Sea Holly

Sea Holly tells the story of John Vine, a hard working English teacher who has left job and family and moved to a nearby coastal caravan park, calling bingo numbers for a living. John Vine - He has it all. Home, family, career. You can’t knock that. But he has this worm inside him, this dissatisfaction…A boy of twenty, that’s OK, he’s going to dream. But a man of fifty? With a young piece who thinks he’s not half bad?…believe me that’s when everything’s going to come loose. That’s when it’s going to get dangerous.‘ Key to the novel is a deeply rooted sense of place: a seaside town of shifting sand, illegal immigrants, a decaying funfair with it’s own 'kingdom of evil’, amusement arcades and dubious pubs and clubs, existing cheek by jowl with town houses and middle-class intelligentsia. The narrative stretches over one week and is told by several different characters. Minhinnick makes an assured transition to fiction and dialogue. And, as with his poetry, his prose is superb, rich with vibrant, exotic imagery, from the black sands of Spain to the black sea of ‘The Caib’. His novel creates a sinister but vivid human world, existing as a part of the natural world on the edge of the ever-present sea and sand, which seep through the novel. Through its characters and environment, Sea Holly explores transience and permanence, stretching from the prehistoric past to the present day obsession with mobile phone filming and images. And behind all the lives captured is the image of Rachel, an 18-year-old pupil of Vine’s who has suddenly vanished, leaving only briefly visible traces of her existence, and a deep sense of unease.