Reservoir 13

Jon McGregor Fourth Estate €13.99 A 13-year-old girl on holiday in a small village disappears; a police search yields no clues. It sounds like the beginning of a murder mystery, but it isn’t: instead, McGregor’s inventive novel charts the everyday life of the villagers over the next dozen years. The teenagers who knew the girl leave for university; the butcher goes bankrupt; two former sweethearts reconnect. McGregor doesn’t make it easy for his readers: the book has no paragraphs, almost no dialogue, a confusing multiplicity of characters and an arbitrary ending. But it’s so beautifully written that you have to forgive him. Anthony Gardner