Little Gods, By Anna Richards

A gothic tale of cruelty and survival

Jean Clocker begins a life of struggle from the moment of conception, when Wisteria, her psychotic mother, attempts assassination of the germ inside her but "could not prise her daughter loose". Wisteria underestimates Jean's strength, and in the "battle of birth" is left "split like a rail". Defeated, she whispers, "Heads? How many heads?"

In a nightmarish blend of gothic fairy tale and the very human capacity for cruelty, Wisteria gains revenge by inflicting neglect, starvation and psychological torment. Still her daughter grows "magnificently large, unstoppable". Jean finds relief in the attentions of Gloria, the confectioner's daughter, who is attracted to Jean's ability to endure suffering and her compliance in acting out death scenes in the playground.

But it takes a Second World War bomb that "tore through night like birth" to free Jean from her mother. Jean joins the Women's Civil Defence, which cements her new identity. Her mother, although dead, continues to haunt Jean, whose vulnerability seems at odds with the resilience of her vast body as she forges a deeper relationship with the voluptuous and romance-obsessed Gloria. The undercurrents of repressed desire pulsate when Jean discovers a boy mauling Gloria, his eyes full not of desire but of hatred, "wanting to destroy something which Gloria believed about herself".

The male characters in Anna Richards's novel are weak. Jean's father, who "gave an arm to stop fighting" in the First World War, accepts life with Wisteria as his "punishment" and fades into oblivion. Gloria faces sexual violence before marrying a man who returns from war disappointed to be alive. Jean's own husband abandons her; she continues to grow through a series of surreal, painful experiences.

The prose is lyrical and powerful in its simplicity. Richards's theme is the redemptive power of love, which exposes how destructive conforming to gender expectations can be for both sexes. Little Gods is a startlingly original first novel by a remarkable new talent.