Review of Phantom Limb by Chris Kohler: An Unusual Debut

Gillis is on a quest for a higher purpose. At the age of 31, he’s taken on the role of minister in a crumbling Scottish kirk with no congregation in a quiet coastal town. He also needed work, and it was either this or a supermarket job. “It’s not a bad job,” the outgoing minister reassures him. “The wages aren’t much, but you get the manse guaranteed, a motor too, and you’ll have your mornings and evenings free. Mostly, it’s just hospital visits, funerals, home by five.”

Not a bad deal indeed, but Gillis seems destined for greater things. In Phantom Limb, Chris Kohler’s debut novel filled with farcical and apocalyptic elements, Gillis soon finds himself performing miracles and taking on the role of a messiah. The story ties Scotland’s past to its present in twinned narratives, alternating between Gillis’s endeavors and the hardships of an apprentice painter named Jan in pre-Reformation Scotland.

The narrative kicks off one night when Gillis, a bit worse for wear after a funeral service, stumbles into a pit in the kirk’s grounds and discovers a disembodied hand. To his horror, it begins to move: “It curled and uncurled its fingers, then turned to find him and pointed ominously. The sharp fingernail seemed to be accusing him of something.”

Gillis indeed has much to feel guilty about. Once a promising athlete, he left behind friends, family, and his longtime girlfriend Rachel to compete south of the border. Now he has returned under a cloud of failure, shame, and misery. The hand, which has healing powers, offers a chance for redemption. Gillis quickly starts curing ailments, daydreaming about the adoration of a grateful nation: “‘Who is it?’ the gathered crowds will ask. It’s the young minister, his sad eyes and slight smile illuminated by the moonlight; next to him, his miraculous severed hand. Thank God, a beacon of light still shines in the darkness of this world.”

Needless to say, things don’t go as planned. Gillis comes across as an endearingly pathetic figure. Cynical about his vocation and bewildered by his shattered dreams (“All that failure, and he wasn’t going to admit to the job-seeking, the redundancy, the unfair dismissal, and the year or so spent living in his dad’s front room”), his increasingly desperate attempts to heal the town provide some fine comic moments. His tender but uncertain relationship with Rachel and her young son offers a glimmer of hope for a more stable existence.

Gillis’ increasingly deranged attempts to heal the world – or at least the town – provide some fine comic moments.

Kohler paints a bleak yet comical picture of modern life. The kirk is empty, and the local industry has dried up. The salmon farms, the main source of employment, are plagued with disease, leaving the town reeking of rotten fish. The church is populated by irreligious time-servers like Gillis or corporate bean counters like his boss: “Going forward, we need to be looking at expansion. Growth.” Even Rachel, a remarkably patient and sympathetic figure, is content to leave her troubled son in front of the television without nurturing his artistic talent. The prevailing mood is one of extreme indifference.

As the story unfolds, the significance of Jan, whose story runs parallel to Gillis’s, becomes clear. These chapters offer some historical backstory (the violent origins of the Church of Scotland) and a mirrored image of Gillis’s skeptical quest, as Jan ekes out a living as a fraudulent faith healer. It becomes clear that opportunistic churchmen have always existed. Though this storyline is less compelling than Gillis’s, it helps establish the oppressive historical weight that burdens poor Gillis. The novel’s considerable charm and energy create a mad world that mirrors our own, making us sympathize with someone like Gillis, against all odds.

Phantom Limb by Chris Kohler is published by Atlantic (£17.99).

Source: The Guardian