrendous incident which ensures that neither Gabriel nor Michael will ever be the same again.
Now, in his sunset years, Gabriel is ready to confront the past. But does he have the self-awareness to really know what he's doing? He's accompanied on his inner journey by two women: the gentle and understanding Mrs Sarobi, an Afghan widow who was educated in Britain and has come back here to live; and Doris Ludgate, a far more hostile villager with a sharp tongue, who is quick to think the worst of anybody.
There are few surprises lurking here. The reader can guess most revelations well in advance. Also, there's an uneven quality to Altenberg's writing: Mrs Ludgate's character feels inconsistent, showing surprising articulacy and empathy at odd moments; and the author struggles to make scenes such as the racially insensitive conversation at a Women's Institute meeting fully convincing. The scenes set in a freakshow, while written well, seem almost to belong to another book entirely. But she has a poetic touch which well expresses the weight Gabriel has shouldered, and the dark undercurrents of his life. For all that Breaking Light falters in places, Altenberg is a talent worth making time for.
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