"After a couple of weeks, I found myself standing outside the voids in
the middle of the night listening for human activity, for any sign of
life at all. Voids are flats that have been vacated, that will never be
lived in again. But there never were any signs of life. Only the wind
whistling through vacant interiors."
In a condemned tower block in Glasgow, residents slowly trickle away
until a young man is left alone with only the angels and devils in his
mind for company. Stumbling from one surreal situation to the next, he
encounters others on the margins of society, finding friendship and
camaraderie wherever it is offered, grappling with who he is and what
shape his future might take.
The Voids is an unsparing story of modern-day Britain, told with
brilliant flashes of humor and humanity.
"Reading The Voids is a sensory experience. There is never a word too
much, it never lingers. There is tragedy but no melodrama. O'Connor's
lightness of touch, the pace, economy, characters... are all perfect,
all harmonious, poetic, but unadorned, even in the blackest of moments.
Part of me is still in that high rise or watching the sunlight through
the fire exit door at The Satellite. It is beautiful and perfect. I want
to say this is a book God would like." --Paul Buchanan, The Blue Nile
