Book Review – Brixton Beach by Roma Tearne
Sri Lankan-born Novelist’s Thought-Provoking Family Saga
Following the lives of the Fonseka family, Roma Tearne’s third novel combines rich imagery and fascinating characters. Brixton Beach (Harper Collins, 2009) explores themes of race relations and identity with homeland.
Brixton Beach
While the novel opens with the 2005 London bombings, giving readers an idea of where the story is heading, the action quickly returns to Sri Lanka in the latter half of the 20th century, where Alice Fonseka is eagerly awaiting her ninth birthday and a visit to her beloved Grandpa Bee.
Alice is too young to comprehend the events that are unfolding around her. She only knows that her Tamil father is preparing to leave Sri Lanka for London, in order to escape the growing tensions of a country on the brink of civil war. Alice’s Sinhalese mother, Sita, feels the full impact of the division when she loses a baby in childbirth because of the actions of a prejudiced Sinhalese doctor.
As a devastated Sita becomes more withdrawn, Alice relies on the time spent with her grandparents before they follow her father to London. Bee is an artist and encourages his granddaughter to express herself through creation. Although Bee is distraught at the thought of Alice leaving, he is increasingly disturbed by the violence that he witnesses, even in his peaceful fishing village.
Sri Lanka and London
Despite the opening in London, much of the action of the story takes place in Sri Lanka. When Sita and Alice join Stanley in England, the novel still continues to follow what is happening to Alice’s grandparents and extended family back home. While Alice is learning to assimilate into her new country, her heart still belongs back in Sri Lanka with Bee. Sita becomes more reclusive, broken by the many losses of her life. Even Stanley, who most tries to become part of life in the UK, cannot completely break his ties with his homeland.
Alice’s affinity with Sri Lanka and the life she had there is expressed through her art. Tearne is adept at evoking the colours and light of Bee’s home by the sea, and the reader can almost feel the cold, grey atmosphere of London as strongly as Alice and Sita when they first arrive in their too-thin clothing.
Roma Tearne
Born in Sri Lanka, Roma Tearne arrived in the UK at the age of ten. With a Masters degree from the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, she has worked as a painter, installation artist and filmmaker. Her first novel Mosquito (Harper Collins, 2007) was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award.
Thought-provoking and exquisitely written, Brixton Beach is an incredibly readable novel that captures a turbulent time in Sri Lanka’s history.
Brixton Beach (ISBN: 978-0-00-730155-3, 408 pages)
Brixton Beach by Roma Tearne
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