Customer Reviews

Dreams of Leaving

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Rupert Thomson starts off his brilliant literary career with `Dreams of Leaving'. A young father with dreams of leaving a small English village puts his son (appropriately named Moses) into a basket and floats him down a river. Moses grows up never knowing his real past (being the only one to ever "escape" from the village). Sounds interesting? Don't worry, the story doesn't matter. The author's narrative brilliance will dazzle you. I found myself stopping continuously to admire Thomson's ability to describe even the most commonplace event. Thomson definitely defined his superb style with this novel.

Check out `The Insult' another tribute to his craft. David Bowie has Thomson (and `The Insult') on his list of recommended reading.

Read entirely whilst incapacitated following an operation, Dreams of Leaving was a beautiful and profund account of attempting to belong, and the desperation for security. Moses Highness represents the secure element; he has been allowed to grow and evolve within the city. In contrast, Chief Inspector Peach (whom I believe to be the true central character), is a man who believes in his apparent security, nursing a secret fear and distrust for the outside world. The crucial point is when Moses visits New Egypt. He is able to look upon it as another village, and is not frightened, although he remains an outsider. Conversely, Peach's childlike innocence (as a result of ignorance) is his burden as he travels to the big city. Dreams of leaving is about change; gradual and sudden, and how individuals evolve accordingly. However, it deals with fear - the fear of difference, and especially the fear of ultimately having to accept change, and live within it. There is a piece of Peach in all of us.

Like all Rupert Thomson's settings, the (almost) inescapable village in this novel is strange not because it is alien but precisely because it is so familiar. And yet, things aren't quite right. This village is run by the tyrannical Inspector Peach with his macabre little police museum and his cardboard policemen to scare would-be leavers.

As so often in Thomson's novels, this is a story in two parts. Moses, the child, does escape, to an equally familiar and unfamiliar city where he finds his place at a triangular pink night club...

All very weird, but compelling, and only a bit first-novel-ish. Recommended if you like to be made uncomfortable by a slight twisting of normality.

The eccentric characters that Thomson creates get into your system, and while it's not a typical "page-turner" novel, you just want to read a little more to find out what happens to them next. The writing is not mainstream and not formula; it is beautiful and unusual without being so esoteric as to make it difficult to follow. I loved this book.

DREAMS OF LEAVING is without any doubt the best novel I read in the past few years. Being disappointed in Dutch 90's literature, this book was a breathtaking eye-opener. Thomson knows what he's writing about, but doesn't make a fuss about it. The book is about drugs, sex and rock'n roll but not in a irritating 'show-off'-way. Perfect.