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A review by peripetia
Young Mungo by Douglas Stuart
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
4.0
I loved Shuggie Bain and I was expecting to be destroyed in a similar way with this one. My expectations were correct - maybe too correct.
This novel feels very much like Shuggie Bain repeated. In both books, we have a young boy, youngest of three children, his siblings being a boy and a girl, with an alcoholic mother and an absent father, trying to come to terms with his sexuality. The plot was very similar even if the details had been changed. Like Shuggie Bain, this book was slow and heavy and in the end the plot got solved (in a way) very fast.
Still, Stuart writes beautifully. What I love the most about his books is the depiction of working class life, which is usually completely ignored or forgotten. For me this book was more about class and poverty than anything else. I wish there were more books like this. I will definitely read whatever he writes next.
This novel feels very much like Shuggie Bain repeated. In both books, we have a young boy, youngest of three children, his siblings being a boy and a girl, with an alcoholic mother and an absent father, trying to come to terms with his sexuality. The plot was very similar even if the details had been changed. Like Shuggie Bain, this book was slow and heavy and in the end the plot got solved (in a way) very fast.
Still, Stuart writes beautifully. What I love the most about his books is the depiction of working class life, which is usually completely ignored or forgotten. For me this book was more about class and poverty than anything else. I wish there were more books like this. I will definitely read whatever he writes next.