Review: The Amusements by Aingeala Flannery

I so enjoyed this collection of interrelated stories about various characters living in, or connected to, the Irish seaside town of Tramore.

The two central characters are Helen and Stella, who first meet when the rebellious and free-thinking Stella turns up at Helen's secondary school. Helen's not sure why Stella's there - she comes from the top town, where girls go to school at the Ursuline Convent. But Helen doesn't care why, she's immediately captivated, and a little in love, with 'Stella Swoon' as Helen's brother calls her.

The girls become very close, but Stella is always slippery and unpredictable. When Helen gets a job at the local supermarket to help her to save to go to art school (an ambition strongly opposed by her mother) vicious behaviour by Stella's mother and an unforgivable betrayal by Stella herself break the girls apart; they are not really reunited until the end of the book, thirty years later.

In some ways Helen's household reminded me of Derry Girls.  Helen's hard working, plain speaking mother could be Mary Quinn, just as her quieter, more sympathetic father could be Gerry,

When Helen goes to the builders' yard to tell Da that his mother, Nanny Moll, has suffered a stroke, he simply asks what kind of stroke,

'Da left drama to other people, and by other people what I mean is Mam and Nanny.'

Meanwhile Mam follows the ambulance to the hospital 'with Nanny's false teeth in her coat pocket.'

While there is perhaps a little less comedy in the Grant household than the Quinns', this is more than made up for by Flannery's sharp observations of life in a fading seaside town. 

'There are things you need to know about growing up in Tramore.

 

Young ones from the estate are easier than young ones from the top town.

Stay away from townies and jackeens.

Don't go knacker drinking on the cliff top.

Stay away from the saltmarsh. It's full of quicksand and perverts. 

Get out before you're twenty, or you'll have to abide by the rules forever.

This was the story for girls. Fellas didn't have to abide by any rules....You didn't have to do much if you were a girl to land yourself in trouble. Having a fanny was enough.'

Other Tramore residents and visitors orbit around the main axis of Helen and Stella's story. Every one is well drawn, convincing and real. 

Tip Phelan of the caravan park, who becomes obsessed with the beautiful Stella when his own wife becomes worn down by motherhood; Muriel Power, who runs the guest house just as her mother did before her, and gives a customer she doesn't like bacon that's 'on the turn'; Ted Burke, the butcher who delivers meat to the guest house; Nancy Swaine, Stella's bitter and spiteful mother; Nancy's new neighbour, the slightly exotic Vonnie Jacob, whom Ted would like to get to know better. And many more, each of them fascinating.

Aingeala Flannery handles all of these characters with real skill; none of the connections between them seem contrived, and I raced to the end of the book to see how their many stories would play out. Flannery also has Irish small town life down to a T; every tiny detail is so accurate, so telling. She takes you there.

And in among the small stories, Flannery explores the larger question of who succeeds and who fails, how success and failure are measured, and whether, ultimately, the 'success' is worth more - or less - than the 'failure.' Do we gain more from leaving than we do from staying? Or are some of us simply born leavers and other stayers?

The Amusements deservedly won the 2022 John McGahern Prize for a debut book of Irish fiction. I'd love to read more by this author.

The Amusements by Aingeala Flannery is published by Penguin Books.