- In lucid and engaging prose Allinson takes us on one family's inter-generational journey that is a sheer delight to read. The characters are struggling, financially and personally, and live on the margins. But they have mostly resisted social conventions, opting for authenticity and community. It’s a gently told and measured story, especially at the beginning, but its power builds and becomes absorbing.
- At first we meet Joe, his hippy parents and their friends. It's the 1970’s and his marriage is on the rocks.
- His father Vince was prone to violent rages and he committed suicide. He was a heavy drinker and likely abused by his father. His friends and lovers were all New Age marginals, living on the edge. As the story progresses we recognise the scars left on sons and daughters by parents and grandparents. They are carried down the generations and impossible to escape from.
- Joe sets out on a journey of discovery. His father had secrets and he wants to uncover them. He knows Vince spent a year in an ashram in India as a member of a cult run by a swami called Bhagwan. It was mostly Western innocents seeking transcendence and meaning - and sex. But Vince wasn't so innocent. His propensity for violent outbursts got the better of him. There was an incident.
- In the ashram Vince became close friends with a charismatic American Kurt. Twenty or so years later Kurt is now old and sick, but still living in India. He's agreed to meet with Joe. Kurt is fascinating and he raises the novel to a new level. He also had an angry and abusive father, and his views on the ashram experience are now clear: ‘All that fascist, corporate mysticism really gives me the shits…(Bhagwan) was just an empty vessel…a complete and utter fucking loony-tune’.
- Joe is desperate to hear from him what happened to Vince, his father. What caused his unwillingness to share his experiences? Why was he so troubled? Kurt refuses to be honest, choosing to honour an unwritten agreement with his old friend.
- The final part of the novel is also fascinating. Joe's daughter Sylvie is now 31 and Joe himself is a beaten, mostly drunk, old man running a caravan park for the aged in rural NSW. We're introduced to a dystopian future. Civil society has been wrecked, mostly by climate change. ‘…the riots, the blackouts, the housing crisis’. There's little meaningful communication between the two of them, but there’s a real connection. And hope.
- I enjoyed this novel immensely.
No comments:
Post a Comment