The Possible World

Our Review

The Possible World by Liese O’Halloran Schwarz starts off with Six-year-old Ben is the only survivor of a crime that killed his mother and many others.

Lucy, the doctor who tends to Ben, is dealing with her own personal upheaval but feels a profound connection to him. Will recovering his memory heal him, or damage him further?

Clare believes the lifetime of secrets she’s been keeping don’t matter to anyone now, until an unexpected encounter prompts her to tell her story.

It is told from the viewpoint of multiple characters – Ben, Leo, Clare and Lucy. Normally I like split narrative tales as I think it helps the reader associate with characters but there were times in this book where I think it added to my confusion as to what was happening.

Having said that each character was well developed and once I understood what was happening I did enjoy The Possible World despite having not understood how it all connected for a very long time whilst reading it.

Ben is almost 7 years old when he attends the party that will change his life forever. He is anxious, so his mother comes in with him, something he is embarrassed about because he knows none of the other boys will have their mother there.

During this chapter he is thinking about his mother and the things she says to him like, “I love you more than pizza, bingo or caterpillars.”

Whilst at the party, there is some teasing of one of the boys and Ben senses that things are about to turn nasty so he decides to use the opportunity to go off to the toilet, so he doesn’t need to be witness to it. He is in there for a while and when he comes out it is clear there is something wrong.

“There aren’t any lights in the hallway and its gotten dark. I make my way be feel, one hand on the wall., towards the living room…When I step onto the fringey living room carpet it squelches, uh-oh, Scooter probably peed and now it’s on my sock. It’s a whole lot of pee – my socks warm and wet- I steep back and lift my foot to peel the sock off. Something in my brain knows that it’s not pee; there’s something flashing warning in my head.”

Ben has been a witness to something horrific that will change his life forever.

The next chapter begins with Lucy, a dedicated ER doctor with a busy schedule and a failed marriage. She was an interesting and humorous character and I enjoyed reading her chapters. She is the admitting doctor for him and is shocked first when she learns what he was witness to and secondly when she realises she knew his mum.

“I’ve presumed taken from the scene of a homicide meant he’d been found in a house where a domestic dispute had ended in gunshots – that he’d been hiding in his bedroom or ensconced terrified in a closet. Not close enough to the action to be soaked in blood, so much blood – what must the scene be like?”

When she speaks to him he tells her his name is Leo and refuses to say anything about the event, he claims not to remember anything. Over the course of his stay in the hospital flashes come back to him but he doesn’t speak about them and his psychiatrist decides to try hypnotherapy on him.

The young boy knows something is wrong, but he cannot remember what happened.

“The sorrow is in the cookies, the juice, the rough towel they dry me with after the bath, but mostly in their eyes that don’t look right at me. It’s as though I’m the sun too painful to look at, I am something too hugely sad to behold.”

Clare was my favourite character in this book and the parts involving her and Leo were my favourite in the book, something that I wasn’t expecting when I began it.

Clare around 100 years old and living in a care home. She isn’t close to anyone and keeps her secrets close thinking no one will care and that she doesn’t want to share them anyway. Then she meets Gloria and begins a reluctant friendship with her and eventually decides to open up about her tragic past.

The Possible World is a book worth reading but there were several things about it which caused me to rate it at three stars. Firstly, as I already mentioned, it was confusing at times because of the split narrative form – particularly in relation to the chapters from the point of view of Ben/Leo. This would have been easier to follow if I had known from the start the reason for the switch between the two.

Secondly, there were times where it felt like I was reading two different stories, both well-written but they didn’t mesh together until I was a long way into the book.

Having said that, the character development was excellent, and I enjoyed the story once I realised what was happening.

Our Final Rating...

Tue, 17th July 2018