Review of NIGHT BOAT TO TANGIER by Kevin Barry

3.5 Stars

I came across this title when it appeared on the longlist for the Booker Prize.  It bears much resemblance to Waiting for Godot, the play by Samuel Beckett; in fact, as I read Night Boat to Tangier, I kept thinking it should be a play or at least a novel to be read aloud.

Maurice Hearne and Charlie Redmond are two “fading Irish gangsters.”  One limps and the other is missing an eye.  They are in the ferry terminal in Algeciras, Spain, where they hope to see Dilly, Maurice’s estranged daughter.  Maurice hasn’t seen the 23-year-old Dilly for three years, but he and his friend have heard that she might be passing through the terminal on her way to or returning from Morocco sometime on that day, October 23, 2018. 

During their vigil, they flashback to their early lives when they were partners in crime, fierce friends, and equally fierce rivals:  “From beneath the stones of the Algeciras dockside the humid air of reminiscence rises – it is one of the places of the earth designed for a good wallow.”  There is considerable focus on Maurice’s stormy relationship with Cynthia, Dilly’s mother.

Though the men are drug smugglers, this is not an action novel.  It is very much a novel of character.  Both men are flawed; we learn of their propensity for  violence, for example, in their intimidation of a traveller whom they think might know something about Dilly’s whereabouts.  They have spent virtually their entire lives in criminal activities, mostly smuggling and selling drugs.  In their personal lives, they have been disloyal and neglectful.  Both men emerge as fully developed characters who are best described by Cynthia:  “They do fill a room, though, don’t they?”

Despite all their negative qualities, the reader will feel some compassion for them.  Flashbacks show their impoverished pasts and familial mental health issues.  Despite their flaws and abominable behaviour, they both love Dilly and she’s missing:  “Can you imagine what that feels like?”  Though there is much humour in their witty banter, “Their talk is a shield against feeling.”  Even drug smuggling is not as lucrative as it once was:  “But the money no longer is in dope.  The money now is in people.  The Mediterranean is a sea of slaves.  The years have turned and left Maurice and Charlie behind.”  That the author can arouse compassion for unreformed criminals attests to his skill.

The hours that the men spend in the ferry terminal seem like time spent in purgatory.  The terminal itself is suffused in a “dank light” and is described as an “awful place” with “a haunted air, a sinister feeling.”  Here Maurice and Charlie seem to realize the impact their crimes have had on their lives:  the regret, the constant threat of danger and violence, the punishing paranoia, the broken relationships.  “The men are elegiacal, woeful, heavy in the bones.  Also they are broke and grieving.” 

The lyrical style of the novel is noteworthy:  “The boats put out to sea.  The trawlers moved their rust in the winter sun.  The harbour was a skivvy to itself always” and “The interior patio was whispery with ferns.  He lay shivering in a room set off from it.  It was cold as the moon.  It was so cold he could feel his blood move” and “The long night lowered itself along the last notches of its spine – the lizard night.”

This novel will not be for everyone.  For me, the Hibernian slang sometimes presented difficulties, especially when I could not easily find definitions.  It will appeal to those who enjoy novels which focus on characterization and philosophical discussions and include staccato dialogue and a lyrical style.