A book about bullfighting is an ambitious undertaking, knowing how it is a tradition at the heart of Spain’s culture. Passion, ceremony and performance are all wound up together in what is essentially organised animal cruelty and Garai, in this novel, attempts to tackle this rather conflicting set of issues through a vast array of characters who proffer, from their occupations and backgrounds, the vast plethora of views and circumstances that surround la corrida.
The story is really centred around three main characters. Firstly, Ignacio, a multi-talented man who we first meet as a flamenco dancer but who is also studying to be a vet whilst harbouring ambitions to be a matador. He loves Nuria who is his sister but not by blood or relation; Ignacio was brought up by Nuria’s parents and so, they have grown side by side. However, as time passes, there is the danger of them growing apart, their views on bullfighting becoming more and more disparate, causing their relationship to fracture. Nuria becomes more involved in trying to change the culture, it becoming the passion she follows rather than love. And then, rather unusually, there is Victor, a bull as our third character.
Yes, a bull. And actually, I found the passages where we are inside Victor’s head (or Mors as he’s also known in the book) the most interesting and stimulating in the novel. Garai, by providing us with the perspective of the bull, offers an extra layer to the story, creating sympathy and awareness of a creature instead of a construct merely used in a fight for entertainment. Victor is intelligent and sensitive. Garai shows this through Victor’s thought processes and his interactions with other animals and humans and this unusual approach works really well, over and above other aspects.
I liked this book and especially the debate that it prompts but at times, I found it confusing. It took a while for me to get all the characters clear in my head and there were parts where I had to reread paragraphs to be sure of their meaning. I also felt like there was a lot of telling – instead of being in the scenes, they were described more generally and lacked intensity despite the action that they presented and whilst I enjoyed the story and where it went, it was a trickier read than others by Garai.
All that said, it is still worth checking out.
Scuffed Granny 