Priya Sharma’s new novella Ormeshadow has the quality of a story that has always existed.
Gideon Belman learns the legend of the orme from his father John, who tells him of a great beast, a dragon, that once flew high across the bay before coming to rest with its head in the waves. The dragon fell into a sleep that seemed vast as death, but as John is careful to remind Gideon, sleep and death are not the same…
Ormeshadow is the story of Gideon, his father, mother and uncle and the many lives that intersect with theirs as they live out harsh lives on the farm held by both the Belman brothers, a plot of land loved by one, left behind by the other but not forever, the site of promises and betrayals and – ultimately – the birth of new futures.
The story is told through a series of discrete chapters, sections of a continuing narrative that take place sometimes years apart, sometimes a few scant days. This fractured form is both mosaic and multifaceted jewel, a sequence of prose poems that beguile and engross and accumulate and shatter the senses.
The urgent themes from Sharma’s earlier work are here – family tensions, social inequality, myth and magic. In Ormeshadow, we see her acquiring still greater confidence and authority in the art of storytelling. It is impossible to read this novella and not be affected by it at a gut level. It is still less possible to read this novella and not be overcome by admiration for what Sharma as a writer has accomplished here. Ormeshadow feels ageless, perfect. Yet it is a story that speaks persuasively for our time.
A powerful fusion of language (did I mention the language?) form and mythmaking from a writer whose work is constantly evolving and breaking new ground. Superb. Read it.