The Mermaid and the Drunks

Richards has produced a nicely paced novel in which the plot and sub plots are easy to follow, the scene setting tangible, the relationships complicated but relatable.
The main protaganists of Joe and Fresia are at the apex of overlayed love triangles, set against a backdrop of a Chile emerging not only from Pinochet's dictatorship but also the open untreated wound of his brutal coup over the populist Allende.
The push and pull of right and left, right and wrong, is all pervading and the country is strugglng to create its identity and place in the world. Joe, Fresia and their associates traverse the world of the wealthy and the poor, a little too seamlessly at times but necessarily to enable the political intrigues and social contrasts to show more unfold and be laid bare.
I simply could not attempt to improve on this commendable review by Alfred Hickling of The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2003/may/03/featuresreviews.guardianreview33 although I would add that there are two things which prevent me from offering this book a higher rating; there being too many clumsy coincidences, too many rather unlikely chance meetings, used to connect the various threads of the story, and the way that the middle class young people seem never to need to earn a penny or peso towards funding their relatively spendthrift, bohemian lifestyle. They are all too obvious and cringe worthy failings but they are not what the book ultimately will be warmly remembered for. show less