Review copy kindly provided by Booksellers Association NZ on behalf of Victoria University Press, Wellington.
This is the second book written by Breton Dukes and published by VUP. Like the first, "Bird North" it is a collection of stories, but only six rather than seventeen as in the first. I haven't read the author's first book, but I understand from reading online reviews that is a hard hitting and not very attractive look at the underbelly of the young New Zealand man. Hmm, says this reviewer - over 50-female, just my cup of tea. Is his latest book more of the same?
Interesting then that the cover features a woman, in a swim suit no less, one hand on a ladder rung and the other holding a fishing line, apparently some distance from land. The character on the cover, Laura, is one of three adult siblings in the story 'Empty Bones'. This story, according to the blurb is a novella; the remaining five being short stories, although to be honest, it read more like a long short story. In this story, Laura's father Ian is hosting a bit of a weekend family reunion at the family bach. Ian and his three offspring have plenty of baggage between them as well as the usual love-hate stuff that goes on between siblings. By any family's account, this is certainly a very strange family with peculiar dynamics happening. For a start, Ian has just had a major face lift. A family reunion, for a writer, is a marvellous place for emotions to run high, for events to tilt slightly out of control, and for issues to be resolved, which all happens in this story. The author penetrates very deeply into the psyche of his characters, which is somewhat disturbing, as none of them are very likeable, and the things they do aren't very admirable, but I guess there really are people like that out there, and not just in New Zealand.
The five other stories, being considerably shorter than Empty Bones, have a lot more tension, dysfunction, and unease packed into them. And all with the same degree of intense characterisation as in the longer story. This, I feel, is the author's strength - he has the ability to get into the souls and heart of his characters, their complexities. And none of them are nice.
I can't say I liked reading these stories. I didn't like the characters, mostly young to middle aged men, who seem to have little direction in life, very little to get up for each day, users and bludgers of other people. Other than Laura, who has her own issues, the only other story with its main character as a female is the story about Rachel. Plenty of potential perhaps for things to turn out a little differently maybe? But no, same downward spiral as the others. In all his stories, the characters seem to have got to a point in their lives where they seem to have lost control of where they see their life going. And didn't seem to know or be able to see how to get it back. Depressing reading really.
Maybe that is the author's point. Get us thinking a little more about the type of society we are living in and the type of people it is turning out. Are these behaviour issues something people are born with or a product of their upbringing/the passage of their lives/alcohol/drugs. Or maybe this underbelly of human nature has always been there, and he is simply bringing it to our attention.Whatever we may think of the subject matter of the stories, the unlikeable characters the author has created for his reader, and the future of masculinity in New Zealand, there is no denying the quality of the writing. These are well written stories, very evocative, they leave powerful images, and if they can bring about a strong emotion from the reader, then maybe the author has been successful in communicating his message.
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