SOURCE: Wall, Eamonn. Review of Original Bliss, by A. L. Kennedy. Review of Contemporary Fiction 19, no. 3 (fall 1999): 161-62.

In the following review, Wall offers a positive assessment of Kennedy's “richly understated and beautifully plotted” narrative in Original Bliss.

Original Bliss, a strange and unpredictable novel, explores and uncovers the various levels of abuse which Helen Brindle has been subjected to throughout her life, and moves toward a surprising salvation. As a result of a strict religious upbringing and involvement in an unsatisfactory marriage to a cold and abusive man, she is emotionally crippled. Her life changes after seeing Edward Gluck, a pop psychologist, on the Open University. She writes to him and they arrange a meeting at a conference. Gluck, addicted to hardcore pornography, is equally crippled emotionally. However, the relationship they begin moves forward, tentatively at first, and allows both of them to conquer together their parallel...