Dan’s in his 60s, retired and living in Dubai. He’s done well off of crypto - made some big money bags by being an earlier speculator of Bitcoin. Then he meets Vikki - the one who got away, the possible love of his life. And then… nothing! He warbles on about his life story until he doesn’t.
Much like my attempt at a summary of this novel, Tibor Fischer’s My Bags Are Big goes well until it sputters out - and then it’s just really blah. Unfortunately, the really good part ends relatively early (around page 30) and then gets steadily more tedious until the end.
The book starts very strongly. Dan’s voice reads like an early Guy Ritchie character (Lock Stock/Snatch-era) and it’s funny and engaging. The tone is very London, everyone’s got a nickname (Tree-Hugger Trev, Disaster Dmitri), and there’s a bizarre running joke where Dan keeps meeting David Bowie even though he’s not really a fan.
Dan repeatedly returns to Vikki in the present who reminds him of Vikki in the past which makes him tell his entire life story - which isn’t that interesting. He plays tennis until he realises he doesn’t have the onions to make a career out of it, so he stumbles into sports management, then middle middle middle, some more about boring Vikki, and Bitcoin until the end. Which is just Dan talking about crypto, and it’s kinda dull.
You would think with all the Vikki talk that the novel is about their relationship and the arc would be the two finally getting together but no. Vikki instead gradually disappears and nothing in the form of a story emerges to fill her absence. The novel peters out into emptiness long before the end and I kept wondering what the point of it all was.
Fischer is clearly a decent writer but is really lacking on the story front. My Bags Are Big has a great few dozen opening pages which isn’t enough to recommend this nearly-200 page novel. A meandering shrug of a book.
No comments:
Post a Comment