Can a supernatural force put someone on a predetermined path; can the predictions of an old clairvoyant, presumably concocted to scare a small child, really become reality? Trouble in paradise begins for Celia during childhood. Brought up by extended family in Tobago, she knows little of her parents except that her mother died during childbirth, and her father travelled back to his hometown of Southampton, never knowing she existed. Celia’s world is turned upside down when her kindly aunt marries a monster, Roman (known as Allah amongst the villagers of Black Rock, as everyone knows he considers himself Godlike). Roman forces Celia to flee Tobago to Trinidad.

Without giving too much away of the plot, Celia seems to hit a run of bad luck –the path that was predicted for her back in early childhood – and her hardship carries on, from sickness to abuse, to unrequited love and the burden of being loved too much, without her ever knowing who she is or where she might be going. And yet so much grief and suffering feels relatively light on the reader’s heart and the head. Black Rock is written in such a way that we are invited to flow through the prose with little effort, but still grasp the essence of Celia’s hardship.

Some might find Celia’s misfortune a little too relentless for one child to manage, but there is a refreshing lack of self-indulgent dwelling on said circumstances; writing the narrative as though through the eyes of a child was the best thing Smyth could have done, since a child’s-eye-view lessens the gravity of the troubles Celia finds herself involved in.

One recurring theme is Celia’s beauty and intelligence, and how they are apparently conflicting. Does she allows herself to be taken in by a man who can never love her simply because she is beautiful, and enjoys being flattered? And when she has nowhere to go, does she take advantage of a man who would walk to the ends of the earth for her, by allowing him to ‘persuade’ her to stay with him? Something about this combination of feminine vulnerability and almost cruel manipulation adds a thousand new dimensions to Celia’s character – she is a victim, but then another is also a victim of her, and she knows it. Rather than relishing Celia’s victimhood, Smyth, while not overcomplicating the language or story, has her main character make us question how and why certain things are happening – are they more to do with Celia’s own thought out decisions than might be initially suspected?

While the narrative moves forward at a lovely pace, and the prose is absorbed with ease, my knowledge of Trinidad and Tobago is certainly enhanced by reading Black Rock. Whilst Tobago is the place Celia initially runs away from, the memories that are recounted of blissful summers and happy childhood friendships linger in the reader’s mind. Once in Trinidad and away from the monster who drove her out of her home, the events that pass hold a prevailing sense of sadness and disappointment, as though everything is tainted by a sense of an island in turmoil. The British characters who have migrated to the island to be nearer loved ones seem to long for the sanctuary of their homeland. The safe haven that Celia hoped for when she took the crossing to the island never seems to quite materialise, and in the end she is drawn back to the place she always called home, where she manages to grasp a little more peace in herself and what the future holds.

The question of clairvoyance, and how much of our lives are lead by predictions that we are willing to believe or not, also recurs. And it is up to the reader to decide whether the balance of luck and misfortune in Celia’s life is determined by self-fulfilling prophecy, that as an impressionable child she was ready to be told that she was to be unlucky throughout her existence, and thus feels as though she is just this. It is also up to us as the reader to decide whether she blames the path that she finds herself walking on old Mrs Jeremiah, instead of taking responsibility for her own actions and behaviour. But then who can expect a child who has suffered from a young age to know who to turn to, or how to make sense of the world, or to follow an example that has been confused from the outset of their short life. It is only at the very end of the book, when Celia seems to find some comfort in being back in a familiar environment, when she feels like that has come full circle, as though she may have lived through the circumstances and predictions that were made about her, that she seems to realise that there is hope in despair and sadness, as long as you can look forward to something better. A hard but important lesson for us all, I feel.

This novel is a journey of discovery, of childhood to adulthood, learning to muddle through, and to getting yourself to where you really belong, even if this place may not always have felt like home.