Inventory: A River, a City, a Family by Darran Anderson review – troubled lives brought to light
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/feb/02/inventory-a-river-a-city-a-family-darran-anderson-review
A Derry-born writer’s singular study of his home town and hidden family history is revelatory
“How might it be possible to construct a lost person?” asks Darran Anderson in the preface to Inventory, “...to rebuild a human being from photographs, documents, the contradictory fragments they left behind.” The answer, as articulated in his hybrid book, part memoir, part social history, part family archaeology, is painstakingly, and with a relentless curiosity to interrogate the secrets, silences and stories that have accumulated over generations.
The first clue that Inventory is a radically different take on memoir is the chapter headings: Longwave Radio; Belt; Salt; Mixtape; but also: Handkerchief (bloodstained); Pills; Barometer (cracked at “Stormy”). Out of these familiar, occasionally intriguing objects, Anderson shows how the past haunts the present. In doing so, he also lays bare, with compelling self-scrutiny, his own protracted crisis of belonging. It is quite a journey.
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