So Much for That by Lionel Shriver HarperCollins HK$104
This will be a busy year for Lionel Shriver. There's a forthcoming film version of her controversial but gripping best-seller, We Need to Talk About Kevin. First is the paperback release of her most recent novel, So Much for That. After the rather disappointing The Post-Birthday World, something is riding on her ninth novel, both commercially and artistically. Shriver delivers by crafting a tightly wound plot from a feeling of helpless rage. Her grand theme is the US healthcare system - something worth getting angry about. In this context, the title sounds spat out, a feeling her story backs up. Having run a small but profitable handyman business in New York for decades, Shepherd 'Shep' Knacker is planning to take his money and retire to warmer and quieter climes: a small island off Tanzania. But then his wife, Glynis, is diagnosed with cancer. The sticking point is Shep's medical insurance. Forced together, the couple descend towards bitterness: Glynis wishes that everyone in the world would contract her disease; Shep becomes convinced that, himself excepted, decency has died. It is not comforting, but deeply moving and truthful.
