The Crossing

The Crossing is a complex tour de force that deserves to be read more than once. Spanning more than a century, the narrative embraces a combination of real-life and fictional events and characters, which often had me turning to Google for clarification and detail. The intertwined story lines focus on the coal industry of south Wales, from the boom years of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, through nationalisation, decline, the miners’ strike of 1984-85, and the subsequent reliance on public and EU funding for regeneration. The main characters of the two story lines are D. A. Thomas, Lord Rhondda (1856-1918), and modern-day photographer Billy, who are linked through ‘the Secretary’ in ways the reader does not fully understand until the end. There are mysteries and secrets here, and parallels between the stories that range from the individual human level to questions of power and politics – failed love affairs, uncertain paternity, parent-child relationships and their ongoing impact; the use and abuse of power, selfish motivations wrapped up as altruism, age-old issues of class divisions, greed and philanthropy. The risk is of a heavy read, and certainly the novel has to be read with some care and attention. But the modern-day story has a gritty forward thrust, and the earlier story is told through an intriguing web of narrative modes that deftly draw the reader in and on: first person, newspaper cuttings, diary entries and documents from the Taliesin Arthur Lloyd papers, purportedly held by the National Library of Wales. This narrative style reminded me of Stuart Evans’s unsung masterpiece, The Caves of Alienation, which was reissued in Parthian’s Library of Wales series edited by none other than The Crossing’s author, Dai Smith. It is a style that teases the reader’s curiosity. ‘And so,’ writes the Secretary at one point, ‘I must choose which truth to tell.’ This is perhaps the central conundrum – that one set of facts can give rise to many truths, as a result of personal interpretations and angles of perception, distortions and misunderstandings, and vital missing information. In short, The Crossing is a challenging, fascinating read that works on many levels, from the personal to the political. It is very much worth the effort. -- Suzy Ceulan Hughes @ www.gwales.com