Set in West Berlin in the 1970s, this novel tells the story of a young Irish man who falls in love with Helen, also from Ireland. It charts a love story that runs its course among the misfits of a city where human contact is remote, overshadowed by the force of state boundaries and the Berlin Wall.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A perfect introduction to Hamilton's concerns,
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This review is from: Surrogate City (Hardcover)
Hamilton has written three novels about Germany, and I found this one first. His own Irish-German mixed background, explored in his memoir "The Speckled People," enlivens each of the three novels. They are not related, but each tackles alienation within, in this case, Berlin around the fall of the Wall. It begins with a literally headlong rush, and draws you into a tangle of relationships. It feels as if based on real situations. This may testify to H's skill in inventing fiction out of his life, or his ability to make it seem so! Either way, without giving away too much of the plot, the Irish narrator must become a "surrogate" companion for a woman he falls for, who may or may not have been jilted by her lover. Interspersed with this plot, a Turkish-German woman widens the relevance of how "outsiders" in Germany can become accepted or remain at odds. Often, fiction that concentrates upon such intimate connections leaves me detached, but Hamilton keeps the narrator's development arc convincing while subtle. His prose style, unassuming, uses transparency to allow you to gaze into the character's depths, and he handles the unfolding story well, given the limitations of the first-person that at times slow the action. After this, I would turn to his "The Last Shot" and "The Love Test."
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