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Twelve-year-old Freya stays with her distracted mother in Cornwall when she meets 14-year-old twins. "The only thing better than being aware of a secret," they inform her, "comes from possessing one of your own." In the time that come after, they sexually assault her, then bury her alive, a mix of unease and annoyance flitting across their faces as they eventually liberate her from her improvised coffin.

This might have stood as the shocking main event of a novel, but it's just one of multiple horrific events in The Elements, which gathers four short novels – released distinctly between 2023 and 2025 – in which characters confront historical pain and try to discover peace in the current moment.

Disputed Context and Thematic Exploration

The book's publication has been marred by the addition of Earth, the subsequent novella, on the candidate list for a notable LGBTQ+ writing prize. In August, most other nominees withdrew in protest at the author's gender-critical views – and this year's prize has now been called off.

Discussion of gender identity issues is not present from The Elements, although the author explores plenty of significant issues. LGBTQ+ discrimination, the influence of conventional and digital platforms, parental neglect and abuse are all investigated.

Multiple Accounts of Suffering

• In Water, a grieving woman named Willow relocates to a secluded Irish island after her husband is incarcerated for horrific crimes.
• In Earth, Evan is a athlete on trial as an participant to rape.
• In Fire, the grown-up Freya juggles revenge with her work as a surgeon.
• In Air, a father travels to a funeral with his young son, and wonders how much to reveal about his family's history.

Pain is layered with suffering as wounded survivors seem fated to bump into each other continuously for all time

Related Accounts

Links multiply. We first meet Evan as a boy trying to flee the island of Water. His trial's group contains the Freya who reappears in Fire. Aaron, the father from Air, collaborates with Freya and has a child with Willow's daughter. Minor characters from one account resurface in cottages, pubs or courtrooms in another.

These storylines may sound complex, but the author knows how to propel a narrative – his previous successful Holocaust drama has sold many copies, and he has been converted into numerous languages. His straightforward prose bristles with thriller-ish hooks: "after all, a doctor in the burns unit should know better than to experiment with fire"; "the first thing I do when I arrive on the island is change my name".

Character Portrayal and Storytelling Strength

Characters are sketched in concise, powerful lines: the caring Nigerian priest, the troubled pub landlord, the daughter at war with her mother. Some scenes echo with tragic power or perceptive humour: a boy is struck by his father after wetting himself at a football match; a biased island mother and her Dublin-raised neighbour exchange insults over cups of diluted tea.

The author's knack of bringing you fully into each narrative gives the return of a character or plot strand from an previous story a genuine excitement, for the opening times at least. Yet the cumulative effect of it all is desensitizing, and at times nearly comic: pain is piled on trauma, coincidence on coincidence in a grim farce in which damaged survivors seem doomed to meet each other again and again for eternity.

Conceptual Depth and Concluding Evaluation

If this sounds different from life and closer to limbo, that is element of the author's thesis. These wounded people are burdened by the crimes they have suffered, caught in cycles of thought and behavior that stir and descend and may in turn damage others. The author has talked about the influence of his own experiences of mistreatment and he describes with understanding the way his ensemble negotiate this dangerous landscape, striving for treatments – seclusion, icy sea dips, forgiveness or invigorating honesty – that might bring illumination.

The book's "elemental" structure isn't particularly instructive, while the rapid pace means the exploration of social issues or social media is mainly shallow. But while The Elements is a flawed work, it's also a entirely readable, victim-focused epic: a welcome riposte to the common fixation on authorities and criminals. The author demonstrates how trauma can permeate lives and generations, and how years and compassion can quieten its aftereffects.