Steve Toltz follows up his Man Booker Prize–shortlisted A Fraction of the Whole with a tragicomic novel about a misfit loser whose hapless adventures chronically misfire.
The novel opens when Liam, a reluctant policeman and failed novelist, visits his childhood friend Aldo, now a paraplegic after an unsuccessful suicide attempt. As Aldo recounts the sorry details of his life, Liam realizes he is listening to the makings of the epic novel he's been itching to write.
This novelist-writing-a-novel frame neatly captures the ironic tension at Quicksand's heart. Liam's success depends on Aldo's failures, which he recounts in horrifying and surreal detail. Many of them are absurd: his get-rich-quick schemes, like a BB&B (bed, breakfast and brothel), are ill conceived and in appallingly poor taste. Others leave shattered relationships in their wake. In a pivotal scene that marks the end of his marriage, he learns that his wife, a singer-songwriter, is about to give birth to a stillborn baby. They are at a concert, and in his confusion, Aldo presses her to get on stage and perform, then urges her to sing louder and even gives her a thumbs-up, knowing he's reacting in the worst possible way but powerless to stop himself.
On the surface, Quicksand is a clever novel about failure and friendship, told with brilliant irony and black humor, peppered with exuberant wordplay and one-liners--"Love for God is just Stockholm syndrome," he comments--but it is ultimately a cri de coeur protesting the futility of suffering and celebrating the simple victory of being alive. --Jeanette Zwart, freelance writer and reviewer