The Matiushin Case by Oleg Pavlov

'Matiushin thought it was hilarious, everything suddenly seemed funny to him; the more hopelessly dark and confused it became, the funnier it was.'

Beginning with an unwanted baby born to a wailing mother in the middle of graveyard, Oleg Pavlov's The Matiushin Case is a long, grey night that never really brightens. Charting Matiushin's journey from a loveless home to the brutal life of a soldier in a Soviet labour camp, Pavlov's novel quickly numbs the reader to the constant horrors that constitute his life. Written in a bare, stilted style, it never plays for the high drama its Hardy-esque opening scene might suggest, choosing instead to beat steadily on from one absurdity to the next, coolly piling horror on top of horror. Moving relentlessly forward with such weary inevitability, the entire tale soon begins to blur, drifting between the truly horrible and the simply miserable in a dreamlike haze.

Seen through a lens softened by exhaustion and cheap vodka, Pavlov's dark picture of existence becomes wryly amusing and often almost whimsical in its black humour. In the tradition of Russian novels, The Matiushin Case makes a fine read out of the essential awfulness of life. [Ross McIndoe]