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The Drowning
May 1944: dawn in the Bay of Biscay. A U-boat lies crippled on the seabed. Within earshot of the warship that sank her, a solitary survivor breaks the surface. Injured, in shock, hypothermic, his life-vest torn, he cries out for help.
The captain is on the bridge and brings his binoculars to bear.
The order he gives sets off a train of consequences reaching down through the landscape of post-war, post-colonial Britain, changing not only his own life and the lives of his men, but those of civilians ashore and of children yet unborn.
Spanning seventy years, set in England and in Nigeria during the Biafran crisis, this is a sweeping, compulsive story about conscience and selfishness and the far-reaching damage that cruelty can do.
The captain is on the bridge and brings his binoculars to bear.
The order he gives sets off a train of consequences reaching down through the landscape of post-war, post-colonial Britain, changing not only his own life and the lives of his men, but those of civilians ashore and of children yet unborn.
Spanning seventy years, set in England and in Nigeria during the Biafran crisis, this is a sweeping, compulsive story about conscience and selfishness and the far-reaching damage that cruelty can do.
ebook
First published May 29, 2011
About the author
Richard Herley
23 books43 followersI was born in England in 1950 and educated at Watford Boys’ Grammar School and Sussex University, where my interest in natural history led me to read biology; but from my earliest years English had been my “best” subject, and shortly before my final exams I decided to try to become a professional writer. The job of the artist – in whichever medium he or she works – is an important one, since, conscientiously practised, it helps us to make sense of ourselves and the world.
Authorship is not an easy path to follow. I continue to work at the craft and marvel at its subtlety. I prefer a conventional storytelling framework. This offers the greatest potential for the writer: a reader who wants to know “what happens next” is the most receptive and stands to gain the most of all.
Authorship is not an easy path to follow. I continue to work at the craft and marvel at its subtlety. I prefer a conventional storytelling framework. This offers the greatest potential for the writer: a reader who wants to know “what happens next” is the most receptive and stands to gain the most of all.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
November 29, 2011
I read this book a second time before sitting down to write a review, simply because I didn't trust my flood of first impressions after the initial run-through. Having finished it again, with six months in between to digest its contents, I feel I can safely say that The Drowning is one of my five favorite novels. I found it spellbinding, poignant, painful, joyful, and ultimately uplifting, and I give it my highest possible recommendation.
I was unprepared for a book like this from Richard Herley. His early work - which I love - does nothing to prepare the reader for The Drowning. Books such as The Penal Colony, The Pagans, and Refuge are all smart, thrilling, and immaculately researched and written, but they don't approach the sheer ambition of The Drowning. Only The Tide Mill, which immediately precedes this book in Herley's fiction catalog, and shares several key themes with it, rivals it in reach and scope.
The ambition I speak of here is, in my opinion, the highest one to which a book, or film or painting or song or any other work of art, can aspire: to help the audience make sense of the world and their place in it. Writers who tackle this lofty challenge fail far more often than they succeed, in my experience, and those failures are often cringe-inducingly preachy and pretentious.
That Herley succeeds in such a grand undertaking is testament to his skills as a novelist; he is a master at research and forethought, and he is truly an artist with language. His language is by turns elegant, blunt, dry, hilarious, or whatever else best serves the story, and it provides him with a palette and set of brushes that very few other writers can match. Whereas his considerable technical skills were once put to service writing fast, brainy, razor-sharp genre pieces, here they are employed in creating a warm, sprawling, character-driven epic, where the dramatis personae move in and out of one another's lives over a period of decades. The narrative follows these characters as they learn to live with themselves and the far-reaching consequences of their actions as well as those of others, and as they deal with death, either their own or that of loved ones.
