Icarus high on bluffs

Press, 17 December 1988, Page 24

Icarus high on bluffs

Bluff. By Jersmy Leland. Meth ven, 1988. 215 pp. $17.99 (paperback). Just who is bluffing whom in this novel? Or is the title taken from the bluff on the farm in County Clare which Conor de Burgh has made his retreat from involvement in the world? Birds fly round the countryside in noticeable numbers, and Conor, survivor of a plane crash, has plans to become a latter-day Icarus. A series of women find their way to his remote farm and after a brief relationship each leaves. Or are they the same women in a different guise? Is each relationship a reworking of his past? While these affairs are transient, Conor maintains a permanent friendship with his neighbours, the Riordans, mothers and daughters. When the last of the visitors, Nel the journalist on the track of a political scandal disappears, seemingly the victim of the omnipresent violence, secrecy is invoked. Nothing must rock the ship of State. Jeremy Leland’s writing is a delight to read. His style is strong and elegant, and the plot is compelling. There are no neat solutions but the reader is left to speculate about why Icarus survived. — Ngaire Orlowski.