Decline and Fall on Savage Street by Fiona Farrell   {Reviewed by STELLA} In the wake of the Christchurch earthquakes, Farrell produced two works of non-fiction, The Villa at the Edge of the Empire and The Broken Book- her response to these disasters. “I am normally a fiction writer, but in 2010-11 fiction felt irrelevant. What mattered was reality. What mattered were the factual narratives...” Both these important and exceptional books were short-listed for The New Zealand Book Awards. In a return to fiction, Decline & Fall on Savage Street is Fiona Farrell’s companion novel to The Villa at the Edge of the Empire. In her notes, Farrell says “…fiction has its role…it can go straight to the heart of things, into private and secret places… It gives shape to the random narrative of existence.” Opening in 1906, with the site of the house secured, we are introduced to the possibility of a growing nation, a developing city, a new place from which to see a prosperous future. A chapter later, two years on, the floor plans are ready and George is ready to put his stamp on the house. A grand yet comfortable home, not too big but with some quirks – a house that will entice several owners over the following decade, beguiled by its character. Farrell cleverly weaves a story about the home on Savage Street, the families that live and love there: their ups and downs introducing us to people both familiar and particular - their follies, weaknesses, strengths and loyalties to the each other and the house, and to the communities they are part of. In the first part of the novel, the chapters jump ahead in 2-year leaps, taking the reader through a potted New Zealand history of a developing city, of settlement through two world wars, the changing social mores of the 1950s and '60s, political upheavals of the '80s, economic booms and busts of the '90s, to just beyond the millennium. Part 2 focuses on the period of the earthquakes, starting just prior to the first quake in 2010 and concluding in late 2012. Focusing on one house is an ingenious way to structure this novel: as a reader, you follow the generations of families, see the house loved, let go, sold, change hands, change status as the suburbs grow and morph, get renovated and reinvigorated, and be torn asunder by the ground beneath it. Understandably there is a huge cast of characters: the founding family, the tenants (when needed as circumstances change), the community of idealists that co-own and rescue the house, the doer-uppers, the new blended family - all of whom call this place home. Farrell makes all their stories interesting and relevant to the main threads of the novel. While you often only glimpse their lives, you feel as though you know and understand them all – are a neighbour and confidante looking in through the windows. Interspersed between the chapters are short pieces which anticipate change, which represent the breathing in and out of time, of forces that can’t be controlled, of nature and what happens despite our human interventions and our best-laid plans.