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Young Freya is visiting her self-absorbed mother in Cornwall when she comes across teenage twins. "The only thing better than knowing a secret," they tell her, "is having one of your own." In the days that follow, they will rape her, then bury her alive, combination of anxiety and annoyance passing across their faces as they finally liberate her from her improvised coffin.

This could have served as the disturbing focal point of a novel, but it's only one of multiple horrific events in The Elements, which collects four novelettes – issued individually between 2023 and 2025 – in which characters negotiate previous suffering and try to discover peace in the present moment.

Controversial Context and Subject Exploration

The book's publication has been overshadowed by the presence of Earth, the second novella, on the longlist for a prominent LGBTQ+ writing prize. In August, most other contenders pulled out in objection at the author's gender-critical views – and this year's prize has now been called off.

Debate of LGBTQ+ matters is not present from The Elements, although the author explores plenty of significant issues. Homophobia, the impact of traditional and social media, caregiver abandonment and assault are all investigated.

Multiple Accounts of Trauma

• In Water, a mourning woman named Willow moves to a remote Irish island after her husband is jailed for terrible crimes.
• In Earth, Evan is a athlete on court case as an accessory to rape.
• In Fire, the adult Freya balances retaliation with her work as a surgeon.
• In Air, a dad flies to a funeral with his teenage son, and wonders how much to divulge about his family's history.

Trauma is layered with suffering as damaged survivors seem destined to meet each other again and again for eternity

Related Narratives

Relationships multiply. We initially encounter Evan as a boy trying to escape the island of Water. His trial's group contains the Freya who reappears in Fire. Aaron, the father from Air, partners with Freya and has a child with Willow's daughter. Supporting characters from one narrative return in houses, pubs or courtrooms in another.

These narrative elements may sound tangled, but the author is skilled at how to power a narrative – his prior acclaimed Holocaust drama has sold millions, and he has been rendered into many languages. His businesslike prose sparkles with suspenseful hooks: "in the end, a doctor in the burns unit should be wiser than to play with fire"; "the first thing I do when I come to the island is modify my name".

Personality Development and Storytelling Strength

Characters are portrayed in concise, effective lines: the empathetic Nigerian priest, the troubled pub landlord, the daughter at struggle with her mother. Some scenes resonate with sad power or perceptive humour: a boy is hit by his father after wetting himself at a football match; a narrow-minded island mother and her Dublin-raised neighbour exchange insults over cups of watery tea.

The author's knack of carrying you wholeheartedly into each narrative gives the reappearance of a character or plot strand from an previous story a genuine excitement, for the opening times at least. Yet the collective effect of it all is dulling, and at times almost comic: trauma is accumulated upon pain, coincidence on coincidence in a grim farce in which hurt survivors seem fated to bump into each other repeatedly for forever.

Thematic Depth and Concluding Evaluation

If this sounds less like life and more like purgatory, that is aspect of the author's point. These damaged people are burdened by the crimes they have experienced, stuck in cycles of thought and behavior that churn and descend and may in turn harm others. The author has discussed about the influence of his personal experiences of abuse and he describes with compassion the way his cast navigate this perilous landscape, extending for treatments – solitude, icy sea dips, reconciliation or invigorating honesty – that might provide clarity.

The book's "basic" structure isn't extremely informative, while the brisk pace means the discussion of social issues or social media is mainly superficial. But while The Elements is a flawed work, it's also a completely accessible, victim-focused saga: a valued rebuttal to the common fixation on authorities and criminals. The author shows how trauma can permeate lives and generations, and how years and tenderness can quieten its echoes.