The latest addition to my website is Evie Wyld‘s After the Fire, a Still Small Voice. Evie Wyld was one of the Granta’s Best Young British Novelists and this is her first novel. (her second novel will appear next month, i.e. June 2013). This novel, according to Wyld, tells the story of traumatised men, not talking and scary things that people try to ignore. It is set in Australia and focusses firstly on Frank, a young man whose girlfriend has left him as he hits her too much and who heads off to a remote shack where he tries, alone, to get his life back together. When the young daughter of a neighbour disappears, he is suspected. The other apparently unrelated story tells of Leon, the only son of two Dutch Jews who escaped Nazi persecution and came to Australia. There, they set up a bakery business. Leon’s father goes off to fight in Korea and comes back traumatised. Leon works in his parents’ bakery and enjoys decorating cakes. However, when called up, he goes off to Vietnam, where he sees death and destruction and he, too, is affected by his experience. It is a well-told story and Wyld certainly brings out her theme of traumatised men, not talking and scary things that people try to ignore but I am not sure that this novel is indicative of a talent worthy of nomination to the Granta list