There’s Always More to Say by Natalie Southworth

Reviewed by Timothy Niedermann

In this, author Natalie Southworth’s first short-story collection, three stories frame the other six: the first, “There’s Always More to Say,” the fifth, “The Bottom Line,” and the ninth and last, “Inheritance.” Each is narrated by Cora, the younger of two daughters in a family of four. The stories take place at different times during the girls’ lives—pre-teen, teen, and adult—as the family tries to cope with the mother’s mental issues and their effects on the other family members.

All of the other six stories also feature characters who must deal with similar issues, whether actual mental illness or simply having a state of mind that does not fit in with those of others around them: A failed puppeteer tries to make a place for himself in the real estate business; a man sinks increasingly into his own spiritual world; a woman, both businesswoman and mother, tries to go off anti-depressants; a teenage girl becomes increasingly anorexic while preparing to perform in her high school’s spring concert.

In little ways, Southworth shows how dealing with a person with such issues can affect the people around that person: how their personality adapts, how they create defence mechanisms, how they act out. Southworth focuses mostly on the children in such situations. Six of the nine stories are narrated by a child who is commenting on a parent or another child. In two others, the main character is a child. Only one has an adult as the main character, the story of a woman trying to get off anti-depressants, but even in that one, her relationship with her mother and her own children figures centrally to the story line.

But in each story, the existence of a mental issue is treated as a more-or-less permanent part of the characters’ lives, not as a temporary diversion from some sort of imaginary “normal.” And this appears to be Southworth’s point: that “normal,” in the sense of what we come to expect as constant in our lives, is very often, maybe always, not what people like to think it should be.

Southworth’s great skill is in getting into the minds of people at different stages of life. She shows how difficult it is, not just to deal with people whose behaviour is challenging, for whatever reason, but how hard it is to leave the effects they have on one behind. In the process, she confronts the quandaries of being a parent or a child, as well as being an adult trying to leave childhood behind.

Engaging, stimulating, and insightful. A marvellous debut!

There’s Always More to Say is published by Linda Leith Publishing.