Earth is the second (and latest) book in Boyne’s promised quartet of novels themed around the elements. I read the first in the series, Water, last month.

You may recall that Water focused on Willow Hale, a woman who moves to a remote Irish island as she spends time coming to terms with the collapse of her family life. Earth picks up a few years later, and is narrated by Evan Keogh, a young island resident who was a relatively minor character in Water.

At the start of Earth, Keogh is a professional footballer, on trial as an accessory to the rape of a young woman allegedly committed by one of his teammates. As with Water, we gradually come to learn more about Keogh’s life story and the abuse he has suffered in his past, including while coming to terms with his sexuality. We also, of course, follow the progress of the trial while learning about the truth of the events the trial considers. Many of the revelations about Keogh’s background hark back to events described in Water, in a way that makes me look forward to re-reading the whole of the quartet at some point in the future.

As is Boyne’s usual style, his characters are all damaged, complete and emotionally complex. Often, Boyne’s plots are ridiculously implausible (and that’s certainly the case here), but he’s an author for whom that doesn’t matter. In Boyne’s novels, the plot merely serves as a background to character development, it is not the focus of the work. It is a little like opera in that sense.

Earth felt like a more direct novel than Water. In Water, most of the abuse is at one remove from the main characters who are reacting to it. In Earth, the narrator himself is both a victim and a perpetrator. This makes it a slightly harder read in some senses, but overall, I found that I enjoyed it slightly more than the first novel in the series.

The themes explored in Water and Earth were very similar: the long-term effects of abuse, pricking consciences, and the difficulty of reconciling public perception with reality. Boyne’s storytelling ability made the stories feel completely different, but I’m nervous as to whether he can pull that off twice more.

I look forward to finding out: Fire, the next in the series, is due to be released in November.