The Rescue Man by Anthony Quinn

 

Anthony Quinn’s The Rescue Man is above all a tribute to Liverpool – the city’s history, architecture and people. The story unfolds in a double narrative: the main plot is set during the second world war, but it's interspersed with the life of a nineteenth-century architect called Peter Eames. At first, the careful architectural desciptions, contrasted with the rather bland main protagonist Tom Baines, make the houses seem more interesting than the people in the book. Luckily, as the plot develops (and especially when love inevitably enters the picture) Baines gains more depth and the buildings recede from the foreground. Particularly impressive are the moments of day-to-day normality that emerge in the midst of the inferno of the Blitz: a cup of cooling tea, a shared breakfast, or walking home on a starlit night. The one downside is that the book's language often feels stilted, and its archaic stiffness interferes with the narrative’s drive. One could also wish that the author would refrain from transcribing the Liverpudlian accent, or if he feels obliged to do so, that he would be more consistent about it. However, these are minor weaknesses in an overall very worthwhile book. [Mathelinda Nagubodi]