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jazzy_davePat Barker "The Man Who Wasn't There" (Penguin)
This has nothing to do with the Coen Brothers movie of the same name but is a short novel or longish novella that's in a way an extension of the Walter Mitty idea.
Young Colin knows nothing of his father except that he must have fought -- and died? -- in Europe during World War II. His mother won't tell him anything; neither will any of the other adults around him. So, as he wanders around his postwar neighbourhood, Colin acts out some of what he believes his father's glorious adventures must have been - and making of them a mental movie whose script the writer offers us intertwined with the main narrative. The effect is often very funny, sometimes extremely moving. Still, I think Barker was wise not to try to extend this to a full-scale novel. “The Man Who Wasn't There” is just long enough the way it is.
Infact, I read it in one go on my journey to and from Margate today.
This has nothing to do with the Coen Brothers movie of the same name but is a short novel or longish novella that's in a way an extension of the Walter Mitty idea.
Young Colin knows nothing of his father except that he must have fought -- and died? -- in Europe during World War II. His mother won't tell him anything; neither will any of the other adults around him. So, as he wanders around his postwar neighbourhood, Colin acts out some of what he believes his father's glorious adventures must have been - and making of them a mental movie whose script the writer offers us intertwined with the main narrative. The effect is often very funny, sometimes extremely moving. Still, I think Barker was wise not to try to extend this to a full-scale novel. “The Man Who Wasn't There” is just long enough the way it is.
Infact, I read it in one go on my journey to and from Margate today.
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