Much of this book consists of the various characters trying to find meaning or answers in life, and while many of them come to different conclusions, a plurality of those conclusions are Buddhist in flavor. This is not a new theme for Richard Herley, but here it is made rather more explicit than in his other works, with several characters actually becoming Buddhist, and the topics of reincarnation, karma, and dukkha being openly discussed. As the child of one Christian and one Buddhist parent, yet who ended up atheist himself, I found this search for meaning enormously evocative. The book's notions of rebirth, of bodhisattvas, of dharma, are all devices serving to illuminate what I took to be the overarching message of The Drowning, to wit: We are all beings looking for redemption-happiness-enlightenment-call it what you will, and in that search, all the help we have is each other. Flint-hearted materialist (speaking philosophically, not economically) that I am, I nonetheless was forced to look back on my life and reflect on people who almost seemed to have been put in my way simply to teach me some small or large lesson, and who then moved on in some other direction, out of my life. Which then, of course, led me to wonder if I had knowingly or unknowingly played that role in someone else's life, and which in turn led me to reflect on the greater consequences that even my small and seemingly insignificant decisions might have. Deep stuff.
The Drowning is all this and much more, and I'm at risk for beginning to ramble here. The weighty, meaning-of-life stuff in this novel is adroitly balanced with humor, for one, and this is probably Herley's funniest novel. Yet on the other hand, it features some of the most painful and poignant love stories I've ever read. There's also a lot here for British readers of the Baby Boom generation (is it called that over there?) that they would probably experience in quite a different way than I do, as the book covers more than a half-century of British history and popular culture. The Beatles and Stones, the Nigerian-Biafran war, Great Britain's final transition into post-colonialism, a cavalcade of Prime Ministers of whom I only recognize the names of about a third, it all rushes by along with the characters' lives.
Ultimately, The Drowning feels to me, in much the same way W. Somerset Maugham's The Razor's Edge does, like one man's powerful statement of philosophy and artistic purpose. It says to the reader, "After a good amount of living, and much consideration, this is what I think the world is about." And whether or not the reader agrees with the substance of that statement, they can't help but be enriched on some level by its eloquence and beauty. I know I was.
I was unprepared for a book like this from Richard Herley. His early work - which I love - does nothing to prepare the reader for The Drowning. Books such as The Penal Colony, The Pagans, and Refuge are all smart, thrilling, and immaculately researched and written, but they don't approach the sheer ambition of The Drowning. Only The Tide Mill, which immediately precedes this book in Herley's fiction catalog, and shares several key themes with it, rivals it in reach and scope.
The ambition I speak of here is, in my opinion, the highest one to which a book, or film or painting or song or any other work of art, can aspire: to help the audience make sense of the world and their place in it. Writers who tackle this lofty challenge fail far more often than they succeed, in my experience, and those failures are often cringe-inducingly preachy and pretentious.
That Herley succeeds in such a grand undertaking is testament to his skills as a novelist; he is a master at research and forethought, and he is truly an artist with language. His language is by turns elegant, blunt, dry, hilarious, or whatever else best serves the story, and it provides him with a palette and set of brushes that very few other writers can match. Whereas his considerable technical skills were once put to service writing fast, brainy, razor-sharp genre pieces, here they are employed in creating a warm, sprawling, character-driven epic, where the dramatis personae move in and out of one another's lives over a period of decades. The narrative follows these characters as they learn to live with themselves and the far-reaching consequences of their actions as well as those of others, and as they deal with death, either their own or that of loved ones.
Much of this book consists of the various characters trying to find meaning or answers in life, and while many of them come to different conclusions, a plurality of those conclusions are Buddhist in flavor. This is not a new theme for Richard Herley, but here it is made rather more explicit than in his other works, with several characters actually becoming Buddhist, and the topics of reincarnation, karma, and dukkha being openly discussed. As the child of one Christian and one Buddhist parent, yet who ended up atheist himself, I found this search for meaning enormously evocative. The book's notions of rebirth, of bodhisattvas, of dharma, are all devices serving to illuminate what I took to be the overarching message of The Drowning, to wit: We are all beings looking for redemption-happiness-enlightenment-call it what you will, and in that search, all the help we have is each other. Flint-hearted materialist (speaking philosophically, not economically) that I am, I nonetheless was forced to look back on my life and reflect on people who almost seemed to have been put in my way simply to teach me some small or large lesson, and who then moved on in some other direction, out of my life. Which then, of course, led me to wonder if I had knowingly or unknowingly played that role in someone else's life, and which in turn led me to reflect on the greater consequences that even my small and seemingly insignificant decisions might have. Deep stuff.
