As the name suggests, Swimming Home by British writer Deborah Levy is a submerged plunge into the refracting light and pockets of darkness of home life abroad. Nominated for the 2012 Booker Prize, it’s a literary tour de force with poetic prose and a fascinating plot set in the sunshine of the French Riviera.
The story follows a family holiday in a villa in the hills outside Nice. However the vacation idyl is punctured by the unexpected arrival of one flame headed beauty, Kitty Finch, found naked swimming in the villa’s leaf scattered and slightly cloudy pool. Isabel Jacobs, the mother of the family invites the dangerous apparition to stay with then, in spite of her knowledge of her husband Jozef’s past, setting a course for gasping consequences.
Swimming Home is a joy to read, with great sentence construction, tight narrative and a relentless flow. The day long chapters set the pace of the story, showing the relatively short time in which things can change forever. However, the real skill of Deborah Levy’s writing is her ability to create depth and layers beneath the surface scum of the superficial, building truth in the undertow.
The characters of the sun drenched tragedy are weighted and unforgettable, whether they’re central or bit part players. Nina, the daughter of the family, and arguably the true protagonist of the play, exudes a subtle coming-of-age drama of her own in and amongst the family saga that flows out below her. Kitty is a mystery of madness that seems to be able to whip up the murk deep down at the lower levels, while twisting all life around her dirty finger nails.
Family friends and fellow holiday makers, Mitchell and Laura, are themselves little windows into another life that manage to magnify the inspection of the Jacobs family condition. However, the Kitty Finch side of the French vacation is best told through her existing relationship with dreadlocked German caretaker, Jurgen, Mick Jagger lookalike waiter, Claude, elderly therapist, Madeleine, and her burgeoning friendship with Nina Jacobs, which has an odd quality to it because of her dangerous poetic liaison with Jozef.
Deborah Levy’s Swimming Home is one of the best written novels of 2012 and for anyone that hasn’t read it, you’ll find a mix of darkness that only deep water can conjure up set against the background of a blistering summer in the South of France.
Deborah Levy Swimming Home review: 4.5/5
