From small observations comes a larger perception

DEEPER Water is compelling and at times stunningly rich but it doesn’t hold the reader hostage in the same way as Jessie Cole’s first book.

Jessie Cole teases out intriguing and rich characters with an impressive economy of language.

A CAR accident brings a stranger into the lives of a family living on the outskirts of a small rural community: it is a premise reminiscent of Darkness on the Edge of Town, Jessie Cole’s ­acclaimed debut novel of 2012. Deeper Water is quite compelling and at times stunningly rich but it doesn’t hold the reader hostage in quite the same way as her gripping first book. Where Darkness on the Edge of Town weaves together voices of the protagonists to form a tensely escalating drama, Deeper Water slinks and darts towards its stunning catastrophe.

The novel is told through the eyes of Mema, a sheltered young woman who comes across the slightly older and intriguing Hamish during a storm. His intrusion into her world — which includes a bereaved sister, fierce mother, wild best friend and several pets — forces Mema to consider her place in the world.

Mema’s self-confessed hero’s journey — beginning with ‘‘they say every hero has to leave home’’ — takes her from a simple existence in secluded bush through trials that threaten her innocence and the surrounding natural world. The beautifully realised environment is integral to the narrative and entirely evocative, comparable with the way the bush envelops the reader in Alex Miller’s recent Coal Creek.

Mema is isolated, physically and intellectually, but her lack of interest in people and information does not make her ignorant. An initial assessment of Hamish demonstrates a capacity for insight: ‘‘He had an invisible quality, like if he stood still enough he’d disappear against the walls. I thought perhaps in the daylight he’d be handsome. I was careful of beautiful people. There was something untrustworthy about them. They’d ­always been the ruin of us.’’

In this small observation of the stranger lingering in her hallway is a deeper assessment that carries the weight of experience and memory, not just her own. We bear witness to the lives of the women around Mema, for unlike her brothers — who have all escaped the remote property in search of adventure — the women have remained. As the world outside the farm encroaches on to Mema’s sense of tranquillity, it is a challenge and an awakening. Local boy Billy complicates Mema’s feelings about Hamish, and her sexual discoveries occupy her for a time, though she is soon drawn back from freedom into the community, with its demands and the attitudes ­towards female sexuality held by certain townspeople.

Cole’s earthy imagery vividly connects sex and nature in a way that aligns Mema with ­nature and opposes her to the community.

Cole teases out intriguing and rich characters with an impressive economy of language. Small observations, such as the telling bruises on the forehead of Mema’s sister Sophie, offer a rich background to supporting characters. Despite her occasional naivety, Mema is observant and engaging. Glimpses of black humour and social commentary often stem from her seclusion: a conversation with Hamish about the value of email and an inadvertent re-enactment of an iconic romantic movie scene are two such instances, which bring a lightness to an otherwise intense dynamic.

Beneath these flashes of humour is a sense of foreboding, often centred on Mema’s unpredictable best friend Anja. Cole has set up a slow burn towards catastrophe that echoes the mounting tension of Darkness on the Edge of Town. Here the narrative is more constrained but a mythic quality to it springs from the connection of characters to nature. Anja is a wild creature, looking for a place to house her excess of energy and pain. She is Mema’s opposite in many ways, and floats around the edges until her need becomes too great.

The complicated relationships and the small-town gossip of Deeper Water are set against a backdrop of lush and strikingly depicted bush that stands in stark contrast to traditional representations of the dry, harsh plains of the sunburnt country. Cole’s Australian landscape is green, lush, moist, still isolated, but a safe space. Even at its most tempestuous, Mema feels safer than she does around the unpredictable factor of other people and the feelings they provoke. Readers can feel the grass soft underfoot and the crawling ants, such is Cole’s sense of place.

Deeper Water is a fine and elegantly written novel from an impressive writer.

Portia Lindsay is a freelance writer.

Deeper Water

By Jessie Cole

HarperCollins, 384pp, $29.99