*Download this review as a PDF
Something to Tell You: A Novel
by Hanif Kureishi
a book review by
Kristianne Huntsberger
By the end of the novel, when the London Underground is shaken by suicide bombers, we are already expecting an explosion. The tension that Kureishi has built in the secret lives of his characters, the social unrest of Britain at war and the paranoia of a violent past cannot be settled with anything less than cataclysmic.
Everyone is hiding something: a new penchant for kinky fetish clubs, a stolen painting, a history of child abuse and a murder. Many of the character’s secrets won’t keep, but you never know when or how they will break or what kind of repercussions will result. Our narrator, Jamal, is the catalyst of this mounting pressure. As a Freudian psychoanalyst, Jamal deals in people’s secrets, but he has managed to keep his own masked. We follow him as he delves into the nostalgic and volatile world of repressed memories. He copes with his impending middle age, a recent divorce, and the confusion of fathering a teenager while simultaneously sorting through the past, which surfaces suddenly when faced with his lost lover and a violent incident he has tried to forget.
Kureishi does not shy away from difficult subjects; we get characters’ analyses of Thatcher and Blair, the debacle in Iraq, and the social tension of ethnic conflict and sex. His writing is sharp and engaging and by using semi-autobiographical experiences of a Pakistani-British citizen’s life Kureishi develops a story that is full and honest.
My idea of a great summer read may be far from the norm, but I find this summer release a welcome addition to the sunny day picnic blanket. Because Kureishi’s book merges the suspenseful engagement of a mystery novel with provocative socio-cultural critique, the reader suffers neither brain drain nor an over-achiever’s guilt.
