A losing streak

In backgammon, a blot is a single checker, sitting alone and unprotected. This is a sly title for this sly novel (which was published in the US as the more literal A Gambler’s Anatomy). The hero, Alexander Bruno, is a single, exposed man, and a professional backgammon player. He also suffers from an eye condition: there is a floating blank space in his line of vision, which means that he cannot see that which he looks directly at. Lastly, as a term drawn from the specific vocabulary of the game, the title suggests Lethem’s deep interest in the conventions and insider language of obsessions and professions.

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Druin Burch

Lucy Letby and the killer nurse I worked with

As the novel opens, Alexander Bruno is on his way to play backgammon with a rich German industrialist in the outskirts of Berlin. On the ferry, he flirts with a German girl.