Never Ending by Martyn Bedford (review)

“Siobhan, I don’t know who you are anymore,” Siobhan’s father says after her latest violent escapade, and the fifteen-year-old can only candidly reply “Me neither.” Since the death of her beloved younger brother, Declan, Siobhan—or Shiv, as she’s generally known—has erupted in violent rages, a mask for the guilt she feels about Declan’s fatal accident on the family vacation in Greece. Now she’s at the Korsakoff Clinic, a facility specially geared to treating troubled young people who feel responsible for another’s death, and its modality is to make her confront her memories of Declan and face again the horror of his death. Bedford’s writing is lush and atmospheric, especially in the flashbacks to Shiv’s stay on the Greek island of Kyritos and her illicit holiday romance with the handsome Nikos (to whom she claims to be seventeen). The circumstances and the clinic’s methodology are somewhat contrived, but the emotive narration is compelling enough to compensate, and there’s an enjoyably melodramatic flavor to the story. This is an interesting complement to Serle’s similarly themed The Edge of Falling (BCCB 3/14); that title offers more psychological perception, but this one will engage readers looking for romantic and beautifully ugly sadness.