Black Rabbit

by Angus Gaunt

Pompous, pampered Maurice thinks he has his life sorted out. But when he meets a stranger at the funeral of his maiden aunt, he is taken on a bizarre journey of self-discovery that sends him to places people like him are not supposed to go.
This is a novel about a man who finds a kind of redemption as he absents himself from society.

Genres: Australia

187 pages, Paperback

First published December 25, 2013

Reviews

[Theresa Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not much is given away in the blurb for this novel so reading it was a revelatory experience, and one I enjoyed immensely. The story opens at a funeral for an elderly aunt where Maurice and his sisters are attending what they have obligatorily organised. As they get into the family funeral car, a stranger is sitting in there and they have no idea how he is connected to their aunt, nor is the stranger at all forthcoming with the details.

This opening is at once intriguing, but it’s the writing style of Angus Gaunt that really drew me in. He has such a command over his words and the way he arranges them is exact, giving and taking on a need to know basis. It’s such a sought after skill, that ability to give enough to the reader so they feel assured they know what’s happening, but holding back, allowing the reader the opportunity to see for themselves without having to have everything laid out and explained for them. It goes beyond ambiguous endings and is more about crediting the reader with intelligence. I liked that about his writing, very much.

This novel is darkly funny, the kind of humour I like best: sarcastic, satirical, clever. It walks a fine line that occasionally puts a toe into the preposterous, particularly as the ‘stranger’ ingratiates himself more and more into Maurice’s life. Maurice himself is on a downward spiral, things are going bad for him, both personally and professionally. It was beguiling to witness the trajectory of Maurice’s fall, and moreover, the path to his…let’s just call it a redemption. Nothing within this novel is as you would expect, which just makes it all the more delightfully sinister. I’d love to see this one adapted into a film, I think it would be brilliant.


Thanks is extended to Sappho Books for providing me with a copy of Black Rabbit for review.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was good fun to read this satirical romp by Angus Gaunt. Black Rabbit is the story of a self-made man whose life unravels, and in the process he earns a kind of redemption.

The story begins at Aunt Patricia's funeral, where her nieces and nephew Maurice are, not without relief, performing the last of their duties towards someone who meant very little to them. They had paid dutiful visits to her and hosted her at dutiful lunches, dutifully waiting for her to die so that they could finally collect on their inheritance, i.e. their grandmother's house. (Their grandmother's Will had made provision for Aunt Patricia to live there for the rest of her life.)

However, there at the funeral, and in the chief mourner's car no less, is a strange and unprepossessing man that none of them know. He turns out to be Sandford, and he claims to be a friend of Aunt Patricia's, who, they thought, had no friends. Sandford has an odd air of entitlement which deflects questions and leads people to do what he wants, even when it's not at all reasonable. Maurice, who works in the finance industry and has all that goes with it including trophy wife and child, has a sense of entitlement too. But it's his idle curiosity about Sandford that leads — fatally — to driving this stranger home, having a cup of awful coffee in his depressing flat, and making the acquaintance of Sandford's rabbit.

It is this rabbit which leads on to Maurice's entanglement in a bizarre state of affairs.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2020/07/12/b...