It’s hard to imagine that a novel so sure-footed and so confident as Elmet could be an author’s first.  Set in modern-day Yorkshire, it tells the story of two children, Cathy and Daniel, raised on the margins of society by their father. They live in the deep countryside in a makeshift house built by “Daddy”, go to school only intermittently, and live on what their father earns through prizefighting and other casual jobs.  With no friends and minimal interaction with society, the children form a powerful bond with their fearsome father, famed for his strength, courage, and brutality, and with the surrounding natural world.  Their efforts to create a rural idyll for themselves fail as modern “civilization” encroaches in the most hostile way imaginable.

Elmet is certainly not a perfect novel, but the scale of the achievement is such that it feels ungenerous to cavil at its shortcomings.  One of the many pleasures was the fun I had detecting the author’s literary influences.  Ted Hughes (obviously), Emily Brontë, and D.H. Lawrence stood out, but with time I think I could find others. I’m already looking forward to seeing what Fiona Mozley does next.