Love, Roddy Doyle

 

Love by Roddy Doyle came up in my library application as a suggestion for reading for St. Patrick's day.  The description of the novel seemed good and the author is a Booker Prize winner, so it seemed like a good idea to give it a shot.

Started: 3/23/2021
Completed: 3/27/2021
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Recommended By: The local library

Review:

This book is almost entirely dialog.  The dialog is punctuated with, "wha?" "for fuck's sake," and "fuck off."  I can't say that reading about two drunks talking makes any sense.  The story is slow to develop with constant starts and stops.  It seems odd that there are two fellows who are, by turns, so angry at one another and so friendly to one another.

Within this drunk dialog of 60 year old men, there is a quiet sorrow of opportunities lost and the gradual effect of old age.  There are moments of retrospection that fill out the characters and, yet, it feels like there is so much lost in the gauzy recollections.  I just did not enjoy it.