60 NOVEMBER 2019 http://www.writers-online.co.ukBut the hotel is also important
as a symbol of Caoimhin’s state of
mind. He bought it off the back of
a mid-life crisis and in the hope that
it would help him break his writer’s
block and get back to writing poetry.
In a sense it replaces the gap left by
his former life, although it hasn’t
yet worked the magic on his state of
mind that he was hoping for. It also
represents the money that he spent
on it. He reflects that if he sold it, or
claimed on the insurance, he could
buy half of Cambodia, he reckons. In
that sense it also represents a potential
alternative future.
One of the interesting things about
the story is the way in which the
author creates a sense of tension andlive their lives. However, it is the hotel
itself that is the most significant thing
in terms of setting, both as a physical
structure and in terms of what it
means symbolically to Caoimhin.
The hotel as a building is important
to the plot of the story, from the
listing floors that you can roll a tin of
peas down, the bar with its mahogany
and zinc and a small window that
gives a view of the rising waters, the
dreary viewless rooms at the back that
are used by the Belarusian summer
staff, and the function room where
they all end up marooned by the
rising water. There aren’t screeds of
description, but the details we are
given allow us to clearly visualise the
events of the story.T
his month’s story is richly
layered with well-observed
characterisation and a good
ear for dialogue. Kevin
Barry’s Fjord of Killary is
set in a hotel located in the West of
Ireland and, as we’ll see, the building
itself is of crucial importance to the
story in a number of ways. As always
you’ll gain most from the masterclass
if you read the story for yourself,
and this one comes with a bit of a
strong language and content warning:
https://writ.rs/fjordofkillary.
Notice first how Kevin Barry has
subverted norms in his description
of the surroundings of the hotel. In
a tourist location such as Killary, the
fjord and mountains beyond might
normally be referred to as beautiful
or majestic, but instead he talks of
‘disgracefully grey skies’ and ‘the
most depressing’ mountain ever. The
narrator, Caoimhin, makes it clear early
on that he is not entirely happy here.
The chatter of the locals places the
hotel in a wider geographical setting.
Their endless talk of how long it
would take to get to this place with
this amount of traffic on this day of
the week infuriates Caoimhin, but
gives the reader a good feel for the
place, the people and the way theyYour place or mine?
Helen M Walters explores
the role a building can play in
your fiction