Ghost Wall by Sarah Moss
Publisher - Granta
Published - Out Now
Price - £8.03 kindle ebook
It is high summer in rural Northumberland. Seventeen-year-old Silvie and her parents have joined an encampment run by an archaeology professor with an interest in the region's dark history of ritual sacrifice. As Silvie finds a glimpse of new freedoms with the professor's students, her relationship with her overbearing father begins to deteriorate, until the haunting rites of the past begin to bleed into the present.
History can repeat itself. A simple phrase both incorrect and also poignant to us - no moment is ever exactly the same but we spot themes repeat over years centuries and beyond. In Sarah Moss’ disquieting novella Ghost Wall a young woman and her family are re-enacting life in an Ancient Briton home with archaeologists. But a long hidden family conflict is about to be finally revealed with terrifying consequences.
Silvia, her parents and archeologists are in Northumberland. Her father has long been fascinated with the ancient people who lived in the area and he’s very familiar with their customers, he hunts and forages and so is seen as an invaluable source to the team. But Sylvia knows her father is controlling and has a violent temper a hidden side that as she gets exposed to the student’s way of life sets up a battle of the two and her father intends Sylvia learns a lesson.
This is a powerful read short but very effective. Moss makes you feel a hot summer air around the fair camp, full of life, nature and yet feels very much like a thunderstorm brewing. Told by Sylvia we get initially a lighter set of scenes family life, young people bonding and Sylvia grows in confidence and starts to see a way forward in life. All lovely but then we notice the way Sylvie’s mum is quiet unexpectedly and how both her and her mother are wary of the father. Who can berate them for tea not being on the table after a game of hunter gathering.
This is a tale of abuse. We see the father erupt with anger in terrifying brutal ways and we start to see this isn’t the first time. Moss makes us feel Sylvie’s fear of being found awake at night, the realisation she’s broken a rule of his she didn’t know about and the violence is unflinching and her detachment from it and almost how she is still loyal to her family is startling yet very realistic.
All of which sounds so far very modern but Moss also weaves in a link to the ancient site they’re on - the many people found in bogs apparently as some form of sacrifice. The book posits they too were betrayed by their loved ones and used for terrible purposes. The past and the future still hold terrible things and not everything has been removed in this enlightened age of ours. This circles back as her father had a truly horrible idea for punishing Sylvia some of the Archeologists think will be lots of fun and instead holds an element of folk horror. I will stress despite all this horror the story had a ray of hope in survival ay the end which makes like any thunderstorm a reminder that it will pass eventually. Human kindness exists as does hatred.
Ghost Wall is a great novella; slight but powerful and will likely haunt you long after completion. Highly recommended!
