Waves

A year has gone by since Charlie went surfing at night and was discovered the next morning lying on the rocks by her younger brother, 15-year-old Hal. It has been a year for the family of visiting Charlie in hospital where she lies in a coma. Is she brain dead or trapped in her inert body, conscious of their presence, listening to what is said to her? And was it an accident? Who was she with that night?

For the first time since the tragedy the family return to their house on the beach. Charlie’s absence is a powerful presence and most particularly for Hal, who is compelled to explore what might have happened. Charlie had made friends with people from the nearby campsite, an older crowd from whose company Hal had felt excluded. Now a year older he is invited in his own right by a girl who, to his amazement and pleasure, finds him attractive. The discovery that her brother was Charlie’s boyfriend is another aspect of the past events that he is trying to piece together.

Told in the first person by the different protagonists in turn, Dogar’s narrative presents us with a complex and many layered depiction of grief and loss. The agony of Charlie’s condition – absent yet still alive – is well conveyed as each family member struggles to accommodate this dead weight inside them. At the same time the novel affords a tender portrayal of first love (both Hal’s and Charlie’s) as well as being a work of detection. It is a most convincing debut from a writer who will have much to offer.