A colourful tale that will have you shedding a tear
‘IN A THOUSAND DIFFERENT WAYS’ Cecelia Ahern
Jonathan Ball
Review: Beryl Eichenberger
MULTITALENTED Irish author Cecelia Ahern was present at the Franschhoek Literary Festival, where I was fortunate enough to interview her. At the age of 21 her first book, PS I Love You (2004), went on to become a series, a major movie with Hilary Swank and has a sequel, Postscript. Many of her subsequent books have been made into series and her 20th book is out later this year.
Ahern has been writing since she was a child, from journalling to story-telling, “I was always scribbling,” she says. “I loved thinking I could write!” And write she can!
She writes about empathy, emotions and always exploring the “what ifs” and admits that Irish tales have shaped her imagination.
Her novels are very grounded, taking ordinary events and challenges and turning them into emotionally charged yet realistic stories. She’s a keen observer, watching those that listen and those who give away with their faces. Human interactions inspire her and her stories start with a concept, then a premise and what kind of character would find themselves in that position.
“I wanted to write about empathy, what it's like to be highly empathetic, what it’s like to go through, feeling what everyone feels around you,” she says as we talk about her newest novel, In a Thousand Different Ways. Her protagonist, Alice Kelly, is an unusual girl with synesthesia, a condition that is perhaps not too well known.
“I thought: colour. If somebody is angry there’s red. That travels to someone else, and the red is on them. Driving in traffic and someone’s angry and all of a sudden they do something and they make you angry.”
For Alice Kelly, colour is what informed her from an early age. Her undiagnosed, bipolar mother emits a swirl of colours concomitant with her moods and Alice becomes skilled at reading them and other people’s needs through their colour auras. Everyone has a colour – her brother Hugh, the caring one, has a pink aura while younger brother Ollie shows anger in his aura. Seeing and feeling all of this makes Alice a misfit.
She is sent to a special school and meets Gospel who has Tourette’s syndrome, which does not prevent him from becoming a football star. Together they help each other.
But life happens. Alice is forced to return home to care for her mother; Hugh goes off to university and then to Doha; Ollie is already in trouble and Alice is unhappy and “withdraws into herself, because it was so much too much for her”.
But there is light at the end of the tunnel. She finds solace (and colours) in the plants around her – an early waning of a drastic tree infestation allows the park manager to take action; a lone Aloe vera, allows her to gauge the best growing place. These become a benchmark for what she will later pursue. As Alice finally leaves Ireland to settle in London and make her own life, it’s tough with all these people, their colours intruding and she knowing their moods and troubles. She finds a friend in the gentle, spiritual Naomi and there is a semblance of balance. Until the day she sees a man with no colours. “And here’s this person that she knows nothing about, she has to start from scratch and learn actually how to engage with another human properly.” says Ahern.
And no more spoilers here: Synesthesia is a real condition, in various shapes and forms but colour being the common factor. Author Lewis Carroll suffered from it and Ahern experienced aura migraines when she was pregnant.
A beautifully written story, we travel this colourful journey with Alice and learn so much about empathy, loss and humanity but ultimately the joy of life and finding your place.
“I cry whenever I finish a book,” Ahern attests.
There will be tears from readers too.