Review: Fences make good neighbours until garden takes root

Houses, it seems, should not be judged by curb appeal alone. From the front, most semi-detached homes look more or less alike, but beyond the front door everything changes. In The Insistent Garden, Rosie Chards second novel, set in 1960s England, she ignores the front of the house entirely in favour of whats happening in the back: Wilf Stoker is building a wall.

The Stokers wall runs the full length of the garden and serves as a kind of extension of the party wall he has no choice but to share with the man next door. Wilf hates his neighbour with such purity that, day after day, he and his daughter Edith work on the wall, which, at eight-feet and counting, requires constant upkeep.

Edith doesnt know the genesis of either the wall or her fathers hatred for Edward Black, the invisible neighbour, but neither does she ask any questions. Her fathers anxiety has percolated down, instilling in her a great fear of the man next door and a larger, harder to explain, feeling of shame.

The wall isnt visible from the street, but it is to their neighbours (the ones she cares about) and to anyone who enters the kitchen at the back of the house. Not that many do, since the Stokers are reclusive and Edith has almost no friends.

If Ediths life were a colour, it would be the drab grey of an unwashed sock. Recently finished high school and feeling unspoken pressure to stay home and look after her father, Edith is more isolated than ever, her life only punctuated by her bullying Aunt Vivians unpleasant weekly visits. Without plan or passion, Edith is drifting.

Everyone has a trigger, and for Edith its the appearance of a gardening magazine in the mail. Something about the cover image captivates her, and even though her Aunt Vivian instructs her to throw it away, she later sneaks back and retrieves the cover from the kitchen garbage. Its her first act of rebellion.

The desire for a garden of her own quickly follows and she is soon consumed with daydreams of flowers and colour growing in the shadow of her fathers wall.

As she plots her garden, Edith allows herself to wonder about her mother, who died under mysterious circumstances when Edith was a baby. As the garden grows, so too do Ediths questions, propelling her out of her safe, dull life at home and out meeting new people and exploring new parts of her town.

As a visual metaphor, the garden is a good, if obvious, choice, and Chards background as a landscape architect makes the planning and planting of the garden detailed and lively.

Watching Edith come alive with an interest all her own is the most compelling part of the novel.

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Review: Fences make good neighbours until garden takes root