‘I’ll tell you what happened because it will be a good way to introduce my brother. His name’s Simon. I think you’re going to like him, I really do. But in a couple of pages he’ll be dead. And he was never the same after that.’
Nathan Filer’s debut novel The Shock of the Fall is narrated by Matthew, a 19 year old suffering from schizophrenia. When he was a child, Matthew’s family went on a seaside caravan holiday. While they were there, two bad things happened, changing his life irrevocably. Now, alternating between the shared PC at his day centre and the battered typewriter his Nan has bought for him to use in his flat, Matthew attempts to chart the development of his illness, and describe the events which lead to him being sectioned.
Schizophrenia is often deeply misrepresented in popular culture. It is generally characterised by voices and violence (see Summer of Sam for example) or as a Jekyll and Hyde style multiple personality disorder. In reality, for many the disease causes a sense of deep isolation, a gradual disassociation and withdrawal from society. This is the case even before the sluggish side-effects of drugs and the enforced boredom of institutional life, which many schizophrenics will experience, take hold. It is this prosaic, lonely experience of illness which Filer captures so effectively in his novel.
Schizophrenia is often deeply misrepresented in popular culture. It is generally characterised by voices and violence (see Summer of Sam for example) or as a Jekyll and Hyde style multiple personality disorder. In reality, for many the disease causes a sense of deep isolation, a gradual disassociation and withdrawal from society. This is the case even before the sluggish side-effects of drugs and the enforced boredom of institutional life, which many schizophrenics will experience, take hold. It is this prosaic, lonely experience of illness which Filer captures so effectively in his novel.
The Shock of the Fall is no misery memoir though. Filer’s writing is vital, engaging and extremely quotable. Like a method actor, you get a sense of Filer really becoming his narrator. Throughout the book, Matthew makes references to unseen characters around him, creating a sense of the world he inhabits, with medical staff glancing over his shoulder and trying to help with his work. This is heightened by the shifting fonts, from PC Arial to typewriter lettering, and the inclusion of drawings alongside the text. In terms of the narrative mapping the workings of a schizophrenic mind, it recalls one of my books of 2012, The Quiddity of Will Self, although the overall feel of the novel is very different.
Matthew’s tone is often naïve (‘I should tell you about my mum, because you’ve probably never met her’), but he is also capable of sharp moments of insight and analysis – at one point he describes schizophrenia as ‘a disease with the shape and sound of a snake’. He writes particularly well, from a child’s-eye view, about life with a depressed mother: ‘a good thing about talking to someone who is standing behind you is that you can pretend you don’t know they’re crying’. There are hints of Vernon God Little in his idiosyncratic narrative voice, but Matthew is no outlaw iconoclast, just a troubled young man trying to understand his past.
As Matthew describes his treatment first as an in-patient, and then on day release, there is some commentary on the state of the NHS (the abundance of drug company paraphernalia on the wards, and the effects of cut-backs on service users), but The Shock of the Fall is rarely political. Instead, the focus in on the way we deal with death, how trauma left unacknowledged can return to haunt us later.
It seems that the modern rituals we go through in the event of bereavement are insufficient to help Matthew and his mother to come to terms with such an unexpected and brutal event as the loss of a young child. In the immediate aftermath of Simon's death, Matthew’s mother displays signs of depression and even Munchausen’s Syndrome, as she tries to keep her younger son close. Matthew himself is plagued by a desire to make amends with Simon – he still has the sense that his brother is somehow close to him, and his madness focuses on ways to make up for his perceived crime. Both take on personal responsibility for grief, turning Simon into a burden which threatens to destroy them, because they have no outlet for a collective sense of mourning.
The Shock of the Fall is a very impressive novel, able to challenge stereotypes of mental illness whilst remaining extremely readable. While the issues of family trauma and personal responsibility addressed here are also touched on in books such as We Need To Talk About Kevin, the originality of Matthew's narrative voice and Filer's understated, gothic humour give it a distinctive appeal. This could be one of the most talked-about debuts this year.
It seems that the modern rituals we go through in the event of bereavement are insufficient to help Matthew and his mother to come to terms with such an unexpected and brutal event as the loss of a young child. In the immediate aftermath of Simon's death, Matthew’s mother displays signs of depression and even Munchausen’s Syndrome, as she tries to keep her younger son close. Matthew himself is plagued by a desire to make amends with Simon – he still has the sense that his brother is somehow close to him, and his madness focuses on ways to make up for his perceived crime. Both take on personal responsibility for grief, turning Simon into a burden which threatens to destroy them, because they have no outlet for a collective sense of mourning.
The Shock of the Fall is a very impressive novel, able to challenge stereotypes of mental illness whilst remaining extremely readable. While the issues of family trauma and personal responsibility addressed here are also touched on in books such as We Need To Talk About Kevin, the originality of Matthew's narrative voice and Filer's understated, gothic humour give it a distinctive appeal. This could be one of the most talked-about debuts this year.
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