January09_2

It's hard to write about 'The Slap', by Christos Tsiolkas, because it was gripping and devestating in one. I had read a short review about this book and knew it had a great set-up - a suburban BBQ in Melbourne, where a dad slaps another person's toddler - but I didn't know anything about Tsiolkas. I'm unresolved on this book. I couldn't leave it alone; it was an obsessive read, with the story - told by each of the key characters in sequence - completely absorbing. The moral issue is explored, a sequence of events revealed, all this is clever and credible, but as each voice is introduced and their actions are described and dialogue provided, under it all we hear their inner voice and it's bleak stuff. Racist, self-serving, self-centred, deluded, mediocre, mean-spirited suburban mums and dads and grandparents and teenagers who Tsiolkas submits as regular folk. I still feel affected by it, drained and exhausted by it.

Before Tsiolkas I read 'The Best American Crime Writing 2005' and I could be addicted. This edition (part of the fabulous 'Best American' series (Essays, Travel Writing, Sports Writing etc)) was edited by Jameds Ellroy, and I expected to just dip into it on recommendation from W. But I dipped in at the back (an article about a wildly successful doctor who fell into drug addition and crime) and kept reading until I reached the front, skipping a few but enjoying most.