Friends in the North

If I were a contemporary novelist, each day I would pray in thanks for unhappy families. Where would new writing be without them? Bunderlin is another of those novels in which families’ secrets are slowly uncovered by those whose lives have been unwittingly shaped by their consequences.

The Bunderlin of Bunderlin, is a rather eccentric type who forces his way into the life of the novel’s protagonist, Martin. Bunderlin is a man whom, if I were given to cliché, I would describe as a ‘gentle giant’. Fond of animals, given to wordplay (of a musical if seemingly meaningless nature), Martin first meets him as a schoolboy. When Bunderlin reappears several years later, Martin is annoyed and puzzled in equal measure, but slowly comes to accept Bunderlin as a friend he may not have chosen, but nevertheless must accommodate. When, however, a local barber is killed in an arson attack, and Bunderlin appears at Martin’s flat reeking of petrol and unsurprised by the news, Martin finds himself torn between loyalty and duty.