Alice Chadwick’s debut novel takes place during a single day, which begins with the death of geography teacher Mr Ardennes, a calming presence in his unnamed, middle-England grammar school. We meet him briefly at the novel’s start – still alive – night-walking as if he could “never be easy”.
After the announcement of the news in assembly, the day marches on unimpeded, with brutal precision. Chadwick’s book is not only underpinned by an incisive faithfulness to details – canteen cutlery like “fish poured from a net”, 1980s “ceiling swirls like crests of royal icing” – but an unwavering adherence to her own time-stamped chapter form. Leaping between the perspectives of students and teachers, it transpires that the children’s chief concerns include the forthcoming timetable changes, or the injustice of the deceased teacher no longer marking their projects.
Those more deeply troubled are further beyond reach: the enigmatic, enthralling Tin, who “made the hot, empty days sparkle like broken glass”. Tin has suffered a tragedy of her own, making the event seem like history repeating – but her classmates are convinced her upset pertains to her boyfriend Jonah and best friend Robin, together involved in “a Sunday night of bonus shock and betrayal”.
Graver tensions are also at work. Beneath the day’s onslaught of normality, it becomes clear that Mr Ardennes was on one side of a split between a more progressive faction of teachers and a more tyrannical group, spearheaded by Gomme – nicknamed “the Mad Penguin”. This divide serves to be microcosmic of 1980s society as a whole: workers railing against the authorities.
Against a backdrop of Thatcher and the Falklands war, Chadwick’s cast of children, on the precipice of adulthood, are caught in the crosshairs of adult politics. Each represents a different class archetype and these are shrewdly – if slightly cruelly – drawn. In the refraction of their various viewpoints, Chadwick is adept at finding the lesser tragedies bursting at the seams, amounting to a clever and compassionate debut.
• Dark Like Under by Alice Chadwick is published by Daunt (£10.99). To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply
