The Slap, Christos Tsiolkas

This was my first Man Booker read, and technically I didn't read it for that purpose. I have loved Tsiolkas' writing for a long time, since losing myself in the gothic darkness of "Dead Europe". Since then, I've read all of Tsiolkas' (often morbidly brutal) novels, and have wallowed in my addiction to his narrative voice, combined with utter loathing for character.

I find it funny when people describe how hard they found "The Slap" to read, on account of the characters having no redeeming features. That always marks the reader as a Tsiolkas virgin to me; "The Slap" characters may be unpleasant in ways, but they are nothing on the unseemliness of, say, the protaganist of "The Jesus Man". Tsiolkas loves to shock. In a way he follows an Australian suburban tradition of writing characters gritty and realistically depraved. Sure, his characters cheat and lie, or at least dream of it; but who hasn't experienced a semblance of such thoughts at some fleeting moment?

"The Slap" is somewhat watered down from Tsiolkas' prior novels, because the narrative voice jumps from character to character, meaning you needn't bathe too long in one character's nastiness. On the other hand, this does ensure that you can't pick a particular character out as the villain; they all have some form of fatal flaw. In other words, they're all human.

The novel's content has been well discussed in public media, particularly with the screening of the ABC mini-series adaptation. A child is slapped by an adult not his parent at a barbecue. The resulting outrage and legal proceedings threaten to shatter a formerly close group of friends and family.

I found the story interesting, but it was the structure which truly grabbed me. Tsiolkas doesn't simply tell the same moment of story from a number of different points of view. Each chapter is from the voice of a new character, yes; but it is also a chronological progression of the storyline, so that Hector's chapter tells a completely different section of the tale to Rosie's chapter.

Importantly, too, each chapter immerses the reader in the life of its narrator. We hear all of their innermost secrets, the kind they don't dare speak aloud. The intimacy with each character via only a single chapter is incredible, and at the same time does not sacrifice our understanding of the narrative as it rolls along. This is truly masterful storytelling, even if the tale told is somewhat confronting. An outstanding read, and certainly should have been shortlisted, in my opinion.