REVIEWS
Men of faith find hell at the end of the earth
In Room, Emma Donoghue’s Josef Fritzl-inspired novel about a mother and child trapped in a kidnapper’s lair, the author suggested that, with enough love, it was possible to create an almost-haven in the depths of hell. In her latest book, Haven, she shows how, with enough zealotry, a spiritual sanctuary can be transformed into a cruel parody of the divine.
Set in seventh-century Ireland, Haven follows the attempts of Artt, a revered scholar and priest, to set up a religious community far away from the temptations of the world. Dismayed by the laxity he finds at a monastery he is visiting, and seizing on a dream as prophecy, he sets forth to find an unsullied spot with two of its monks: Cormac, a late convert who lost his wife and children to the plague, and Trian, a young daydreamer handed to the community at the age of 13.
Soon they come upon Skellig Michael – that twin-peaked shard
