After Rain by William Trevor, 1995
The magic trick:
A protagonist processing one aspect of her life and instead finding clarity about something else
“After Rain” is a slow, sad, mesmerizing story (heads up: it doesn’t even start raining until the second-last page). In it, Harriet has fulfilled a resort vacation even after her partner has left her. She thinks it will help her better process the breakup. We recognize a characteristically Trevor setup then – a lonely protagonist trying to manage grief. What’s interesting then is that the resort stay doesn’t necessarily help Harriet better understand the end of her relationship; it brings her clarity about an entirely different part of her life.
And that’s quite a trick on Trevor’s part.
The selection:
“They certainly feed you,” Harriet’s companion remarks, “these days at the Cesarina.”
“Yes.”
“Quite scanty, the food was once.”
“Yes, I remember.”
“I mean, a longish time ago.”
“The first summer I came here I was ten.”
He calculates, glancing at her face to guess her age. Before his own first time, he says, which was the spring of 1987. He has been coming since, he says, and asks if she has.
“My parents separated.”
“I’m sorry.”
“They’d been coming here all their married lives. They were fond of this place.”
“Some people fall for it. Others not at all.”
“My brother found it boring.”
“A child might easily.”
“I never did.”
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