Sterling Karat Gold

Abandoned, p.78. I used to like a healthy dose of surrealism. Here, I tried and tried, but nope. Maybe I’ve grown too old. Maybe I’m not smart enough or hip enough for this book. Doesn’t matter. I found it monotonous: angry stream of consciousness, uninteresting first-person protagonist, and the story caroms disjointedly -- kind of like Meow Wolf, where it’s just slapped together randomly and feels fun for a while. Only a while. Oh, plus lots of sports and fashion talk with promise of more to come. No thanks.

Subverting conventions of plot construction as well as gender identity, Waidner amalgamates football lore, a reversed version of Kafka's "Process", Google Maps as a time-travelling device, and anti-queer violence expressed in spontaneously erupting bullfights, taking us on a near-psychedelic trip through migrant biographies, working class experience, time-tested friendship, and the struggle for respect and agency, if not justice in modern-day, hyper-unequal London. Highly recommended.

A brilliant read - inventive and playful, perhaps the only way to approach the sombre reality of life in Britain today.