Books of the Month
'The Raw Shark Texts' by Steven Hall
 OK, so if I tell you this book has a hero called Eric, a cat called Ian, and features a threatening thought-fish, you might not be instantly convinced. But give it a chance... The Raw Shark Texts is one of those novels which is very hard to define, but which rewards an open mind. On one level, it's a simple 'what the hell happened?' story. Eric Sanderson wakes up on his bedroom floor one day and doesn't know how he got there. He doesn't even know it's his own bedroom floor. And, er, what's his name again? Something's been attacking his memories, and it's only a matter of time before the strange creature returns for another go. Piecing together the life of the person he was before he lost his memory (what he calls 'The First Eric Sanderson'), he begins a quest to find himself, to shake off the terrifying force that's pursuing him, and to learn more about Eric's former girlfriend, Clio Aames. The ensuing journey takes him across northern England, cracking codes in B&B bedrooms, hiking miles in the murky gloom beneath city streets, through rooms made of paper and pages and words, into a strange space somewhere between reality and textuality.
If you like your fiction to be firmly rooted in the believable, then this book may be a leap too far. But if you're prepared to go along for the ride and see where an author's imagination takes you, then you'll find Steven Hall's debut a pretty enjoyable trip. The laudatory quotes on the covers have likened it to films more than books (Memento, Jaws, The Matrix, Donnie Darko, etc), but with everyone from Mark Haddon to Audrey Niffenegger and Joyce Carol Oates raving about it, you have to think they can't all be wrong... To my mind the experience is a little like that of reading something by Haruki Murakami - there's no point getting caught up with facts and likelihoods and probabilities - you just have to go with it. This is a fast-paced book, with a complexity of storyline you could spend all day trying to get your head around, but which doesn't spill over into pretentiousness. My only advice would be to give it a miss if you're about to go scuba-diving.
Susan Tranter
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