His unexceptional life suddenly disrupted by a series of coinCidences, he starts frantically trying to cover his backside, rushing from office to home, keeping half-an-eye on a restaurant owner who may or may not want to cause him grievous injury and
dreaming of euthanasia-inflicting TV
shows. Once ejected from his rut, things can only go badly wrong or
badly right for the increaSingly deVil-
may-care public servant.
A/l Bones And [/95 is an affectionate and perceptive novel, and one whose understated epiphany suggests that there is hope for heroes, of a sort. (James Smart)
BOHEMIAN COMEDY Christina Koning Fabulous Time (Viking £12.99) r i
oi—i Ram KQNINS”
.' m ' J}: _t _‘__' .-
Sex and sexuality is such a part of our lives, that it is hard to think that there
was a time when a woman’s reputation and prospects could be
ruined if she was so much as seen
with a single man. Or that male
homosexuality was not merely frowned upon, but actually illegal.
Christina Koning’s clever comedy of
3 sexual morality, chooses the early 605 n and the countryside near Brighton to = drop a frustrated older gay man
Sandy, and his voraCioust scavenging
protege, Ray. They become trapped
on a Visit to Sandy’s fading aunt
Connie in her aged country house, and the ensuing clash between gay culture, stiff English formality and nascent flower power is peppered
wrth Connie's fumbling memories of a misspent youth in pre-World War II Shanghar
This is an intriguing and meticulously-detailed book, but while
the titillating, page-turning narrative
would have been risque in more naive times, today it seems a trifle pallid. (Thom Dibdin)
CRIME THRILLER George Tiffin Mercy Alexander (Picador £12.99)
Sex, death, love, beauty, corruption, eVil, tragedy, tarts wrth hearts, ruthless pimps, inscrutable undertakers, oh, and fry-ups and art, too. First-time
author George Tiffin throws in all these things, some that ought to
feature in any self-disrespecting noir work, but it's not qwte enough Or maybe it’s Just too much
His herome, the eponymous Mercy, IS an ex-model turned conceptual artist on the hunt for the killer of her pal who was surreptitioust a high-class hooker, The prose is sharp enough and Tiffin’s picture of London’s sex industry is both banal and ugly, but it's the plot that disappomts. Pedestrian to the paint of stationary, this is less a whodunit than a whyandhow’dtheydOit? It's a mystery that would barely have troubled Marlowe or Spade.
And while MerCy IS both smart and stylish, she's never real enough to be conVinCing. Not a terrible debut then, Just not a terribly accomplished or diverting one. (Rodger Evans)
CONTEMPORARY HORROR Michel Faber Under The Skin (Canongate £6.99)
)c,?
Big-breasted lsserley drives around the highways and by-lanes of the Scottish
Highlands in her battered Toyota
picking up male hitch-hikers, usmg a j selection process based on their
a physical prowess and loneliness. Her
motives, however, are far from
obvious, veering wildly towards the nightmarish.
To give away the startling plot twist of this wonderful novel would be akin to handing out linen sheets with holes
cut in them with every video copy of
The Sixth Sense. This book fills you
i with the kind of pleasure gleaned as a
kid, havrng Just discovered Roald Dahl’s Switch Bitch collection or reading The Pan Book Of Horrors under the bedcovers at night as a
confused hormonal teenager. It also
has the driven narration of Conrad and the subtle yet complex heart of John Wyndham’s greatest works.
This debut tale of ordinary and extraordinary madness is little short of exceptional. (Paul Dale)
Continued over page
"T MISTARRATI—N‘G—Sm" T T ‘
~ ~ —- - Unmissable
' xv i a Very ood
w -~ + Wort a shot »- ~ Below average
_ Yeiafxe Pesnwarned .
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