Intermezzo

A little light in the end but the wind-up was beautiful. At times it knocked the wind out of me. The writing is thoughtful and loaded with character - e.g., Peter's narrative is noun-forward, older and resigned to experience, while Ivan has rambling “I” statements, working through his relation to the world. There's a spark here. My copy is full of highlights. Page-to-page, Rooney is damn good at stirring something up. Yet for a book capable of such enchanting lines and subtle through-narratives, it just didn't quite punch as hard as I hoped it would. I wish that, in the end, Rooney had committed to showing us real chaos - pain, dysfunction, disruption - instead of orderly conflict plodding along. Peter never feels like a real addict and Ivan never feels like a real outsider. They have moments, but they never break through. The proverbial gun hangs over the mantle but is only ever used to fire pellets into a bush, revealing itself to be a prop gun all along, and we all shrug and walk away.