Sometimes when reading a story a reader can detect the direction a story is going in and how it will finish. But not with this tale. The author is known for writing stories with bizarre plots and flights of fancy. Children born with an aging disease and abandoned by their parents at birth are taken in by an institution. There to be looked after until they are ready to go out into the world. But what are they been made ready for? A. is one such child. And it’s through his thoughts that we find out what else is going on. By far the nastiest but also, thought provoking story on my list.
“Why, of all people in the world, did A. hate more than anyone else the man who had helped him the most? Why did A. wish that bad things would happen to the person who had taken him under his wing after his parents had abandoned him and who had devoted his life to helping him and others who suffered the same fate? The answer was easy: If there’s one thing in the world more annoying than being dependent on someone, it’s when that someone constantly reminds you that you are dependent on him. And Goodman was exactly that sort of person: insulting, controlling, patronising. Every word he said, every gesture he made, carried the clear message – your fate is in my hands, and without me, you all would have died a long time ago.”
Published in Fly Already, Granta, 2019
A Personal Anthology 