The Stars in the Bright Sky, Alan Warner

Told via conversation and neutral observation of their actions, 'The Stars in the Bright Sky' introduces the reader to six young women meeting at Gatwick Airport for a spontaneous trip. Five of the characters carry on from a previous Warner novel (which I haven't read, nor do you need to in order to get the story). Ava is new, and provides a good vehicle for familiarisation with the rest of the group as she gets to know the other girls.

The girls spend a lot of time trying to prove how grown up they are, all the while demonstrating their general lack of knowledge of the 'real world'. For the most part these are young, small town girls with young, small town concerns. They talk about drugs, drinking, who's kissing who, and suffer from class envy and insecurity. This is all played out against the backdrop of Gatwick and surrounds, as various mishaps prevent them from actually moving to a larger arena. The restricted, manufactured environment of the airport reflects, in many ways, the experiences of the girls to date; they are so close to being able to access a wider frame of reference, but struggle to take that step.

The characters are all flawed, making them fairly realistic. As we only access what the girls are willing to tell their group of friends, our knowledge of them is at once candid, and carefully screened. The depth to which characters are understood is heavily affected by the other characters involved in the conversation, and we are encouraged to view and seek manipulative behaviour in many of the girls. We are often left feeling like we don't really know them, or their lives: sometimes this is because their shared past means there are some things that don't 'need' explaining; other things it is clear they are not willing to tell even these close friends, and so we must wonder at their unrevealed secrets.

To be honest, the novel frustrated me; it was mostly a blow by blow account of drinking and bitching. Set in 2001, a year of great change in the world, this is entirely deliberate on Warner's account, as it juxtaposes the frivolity of first world problems against the bigger issues. But for me, it just didn't drag me convincingly enough from the real world, and felt lacking in substance. Because I had no alliances to characters, I found them all irritating, and had to push myself to finish. The 'twist' at the end occurred with no follow up, and while I could appreciate the effect of using it as a sudden crash to end the novel, it also seemed hollow to my mind. An ok read, but I can see why it didn't make the Shortlist.

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.