Drybread

Highly enjoyable book from New Zealand - I was lucky to pick this up in a charity shop - the original price tag showed it been bought over there, and I don't think this author's books are widely available in the UK.

The back cover gives the impression that it's about a woman who hides out in a shack in the back of beyond in NZ to avoid having to hand her son over to her estranged husband. Really it's mainly about the journalist who, being the only person to know where she is, writes articles about her to garner support for her cause.

I liked the relaxed way in which the story was told - for much of the time we are just following the journalist, Theo, as he meanders through his everyday life, getting topless massages, jogging with his show more (highly witty) colleague, and - a particular highlight for me - attending a hilarious protest over a wind farm. Allt his left plenty of room for some pithy observaions on life, sexual politics etc. If there was a bum note in this novel, it was the fact that the author felt he had to keep reminding us of the presence of the woman in the shack. Suddenly, in the middle of some interesting daily encounter, Theo has to start thinking about her, draw some profound parallel with her experience, and the text becomes predictable and trite (barren landscape ... blah blah ... sod roof .... blah blah). show less