Ordinary Thunderstorms: A Novel

I had never read William Boyd before, but this tense, intriguing account will bring me back for more. This novel more than satisfies on two levels. First, what happens to Adam Kindred, caught up in mysteries beyond his understanding? Second, its account of the all-knowing modern state -- almost all-knowing, anyhow. I highly recommend Ordinary Thunderstorms.

In British author Boyd's (A Good Man in Africa, An Ice-Cream War) capable hands it's actually believable that a slightly depressed, mild-mannered climatologist chooses to go underground in a strange city rather than report a murder. Born in Britain, Adam Kindred has lived in America most of his life. Now, newly, devastatingly divorced, he's left his U.S. university job and hopes for a new start with a fellowship in London. Fresh from the job interview, he treats himself to a meal, exchanges pleasantries with another solitary diner and afterwards discovers that the man - a research doctor - has left a file behind. Good naturedly, Adam arranges to return it and goes to the man's flat where he finds him fatally stabbed. "Philip Wang lay on top of his bed in a widening pool of blood. He was alive, very conscious, and a hand, flipper like, gestured Adam towards him." His last words concern the file. " `Whatever you do, don't - ` Wang died then, with a short gasp of what seemed like exasperation." Going for the phone, Adam hears someone enter, and flees without calling the police, taking the murdered man's file with him. Reaching for his cell he discovers blood on his hand, washes it in a fountain, then feels the need of a drink. "...he needed to calm down, give his thoughts some order..." Incrementally time passes until it's too late. The police naturally assume Adam's guilty and the real murderer knows who he is. A vagrant on the banks of the Thames, he passes his first days assuming the situation will right itself, he will be cleared and the real murderer caught. But things don't work out that way. Staying primarily with Adam, Boyd shares point of view among several characters: the mercenary who killed Wang and now has a contract on Adam; the hapless CEO of the pharmaceutical firm Wang worked for, whose new riches come at a hidden price; the CEO's dissipated, aristocrat brother-in-law; and Rita Nashe, the cop who discovered Wang's body. The tension builds as Adam loses the trappings of normal life to blundering naivety, until he hits rock bottom and, starving, begins to exert himself. He has entered a world of muggers, prostitutes, hard-luck cases and opportunists and the way back - if there is one - requires an education in street smarts. It also requires detective work. The police are satisfied with him as their suspect and Wang's file is his only hope. The data mean nothing to him, but Adam begins to dig into the man's work with pediatric asthma patients, determined to uncover the secret that killed him - and stay alive to expose it. Winner of numerous awards, including the Whitbread, Boyd explores identity and the influence of social forces in this character-driven thriller. What happens when a man becomes unmoored from society? What will he do to preserve his life, his freedom, his dignity? What will he not do? The prose is muscular and straightforward; the plot is compelling and tense, the secondary characters are well-fleshed. Boyd

that always get to me. Too many novelists develop one or two and then let the others carry along as stereotypes or composites of characters we already know. Not so with Boyd who can move a plot along with the best of them, but not many can develop living, breathing, flawed characters. All with some good all with some bad and all with some in between-kind of like ordinary thunderstorms - depends how you're caught in them. I have no plans to reveal the plot...but our protagonist is flawed. One bad guy loves his dog and in his day to day life sounds like most of the conservatives around me. One female character gives as good as she gets. Another bad guy who runs a pharmaceutical company isn't like we'd image he should be and his ache for the love of his son is painful to the reader too. So, this is all to the good. People might complain about the ending but I liked it.

William Boyd is a literary craftsman whose skills keep the reader enthralled and informed from the first page to the last. He is the antidote to all the overpraised writers fawned over erroneously in the current publishing climate of `name' and `brand' because they lucked into (often undeserved) popularity. Boyd is the real thing: a writer. `Ordinary Thunderstorms' (the title reflects the way in which simple climatic phenomena can grow in complexity to major events) is brilliantly observed and meticulously written. No reader in the U.S. should stay away simply because it deals significantly with London and the Thames. It explains much that curious and intelligent readers want to know about any major world city, a stunning insider view that strips modern London to its truths. Boyd takes us into the times, places and events with unerring skill, drawing out the characters with exquisite detail of appearance, speech, environment, motivation and behavior. This is a thriller of extraordinary dimensions, and one can only hope it will be filmed, to provide (yet again) counterpoint to the mindless drivel that passes increasingly for movie entertainment these days. I will not reveal the plot. The suspense is excruciating, and who would deny a reader that pleasure? Suffice it to say that Boyd traces the life and transformation into other worlds and identities of a young British college professor, newly returned to the U.K. from the U.S., dragged unsuspecting into a murder for which he is considered guilty. As it evolves, the story encompasses a pharmaceutical-corporation deception of global intricacy, a murder-for-hire thug, a young black prostitute and her son, a revivalist mission, and the London police. Every character is memorable, every chapter turns the screw tighter, until the reader is caught up in the plot intricacies at ever-heightened levels of tension and anxiety. In this, Boyd shows his skills as a writer: it all fits, like the structure of a complex pharmaceutical molecule, and the necessary suspensions of disbelief are few and forgivable. This is entertainment at rarified levels of execution. Boyd does one other thing, and it is important. He never overwrites. He uses only the right amount of unaffected words and appropriate levels of detail to tell his story. In this (read some of my other reviews for amplification) he provides a model for other writers who apparently can't stop themselves from telling us too much, in too lengthy and repetitive forms, and who seem to be in love with the sound of their own voices. Boyd "tells it like it is" as directly as he can. He richly deserves all the praise that is heaped on him in the UK.

The drop is closer than you think. A young man - Adam Kindred - through a misfortunate occurrence is forced to change his life and persona. He becomes another person entirely and enters a world previously unknown to him: living, for a time, as a down and out in London. He truly disappears, goes underground and his previous existence vanishes. The necessity comes from the fact that Adam is persistently hunted by a lone gunman, and comes close to being killed. The tragedy is that the new Adam eventually loses his own sense of morality and carries out a terrible crime, seemingly with little remorse or reflection. Reminiscent of George Orwell's "Down and Out in Paris and London" we are taken into an underworld of poverty, crime and hopelessness, with no place for the ordinary morality we take for granted. The realisation that this world is so close to our ordinary lives is a sobering one - as well as the concept that a mere misfortune could send any of us plunging into its dark despair. Particularly chilling is the concept that an individual can be killed and the body disposed of so easily in a great city like London. All underneath our very noses. William Boyd seems to invent, for this underclass, a type of street language - using words like "flat" and "Green Peas" - helping to immerse the reader into this bizarre world. William Boyd has explored the concept of altered identities in other books but it is fully fleshed out in this tale. The story moves along at a great pace - with each chapter bringing fresh developments in the plot. It contains so much: - Psychopathic murders - hit men, contracts involving the security forces - Financial intrigue, double dealing, insider trading, fraud - Boardroom coupes - An insight into drug testing and vast financial rewards certain individuals achieve - Love and relationships I thoroughly enjoyed this book - but was left with a profound sense of unease - speculating as to whether there really is an alternative society living in parallel to our own, and how close we all are to joining it.