THE TOTHEROH CLUB

For the first time as a book reviewer, I am at a loss how to explain this slim volume. It is described as ‘surreal’ in the blurb. Incomprehensible would be more my description. It is like the emperor’s new clothes where you are told something is a ground-breaking piece of work that only somebody with a special awareness of true genius would appreciate.

Alternatively, anyone with an ounce of common sense would recognise they were being conned.             

Hard to describe the plot. We are given excellent architectural details of this club. We get to meet the strange staff.  There is talk of stealing and bodies and there is certainly a brooding atmosphere about the book.. But no continuity. No sense of turning the page to see what happens next as we are none too sure what has happened before.            

Obviously I haven’t got that special awareness. To make sure I wasn’t missing something, I lent my review copy to two other people, both lovers of crime novels, and they couldn’t make head or tails of it either.            

All I can say in its favour is, it is different. And how.