The Night Always Comes

 The Night Always Comes

Reviewed By  Ian Banks       September 25, 2021

 

Author  Willy Vlautin

Distributor:      Allen & Unwin
ISBN:                 9780571361915
Publisher:         Faber
Release Date:   July 2021  

   Website:   https://www.allenandunwin.com

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To everyone there comes a time when eventually choices have to be made, choices to move on or remain. Willy Vlautin has in The Night Always Comes captures that pivotal moment in time when a decision has to be made to move on, to follow the dream to remain in the mind numbing world of poverty, distress and hopelessness.

His protagonist Lynette has done it tough. A failed marriage, an abortion, life with her alcoholic mother and the main career for her severely handicapped brother Kenny, has worked hard for a better lifestyle, for not just herself, but her mother and brother. The house they rent is old, in terrible repair and able to be purchased for a reasonable sum of money.

She makes the decision that no matter what she will save up for the deposit and purchase the property, a decision which looks promising until her mother decides to use some of the hard earned deposit to purchase a car; second hand to be sure, but money that was set aside for the house.

Two low paid jobs, the occasional night as a call girl to several regulars who pay well, added to the stress of part time study see Lynette at breaking point, her dream so close and yet almost destroyed by her mother’s complete self-absorption. She sets out over the course of two nights to call in all the debt she is owed, but finds this far more challenging and dangerous than she ever imagined.

Come the morning little has changed and all it takes is the realization that she is the one to move on, no one else.

Very real, the characters come to life on the page; they could be you or someone you know facing some of life’s most difficult choices which make the essence of the storyline vibrant, challenging, confrontational and yet full of hope.

Following her dream cost Lynette dearly in the end, but was it all worth it; only you and she will ever know.

Fiction