There's some exquisite writing here. I envy Evie Wyld's clean, unvarnished style. Beautifully composed, with startling, vivid imagery in so many places. This book has bold ambitions, which I really liked it for. Parallel stories, separated by forty years, of a father and son - the father being younger than the son for much of the narrative. Each of the journeys is quite compelling, although Leon, the father's, story initially held me more. I really enjoyed the sections about his childhood in the cake shop when his own father left to go to the Korean war. And then when Leon, in turn, leaves the shop, conscripted to fight in Vietnam, there's a lovely symmetry to the experiences. Leon's son, Frank's, strand has more of a slow boil to it, although there are some nicely planted clues of what is ahead for him. His encounter with a shark is wonderfully portentous. Each strand reaches a climactic sequence that rewards the parallel structuring - but I'm not sure if the ending gave me everything that I had hoped for. I wouldn't have minded more of a big red bow to nicely tie everything up. There are deliberate loose ends and I sort of wish there weren't, really. However, that doesn't wreck an impressive debut. Very much looking forward to what Evie Wyld writes next.