Introducing Private Rites

The Audacious Book Club January selection

In “Salt Slow,” the titular story of Julia Armfield’s debut 2019 short story collection, there is a before, and there is an after: the world before the rain and after the flood. The unnamed pregnant protagonist and her lover are confined to a boat drifting, day after day in a water-filled world, attempting both to survive and to find some routine for their days. The two scavenge for food, row for hours and hours in an attempt to find some remnant of land, and hold one another close each night in the belly of their boat. As her due date approaches, the protagonist notices distinct bodily changes caused by dehydration and sun, but also changes that defy reality, such as webbing between her fingers and toes that she and her lover refuse to speak of aloud.

Perhaps because she is resisting the facts of her situation, or because she simply needs an escape, the protagonist of “Salt Slow” increasingly retreats into her memory of the time before, of the beginning of their love story, of her previous miscarriage. The beauty of the world and its apocalyptic and speculative terrors remind her of Dylan Thomas’s Under Milkwood, a radio play-turned-stage play where an omniscient narrator invades the thoughts and dreams of the sleeping residents of the town of Llareggub (“buggerall” spelled backwards, which hints at the play’s articulation of everything and nothing). The reference is the perfect set piece for the brutal and lovely climax of Armfield’s story, where the protagonist gives birth to something unimaginable, and her lover does something unimaginable in return.

Armfield’s third book and second novel, Private Rites reads, in many ways, as a prequel to “Salt Slow.” The world of this novel is in the process of collapse rather than wholly submerged beneath the flood: storms are constant, the rain never stops, and the thread of civility that held the world together before the “roiling weather” arrived has begun to fray as more and more coastal areas have been taken over by floodwaters and more people succumb to hopelessness. Three sisters—Agnes, Irene, and Isla—are the protagonists of this story. They are coping with the death of their domineering architect father, the surprises in his will, the mystery surrounding their mother’s death years before, and the house their father left behind. The house, which they call a “floating house” and which sits right on the water, is effectively a boat in this book too. No matter where the sisters are, their minds are centered within it, and it is in that house where the novels’ startling climax also occurs.

Much like “Salt Slow,” this is a novel steeped in literary heritage—a clever retelling of Shakespeare’s King Lear. But like “Salt Slow,” it’s also a profoundly contemporary narrative, a meaningful addition to the growing body of climate fiction, and an uncomfortable reminder of how desperate people in desperate circumstances surrender to very desperate acts. It’s also a deft example of Armfield’s ability to illustrate how, as Angelica Jade Bastién notes, the most effective horror is horror which speaks to “the piquant and definitive fears that mark our historical moment.”

Private Rites is a gripping, gorgeous read, one that demands that we learn from our past, figure out a way to live with the terror of this current moment, and use this time to knit together with one another in order to cope with whatever horrors are coming. I’m so looking forward to discussing this book with you throughout this month and at our book club discussion with Julia, which will take place on January 26 at 2 p.m. ET (11 a.m. PT). You can register for our discussion here.

Have you started Private Rites? And if so, what are your early impressions?