Adrian Turpin
Riddle of the Sands
The Forgiven
By Lawrence Osborne
Hogarth 305pp £14.99
Like any desert trip, Lawrence Osborne’s The Forgiven is alarming and liberating in equal measure. Here is a tale as hot, claustrophobic and gritty as being rolled in the sand after a sweat bath. But it’s also a novel with a vast moral horizon, which recedes and advances disorientatingly, leaving the reader with a sense of vertigo. Written with an untimely elegance more 1930s than 2010s, the book proceeds at thriller pace, or at least it would if almost every page didn’t cause you to fixate on a clinical insight into human nature or a snatch of dream-like description. If it were a film, it would be shot in high definition; every grain of sand would show.
In its opening, The Forgiven consciously echoes Paul Bowles’s The Sheltering Sky. Like Bowles’s Port and Kit Moresby before them, David, a heavy-drinking doctor, and Jo, a floundering children’s author, are a middle-aged couple seeking in Morocco temporary respite from their troubled marriage. Their destination is a remote ksar (castle)
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
Russia’s recent efforts to destabilise the Baltic states have increased enthusiasm for the EU in these places. With Euroscepticism growing in countries like France and Germany, @owenmatth wonders whether Europe’s salvation will come from its periphery.
Owen Matthews - Sea of Troubles
Owen Matthews: Sea of Troubles - Baltic: The Future of Europe by Oliver Moody
literaryreview.co.uk
Many laptop workers will find Vincenzo Latronico’s PERFECTION sends shivers of uncomfortable recognition down their spine. I wrote about why for @Lit_Review
https://literaryreview.co.uk/hashtag-living
An insightful review by @DanielB89913888 of In Covid’s Wake (Macedo & Lee, @PrincetonUPress).
Paraphrasing: left-leaning authors critique the Covid response using right-wing arguments. A fascinating read.
via @Lit_Review