The Drowning is all this and much more, and I'm at risk for beginning to ramble here. The weighty, meaning-of-life stuff in this novel is adroitly balanced with humor, for one, and this is probably Herley's funniest novel. Yet on the other hand, it features some of the most painful and poignant love stories I've ever read. There's also a lot here for British readers of the Baby Boom generation (is it called that over there?) that they would probably experience in quite a different way than I do, as the book covers more than a half-century of British history and popular culture. The Beatles and Stones, the Nigerian-Biafran war, Great Britain's final transition into post-colonialism, a cavalcade of Prime Ministers of whom I only recognize the names of about a third, it all rushes by along with the characters' lives.
Ultimately, The Drowning feels to me, in much the same way W. Somerset Maugham's The Razor's Edge does, like one man's powerful statement of philosophy and artistic purpose. It says to the reader, "After a good amount of living, and much consideration, this is what I think the world is about." And whether or not the reader agrees with the substance of that statement, they can't help but be enriched on some level by its eloquence and beauty. I know I was.
May 4, 2012
I loved this book. Reminiscent of the style of Kazuo Ishiguro, this is a novel of undeclared love, class distinction, duty, ambition, and regret.
The title event, "The Drowning," sets in motion conditions for the book. Malcolm Urquhart, a junior naval officer in World War II is aghast when his commanding officer leaves a German sailor to drown after sinking the German's submarine. Urquhart brings charges against his superior, expecting it to be handled within the service, but is appalled when it becomes a show trial. Urquhart leaves the service and becomes successful in the shipping business. He and his upper-crust wife have three children, two beautiful girls named Isobel and Elspeth, and a boy, George, born with spina bifida. The couple hire Roland Singer, a disillusioned school teacher to instruct the wheelchair-bound George. Roland and George develop a close friendship, but the teacher is absolutely smitten with Elspeth. Long-constrained by issues of class and income, Roland is sacked by Mrs. Urquhart after George becomes ill during an educational outing. Roland enters a burgeoning real estate market with the assistance of an immigrant Jewish family; Elspeth marries a rising young diplomat stationed in Uganda; and Malcolm's fortunes decline with the oil crises of the 1970s.
The crux of "Seinfeld" was "No growth, no learning." The opposite is true with "The Drowning." There is considerable growth and learning, and on the part of several characters resignation to the lives they made. There is precious little action in this book, but quite a lot of considered thought.
Richard Herley has written a beautiful book, one that - if there is any justice in the world - should find itself a wide audience and a Masterpiece Classic mini-series.
The title event, "The Drowning," sets in motion conditions for the book. Malcolm Urquhart, a junior naval officer in World War II is aghast when his commanding officer leaves a German sailor to drown after sinking the German's submarine. Urquhart brings charges against his superior, expecting it to be handled within the service, but is appalled when it becomes a show trial. Urquhart leaves the service and becomes successful in the shipping business. He and his upper-crust wife have three children, two beautiful girls named Isobel and Elspeth, and a boy, George, born with spina bifida. The couple hire Roland Singer, a disillusioned school teacher to instruct the wheelchair-bound George. Roland and George develop a close friendship, but the teacher is absolutely smitten with Elspeth. Long-constrained by issues of class and income, Roland is sacked by Mrs. Urquhart after George becomes ill during an educational outing. Roland enters a burgeoning real estate market with the assistance of an immigrant Jewish family; Elspeth marries a rising young diplomat stationed in Uganda; and Malcolm's fortunes decline with the oil crises of the 1970s.
The crux of "Seinfeld" was "No growth, no learning." The opposite is true with "The Drowning." There is considerable growth and learning, and on the part of several characters resignation to the lives they made. There is precious little action in this book, but quite a lot of considered thought.
Richard Herley has written a beautiful book, one that - if there is any justice in the world - should find itself a wide audience and a Masterpiece Classic mini-series.
January 31, 2012
This is the first book I've read by Richard Herley and after reading reviews on this book I thought I had an idea of what to expect. I did and I totally didn't. I was never able to accurately predict what was going to happen to the characters, yet the overall universal lesson taught to the characters in the book came across very poignantly.
