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Young Freya spends time with her distracted mother in Cornwall when she encounters teenage twins. "Nothing better than being aware of a secret," they advise her, "is having one of your own." In the days that follow, they will rape her, then inter her while living, a mix of anxiety and irritation passing across their faces as they finally liberate her from her temporary coffin.

This could have served as the disturbing main event of a novel, but it's just one of multiple terrible events in The Elements, which assembles four novellas – published individually between 2023 and 2025 – in which characters negotiate historical pain and try to discover peace in the contemporary moment.

Debated Context and Thematic Exploration

The book's publication has been marred by the addition of Earth, the second novella, on the longlist for a notable LGBTQ+ writing prize. In August, most other contenders pulled out in dissent at the author's debated views – and this year's prize has now been called off.

Discussion of LGBTQ+ matters is not present from The Elements, although the author addresses plenty of major issues. Anti-gay prejudice, the effect of conventional and digital platforms, caregiver abandonment and sexual violence are all explored.

Multiple Stories of Trauma

• In Water, a sorrowful woman named Willow transfers to a secluded Irish island after her husband is imprisoned for terrible crimes.
• In Earth, Evan is a footballer on court case as an accomplice to rape.
• In Fire, the adult Freya juggles retaliation with her work as a surgeon.
• In Air, a dad travels to a burial with his young son, and considers how much to disclose about his family's past.

Trauma is layered with suffering as damaged survivors seem destined to bump into each other repeatedly for eternity

Interconnected Stories

Relationships proliferate. We initially encounter Evan as a boy trying to flee the island of Water. His trial's jury contains the Freya who shows up again in Fire. Aaron, the father from Air, collaborates with Freya and has a child with Willow's daughter. Secondary characters from one account return in cottages, taverns or judicial venues in another.

These narrative elements may sound complicated, but the author knows how to power a narrative – his earlier acclaimed Holocaust drama has sold numerous units, and he has been rendered into numerous languages. His direct prose sparkles with thriller-ish hooks: "after all, a doctor in the burns unit should understand more than to toy with fire"; "the primary step I do when I come to the island is modify my name".

Personality Portrayal and Storytelling Power

Characters are portrayed in concise, impactful lines: the compassionate Nigerian priest, the disturbed pub landlord, the daughter at struggle with her mother. Some scenes resonate with melancholy power or insightful humour: a boy is punched by his father after urinating at a football match; a narrow-minded island mother and her Dublin-raised neighbour trade barbs over cups of weak tea.

The author's ability of bringing you completely into each narrative gives the return of a character or plot strand from an prior story a genuine frisson, for the initial several times at least. Yet the cumulative effect of it all is numbing, and at times nearly comic: suffering is layered with suffering, coincidence on coincidence in a grim farce in which hurt survivors seem destined to bump into each other repeatedly for eternity.

Conceptual Depth and Final Assessment

If this sounds less like life and more like purgatory, that is part of the author's message. These wounded people are burdened by the crimes they have suffered, caught in routines of thought and behavior that churn and descend and may in turn harm others. The author has talked about the effect of his individual experiences of abuse and he depicts with compassion the way his characters negotiate this risky landscape, reaching out for treatments – seclusion, cold ocean swims, reconciliation or refreshing honesty – that might let light in.

The book's "basic" concept isn't terribly instructive, while the rapid pace means the discussion of social issues or digital platforms is mostly shallow. But while The Elements is a defective work, it's also a completely accessible, survivor-centered epic: a valued response to the common preoccupation on authorities and criminals. The author illustrates how trauma can affect lives and generations, and how time and tenderness can soften its echoes.