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A review by book_concierge
Night Boat to Tangier by Kevin Barry
2.0
Digital audiobook performed by the author.
From the book jacket: In the dark waiting room of the ferry terminal in the sketchy Spanish port of Algeciras, two aging Ireishmen – Maurice Hearne and Charlie Redmond, longtime partners in the lucrative and dangerous enterprise of smuggling drugs – sit, none too patiently. It is the evening of Oct 23, 2018, and they are expecting Maruice’s estranged daughter, Dilly, either to arrive on a boat coming from Tangier or to depart on one heading there. This nocturnal vigil will initiate an extraordinary journey back in time to excavate their shared history of violence, romance, mutual betrayals, and serial exiles.
My reactions
Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2019, I had high hopes for this work. But the dark, bleak tenor of the prose, the underworld inhabited by these characters, their despair and inability to lift themselves out of the mess they’ve made of their lives …. Just not my cup of tea, especially not at this stage of my life and given the current events (COVID 19 pandemic, and the US presidential election).
There were moments when the writing captured my attention. Barry’s ability to put the reader into the time and place his characters inhabit is admirable. But I really didn’t want to go there. So it was clearly the wrong book at this time. I finished it only because it is a selection for one of my F2F book groups.
Kevin Barry narrates the audiobook himself. He does a marvelous job. I’m not sure anyone else could have done better.
From the book jacket: In the dark waiting room of the ferry terminal in the sketchy Spanish port of Algeciras, two aging Ireishmen – Maurice Hearne and Charlie Redmond, longtime partners in the lucrative and dangerous enterprise of smuggling drugs – sit, none too patiently. It is the evening of Oct 23, 2018, and they are expecting Maruice’s estranged daughter, Dilly, either to arrive on a boat coming from Tangier or to depart on one heading there. This nocturnal vigil will initiate an extraordinary journey back in time to excavate their shared history of violence, romance, mutual betrayals, and serial exiles.
My reactions
Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2019, I had high hopes for this work. But the dark, bleak tenor of the prose, the underworld inhabited by these characters, their despair and inability to lift themselves out of the mess they’ve made of their lives …. Just not my cup of tea, especially not at this stage of my life and given the current events (COVID 19 pandemic, and the US presidential election).
There were moments when the writing captured my attention. Barry’s ability to put the reader into the time and place his characters inhabit is admirable. But I really didn’t want to go there. So it was clearly the wrong book at this time. I finished it only because it is a selection for one of my F2F book groups.
Kevin Barry narrates the audiobook himself. He does a marvelous job. I’m not sure anyone else could have done better.