Book Review: HAVEN by Emma Donoghue

Haven by Emma Donoghue
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

"Monkish life is one long war against the devil. And when dozens of men live together…well, where better for wolves to hide than in a great flock of sheep?"

What is it about Emma Donoghue that makes her novels so unforgettable?

Two novels by her were among the highlights of my pandemic reading, with HAVEN now being the third in a trinity, and THE PULL OF THE STARS (about "The Rebel Doctor" who fought to save lives in 1918's Spanish flu outbreak, a.k.a. the pandemic before this one) and THE WONDER (recently turned into a film starring Florence Pugh as the nurse who dared to respect human life above religiosity) making me fans of her writing.

Sparse and efficient, Donoghue's characters (usually drawn from real life) tend to fight the Ultimate Battle all from very confined spaces: a hospital room, a sickbed, and now, one island made famous by the Star Wars films as Luke Skywalker's hideout: Skellig Michael.

Fresh from a pandemic ourselves, we are intimate with our own dramas of the soul, and know that the size of the stage does not determine the scale of the war.

The first 80% of the book was all set up for the last 20%, which shall go down in my memory as among the most stressful reading experiences of my life! Donoghue skillfully sets us up for a good dose of real life horror. It starts benignly enough.

Three monks leave their monastery in 7th century Ireland because life had grown too soft, the monks too fat and worldly, the hours passing by too pleasantly for their taste. They set out for a brave new world, determined to build a new house of holy men in the most deserted island they could find like the saints of old, there to copy out holy writ that would outlast them.

Things go wrong. Little ones at first, but then a drop becomes a boulder and suddenly what seemed like a holy dream that must come from God Himself becomes a madman's scheme, borne out of "the devilish pride of a man fonder of his own judgement than God’s."

Donoghue fans will remember that this is a common theme in her previous works: the tension between Science and plain common sense, and blind fanaticism.

Towards the end, as Donoghue builds up to a conclusion I shall not soon forget, one of the monks cries out "I’m not your man, but Christ’s!" to stunning effect, I found myself applauding.

The last two chapters are so exciting, you'd better stop cooking or drop any pretense at exercising, and just sit down and enjoy the ride. If only the first 80% were similarly riveting!

The book has an added dimension of pleading for the cause of acceptance of more than the two usual genders, which is also another theme present in THE PULL OF THE STARS.

In 2023 when we still have fanatics everywhere, with various causes (political or medical), this book set in the medieval ages still describes a very contemporary problem; proof that time goes on, but human nature doesn't.

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