Douglas Kennedy is an American born writer, now living on this side of the Atlantic, dividing his time between London Paris and Berlin. Following a career in theatre and newspapers, he wrote a number of travel books before writing three well-received thrillers between 1994 and 1998. In 2001 he changed genre completely to write 'The Pursuit of Happiness', a literary romantic tale set against the back-drop of the Mc Carthy witch-hunts. He has continued to write intelligent fiction about complex characters in novels including 'A Special Relationship' (2003)and most recently 'The Woman in the Fifth' (2007). He is a self-confessed culture addict and his books are filled with frequent and lyrical references to film, literature and music. 'Leaving the World' is no different.
The book opens with a declaration by heroine Jane Howard on her thirteenth birthday, that she will never get married or have children. “No one's actually happy,” she adds. But words, as her mother (and life) will continually remind her, 'have consequences'. Her father leaves home the next day and Jane's mother will spend the rest of her life mythologising her marriage and blaming Jane for its loss.
Douglas Kennedy's strength lies in producing finely drawn characters thrown by the randomness of life into unbearable situations which, though not their own fault, arise through their flaws. Fans of Kennedy's will quickly recognise this in Jane Howard. She enters adult life starved of approval and with a terror of abandonment and pursues success in her academic career so rigorously that she leaves little time for friends. Her love affairs are with men as damaged as she is. She refuses to commit fully to David, the love of her life and the one man who might save her. And, when she is similarly unable to save him, he dies in an tragic accident.
Jane escapes into a career in finance, deciding to 'make real money' to bolster her self esteem. She is successful but her life soon implodes once again when she makes an unwise decision motivated by the desire to impress her long-absent father. A retreat back into academia leads to an on-off relationship with the with the wildly unstable film-fanatic, Theo and they have a child together. From here things go rapidly downhill for Jane as Theo's involvement in a risky film venture eventually drives her close to bankruptcy and towards heartbreaking tragedy.
By now, her damaged psyche leaves her unwilling or unable to trust those who have her best interests at heart, and Jane 'leaves the world'. Cutting off all contact with her old life, she builds a new life away from anyone who knows her. It is only when a child from a nearby community disappears that she must chose whether to remain anonymous, nursing her damaged sense of self back to life, or follow her instincts and get involved.
'Leaving the World' is a fast-paced, stylishly written novel. But at times it feels over-plotted. Some of the plot-turns feel like devices to set up later action. For example Jane's brief foray into the world of high finance is interesting, but short and unsatisfying, giving the impression that it is included merely to submit her to the final destructive betrayal by her father and leave her in a healthy enough financial position to be a target for later fraud. Similarly the final denouement, the story of the missing child, although it reads like a good thriller with a high potential for horror to keep the reader gripped, (Kennedy is making good use of his early writing experience), it is only loosely tied into the rest of Jane's story.
But for all that, Kennedy has turned out a book that will be popular with his many fans (he is translated into sixteen languages and has sold millions), and he will win readers over with his well written and lyrical investigation of how single random events shape lives.
Leaving the World by Douglas Kennedy
Hutchinson
451 pp £14.99
This review first appeared in the Irish Times Weekend Section on 14t March 2009
