Publisher Description
Kevern doesn’t know why his father made him put two finger across his lips whenever he began a word with a J. It wasn’t then, and isn’t now, the time or place for asking questions. Ailinn, too, has grown up in the dark about who she is and where she comes from. The past is a dangerous country, not to be visited or talked about.
She is new to the village; Kevern has lived here, in half-hiding, all his life. They feel a surge of protectiveness for each other the moment they meet. On their first date, Kevern kisses the bruises under her eyes. He doesn’t ask who did it. Brutality has grown commonplace. They aren’t sure whether they have fallen in love of their own accord or whether they’ve been pushed into each other’s arms. But who would have pushed them, and why?
Nothing in this extraordinary new novel by Howard Jacobson is certain. Time lurches, what passes for memory might not have happened, accidents might not after all be accidental, history itself has been disowned. If this is the consequence of removing your enemies (and disturbing the necessary equilibrium of hate), could it be time to reinvent them? Into these sinister calculations first Ailinn and then Kevern are drawn …
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Jacobson' Booker prize shortlisted dystopian novel is a pastoralist's 1984. Set in a quiet village after a global cataclysm referred to only as WHAT HAPPENED, IF IT HAPPENED the novel is initially as much concerned about the eccentrics down at the pub as it is with explaining what befell humankind. It slowly emerges that generations previously, a global movement named Project Ishmael persuaded the survivors to rename themselves, as well as all of the world's places, in order to obliterate all memory of the apocalypse that nearly destroyed civilization. Esme Nussbaum, formerly an analyst with the mysterious Ofnow organization (charged with monitoring public mood), has moved to the village after a near-fatal accident, and befriended Ailinn Solomons, an orphan with no memories of her past. Esme maneuvers Ailinn into a relationship with Kevern Cohen, a local woodcarver who cannot utter the letter J without putting two fingers to his lips. Kevern and Ailinn fall in love, which suits Esme's mysterious reasons for bringing them together. When a woman from the village is found murdered, and Kevern becomes a suspect, this handful of individuals become a proxy for urgent global concerns. Jacobson's (The Finkler Question) fusion of village comedy and dystopian sci-fi is a tour de force, although in many ways the story Jacobson doesn't tell is more interesting than the one he does. The chilling sketch that finally coheres about the fate that has befallen humanity may make readers lament not having had a more straightforward approach. Nonetheless, fans of dystopian fiction will find this to be a unique entry in the genre.