I struggled to maintain interest throughout the entire book as I found a lot of the subject matter fairly uninteresting due to vast ignorance I possess (and own up to) of British imperialist policies with regard to Nigeria. Also, I am always turned off by social politics of rich parents maneuvering for social status and forcing that garbage on their children. It is so foreign to me and always feels like a fictional vehicle for plot points. I also was lost a lot with regards to the time period I was in. I never felt like it year I was in and the book spans 70 years. Needless to say, I would get the dates a little jumbled.
Even so, the political understanding, connection to certain characters and situations were not at all necessary to understand the profound message in the end. It was all just a setting to teach a lesson that the decisions and choices you make not only effect the outcome of your life, but that of countless others. Positive or negative is not a factor. It is just how it is. I plan on giving it a second read after some time, as this is a book worthy of it.
I struggled to maintain interest throughout the entire book as I found a lot of the subject matter fairly uninteresting due to vast ignorance I possess (and own up to) of British imperialist policies with regard to Nigeria. Also, I am always turned off by social politics of rich parents maneuvering for social status and forcing that garbage on their children. It is so foreign to me and always feels like a fictional vehicle for plot points. I also was lost a lot with regards to the time period I was in. I never felt like it year I was in and the book spans 70 years. Needless to say, I would get the dates a little jumbled.
Even so, the political understanding, connection to certain characters and situations were not at all necessary to understand the profound message in the end. It was all just a setting to teach a lesson that the decisions and choices you make not only effect the outcome of your life, but that of countless others. Positive or negative is not a factor. It is just how it is. I plan on giving it a second read after some time, as this is a book worthy of it.
February 25, 2012
Seldom have I read a book that moved me quite as much, and as deeply, as The Drowning by Richard Herley. From its opening paragraphs set beneath the wartime Atlantic Ocean, where Herley let me think I was reading one type of novel, only to confound me in the second chapter, to its conclusion 70 odd years later, The Drowning never failed to satisfy.
Essentially a love story, the action moves seamlessly between England and Nigeria, and recounts the lives of Roland and Elspeth, both together and apart. The closing chapters are deeply poignant and incredibly moving. I can count on the fingers of one hand books that have left me in tears; this was one of them.
This is a book that should be required reading for any would be writer, and as one such I could only read in admiration. The quality of the writing is superb, and although not normally a jealous person, I am extremely envious of Richard Herley's ability, and wish I could write half as well.
Essentially a love story, the action moves seamlessly between England and Nigeria, and recounts the lives of Roland and Elspeth, both together and apart. The closing chapters are deeply poignant and incredibly moving. I can count on the fingers of one hand books that have left me in tears; this was one of them.
This is a book that should be required reading for any would be writer, and as one such I could only read in admiration. The quality of the writing is superb, and although not normally a jealous person, I am extremely envious of Richard Herley's ability, and wish I could write half as well.
February 10, 2012
Beautifull book on how one man's drowing can influence the lives of a great number of people over decades. Its all about British culture, class, religion, spirituality, money and how love in the '50's makes this all difficult for young people not belonging to that same class. I won't give the story away as there's so many surprises and beautifull parts in it not to spoil the reading pleasure.
Herley is a wonderfull writer, entwining all storylines with such ease and style, you cannot lay the book aside.
Herley is a wonderfull writer, entwining all storylines with such ease and style, you cannot lay the book aside.
December 9, 2011
This book is beautiful. Romantic, subtle, politically insightful and philosophically insightful.
I always enjoy books that span a lifetime. It makes the reader re-appraise their priorities from a more distant perspective than is usually used.
I would recommend the drowning as heartily as it was recommended to me.
I always enjoy books that span a lifetime. It makes the reader re-appraise their priorities from a more distant perspective than is usually used.
I would recommend the drowning as heartily as it was recommended to me.
April 12, 2012
Wow. That's all. Read it. Another stellar recommendation from my brother Ben! See his review to be further enticed... just in case my brevity isn't enticement enough :)
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews