Martyn Bedford

In Extremis

Day

By

Jonathan Cape 280pp £16.99 order from our bookshop

What is it about war that appeals to writers and readers of fiction? Genuine storytelling drama, of course, has to depend on more than bombs, bullets and bloody adventure. Like most genres of novel-writing, war fiction advances or retreats on the strength of its characters as much as on the context.

A L Kennedy exemplifies this in her new novel. From its single-word title (the hero’s surname) through the unfolding of what is essentially an extended and elaborate internal monologue, Day is a war story set inside its protagonist’s head. That isn’t to say there is no ‘action’ (there is, and lots of it), but since we witness it through Alfred Day’s eyes, it is his war, and his drama, that we experience. 

Sign Up to our newsletter

Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.

Follow Literary Review on Twitter

  • Last Tweets

    • 'Full of invention which, at its most pedestrian, is eminently Victorian, and at its most unrestrained wildly imagi… ,
    • 'What in other hands could have been a dry, pedantic account of Christianity’s birth and evolution becomes in Holla… ,
    • RT : One of my favourite literary magazines is celebrating 40 years this year. Here is the September edition of… ,
    • 'Now that the Thames is too fast-flowing to freeze, its spirit’s devotees ... have found other climes for their pri… ,
    • 'Bythell glowers past his till at a world in slow free fall.' on the travails of a second-hand book… ,
    • 'It is a scent of animal wrath, of instinctive need, of brutal life which affects the cultured nostrils of our civi… ,
    • 'The day produced countless stories of chance, of people taking one route or another without realising that the dec… ,
    Follow Us