The House of Broken Bricks, Fiona Williams
Fiona Williams channels both her love for nature and storytelling in this beautiful debut. The House of Broken Bricks follows the Hembry family: Tessa, a black Londoner who is married to Richard, a white farmer, and the mother to two twins, Sonny and Max. This book is essentially a character-driven story that follows the family members through their evolving emotions, grief, and identity. Williams does an incredible job at portraying each character’s voice, shifting tones as she goes from one point of view to another. There is a childhood innocence to the children’s chapters, an overriding feeling anxiety in Tessa’s chapters, and a sense of isolation in Richard’s chapters. This dimensionality of the characters fosters a connection between readers and the family, drawing us into their story.
From the first page, we are wrapped in tension and a gradually impending heaviness. We are not too sure what has happened, yet the words burrow deeper, signalling hidden dejection and escalating into weariness. The author throws a curveball at a later point in the book, which I didn’t anticipate, and it totally changes the reading experience as you start to understand where the cracks lie and begin to watch the light dimming.
The backdrop of the different seasons reflects the cycle of life at the heart of the novel; the everyday rhythms ebbing and flowing while the unconditional familial love remains constant.
There’s a main driving force behind the story, which is nature and a deep appreciation of its power. Williams paints visceral images of natural elements, which are weaved into every part of the story, often representing moments of inner conflict. The landscape is alive in every word; the slither of vines and run of the river transcend the pages and serve as a pillar of beauty.
Alongside the character’s inner lives, we encounter themes of racism, colourism, and belonging. As a daughter to Jamaican immigrants and the only black person in a small town, Tessa is subjected to a wariness and close inspection by everyone around her. This surveillance suffocates her, and she deftly expresses the loneliness involved in being the sole carrier of her appearance and heritage. There’s also the fact that her twins are different in colour: Sonny is black like his mother, while Max is white presenting. This, of course, raises further questions and intensifies the struggle of prejudice that coloured people often confront. Through the eyes of Max, we see an attempt to come to terms with his identity as a multi-ethnic individual who seems to never be fully accepted by both sides.
The House of Broken Bricks is a lyrical novel without a clear story arc; it’s a close insight into a family in a small town at a tough period, lush with beautiful writing and greenery; it’s a mosaic of family ties, broken marriages, miscommunications, acceptance, loss and grief.
The story’s only weak point is that it becomes a little too repetitive, as the reader becomes the onlooker of a growing rift in Tessa and Richard’s marriage and parenthood. Although we root for some productive communication and intimacy between the married couple, the placid hum of their detachment continues. Nonetheless, we close the last page with a sense of relief and bittersweet contentment for this family tale.
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