Set in a family hotel on the south-east coast of Ireland, Dermot Bolger's new novel manages to take the well-known elements of a "mid-life crisis" narrative and give them an added twist. "I gave up my happiness to make another person happy" is a phrase returned to on a number of occasions by Alice Gill, the character round which the novel revolves. She is mother, wife, lover - all of these things to different people simultaneously. However, in the midst of these various roles, the true Alice feels lost.
Happily - unlike so many other aspects of the contemporary world - this is a novel not in a rush. Bolger spends time in drawing his protagonist and filling out the other principal characters. Proving, as he does so, that it is not necessary for a writer to cram a work full of exaggerated incident and over-the-top plot lines to succeed in keeping a reader interested. The reader is able to engage sympathetically with characters and a story which might reflect their own world.
Alice's introspection is prompted by the arrival at the hotel of an old boyfriend. This man, Chris, is the temptation of the title. Nevertheless, Chris has his own past and his own demons to deal with. Thus, Temptation, is not simply a wistful contemplation of "what might have been", rather it is a focused and insightful meditation on the nature of the self in relation to others.
The action takes place over five days. Alice, her husband Peadar and their three children are taking their annual holiday. Beneath the surface comfort of the rituals surrounding this family are questions forming in Alice's mind concerning the rut she believes these very rituals have placed her in. Bolger skillfully weaves the story of the past through the events of the present. The particulars that bind these characters together are measured out carefully over the course of the novel, our knowledge of them and their predicament building toward the climax at the close. It is a technique well handled by the author, wholly appropriate to the material and the pace of the work.
It is a technique, in addition, that lends itself to the air of realism pervading the novel. The characters and the situation are believable, the emotions real. Though action becomes intrusively predominant in the closing stages, Bolger achieves a sustained mood of subdued reflection throughout most of the story. Forced to recollect her past life and the choices she has made, Alice learns many things about herself, but also, more importantly, about other people. Other people are, in reality, the mystery: they remain - even close friends and lovers - always somewhere beyond the reaches of our knowledge.
This is a low-key work in comparison to much of what is being written in Ireland at the moment. However, this is what marks it off from the crowd. Bolger is confident of his abilities and, perhaps, feels - rightly - that there is no need to resort to verbal and formal pyrotechnics when there is absolutely no justification to do so in terms of the tale being told. Such understanding of the need to match form with content is manifested in this novel: an intimate story told in a quiet, unassuming fashion that is all the better for not being forced.
Derek Hand teaches in the Department of English at University College, Dublin