'Masterful storytelling'
The characters in this award-winning debut collection are very good at losing things: children, lovers, hope, the plot. They discover the past is not a place easily escaped from, as it pursues them with startling, sometimes horrifying, consequences.
A writer takes his research a little too far; a couple, stricken with guilt and grief, prepare a last meal; a group of swingers is rocked by the arrival of a new couple; a man takes a train journey to learn how to kill again; a deformed brother and sister exact revenge half a mile underground; a modern-day messiah astonishes a criminal gang; a pair of luckless gamblers are convinced they can beat the system; and a father is forever tormented by the few minutes his back was turned.
A writer takes his research a little too far; a couple, stricken with guilt and grief, prepare a last meal; a group of swingers is rocked by the arrival of a new couple; a man takes a train journey to learn how to kill again; a deformed brother and sister exact revenge half a mile underground; a modern-day messiah astonishes a criminal gang; a pair of luckless gamblers are convinced they can beat the system; and a father is forever tormented by the few minutes his back was turned.
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Gothic wit and cracking dialogue grounded in the author's
genuine sympathy for his characters. A seriously gifted debut. MIKE McCORMACK Read reviews of The Method here. |
