A choice of recent first novels

All writing has some literary precedent; where better then for a first novelist to find inspiration than the Bible, the first book? David Maine takes the few, terse chapters of Genesis that comprise Noah’s story for his striking reconstruction of this crucial episode in Christian history. The Flood introduces us to ‘Noe’, ‘still a vital old corker’ at the age of 600, ‘the wife’, and their family of three sons and three daughters-in-law. Maine’s skill lies in the combination of faithfulness to the familiar authorised version — the relevant biblical verse prefaces each chapter, so the old story unfolds in parallel to the novel — and imaginative exploration of the various characters as they suffer in the throes of God’s devastating miracle. Sem is the obedient one who devotes himself to prayer; Cham is practical and a sceptic, yet without his know-how the ark could never have been built; Japheth cares about little beyond his pretty wife, but he too will have to grow up in the course of the nightmarish voyage.

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Maine’s counterpoint to the Bible overflows with physicality: the humans ‘rut’ with little concern for privacy; sickness and the skies, elation and exhaustion are described in violent and sensual detail. We can almost smell the squalor of the ark and, as Noe’s crazy project lurches from crisis to crisis, we come to question the distinction between religious belief and pure madness. Still, the story leaves an overall impression of indomitable moral faith and earthy good humour. As one long-suffering daughter, tasked with collecting pairs of all the animals in the northern hemisphere, dryly observes, ‘The problem with people who think that God will provide is that they think God will provide.’

Just as richly and sensually written, Mr Timothy is no stocking-filler but one to buy now, since Louis Bayard’s novel is deliberately set in the countdown to Christmas.