Ghost Mountain by Rónán Hession: Offbeat, observational humour as a mountain rises out of nowhere

One day a mountain appears out of nowhere. It is, quite suddenly, just there . Its appearance is the catalyst for mild ontological shock, which ripples through the local community, among them an artist, a drunk, a cartographer, and a young married couple named Ocho and Ruth. All these lives and relationships are changed by this instance of spontaneous tectonics, many in ways which they could never have predicted.

Indeed, Hession’s choice to depict the novel’s many unlikely liaisons and outlandish deaths – not always unconnected – as at least half farce allows him to double down on the surreal. The first third of Ghost Mountain in particular is reminiscent of Murakami before he became big or Beckett after he became an adjective.

Translated fiction: coming of age in Trieste, tales from 19th century Brittany, and life in a post-Soviet worldSome characters even look for a spiritual meaning in the mountain. Those who walk around it find themselves transformed by the experience, and “with each step they absorbed something new and this something new changed them in subtle ways”. Some dismiss it as merely a large hill, yet always the mountain “caused things but was never affected by them”.

Some succeed at this, some fail, but the journeys we accompany them on are moving and hilarious in equal measure. With Ghost Mountain, Rónán Hession has created something different. It is certainly a stranger book that his previous work, but in that lies its unique charm. We are very lucky that there are novels like this being written in Ireland today.Richard Ford: I’d vote for a chimp before I’d vote for Trump.

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